The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-03-18
OLD TAVERNs AND NEW
Charms That belonged to Ancient
English Coffee Houses.

| satire on the medieval clergy, has been
adopted~by generations of topers for six
hundred years. Indeed as tavern life ex-
listed once upon time. there was al aays
| a good chance that a lover of it mi sht come
10 bad end-or a good one. it might
be-in public house, though not in the
sense intended by the Latin lyrist. Some
of these most famous duels in the da. S
| when single combat foutished arose olt
of tavern brawls. When. the wine vas in
the sword was out-as well as the wit But
in these degenerate days nei. r cold steel
nor hot punch is as much in request as
they both were in the age of chiyalry,
which if we are to accept Bafke's theory,
lasted down to the French revolution.
1t was practically brought 90 an end
through the multiplication OF clubs. which
have had a good deal TO do with the de
cline of heavy drinking by creating a taste
for more refined surroundings than the
hest of taverns ever pretended TO AFFORD.
and by providing ways Of spending the
evening without sitting for hours in Il
stufy little box. Bus though we may HAYS
no wish TO restore the old system it has
its interesting side-the charm, that is.
arising from its close connection with so
many distinguished men of letters. and
from its representing phase of social life
in which men of all ranks and classes
authors, actors. soldiers, peers, lawyers,
parsons-met together upon common
ground. without any of the exclusiveness
which in some respects distinguishes con-
temporary manners. Grub Street and st.
James Street. if they did not exactly kiss
each other occasionally, we should I'M
agine. lay down together, and the humor
Gus or tragic situations. the strong con-
trasts and vivid colors. TO which this curl
Gus medley gave birth. imparts even TO the
second-rate essayists and dramatists Of the
period an interest which their literary
merit alone would scarcely have securdG
for them. It is often said that conversation
is a lost art-with what truth We will not
undertake to decide-but though it is by
no means dependent on tavern society for
it's cultivation. both the tavern and tie
coffee house obviously did much TO Ell,
courage it. The two were not always iden-
tical though in time they became so. Some
coffee houses were tayerns and some tsv-
ems were coffee houses. but down to the
end of the last century a distinction was
kept up between them. with which, how
ever. we have long ceased to be familiar.
The coffee house was a morning lounge.
Men went there really to drink coffee and
to discuss literature, society, politi or
business over their tobacco. 1t was here
that friends met one another to make up
their party for dinner for which they ad
journed to the tavern. and sometimes came
back again afterward. Addison and his
party, however. when once they had sat
down at Buttons. generally remained there
for the rest of the evening The system
lasted long after Addisons time. The COZ
fee house. with its general convers stion,
as described in the Spectator was still
to be found in Cumber!and's day, and to-
ward the end of George lis reign the Co
vent Garden coffee house prided thems Ives
on keeping UP the Augustan traditions.
Notwithstanding to Colman-they were
but very degenerate representatives of
their classic predecessors. But the tavern
and tavern life still hourisbed in undated
vigor down to within living memory. The
Bedford, the Rose, the Grecian. Dicks, the
Cock. the Mitre, and the Cheshire Cheese
are all to be met with in the literature Of
the eighteenth century and the first half
of the nineteenth. The customers who
supported them came mostly from a class
the members OF which now dine regu arly
at West Fad clubs, but who then had NO
where but Covent Garden or Fleet Street
tavern to take their meals. johnson, o,
course, is the great luminary who sheds
lustre on the tavern dinner.
When We think of this, as II Was more
than a century ago. we naturally think of
him. Could Johnson and Cowper. in Cow
pers early days, have been brought to-
gether at the Mitre, the talk would have
been worth listening to. Cowper. who had
chambers in the Temple from 1852 to 176S.
used; Dick s, and it is no great stretch of
imagination to suppose that he was often
Joined there at dinner by Colman, Bonnell,
Thornton. Lloyd. and even. perhaps, by
Lloyd's friend, Churchill. Dicks, now ex-
tnct, continued to be the resort of Tenn
plars and men of letters down to thirty
years ago. and. perhaps, the genuine old
tavern life OF London. as known TO John
son. Fielding. and their contemporaries,
was last seen there. There are capital
chop houses and restaurants still to be
found in London, some bearing old and
honored names. but none of them quite
corresponding to the tavern when it
stood in place of the club and men like
Tenuyson and Thackeray dined. drank and
spent the evening there. That particular
form of conyiviality is now extinct, so far
as concerns the class OF men in question.
There are plenty of literary and other
clubs which still meet in taverns. but they
have their own rooms and only meet at in
tervals. To the man in chambers, who
had to dine at a tavern every day when he
was not asked out, the system presents
itself in quite different light. The coffee
room became a kind of home to him, and
the walters were like his own servants.
At most of these houses in their prosper
Gus days the cookery was fairly good.
They did not offer you the kind OF dinner
which is now set before you at the fash
ionable West End restaurant-that was
not their way. But what you did get was
of the best. and at almost all of them was
good port wine in the cellar if you could
persuade the landlord to bring it out.
Such was the old life. Men now middle
aged Just witnessed its departing fringe.
1t had a certain joyiality and sociability,
the loss of which was, perhaps. not too
high a price to pay for the more orderly
and temperate mode Of life which has sue.
ceeded it. Bur what must chiefly have rec
commended the old tavern to its habitues
was the complete independence and free
dom which secured them. Even in the
most easy going West End clubs man
cannot do exactly as he likes. Johnson,
of course could compare only a tavern and
a private house. But in a modified degree
his dictum holds good of a tavern and a
club too No man, he says. unless gifted
with an unusual share of impudence. can
use another mans house as his own. Nor
can he use his club with the same degree
of freedom. He is surrounded by certain
invisible and unwritten conventional limi-
tations. which he cannot transgress with
out making himself disagreeably conspic-
uous. In tavern he could do just as he
liked; sit in a box by himself if he chose.
smoking and drinking until o'clock in
the morning or till the house shut up. with
out waiter even looking at him, except
when he renewed his liquor. Parties CT
three or four could DO just the same and
often did We are far from saying that
this was desirable practice or calculated
TO keep a mans body in the condition pre-
scribed by the catechism We give il only