“All the genuineHousehold Furniture, comprising bedsteads with marine and other furniture, fine goose feather beds, blankets, etc., mahogany wardrobes, chest of drawers, ditto dressing tables, mahogany press, bedsteads, with green check furniture; mahogany escritoire; ditto writing table with drawers; ditto dining and Pembroke tables; library table with steps; mahogany and other chairs; pier glasses and girandoles, in carved and gilt frames; a neat sofa; an exceeding good eight-day clock; Wilton and other carpets; register and Bath stoves; kitchen range; smoke-jack and other useful kitchen furniture; two large brewing-coppers, exceedingly good brewing utensils, and other effects.”
“All the genuineHousehold Furniture, comprising bedsteads with marine and other furniture, fine goose feather beds, blankets, etc., mahogany wardrobes, chest of drawers, ditto dressing tables, mahogany press, bedsteads, with green check furniture; mahogany escritoire; ditto writing table with drawers; ditto dining and Pembroke tables; library table with steps; mahogany and other chairs; pier glasses and girandoles, in carved and gilt frames; a neat sofa; an exceeding good eight-day clock; Wilton and other carpets; register and Bath stoves; kitchen range; smoke-jack and other useful kitchen furniture; two large brewing-coppers, exceedingly good brewing utensils, and other effects.”
This was the sale of the property of a man of quality. It is probable from the descriptionthat the furniture was comparatively new at that time. The Pembroke table, the mahogany escritoire, the pier glasses and girandoles and other items were plainly eighteenth century. The enumerated articles would no doubt be the most attractive pieces in the sale. Whether there was any old oak or not cannot be ascertained from the advertisement, but it is quite likely, for it would never be quoted, being thought at that time of no value. The catalogues of such sales were always left with the chief innkeepers of the neighbourhood, and to the innkeeper came any likely buyers who would discuss the mansion and its contents. Foreign competition in the way of dealers from London, was not to be feared in those days, and the “neat sofa” and “exceeding good eight-day clock” were quite as likely to find their way to the coaching inn as to any of the prosperous farmhouses in the neighbourhood.
A fairly common fixture in old inns was the angle cupboard. It was usually not a separate piece of furniture, but was fitted into the angle of the wall. It takes up little space, and was convenient for the storage of crockery.
There is a famous angle cupboard at theNew Inn, New Romney.
The bedchambers of the old coaching inns had as an inevitable feature the four-posters, now, by the way, again coming into fashion. These bedsteads were not always fine in design by any means. The turning of the posts was often quite clumsy enough, but they were never so hideous as the tester beds of the nineteenth century. The prettiest bed-posts were those of the latter half of the Georgian period, and Heppelwhite in particular is credited with the design of some of the most charming. As to drapery, which all good chambermaids kept spotless and clean, the following suggestion from Heppelwhite’s own book may be quoted.
“It may be executed of almost any stuff which the loom produces. White dimity, plain or corded, is peculiarly applicable for the furniture, which, with a fringe with a gymp head, produces an effect of elegance and neatness truly agreeable.” He goes on to say: “The Manchester stuffs have been wrought into bed furniture with good success. Printed cottons and linens are also very suitable, the elegance and variety of patterns of which afford as much scope for taste, elegance and simplicity as the most lively fancy can wish. In general the lining to thesekinds of furniture is a plain white cotton. To furniture of a dark pattern a green silk lining may be used with good effect.”
This description gives a very fair idea of the way in which beds were draped about a hundred to a hundred and fifty years ago. Of course, the word “furniture” in the above quotation is an old name for the hangings. It is used in the sense that hangings furnished the bed.
Tall-boys were found in the old inn bedroom, the corner washstand with its blue and white crockery, and one of those small loose mirrors (far too small for the modern beauty) with three little drawers underneath. It is quite common in any country inn nowadays to meet with these simple furnishings, though the four-poster has given way in many instances to cheap “black and brass” or “all-black” bedsteads of the age of mechanical ingenuity, and instead of a bed of goose-down you shall lie on wool over that really very comfortable rascal the wire mattress. The immortal Jingle, who surely puts into four words more philosophy on the subject of a good inn than anyone else in fiction, summed up everything when he remarked, “Good house; nice beds.”
