Coffee-houses. (continued 2)

It is worthy of remark that Swift was accustomed to speak disparagingly of Will's, as in his Rhapsody on Poetry:—

Swift thought little of the frequenters of Will's: he used to say, "the worst conversation he ever heard in his life was at Will's Coffee-house, where the wits (as they were called) used formerly to assemble; that is to say, five or six men, who had writ plays or at least prologues, or had a share in a miscellany, came thither, and entertained one another with their trifling composures, in so important an air as if they had been the noblest efforts of human nature, or that the fate of kingdoms depended on them."

In the first number of the Tatler, Poetry is promised under the article of Will's Coffee-house. The place, however, changed after Dryden's time: "you used to see songs, epigrams, and satires in the hands of every man you met; you have now only a pack of cards; and instead of the cavils about the turn of the expression, the elegance of the style, and the like, the learned now dispute only about the truth of the game." "In old times, we used to sit upon a play here, after it was acted, but now the entertainment's turned another way."

The Spectator is sometimes seen "thrusting his head into a round of politicians at Will's, and listening with great attention to the narratives that are made in these little circular audiences." Then, we have as an instance of no one member of human society but that would have some little pretension for some degree in it, "like him who came to Will's Coffee-house upon the merit of having writ a posie of a ring." And, "Robin, the porter who waits at Will's, is the best man in town for carrying a billet: the fellow has a thin body, swift step, demure looks, sufficient sense, and knows the town."[15]

After Dryden's death in 1701, Will's continued for about ten years to be still the Wits' Coffee-house, as we see by Ned Ward's account, and by that in the Journey through England in 1722.

Pope entered with keen relish into society, and courted the correspondence of the town wits and coffee-house critics. Among his early friends was Mr. Henry Cromwell, one of the cousinry of the Protector's family: he was a bachelor, and spent most of his time in London; he had some pretensions to scholarship and literature, having translated several of Ovid's Elegies, for Tonson's Miscellany. With Wycherley, Gay, Dennis, the popular actors and actresses of the day, and with all the frequenters of Will's, Cromwell was familiar. He had done more than take a pinch out of Dryden's snuff-box, which was a point of high ambition and honour at Will's; he had quarrelled with him about a frail poetess, Mrs. Elizabeth Thomas, whom Dryden had christened Corinna, and who was also known as Sappho. Gay characterized this literary and eccentric beau as

it being his custom to carry his hat in his hand when walking with ladies. What with ladies and literature, rehearsals and reviews, and critical attention to the quality of his coffee and Brazil snuff, Henry Cromwell's time was fully occupied in town. Cromwell was a dangerous acquaintance for Pope at the age of sixteen or seventeen, but he was a very agreeable one. Most of Pope's letters to his friend are addressed to him at the Blue Ball, in Great Wild-street, near Drury-lane; and others to "Widow Hambledon's Coffee-house at the end of Princes-street, near Drury-lane, London." Cromwell made one visit to Binfield; on his return to London, Pope wrote to him, "referring to the ladies in particular," and to his favourite coffee:

Even at this early period Pope seems to have relied for relief from headache to the steam of coffee, which he inhaled for this purpose throughout the whole of his life.[16]

The Taverns and Coffee-houses supplied the place of the Clubs we have since seen established. Although no exclusive subscription belonged to any of these, we find by the account which Colley Cibber gives of his first visit to Will's, in Covent Garden, that it required an introduction to this Society not to be considered as an impertinent intruder. There the veteran Dryden had long presided over all the acknowledged wits and poets of the day, and those who had the pretension to be reckoned among them. The politicians assembled at the St. James's Coffee-house, from whence all the articles of political news in the first Tatlers are dated. The learned frequented the Grecian Coffee-house in Devereux-court. Locket's, in Gerard-street, Soho, and Pontac's, were the fashionable taverns where the young and gay met to dine: and White's and other chocolate houses seem to have been the resort of the same company in the morning. Three o'clock, or at latest four, was the dining-hour of the most fashionable persons in London, for in the country no such late hours had been adopted. In London, therefore, soon after six, the men began to assemble at the coffee-house they frequented if they were not setting in for hard drinking, which seems to have been much less indulged in private houses than in taverns. The ladies made visits to one another, which it must be owned was a much less waste of time when considered as an amusement for the evening, than now, as being a morning occupation.

BUTTON'S COFFEE-HOUSE.

Will's was the great resort for the wits of Dryden's time, after whose death it was transferred to Button's. Pope describes the houses as "opposite each other, in Russell-street, Covent Garden," where Addison established Daniel Button, in a new house, about 1712; and his fame, after the production of Cato, drew many of the Whigs thither. Button had been servant to the Countess of Warwick. The house is more correctly described as "over against Tom's, near the middle of the south side of the street."

