Club Life of London Volume Ii Part 16

THE CROWN AND ANCHOR, STRAND.

This famous tavern extended from Arundel-street eastward to Milford-lane, in the rear of the south side of the Strand, and occupied the site of an older house with the same sign. Strype, in 1729, described it as "the Crown Tavern; a large and curious house, with good rooms and other conveniences fit for entertainments." Here was inst.i.tuted the Academy of Music in 1710; and here the Royal Society Club, who had previously met at the Mitre in Fleet-street, removed in 1780, and dined here for the first time on December 21, and here they continued until the tavern was converted into a club-house in 1847.

The second tavern was built in 1790. Its first landlord was Thomas Simpkin, a very corpulent man, who, in superintending the serving of a large dinner, leaned over a bal.u.s.trade, which broke, when he fell from a considerable height to the ground, and was killed. The sign appears to have been originally "The Crown," to which may have been added the Anchor, from its being the emblem of St. Clement's, opposite; or from the Lord High Admiral having once resided on the site. The tavern contained a ball-room, 84 feet by 35 feet 6 inches; in 1798, on the birthday of C. J. Fox, was given in this house, a banquet to 2000 persons, when the Duke of Norfolk presided. The large room was noted for political meetings in the stormy Tory and Radical times; and the Crown and Anchor was long the rallying-point of the Westminster electors. The room would hold 2500 persons: one of the latest popular orators who spoke here was Daniel O'Connell, M.P. There was originally an entrance to the house from the Strand, by a long pa.s.sage, such as was the usual approach to our old metropolitan taverns. The premises were entirely destroyed by fire, in 1854, but have been rebuilt.[35]

Here Johnson and Boswell occasionally supped; and here Johnson quarrelled with Percy about old Dr. Monsey. Thither was brought the altar-piece (St. Cecilia), painted by Kent for St. Clement's Church, whence it was removed, in 1725, by order of Bishop Gibson, on the supposition that the picture contained portraits of the Pretender's wife and children.

FOOTNOTE:

[35] See Whittington Club, Vol. I. p. 313.

THE CANARY-HOUSE, IN THE STRAND.

There is a rare Token of this house, with the date, 1665. The locality of the "Canary House in the Strande," says Mr. E. B. Price, "is now, perhaps, impossible to trace; and it is, perhaps, as vain to attempt a description of the wine from which it took its name, and which was so celebrated in that and the preceding century. Some have erroneously identified it with sack. We find it mentioned among the various drinks which Gascoyne so virtuously inveighs against in his _Delicate Diet for daintie mouthde Droonkardes_, published in 1576: "_We_ must have March beere, dooble-dooble Beere, Dagger ale, Bragget, Renish wine, White wine, French wine, Gascoyne wine, Sack, Hollocke, Canaria wine, _Vino greco_, _Vinum amabile_, and al the wines that may be gotten. Yea, wine of its selfe is not sufficient; but Suger, Limons, and sundry sortes of Spices must be drowned therein." The bibbers of this famed wine were wont to be termed "Canary birds." Of its qualities we can perhaps form the best estimate from the colloquy between "mine hostess of the Boar's Head and Doll Tearsheet;" in which the former charges the latter with having "drunk too much _Canaries_; and that's a _marvellous searching wine, and it perfumes the blood ere one can say, What's this?_"[36]

FOOTNOTE:

[36] We learn from Collier's _Roxburghe Ballads_ (_Lit. Gaz._ No.

1566) that in the reign of James I. "sparkling sack" was sold at 1_s._ 6_d._ per quart, and "Canary--pure French wine," at 7 pence.

THE FOUNTAIN TAVERN,

Strand, now the site of Nos. 101 and 102, Ries's Divan, gave the name to the Fountain Club, composed of political opponents of Sir Robert Walpole. Strype describes it as "a very fine Tavern, with excellent vaults, good rooms for entertainment, and a curious kitchen for dressing of meat, which, with the good wine there sold, make it well resorted to." Dennis, the Critic, describes his supping here with Loggan, the painter, and others, and that after supper they "drank Mr.

Wycherley's health by name of Captain Wycherley."

Here, Feb. 12, 1742, was held a great meeting, at which near 300 members of both Houses of Parliament were present, to consider the ministerial crisis, when the Duke of Argyll observed to Mr. Pulteney, that a grain of honesty was worth a cart-load of gold. The meeting was held too late to be of any avail, to which Sir Charles Hanbury Williams alludes in one of his odes to Pulteney, invoking his Muse thus:--

"Then enlarge on his cunning and wit; Say, how he harang'd at the Fountain; Say, how the old patriots were bit, And a mouse was produc'd by a mountain."

Upon the Tavern site was a Drawing Academy, of which Cosway and Wheatley were pupils; here also was the lecture-room of John Thelwall, the political elocutionist. At No. 101, Ackermann, the printseller, illuminated his gallery with cannel coal, when gas-lighting was a novelty.

In Fountain-court, named from the Tavern, is the Coal-hole Tavern, upon the site of a coal-yard; it was much resorted to by Edmund Kean, and was one of the earliest night taverns for singing.

TAVERN LIFE OF SIR RICHARD STEELE.