The day should not be far distant when the new inn, not large fashionable hotels, will seek to furnish in some better way than by the purchase of heavy and ornate cast-iron tables with marble tops for the saloon bar, with utterly unsuitable saddle-bag suites for the parlour, with flashing mirrors everywhere, and ornamental crockery, palm stands of dubious origin, and gilt leather papers as decorative enrichments.
However much influence the Arts and Crafts movement has had in the furnishing of the domestic dwelling, it has left practically untouched the house which belongs of right to the public. There are craftsmen, however, many of them, whose furniture seems as if it were designed specially for the country inn, yet it is doubtful whether one was ever commissioned to supply the equipment which would give such character and charm to the modern licensed house. Some of the pieces of furniture, such as plain straightforward oaken drawers, benches, chairs, sturdy tables, cupboards and the like which have for many years been exhibited by members of the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, would be infinitely more suitable in the inn than anywhere else. It is not apparently lack ofmoney which makes those who furnish inns anew look to the modern and often hideous productions of commerce for their furniture. It would seem to be rather lack of knowledge or taste. No publican exists but wants to make his house attractive; but, except occasional advice about the preservation of the character of old inns by the retention of what old furniture there may be and the purchase of other pieces in a style suitable to the building, there would appear to be no influence whatever to prevent refurnishing in a manner which suggests too often an attempt to reproduce a railway hotel in miniature. At the moment the most accessible good furniture for the new inns is to be found in the modern reproductions of well-known styles which are to be purchased through the ordinary commercial channels and at commercial prices. It is the commonest experience to go into a country inn of undeniable architectural charm, even if the attraction be merely that it seems a simple homely looking building and nothing else, and to find inside furnishing as bad or worse than that of the cheap lodging-house. Now the inn should be a cut above that. It should not be too much to expect a little simplicity in furnishing. It is theattempt to elaborate which usually results in such artistic disaster. We have in memory many a little public-house, whose parlour is so small as to prohibit the slightest effort at decorative detail, and others—obscure alehouses some of them—where obviously there is not the wherewithal to provide up-to-date splendours, and in these instances the plain, honest benches, the trestle tables, the Windsor chairs and homely dresser constitute an interior which could scarcely be improved. There being no chance to elaborate, well has fortunately been left alone.
The “Skittles” Inn, Letchworth, Herts
THE INNKEEPER
“A seemly man our Hosté was withal.For to have been a marshall in a hall.A largé man he was with eyen stepe,A fairer burgess is there none in Chepe;Bold of his speech and wise, and well-y-taughtAnd of manhood him lackedé right naught.Like thereto he was right a merry man.”
“A seemly man our Hosté was withal.For to have been a marshall in a hall.A largé man he was with eyen stepe,A fairer burgess is there none in Chepe;Bold of his speech and wise, and well-y-taughtAnd of manhood him lackedé right naught.Like thereto he was right a merry man.”
A model to all innkeepers was Our Hosté of theTabard; a born leader of men, quick to understand each man’s individualities, and full of kindly sympathy for all. Ready of wit, he was ever careful to remove the sting before it could rankle. A man of education, he could adapt himself to his company and be skilful in devices for their comfort and recreation. Not least of his many qualifications as a landlord was his presence of mind in averting disputes by a judicious change of the subject.
We no longer send innkeepers to Parliament, nor do members of Parliament, as a rule, undertake the personal superintendence ofhotels, as they often did in the fourteenth century. But the type of innkeeper portrayed as Harry Bailey of theTabard, in Southwark, is by no means extinct. You may find him if you search well under many an old gable or Queen Anne cornice—sometimes even in a smart new red-brick hotel. Nor is he lacking on the great ancient trade routes that run right through Europe—not even in those establishments recommended by Baedeker or Bradshaw—though the new races of purse-proud tourists and Cook’s excursionists are fast expelling him in favour of the servile and mercenary business manager. In a humbler way, the village and wayside inns contain good men and true who follow in the footsteps of Harry Bailey. Such inns, often kept by retired tradesmen, blacksmiths or farmers, are a boon and a blessing to the neighbourhood. They are not only a centre of recreation for the village labourer; they tend also to educate and uplift him, ridiculous as the assertion may seem to those who have never put on an old coat and tramped through the by-ways into Arcady.