Addison was the great patron of Button's; but it is said that when he suffered any vexation from his Countess, he withdrew the company from Button's house. His chief companions, before he married Lady Warwick, were Steele, Budgell, Philips, Carey, Davenant, and Colonel Brett. He used to breakfast with one or other of them in St. James's-place, dine at taverns with them, then to Button's, and then to some tavern again, for supper in the evening; and this was the usual round of his life, as Pope tells us, in Spence's Anecdotes; where Pope also says: "Addison usually studied all the morning, then met his party at Button's, dined there, and stayed five or six hours; and sometimes far into the night. I was of the company for about a year, but found it too much for me: it hurt my health, and so I quitted it." Again: "There had been a coldness between me and Mr. Addison for some time, and we had not been in company together for a good while anywhere but at Button's Coffee-house, where I used to see him almost every day."

Here Pope is reported to have said of Patrick, the lexicographer, that "a dictionary-maker might know the meaning of one word, but not of two put together."

Button's was the receiving-house for contributions to The Guardian, for which purpose was put up a lion's head letter-box, in imitation of the celebrated lion at Venice, as humorously announced. Thus:—

"N.B.—Mr. Ironside has, within five weeks last past, muzzled three lions, gorged five, and killed one. On Monday next the skin of the dead one will be hung up, in terrorem, at Button's Coffee-house, over against Tom's in Covent Garden."[17]

"Button's Coffee-house,—

"Mr. Ironside, I have observed that this day you make mention of Will's Coffee-house, as a place where people are too polite to hold a man in discourse by the button. Everybody knows your honour frequents this house, therefore they will take an advantage against me, and say if my company was as civil as that at Will's. You would say so. Therefore pray your honour do not be afraid of doing me justice, because people would think it may be a conceit below you on this occasion to name the name of your humble servant, Daniel Button.—The young poets are in the back room, and take their places as you directed."[18]

"I intend to publish once every week the roarings of the Lion, and hope to make him roar so loud as to be heard over all the British nation.

"I have, I know not how, been drawn into tattle of myself, more majorum, almost the length of a whole Guardian. I shall therefore fill up the remaining part of it with what still relates to my own person, and my correspondents. Now I would have them all know that on the 20th instant it is my intention to erect a Lion's Head, in imitation of those I have described in Venice, through which all the private commonwealth is said to pass. This head is to open a most wide and voracious mouth, which shall take in such letters and papers as are conveyed to me by my correspondents, it being my resolution to have a particular regard to all such matters as come to my hands through the mouth of the Lion. There will be under it a box, of which the key will be in my own custody, to receive such papers as are dropped into it. Whatever the Lion swallows I shall digest for the use of the publick. This head requires some time to finish, the workmen being resolved to give it several masterly touches, and to represent it as ravenous as possible. It will be set up in Button's Coffee-house, in Covent Garden, who is directed to shew the way to the Lion's Head, and to instruct any young author how to convey his works into the mouth of it with safety and secrecy."[19]

"I think myself obliged to acquaint the publick, that the Lion's Head, of which I advertised them about a fortnight ago, is now erected at Button's Coffee-house, in Russell-street, Covent Garden, where it opens its mouth at all hours for the reception of such intelligence as shall be thrown into it. It is reckoned an excellent piece of workmanship, and was designed by a great hand in imitation of the antique Egyptian lion, the face of it being compounded out of that of a lion and a wizard. The features are strong and well furrowed. The whiskers are admired by all that have seen them. It is planted on the western side of the Coffee-house, holding its paws under the chin, upon a box, which contains everything that he swallows. He is, indeed, a proper emblem of knowledge and action, being all head and paws."[20]

"Being obliged, at present, to attend a particular affair of my own, I do empower my printer to look into the arcana of the lion, and select out of them such as may be of publick utility; and Mr. Button is hereby authorized and commanded to give my said printer free ingress and egress to the lion, without any hindrance, lest, or molestation whatsoever, until such time as he shall receive orders to the contrary. And, for so doing, this shall be his warrant."[21]

"My Lion, whose jaws are at all times open to intelligence, informs me that there are a few enormous weapons still in being; but that they are to be met with only in gaming-houses and some of the obscure retreats of lovers, in and about Drury-lane and Covent Garden."[22]

This memorable Lion's Head was tolerably well carved: through the mouth the letters were dropped into a till at Button's; and beneath were inscribed these two lines from Martial:—

The head was designed by Hogarth, and is etched in Ireland's Illustrations. Lord Chesterfield is said to have once offered for the Head fifty guineas. From Button's it was removed to the Shakspeare's Head Tavern, under the Piazza, kept by a person named Tomkyns; and in 1751, was, for a short time, placed in the Bedford Coffee-house immediately adjoining the Shakspeare, and there employed as a letter-box by Dr. John Hill, for his Inspector. In 1769, Tomkyns was succeeded by his waiter, Campbell, as proprietor of the tavern and lion's head, and by him the latter was retained until Nov. 8, 1804, when it was purchased by Mr. Charles Richardson, of Richardson's Hotel, for £17. 10s., who also possessed the original sign of the Shakspeare's Head. After Mr. Richardson's death in 1827, the Lion's Head devolved to his son, of whom it was bought by the Duke of Bedford, and deposited at Woburn Abbey, where it still remains.