Among the four hundred letters of Steele's preserved in the British Museum, are some written from his tavern haunts, a few weeks after marriage, to his "Dearest being on earth:"

"_Eight o'clock, Fountain Tavern, Oct. 22, 1707._

"My dear,

"I beg of you not to be uneasy; for I have done a great deal of business to-day very successfully, and wait an hour or two about my _Gazette_."

In the next, he does "not come home to dinner, being obliged to attend to some business abroad." Then he writes from the Devil Tavern, Temple Bar, January 3, 1707-8, as follows:--

"I have partly succeeded in my business, and enclose two guineas as earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home to dinner; I languish for your welfare, and will never be a moment careless more.

"Your faithful husband," etc.

Within a few days, he writes from a Pall Mall tavern:--

"Dear Wife,

"Mr. Edgecombe, Ned Ask, and Mr. Lumley, have desired me to sit an hour with them at the George, in Pall Mall, for which I desire your patience till twelve o'clock, and that you will go to bed," etc.

When money-matters were getting worse, Steele found it necessary to sleep away from home for a day or two, and he writes:--

"_Tennis-court Coffee-house, May 5, 1708._

"Dear Wife,

"I hope I have done this day what will be pleasing to you; in the meantime shall lie this night at a baker's, one Leg, over against the Devil Tavern, at Charing Cross. I shall be able to confront the fools who wish me uneasy, and shall have the satisfaction to see thee cheerful and at ease.

"If the printer's boy be at home, send him hither; and let Mr. Todd send by the boy my night-gown, slippers, and clean linen. You shall hear from me early in the morning," etc.

He is found excusing his coming home, being "invited to supper at Mr.

Boyle's." "Dear Prue," he says on this occasion, "do not send after me, for I shall be ridiculous." There were _Caudles_ in those days.[37]

FOOTNOTE:

[37] Lives of Wits and Humourists, vol. i. p. 134.

CLARE MARKET TAVERNS.

Clare Market lying between the two great theatres, its butchers were the arbiters of the galleries, the leaders of theatrical rows, the musicians at actresses' marriages, the chief mourners at players'

funerals. In and around the market were the signs of the Sun; the Bull and Butcher, afterwards Spiller's Head; the Grange; the Bull's Head, where met "the Shepherd and his Flock Club," and where Dr. Radcliffe was carousing when he received news of the loss of his 5000_l._ venture. Here met weekly a Club of Artists, of which society Hogarth was a member, and he engraved for them a silver tankard with a shepherd and his flock. Next is the Black Jack in Portsmouth-street, the haunt of Joe Miller, the comedian, and where he uttered his time-honoured "Jests:" the house remains, but the sign has disappeared. Miller died in 1738, and was buried in St. Clement's upper ground, in Portugal-street, where his gravestone was inscribed with the following epitaph, written by Stephen Duck: "Here lie the remains of honest Joe Miller, who was a tender husband, a sincere friend, a facetious companion, and an excellent comedian. He departed this life the 15th day of August, 1738, aged 54 years.

"If humour, wit, and honesty could save The humorous, witty, honest, from the grave, This grave had not so soon its tenant found, With honesty, and wit, and humour crown'd.

Or could esteem and love preserve our health, And guard us longer from the stroke of Death, The stroke of Death on him had later fell, Whom all mankind esteem'd and loved so well."

The stone was restored by the parish grave-digger at the close of the last century; and in 1816, a new stone was set up by Mr. Jarvis Buck, churchwarden, who added S. Duck to the epitaph. The burial-ground has been cleared away, and the site has been added to the grounds of King's College Hospital.

At the Black Jack, also called the Jump, (from Jack Sheppard having once jumped out of a first-floor window, to escape his pursuers, the thief-takers,) a Club known as "the Honourable Society of Jackers,"

met until 1816. The roll of the fraternity "numbers many of the popular actors since the time of Joe Miller, and some of the wits; from John Kemble, Palmer, and Theodore Hook down to Kean, Liston, and the mercurial John Pritt Harley. Since the dissolution of this last relic of the sociality of the Joe Miller age, 'wit-combats' have been comparatively unknown at the Old Black Jack."[38]

FOOTNOTE:

[38] Jo. Miller; a Biography, 1848.

THE CRAVEN HEAD, DRURY LANE.

This modern Tavern was part of the offices of Craven House, and the adjoining stabling belonged to the mansion; the extensive cellars still remain, though blocked up.

Craven House was built for William Lord Craven, the hero of Creutznach, upon part of the site of Drury House, and was a large square pile of brick, four storeys high, which occupied the site of the present Craven-buildings, built in 1723. That portion of the mansion ab.u.t.ting on Magpie-alley, now Newcastle-street, was called Bohemia House, and was early in the last century, converted into a tavern, with the sign of the head of its former mistress, the Queen of Bohemia. But a destructive fire happening in the neighbourhood, the tavern was shut up, and the building suffered to decay; till, at length, in 1802, what remained of the dilapidated mansion was pulled down, and the materials sold; and upon the ground, in 1803, Philip Astley erected his Olympic Pavilion, which was burnt down in 1849.