Diverse and sundry are the concerns in which the village innkeeper is called upon to give advice. He is the arbitrator in disputes,he solves weighty problems of rural etiquette. He knows the inner secrets of every home and can weigh the respective merits of his clientele to a nicety. To him it is that each one comes for help in trouble, social or financial, and his charity is given irrespective of politics or creed, given considerately as becomes a man of affairs, and without stint. The parish clergy know him as a valuable ally, and it is not unusual to find him acting as churchwarden. Nay, only the other day we saw a procession headed by the worthy village publican carrying the cross, and a manful and decorous crossbearer he proved himself.
It is surprising what good fellows innkeepers generally are, when one considers all the difficulties surrounding their occupation. They are the legitimate prey of every tax and rate collector. We know of one middle-class beerhouse where the rent charged by the brewers is only £50 a year, but which is rated at more than double that amount. The innkeeper, for the purpose of taxation, is merged in the licensed victualler. He is told that his business of selling fermented liquors is a valuable monopoly, and a very heavy licensed duty is exacted for the privilege. Yet he isexpected to view with equanimity the dozens of bottles of beer, wine and spirits passing his door in the trucks of the grocer, who by virtue of a nominal licence can easily undersell him. Long after the hour when he is bound by law to close, he hears the shouts of the bibulous in the neighbouring political club; on Sunday mornings he sees a procession of jugs and bottles issuing from this same untaxed establishment. Blackmailed by the police, and spied upon by the hirelings of all kinds of busybody societies, he goes to the Brewster Sessions in each year in fear and trembling. The licensing justices must by law have no interest whatever either in a brewery or a licensed house of any description, but they may be, and frequently are, teetotallers. Every other subject of his Majesty is entitled to plead his cause before his peers. The licensed victualler, alone of all Englishmen since the days of Magna Charta, has to submit to be tried by enemies who have sworn his ruin.
How we all love to see, on the stage, at least, if not in real life, jovial, hearty old souls like Mine Host who entertained Falstaff at theGarter, or old Will Boniface (first landlord to be so dubbed) of theBeaux Stratagem. Itis disappointing that Farquhar was such a wronghead dramatist as to make all his interesting characters vicious. We cannot believe this fat and pompous host with a wholesome faith in the virtues of his brew could really have been a scoundrel or capable of conspiring with footpads. No! Julius Cæsar was a better judge of fat human nature than Farquhar! Depend upon it, Boniface slept after his potations the sleep of an honest man. Just listen to him:
Sir, you shall taste my Anno Domini, I have lived in Lichfield, man and boy, above eight-and-fifty years, and I believe have not consumed eight-and-fifty ounces of meat.Aimwell.At a meal, you mean, if one may guess your sense by your bulk.Boniface.Not in my life, Sir; I have fed purely upon ale; I have ate my ale, drank my ale, and I always sleep upon ale.Enter tapster with a Tankard.Now, sir, you shall see; your worship’s health; Ha! delicious, delicious—fancy it Burgundy, only fancy it, and ’tis worth ten shillings a quart.Aimwell(drinks). ’Tis confounded strong.Boniface.Strong! It must be so; or how would we be strong that drink it?
Sir, you shall taste my Anno Domini, I have lived in Lichfield, man and boy, above eight-and-fifty years, and I believe have not consumed eight-and-fifty ounces of meat.
Aimwell.At a meal, you mean, if one may guess your sense by your bulk.
Boniface.Not in my life, Sir; I have fed purely upon ale; I have ate my ale, drank my ale, and I always sleep upon ale.
Enter tapster with a Tankard.
Now, sir, you shall see; your worship’s health; Ha! delicious, delicious—fancy it Burgundy, only fancy it, and ’tis worth ten shillings a quart.
Aimwell(drinks). ’Tis confounded strong.
Boniface.Strong! It must be so; or how would we be strong that drink it?