Pope was subjected to much annoyance and insult at Button's. Sir Samuel Garth wrote to Gay, that everybody was pleased with Pope's Translation, "but a few at Button's;" to which Gay adds, to Pope, "I am confirmed that at Button's your character is made very free with, as to morals, etc."

Cibber, in a letter to Pope, says:—"When you used to pass your hours at Button's, you were even there remarkable for your satirical itch of provocation; scarce was there a gentleman of any pretension to wit, whom your unguarded temper had not fallen upon in some biting epigram, among which you once caught a pastoral Tartar, whose resentment, that your punishment might be proportionate to the smart of your poetry, had stuck up a birchen rod in the room, to be ready whenever you might come within reach of it; and at this rate you writ and rallied and writ on, till you rhymed yourself quite out of the coffee-house." The "pastoral Tartar" was Ambrose Philips, who, says Johnson, "hung up a rod at Button's, with which he threatened to chastise Pope."

Pope, in a letter to Craggs, thus explains the affair:—"Mr. Philips did express himself with much indignation against me one evening at Button's Coffee-house, (as I was told,) saying that I was entered into a cabal with Dean Swift and others, to write against the Whig interest, and in particular to undermine his own reputation and that of his friends, Steele and Addison; but Mr. Philips never opened his lips to my face, on this or any like occasion, though I was almost every night in the same room with him, nor ever offered me any indecorum. Mr. Addison came to me a night or two after Philips had talked in this idle manner, and assured me of his disbelief of what had been said, of the friendship we should always maintain, and desired I would say nothing further of it. My Lord Halifax did me the honour to stir in this matter, by speaking to several people to obviate a false aspersion, which might have done me no small prejudice with one party. However, Philips did all he could secretly to continue the report with the Hanover Club, and kept in his hands the subscriptions paid for me to him, as secretary to that Club. The heads of it have since given him to understand, that they take it ill; but (upon the terms I ought to be with such a man,) I would not ask him for this money, but commissioned one of the players, his equals, to receive it. This is the whole matter; but as to the secret grounds of this malignity, they will make a very pleasant history when we meet."

Another account says that the rod was hung up at the bar of Button's, and that Pope avoided it by remaining at home—"his usual custom." Philips was known for his courage and superior dexterity with the sword: he afterwards became justice of the peace, and used to mention Pope, whenever he could get a man in authority to listen to him, as an enemy to the Government.

At Button's the leading company, particularly Addison and Steele, met in large flowing flaxen wigs. Sir Godfrey Kneller, too, was a frequenter.

The master died in 1731, when in the Daily Advertiser, Oct. 5, appeared the following:—"On Sunday morning, died, after three days' illness, Mr. Button, who formerly kept Button's Coffee-house, in Russell-street, Covent Garden; a very noted house for wits, being the place where the Lyon produced the famous Tatlers and Spectators, written by the late Mr. Secretary Addison and Sir Richard Steele, Knt., which works will transmit their names with honour to posterity." Mr. Cunningham found in the vestry-books of St. Paul's, Covent Garden: "1719, April 16. Received of Mr. Daniel Button, for two places in the pew No. 18, on the south side of the north Isle,—2l. 2s." J. T. Smith states that a few years after Button, the Coffee-house declined, and Button's name appeared in the books of St. Paul's, as receiving an allowance from the parish.

Button's continued in vogue until Addison's death and Steele's retirement into Wales, after which the house was deserted; the coffee-drinkers went to the Bedford Coffee-house, the dinner-parties to the Shakspeare.