Hawthorne tried hard to find Mr. Boniface’s inn at Lichfield, but in vain. He had to content himself with theBlack Swan, onceowned by Dr. Johnson. Farquhar was careful not to indicate the particular inn referred to, if it ever existed there. Not that the dramatists in bygone days lived in fear of a libel action. Witness a farce by J. M. Morton, in which Mrs. Fidget, the landlady of theDolphinat Portsmouth, is most cruelly pilloried for her dishonesty and meanness. In “Naval Engagements” Charles Dance portrays Mr. Short of theFountainin the same town as a scurvy impudent rascal, taking advantage of customers who had spent the night not wisely nor too well, to charge them for an unordered and unserved breakfast. Short’s sanctimonious morality and his devices to detain customers in a hurry, so that they are compelled to stay in the inn for dinner, are a valuable humorous element of this play.
Fielding’s innkeepers are all exquisitely drawn, with the lifelike touches of a fine student of human nature in its infinite variety. We love best of all the host of that inn where Parson Adams met the braggart, untruthful squire who offered him a fine living and endless other benefits without the slightest intention of fulfilling his promises. Mine Host stands by chuckling inwardly at the good jest when the squire undertakes to defraythe bill for the lodging and entertainment of the party. Nor does he lose his good-humour when he finds next morning the joke turned against himself and that the worthy curate has not a farthing in his purse.
“Trust you, master? that I will with all my heart. I honour the clergy too much to deny trusting one of them for such a trifle; besides, I like your fear of never paying me. I have lost many a debt in my lifetime; but was promised to be paid them all in a very short time. I will score this reckoning for the novelty of it; it is the first, I do assure you, of its kind. But what say you, master, shall we have t’other pot before we part? It will waste but a little chalk more; and, if you never pay me a shilling, the loss will not ruin me.”
By way of contrast we are given the termagant Mrs. Tow-wouse, whose ill-temper and selfish grasping ways were always counteracting her easy-going spouse’s mild attempts in the direction of generosity:
“Mrs. Tow-wouse had given no utterance to the sweetness of her temper. Nature had taken such pains in her countenance, that Hogarth himself never gave more expression to a picture. Her person was short, thin, andcrooked; her forehead projected in the middle and thence descended in a declivity to the top of her nose, which was sharp and red, and would have hung over her lips, had not Nature turned up the end of it; her lips were two bits of skin, which, whenever she spoke, she drew together in a purse; her chin was peaked; and at the upper end of that skin which composed her cheeks, stood two bones, that almost hid a pair of small red eyes. Add to this a voice most wonderfully adapted to the sentiments it was to convey, being both loud and hoarse.”
Surely such a picture is worthy of being beside Skelton’s description of the frowsy ale wife of Leatherhead.
Dean Swift encountered a lady of the same contrary nature at theThree Crosses, on the road between Dunchurch and Daventry. He left his opinion of his hostess on one of the windows:
“To the Landlord.There hang three crosses at thy door,Hang up thy wife and she’ll make four.”
“To the Landlord.There hang three crosses at thy door,Hang up thy wife and she’ll make four.”
And here we may be permitted to introduce an adventure of our own. A party of three, we were engaged on a walk across the Dunes, near Nieuport, and had lost our way. Flemishwas the language of the district, and this in its spoken form was a sealed book to all three. By and by we came to a little roadside estaminet which we entered, and in correct exercise-book French inquired the nearest way to Furnes. The proprietor replied by placing before us three large glasses of the local beverage. It was a hot, dusty day, we were thirsty and the beer light and harmless. So we drank it and then again inquired the way to Furnes. For answer our glasses were forthwith refilled. When we shook our heads in dissent, the obliging caterer brought out in turn every different kind of bottle and brand of cigar and cigarette the establishment could muster. It was no good. We did not wish to drink or smoke.
He was perplexed and sat down for a few moments to scratch his head and ponder over the puzzling problem. At last he decided to do what many wiser men before have done when in a quandary: he called his wife. Maybe female intuition might pierce into these mysteries where dull reason vainly groped in darkness.
She came, pink and rosy as some glorious dawn, tripping as lightly as a forty-eight inch waist and a weight somewhere near fourteenstone would permit. After darting a scornful glance at her lord and master she turned to us with a sweet smile. We asked in Parisian tongue the nearest way to Furnes. In a trice she placed before us three pint glasses of Flemish white beer. We manifested our disapproval very strongly; we did not want any beer, and her husband watched and smoked his pipe with a cynical grin as she brought us, in vain, the bottles and various other articles from the shelves.