Among other wits who frequented Button's were Swift, Arbuthnot, Savage, Budgell, Martin Folkes, and Drs. Garth and Armstrong. In 1720, Hogarth mentions "four drawings in Indian ink" of the characters at Button's Coffee-house. In these were sketches of Arbuthnot, Addison, Pope, (as it is conjectured,) and a certain Count Viviani, identified years afterwards by Horace Walpole, when the drawings came under his notice. They subsequently came into Ireland's possession.[23]

Jemmy Maclaine, or M'Clean, the fashionable highwayman, was a frequent visitor at Button's. Mr. John Taylor, of the Sun newspaper, describes Maclaine as a tall, showy, good-looking man. A Mr. Donaldson told Taylor that, observing Maclaine paid particular attention to the bar-maid of the Coffee-house, the daughter of the landlord, he gave a hint to the father of Maclaine's dubious character. The father cautioned the daughter against the highwayman's addresses, and imprudently told her by whose advice he put her on her guard; she as imprudently told Maclaine. The next time Donaldson visited the Coffee-room, and was sitting in one of the boxes, Maclaine entered, and in a loud tone said, "Mr. Donaldson, I wish to spake to you in a private room." Mr. D. being unarmed, and naturally afraid of being alone with such a man, said, in answer, that as nothing could pass between them that he did not wish the whole world to know, he begged leave to decline the invitation. "Very well," said Maclaine, as he left the room, "we shall meet again." A day or two after, as Mr. Donaldson was walking near Richmond, in the evening, he saw Maclaine on horseback; but, fortunately, at that moment, a gentleman's carriage appeared in view, when Maclaine immediately turned his horse towards the carriage, and Donaldson hurried into the protection of Richmond as fast as he could. But for the appearance of the carriage, which presented better prey, it is probable that Maclaine would have shot Mr. Donaldson immediately.

Maclaine's father was an Irish Dean; his brother was a Calvinist minister in great esteem at the Hague. Maclaine himself has been a grocer in Welbeck-street, but losing a wife that he loved extremely, and by whom he had one little girl, he quitted his business with two hundred pounds in his pocket, which he soon spent, and then took to the road with only one companion, Plunket, a journeyman apothecary.

Maclaine was taken in the autumn of 1750, by selling a laced waistcoat to a pawnbroker in Monmouth-street, who happened to carry it to the very man who had just sold the lace. Maclaine impeached his companion, Plunket, but he was not taken. The former got into verse: Gray, in his Long Story, sings:

Button's subsequently became a private house, and here Mrs. Inchbald lodged, probably, after the death of her sister, for whose support she practised such noble and generous self-denial. Mrs. Inchbald's income was now 172l. a year, and we are told that she now went to reside in a boarding-house, where she enjoyed more of the comforts of life. Phillips, the publisher, offered her a thousand pounds for her Memoirs, which she declined. She died in a boarding-house at Kensington, on the 1st of August, 1821; leaving about 6000l. judiciously divided amongst her relatives. Her simple and parsimonious habits were very strange. "Last Thursday," she writes, "I finished scouring my bedroom, while a coach with a coronet and two footmen waited at my door to take me an airing."

"One of the most agreeable memories connected with Button's," says Leigh Hunt, "is that of Garth, a man whom, for the sprightliness and generosity of his nature, it is a pleasure to name. He was one of the most amiable and intelligent of a most amiable and intelligent class of men—the physicians."

DEAN SWIFT AT BUTTON'S.

It was just after Queen Anne's accession that Swift made acquaintance with the leaders of the wits at Button's. Ambrose Philips refers to him as the strange clergyman whom the frequenters of the Coffee-house had observed for some days. He knew no one, no one knew him. He would lay his hat down on a table, and walk up and down at a brisk pace for half an hour without speaking to any one, or seeming to pay attention to anything that was going forward. Then he would snatch up his hat, pay his money at the bar, and walk off, without having opened his lips. The frequenters of the room had christened him "the mad parson." One evening, as Mr. Addison and the rest were observing him, they saw him cast his eyes several times upon a gentleman in boots, who seemed to be just come out of the country. At last, Swift advanced towards this bucolic gentleman, as if intending to address him. They were all eager to hear what the dumb parson had to say, and immediately quitted their seats to get near him. Swift went up to the country gentleman, and in a very abrupt manner, without any previous salute, asked him, "Pray, Sir, do you know any good weather in the world?" After staring a little at the singularity of Swift's manner and the oddity of the question, the gentleman answered, "Yes, Sir, I thank God I remember a great deal of good weather in my time."—"That is more," replied Swift, "than I can say; I never remember any weather that was not too hot or too cold, too wet or too dry; but, however God Almighty contrives it, at the end of the year 'tis all very well."

Sir Walter Scott gives, upon the authority of Dr. Wall, of Worcester, who had it from Dr. Arbuthnot himself, the following anecdote—less coarse than the version generally told. Swift was seated by the fire at Button's: there was sand on the floor of the coffee-room, and Arbuthnot, with a design to play upon this original figure, offered him a letter, which he had been just addressing, saying at the same time, "There—sand that."—"I have got no sand," answered Swift, "but I can help you to a little gravel." This he said so significantly, that Arbuthnot hastily snatched back his letter, to save it from the fate of the capital of Lilliput.

TOM'S COFFEE-HOUSE,

In Birchin-lane, Cornhill, though in the main a mercantile resort, acquired some celebrity from its having been frequented by Garrick, who, to keep up an interest in the City, appeared here about twice in a winter at 'Change time, when it was the rendezvous of young merchants. Hawkins says: "After all that has been said of Mr. Garrick, envy must own that he owed his celebrity to his merit; and yet, of that himself seemed so diffident, that he practised sundry little but innocent arts, to insure the favour of the public:" yet, he did more. When a rising actor complained to Mrs. Garrick that the newspapers abused him, the widow replied, "You should write your own criticisms; David always did."

One evening, Murphy was at Tom's, when Colley Cibber was playing at whist, with an old general for his partner. As the cards were dealt to him, he took up every one in turn, and expressed his disappointment at each indifferent one. In the progress of the game he did not follow suit, and his partner said, "What! have you not a spade, Mr. Cibber?" The latter, looking at his cards, answered, "Oh yes, a thousand;" which drew a very peevish comment from the general. On which, Cibber, who was shockingly addicted to swearing, replied, "Don't be angry, for —— I can play ten times worse if I like."

THE BEDFORD COFFEE-HOUSE, IN COVENT GARDEN.

This celebrated resort once attracted so much attention as to have published, "Memoirs of the Bedford Coffee-house," two editions, 1751 and 1763. It stood "under the Piazza, in Covent Garden," in the north-west corner, near the entrance to the theatre, and has long ceased to exist.

In The Connoisseur, No. 1, 1754, we are assured that "this Coffee-house is every night crowded with men of parts. Almost every one you meet is a polite scholar and a wit. Jokes and bon-mots are echoed from box to box: every branch of literature is critically examined, and the merit of every production of the press, or performance of the theatres, weighed and determined."

And in the above-named Memoirs, we read that "this spot has been signalized for many years as the emporium of wit, the seat of criticism, and the standard of taste.—Names of those who frequented the house:—Foote, Mr. Fielding, Mr. Woodward, Mr. Leone, Mr. Murphy, Mopsy, Dr. Arne. Dr. Arne was the only man in a suit of velvet in the dog-days."

Stacie kept the Bedford when John and Henry Fielding, Hogarth, Churchill, Woodward, Lloyd, Dr. Goldsmith, and many others met there and held a gossiping shilling rubber club. Henry Fielding was a very merry fellow.

The Inspector appears to have given rise to this reign of the Bedford, when there was placed here the Lion from Button's, which proved so serviceable to Steele, and once more fixed the dominion of wit in Covent Garden.

The reign of wit and pleasantry did not, however, cease at the Bedford at the demise of the Inspector. A race of punsters next succeeded. A particular box was allotted to this occasion, out of the hearing of the lady at the bar, that the double entendres, which were sometimes very indelicate, might not offend her.

The Bedford was beset with scandalous nuisances, of which the following letter, from Arthur Murphy to Garrick, April 10, 1769, presents a pretty picture:

"Tiger Roach (who used to bully at the Bedford Coffee-house because his name was Roach) is set up by Wilkes's friends to burlesque Luttrel and his pretensions. I own I do not know a more ridiculous circumstance than to be a joint candidate with the Tiger. O'Brien used to take him off very pleasantly, and perhaps you may, from his representation, have some idea of this important wight. He used to sit with a half-starved look, a black patch upon his cheek, pale with the idea of murder, or with rank cowardice, a quivering lip, and a downcast eye. In that manner he used to sit at a table all alone, and his soliloquy, interrupted now and then with faint attempts to throw off a little saliva, was to the following effect:—'Hut! hut! a mercer's 'prentice with a bag-wig;—d—n my s—l, if I would not skiver a dozen of them like larks! Hut! hut! I don't understand such airs!—I'd cudgel him back, breast, and belly, for three skips of a louse!—How do you do, Pat! Hut! hut! God's blood—Larry, I'm glad to see you;—'Prentices! a fine thing indeed!—Hut! hut! How do you, Dominick!—D—n my s—l, what's here to do!' These were the meditations of this agreeable youth. From one of these reveries he started up one night, when I was there, called a Mr. Bagnell out of the room, and most heroically stabbed him in the dark, the other having no weapon to defend himself with. In this career the Tiger persisted, till at length a Mr. Lennard brandished a whip over his head, and stood in a menacing attitude, commanding him to ask pardon directly. The Tiger shrank from the danger, and with a faint voice pronounced—'Hut! what signifies it between you and me? Well! well! I ask your pardon,' 'Speak louder, sir; I don't hear a word you say.' And indeed he was so very tall, that it seemed as if the sound, sent feebly from below, could not ascend to such a height. This is the hero who is to figure at Brentford."