Then a brilliant idea occurred to one of the trio. After all, the Flemish language is only a dialect of German! So in truly classic German he inquired of the puzzled dame—Would she kindly tell us the nearest way to Furnes?
A bright smile of intelligence illumined her features. She understood now exactly what we wanted, and popping into the kitchen behind, she soon returned with three steaming plates full of most delicious hotch-potch soup. There were haricots, lentils, cabbage stumps, garlic, chicken bones, sausages and other articles unidentified in that soup. But it was appetising; we remembered that we were hungry from a long walk and sat down and absorbed it with a good-will.
That woman, we know for certain, became our devoted friend from the moment. She will never forget us. She demurred very strongly to our paying anything for the refreshment, and tried hard to force three more pints of that terribly mild beer on us before we left. Not only had we appreciated her cooking at its fullest value—we had also proved her abilities as a cosmopolitan woman of business—and, depend upon it, the fact has been rubbed into her partner in life many times since then!
But of worthy, buxom good-tempered landladies there is always a plentiful supply, faithful and true in the defence of their friends, like the good widow McCandlish in “Guy Mannering,” or beneficent fairies, ready to adjust the difficulties of eloping young couples and their several guardians with the delicacy and tact of a Mrs. Bartick.[18]The fair sex have usually all the business qualities for the conduct of a good inn, and when with these are conjoined kindness of disposition the traveller is blest indeed.
Once upon a time, so tradition hath it—there was a barmaid in a Westminster tavernwho married her master. After his death, she continued to carry on the business, and had occasion to seek the advice of a lawyer named Hyde. Mr. Hyde wooed and married her. Then Hyde became Lord Chancellor and was ennobled as Lord Clarendon. Their daughter married the Duke of York, and was the mother of Mary and Anne Stewart. So the landlady of an inn became the grandmother of two queens. Most history books are content to describe Lord Clarendon’s second wife as the daughter of Sir Thomas Aylesbury; but the supporters of the traditional view maintain that this was an invention of the Court Party.
The Recreation Room in the “Skittles” Inn, Letchworth
We have not yet encountered an innkeeper exactly of the same type as old John Willet, of theMaypoleat Chigwell, that “burly large-headed man with a fat face, which betokened profound obstinacy and slowness of apprehension, combined with a very strong reliance upon his own merits.” We meet occasionally in other walks of life these small-minded individuals whom chance has endowed with pride of place and the opportunity to tyrannize over all around them. Like the sovereign owner of the ancient hostelry with its “huge zigzag chimneys and more gableends than a lazy man would care to count on a sunny day,” not to speak of its diamond-pane lattices and its ceilings blackened by the hand of time and heavy with massive beams, they imagine that their reign will endure to the end. Is there in all literature a more pathetic piece of writing than that in which Charles Dickens depicts the humiliation of John Willet, when the Gordon rioters invade theMaypole, and the fallen tyrant finds himself “sitting down in an armchair and watching the destruction of his property, as if it were some queer play or entertainment of an astonishing and stupefying nature, but having no reference to himself—that he could make out—at all?”
Innkeepers have been reckoned among the poets. John Taylor, the “Water Poet,” so called because he commenced life as a waterman, and because so many of his voluminous works deal with aquatic matters, kept a tavern in Phœnix Alley, Longacre. Being a faithful royalist he set up the sign of theMourning Crownover his house to express his sorrow at the tragic death of Charles I, but was compelled by the Parliament to take it down. He replaced it with his own portrait and the following lines:
“There is many a head hangs for a sign;Then, gentle reader, why not mine?”
“There is many a head hangs for a sign;Then, gentle reader, why not mine?”
The episode is commemorated in a rhyming pamphlet issued by him at the same time:
“My signe was once aCrowne, but now it isChanged by a sudden metamorphosis.The Crowne was taken downe, and in the steadIs placed John Taylor’s or thePoet’s Head.”
“My signe was once aCrowne, but now it isChanged by a sudden metamorphosis.The Crowne was taken downe, and in the steadIs placed John Taylor’s or thePoet’s Head.”
Of Taylor’s works, the mere enumeration of which occupies eight closely printed pages in “Lownde’s Bibliographer’s Manual,” the best known are his “Prayse of Cleane Linen,” and “The Pennyless Pilgrimage,” descriptive of a journey on foot from London to Edinburgh, “not carrying any money to and fro, neither begging, borrowing or asking meat, drink or lodging.” In 1620, he made a similar journey from London to Prague, and published an account of it.