Foote's favourite Coffee-house was the Bedford. He was also a constant frequenter of Tom's, and took a lead in the Club held there, and already described.[24]

Dr. Barrowby, the well-known newsmonger of the Bedford, and the satirical critic of the day, has left this whole-length sketch of Foote:—"One evening (he says), he saw a young man extravagantly dressed out in a frock suit of green and silver lace, bag-wig, sword, bouquet, and point-ruffles, enter the room (at the Bedford), and immediately join the critical circle at the upper end. Nobody recognised him; but such was the ease of his bearing, and the point of humour and remark with which he at once took up the conversation, that his presence seemed to disconcert no one, and a sort of pleased buzz of 'who is he?' was still going round the room unanswered, when a handsome carriage stopped at the door; he rose, and quitted the room, and the servants announced that his name was Foote, that he was a young gentleman of family and fortune, a student of the Inner Temple, and that the carriage had called for him on its way to the assembly of a lady of fashion." Dr. Barrowby once turned the laugh against Foote at the Bedford, when he was ostentatiously showing his gold repeater, with the remark—"Why, my watch does not go!" "It soon will go," quietly remarked the Doctor. Young Collins, the poet, who came to town in 1744 to seek his fortune, made his way to the Bedford, where Foote was supreme among the wits and critics. Like Foote, Collins was fond of fine clothes, and walked about with a feather in his hat, very unlike a young man who had not a single guinea he could call his own. A letter of the time tells us that "Collins was an acceptable companion everywhere; and among the gentlemen who loved him for a genius, may be reckoned the Doctors Armstrong, Barrowby, Hill, Messrs. Quin, Garrick, and Foote, who frequently took his opinion upon their pieces before they were seen by the public. He was particularly noticed by the geniuses who frequented the Bedford and Slaughter's Coffee-houses."[25]

Ten years later (1754) we find Foote again supreme in his critical corner at the Bedford. The regular frequenters of the room strove to get admitted to his party at supper; and others got as nearly as they could to the table, as the only humour flowed from Foote's tongue. The Bedford was now in its highest repute.

Foote and Garrick often met at the Bedford, and many and sharp were their encounters. They were the two great rivals of the day. Foote usually attacked, and Garrick, who had many weak points, was mostly the sufferer. Garrick, in early life, had been in the wine trade, and had supplied the Bedford with wine; he was thus described by Foote as living in Durham-yard, with three quarts of vinegar in the cellar, calling himself a wine-merchant. How Foote must have abused the Bedford wine of this period!

One night, Foote came into the Bedford, where Garrick was seated, and there gave him an account of a most wonderful actor he had just seen. Garrick was on the tenters of suspense, and there Foote kept him a full hour. At last Foote, compassionating the suffering listener, brought the attack to a close by asking Garrick what he thought of Mr. Pitt's histrionic talents, when Garrick, glad of the release, declared that if Pitt had chosen the stage, he might have been the first actor upon it.

One night, Garrick and Foote were about to leave the Bedford together, when the latter, in paying the bill, dropped a guinea; and not finding it at once, said, "Where on earth can it be gone to?"—"Gone to the devil, I think," replied Garrick, who had assisted in the search.—"Well said, David!" was Foote's reply; "let you alone for making a guinea go further than anybody else."

Churchill's quarrel with Hogarth began at the shilling rubber club, in the parlour of the Bedford; when Hogarth used some very insulting language towards Churchill, who resented it in the Epistle. This quarrel showed more venom than wit:—"Never," says Walpole, "did two angry men of their abilities throw mud with less dexterity."

Woodward, the comedian, mostly lived at the Bedford, was intimate with Stacie, the landlord, and gave him his (W.'s) portrait, with a mask in his hand, one of the early pictures by Sir Joshua Reynolds. Stacie played an excellent game at whist. One morning, about two o'clock, one of his waiters awoke him to tell him that a nobleman had knocked him up, and had desired him to call his master to play a rubber with him for one hundred guineas. Stacie got up, dressed himself, won the money, and was in bed and asleep, all within an hour.

Of two houses in the Piazza, built for Francis, Earl of Bedford, we obtain some minute information from the lease granted in 1634, to Sir Edmund Verney, Knight Marshal to King Charles I.; these two houses being just then erected as part of the Piazza. There are also included in the lease the "yardes, stables, coach-houses, and gardens now layd, or hereafter to be layd, to the said messuages," which description of the premises seems to identify them as the two houses at the southern end of the Piazza, adjoining to Great Russell-street, and now occupied as the Bedford Coffee-house and Hotel. They are either the same premises, or they immediately adjoin the premises, occupied a century later as the Bedford Coffee-house. (Mr. John Bruce, Archæologia, XXXV. 195.) The lease contains a minute specification of the landlord's fittings and customary accommodations of what were then some of the most fashionable residences in the metropolis. In the attached schedule is the use of the wainscot, enumerating separately every piece of wainscot on the premises. The tenant is bound to keep in repair the "Portico Walke" underneath the premises; he is at all times to have "ingresse, egresse and regresse" through the Portico Walk; and he may "expel, put, or drive away out of the said walke any youth or other person whatsoever which shall eyther play or be in the said Portico Walke in offence or disturbance to the said Sir Edmund Verney."