Scarcely less eminent in his way was Ned Ward, the “Publican Poet,” immortalised in the “Dunciad.” His works are scurrilous and coarse, yet not to be despised by students of London topography in the reign of Queen Anne. His writings in theLondon Spydescribe the London taverns and inns of his day, and he produced several imitations of Butler’s “Hudibras,” including a versifiedtranslation of “Don Quixote,” and “Hudibras Redivivus.” The latter work obtained for its author the privilege of standing twice in the pillory and of paying a fine of forty marks. His inn stood in Woodbridge Street, Clerkenwell, and his poetical invitation to customers includes a reference to the Red Bull Theatre, close by, made famous by Shakespeare and Edward Alleyn, the founder of Dulwich College:
“There on that ancient, venerable ground,Where Shakespeare in heroic buskins trod,Within a good old fabrick may be foundCelestial liquors, fit to charm a god.”
“There on that ancient, venerable ground,Where Shakespeare in heroic buskins trod,Within a good old fabrick may be foundCelestial liquors, fit to charm a god.”
Very different was the side in politics favoured by Sam House, “the patriotic publican.” Apprenticed as a brewhouse cooper, his active industrious habits enabled him, when only twenty-five years of age, to lease an inn at the corner of Peter Street, Wardour Street, Soho, called theGravel Pits, which name he changed to theIntrepid Fox, orThe Cap of Liberty. In 1763 he very warmly espoused the cause of John Wilkes, and sold his beer at threepence a pot in honour of the champion of freedom. Of unflinching political integrity, Sam House was in most respects a well-meaning, good-hearted man, with butone reprehensible vice—a habit of swearing most horribly, no matter what the company. Many are the unprintable anecdotes related with regard to this failing, when the most exalted personages were conversing with him. Another eccentric feature of his character was illustrated when he had laid a wager with a young man to race him in Oxford Road. Just when his victory seemed assured, a mischievous wag in the crowd suddenly shouted, “D——n Fox and all his friends, say I!” Forthwith Sam forgot all about his race, and regardless of protests from his backers, turned round and administered a sound drubbing to the blasphemer. This gave great amusement to the spectators, but meanwhile his rival had passed the winning-post. Sam cheerfully paid the penalty, consoling himself that he had lost the race in a good cause, while avenging an insult to his political idol.
PUBLIC-HOUSE REFORM
“Nothing suits worse with vice than want of sense,” remarked Sir Harry Wilding in the “Constant Couple.” For vice we might read benevolence and find the maxim equally appropriate. Good judgment is especially needful in that kind of philanthropy so much in vogue at the present time, wherein one class of the community interests itself in improving the condition of another class with which it is imperfectly acquainted.
Take, for instance, the housing of the working classes. A committee of maiden ladies meet together and engage the services of some clever young architect. The local landowner finds the funds, and very soon a row of cottages has been built of dainty picturesque appearance, and everything inside them equally lovely. The sanitation is of the latest, the rooms are light and airy. All sorts of clever devices are introduced to economize space, nice cupboards, economical cooking stoves with every appliance to delight thehousewife, and even a bath artfully hidden beneath a trap-door just in front of the kitchen fire. There is even high art decoration approved by the Kyrle Society. In short, these cottages would be a joy and a treasure if only the ungrateful labourer would consent to leave his insanitary hovel and come and take up his abode therein. He emphatically declines to do so because they contain no “best room.”
The committee of maiden ladies are very indignant at the idea of the working man insisting on his best room, an apartment which remains hermetically closed from week-end to week-end, reserved only as a shrine for the family Bible and for the reception of a few highly-favoured visitors. He ought, they contend, to be satisfied with the big airy living-room, specially designed for his family, and has no business to complain that his little heirlooms will be at the mercy of inquisitive and mischievous children. But it will be a bad day for England when the “best room” disappears from the artisan’s home. It is by long tradition his castle, his secret keep, the innermost temple of his religion. Every patriotic instinct of the poor man has its centre within that little stuffy apartment.Home to the working man means the best room. The safety of the best room justifies all the national expenditure on a standing army and a huge navy. In the defence of that best room he is prepared to send his sons to lay their bones in some nameless soldier’s grave in the most distant corner of the empire. Take away the best room and the wage-earner has no home worth either working for or fighting for. He becomes an atheist, an anarchist, and a general outcast.