The inventory of the fixtures is curious. It enumerates every apartment, from the beer-cellar, and the strong beer-cellar, the scullery, the pantry, and the buttery, to the dining and withdrawing-rooms. Most of the rooms had casement windows, but the dining-room next Russell-street, and other principal apartments, had "shutting windowes." The principal rooms were also "double creasted round for hangings," and were wainscoted round the chimney-pieces, and doors and windows. In one case, a study, "south towards Russell-street, the whole room was wainscoted, and the hall in part." Most of the windows had "soil-boards" attached; the room-doors had generally "stock locks," in some places "spring plate locks" and spring bolts. There is not mentioned anything approaching to a fire-grate in any of the rooms, except perhaps in the kitchen, where occurs "a travers barre for the chimney."

MACKLIN'S COFFEE-HOUSE ORATORY.

After Macklin had retired from the stage, in 1754, he opened that portion of the Piazza-houses, in Covent Garden, which is now the Tavistock Hotel. Here he fitted up a large coffee-room, a theatre for oratory, and other apartments. To a three-shilling ordinary he added a shilling lecture, or "School of Oratory and Criticism;" he presided at the dinner-table, and carved for the company; after which he played a sort of "Oracle of Eloquence." Fielding has happily sketched him in his Voyage to Lisbon: "Unfortunately for the fishmongers of London, the Dory only resides in the Devonshire seas; for could any of this company only convey one to the Temple of luxury under the Piazza, where Macklin, the high priest, daily serves up his rich offerings, great would be the reward of that fishmonger."

In the Lecture, Macklin undertook to make each of his audience an orator, by teaching him how to speak. He invited hints and discussions; the novelty of the scheme attracted the curiosity of numbers; and this curiosity he still further excited by a very uncommon controversy, which now subsisted either in imagination or reality, between him and Foote, who abused one another very openly—"Squire Sammy" having for his purpose engaged the Little Theatre in the Haymarket.

Besides this personal attack, various subjects were debated here in the manner of the Robin Hood Society, which filled the orator's pocket, and proved his rhetoric of some value.

Here is one of his combats with Foote. The subject was Duelling in Ireland, which Macklin had illustrated as far as the reign of Elizabeth. Foote cried "Order;" he had a question to put. "Well, Sir," said Macklin, "what have you to say upon this subject?" "I think, Sir," said Foote, "this matter might be settled in a few words. What o'clock is it, Sir?" Macklin could not possibly see what the clock had to do with a dissertation upon Duelling, but gruffly reported the hour to be half-past nine. "Very well," said Foote, "about this time of the night every gentleman in Ireland that can possibly afford it is in his third bottle of claret, and therefore in a fair way of getting drunk; and from drunkenness proceeds quarrelling, and from quarrelling, duelling, and so there's an end of the chapter." The company were much obliged to Foote for his interference, the hour being considered; though Macklin did not relish the abridgment.

The success of Foote's fun upon Macklin's Lectures, led him to establish a summer entertainment of his own at the Haymarket. He took up Macklin's notion of applying Greek Tragedy to modern subjects, and the squib was so successful that Foote cleared by it 500l., in five nights, while the great Piazza Coffee-room in Covent Garden was shut up, and Macklin in the Gazette as a bankrupt.

But when the great plan of Mr. Macklin proved abortive, when as he said in a former prologue, upon a nearly similar occasion—

when the town was sated with the seemingly-concocted quarrel between the two theatrical geniuses, Macklin locked up his doors, all animosity was laid aside, and they came and shook hands at the Bedford; the group resumed their appearance, and, with a new master, a new set of customers was seen.

TOM KING'S COFFEE-HOUSE.

This was one of the old night-houses of Covent Garden Market: it was a rude shed immediately beneath the portico of St. Paul's Church, and was one "well known to all gentlemen to whom beds are unknown." Fielding in one of his Prologues says:

It is in the background of Hogarth's print of Morning, where the prim maiden lady, walking to church, is soured with seeing two fuddled beaux from King's Coffee-house caressing two frail women. At the door there is a drunken row, in which swords and cudgels are the weapons.

Harwood's Alumni Etonenses, p. 293, in the account of the Boys elected from Eton to King's College, contains this entry: "A.D. 1713, Thomas King, born at West Ashton, in Wiltshire, went away scholar in apprehension that his fellowship would be denied him; and afterwards kept that Coffee-house in Covent Garden, which was called by his own name."

Moll King was landlady after Tom's death: she was witty, and her house was much frequented, though it was little better than a shed. "Noblemen and the first beaux," said Stacie, "after leaving Court, would go to her house in full dress, with swords and bags, and in rich brocaded silk coats, and walked and conversed with persons of every description. She would serve chimney-sweepers, gardeners, and the market-people in common with her lords of the highest rank. Mr. Apreece, a tall thin man in rich dress, was her constant customer. He was called Cadwallader by the frequenters of Moll's." It is not surprising that Moll was often fined for keeping a disorderly house. At length, she retired from business—and the pillory—to Hampstead, where she lived on her ill-earned gains, but paid for a pew in church, and was charitable at appointed seasons, and died in peace in 1747.

It was at that period that Mother Needham, Mother Douglass (alias, according to Foote's Minor, Mother Cole), and Moll King, the tavern-keepers and the gamblers, took possession of premises abdicated by people of fashion. Upon the south side of the market-sheds was the noted "Finish," kept by Mrs. Butler, open all night, the last of the Garden taverns, and only cleared away in 1829. This house was originally the Queen's Head. Shuter was pot-boy here. Here was a picture of the Hazard Club, at the Bedford: it was painted by Hogarth, and filled a panel of the Coffee-room.

Captain Laroon, an amateur painter of the time of Hogarth, who often witnessed the nocturnal revels at Moll King's, made a large and spirited drawing of the interior of her Coffee-house, which was at Strawberry Hill. It was bought for Walpole, by his printer, some seventy years since. There is also an engraving of the same room, in which is introduced a whole-length of Mr. Apreece, in a full court-dress: an impression of this plate is extremely rare.

Justice Welsh used to say that Captain Laroon, his friend Captain Montague, and their constant companion, Little Casey, the Link-boy, were the three most troublesome of all his Bow-street visitors. The portraits of these three heroes are introduced in Boitard's rare print of "the Covent Garden Morning Frolic." Laroon is brandishing an artichoke. C. Montague is seated, drunk, on the top of Bet Careless's sedan, which is preceded by Little Casey, as a link-boy.

Captain Laroon also painted a large folding-screen; the figures were full of broad humour, two representing a Quack Doctor and his Merry Andrew, before the gaping crowd.

Laroon was deputy-chairman, under Sir Robert Walpole, of a Club, consisting of six gentlemen only, who met, at stated times, in the drawing-room of Scott, the marine painter, in Henrietta-street, Covent Garden; and it was unanimously agreed by the members, that they should be attended by Scott's wife only, who was a remarkable witty woman. Laroon made a beautiful conversation drawing of the Club, which is highly prized by J. T. Smith.

PIAZZA COFFEE-HOUSE.

This establishment, at the north-eastern angle of Covent Garden Piazza, appears to have originated with Macklin's; for we read in an advertisement in the Public Advertiser, March, 5, 1756: "the Great Piazza Coffee-room, in Covent-Garden."

The Piazza was much frequented by Sheridan; and here is located the well-known anecdote told of his coolness during the burning of Drury-lane Theatre, in 1809. It is said that as he sat at the Piazza, during the fire, taking some refreshment, a friend of his having remarked on the philosophical calmness with which he bore his misfortune, Sheridan replied: "A man may surely be allowed to take a glass of wine by his own fireside."

Sheridan and John Kemble often dined together at the Piazza, to be handy to the theatre. During Kemble's management, Sheridan had occasion to make a complaint, which brought a "nervous" letter from Kemble, to which Sheridan's reply is amusing enough. Thus, he writes: "that the management of a theatre is a situation capable of becoming troublesome, is information which I do not want, and a discovery which I thought you had made long ago." Sheridan then treats Kemble's letter as "a nervous flight," not to be noticed seriously, adding his anxiety for the interest of the theatre, and alluding to Kemble's touchiness and reserve; and thus concludes:

"If there is anything amiss in your mind not arising from the troublesomeness of your situation, it is childish and unmanly not to disclose it. The frankness with which I have dealt towards you entitles me to expect that you should have done so.

"But I have no reason to believe this to be the case; and attributing your letter to a disorder which I know ought not to be indulged, I prescribe that thou shalt keep thine appointment at the Piazza Coffee-house, to-morrow at five, and, taking four bottles of claret instead of three, to which in sound health you might stint yourself, forget that you ever wrote the letter, as I shall that I ever received it.

"R. B. Sheridan."

The Piazza façade, and interior, were of Gothic design. The house has been taken down, and in its place was built the Floral Hall, after the Crystal Palace model.