A similar lack of appreciation of human nature is shown by certain philanthropists in dealing with the use by working men of the public-house as a place of resort. How much better, they urge, if the workman would spend his time in more intellectual surroundings—in reading rooms, popular lectures or entertainments, Christian endeavour societies, etc., etc. And so they exert all their influence over licensing justices, the police and other authorities, inciting them to make the public-house as uncomfortable as possible; with the result that a series of very undesirable institutions having all the worst qualities of the gin palace, without its publicity or proper means of supervision, are coming into existence. Penny readings,lectures, and other religious or educational centres are well enough in their way; but the man of few home resources yearns for the gossip of the alehouse. Only there can he find what the soul of every human being longs for, the company of his own kind, and recreation and amusement which he himself can assist in supplying.
Still, if it is to continue, the public-house must be reformed and improved in some way to satisfy the national conscience. And a book of this kind seems to be incomplete unless it contains some suggestions as to the direction in which reform ought to proceed.
In the first place, we would urge the inexpediency of any further legislation. Anybody, who as a parish worker or as an employer of labour has interested himself in a model public-house, will agree with us in this. No other institution in the country is so hopelessly law-ridden and police-ridden. We might make an exception in the case of the licence itself. All taxation of alcoholic liquors should be direct and should be levied at the fountain head—whether distiller, brewer or importer. The licence for retailing such liquors should be a moderate and fixed amount like all other licences. Why the publican shouldbe penalised at so high a rate, when the grocer, whose annual sales often exceed those of all the public-houses in the district combined, is let off with a nominal sum, passes all comprehension.
To impose a high licence on the hotel or tavern-keeper is, in the opinion of those who have studied the subject carefully, a mistake both economically and morally. First, because a large and increasing portion of his sales consists in wares which the outside dealer supplies without the necessity of either tax or licence. Secondly, there is a serious temptation offered to the publican to recoup the high expenditure on his licence by inducing his customers to drink. And it is most important that men of the highest character and responsibility should be encouraged to take office as innkeepers and publicans. This can hardly be the case while the high licence adds so seriously to the amount of unremunerative capital required for embarking in the business. No other trade is handicapped by such an iniquitous impost.
We must not, of course, shirk that ugly word, “monopoly value,” introduced by the Licensing Act of 1902. But it is a monopolyof dwindling value riddled by half a dozen competing agencies and minimised by all sorts of vexatious restrictions. Sunday trading is not a desirable thing, but a visit to any favourite suburban resort on Sunday morning reveals a state of affairs only to be paralleled in Gilbertian comic opera. Tobacconists, sweet-stuff shops, tea gardens and enterprising Italian caterers are all doing a roaring trade without let or hindrance. Meanwhile the “Licensed Victualler,” who pays so high a price for his “monopoly” as a purveyor of refreshments, is compelled on pain of extinction to keep his doors bolted and barred against all but the few hardy souls who have accomplished the Sabbath Day’s journey.
There is an underworld in the drink trade. Provincial allotment holders never seem to lack a good supply of the national beverage on Sunday mornings; it does not flow from the local alehouse. Quarterns of gin and whisky are obtainable in London from some unknown sources at all hours of the night. One of the authors, associated for many years with a famous church in the poorer districts of central London, made some astonishing discoveries with regard to this illicit drinktraffic. Most of it is the direct outcome of the oppressive one-sided licensing laws.
On the liquor question itself, we would suggest that the tax on beer should be graduated, and a comparatively light duty be imposed on beer guaranted to be brewed entirely from malt and hops, and containing only the small proportion of alcohol necessary to carry the phosphates—say not more than four per cent. We believe that the revenue would not ultimately lose much by this concession, while the result of its general adoption as a beverage would be highly beneficial. No better preventative could be imagined against nervous depression, the great curse of modern life, and the real cause of the drink and drug-taking habits—than a revival of the good old English mild ale such as our forefathers brewed in the pre-reformation Church Houses.
We have already referred to the work of the Public Refreshment House Association, and much good is bound to result from the efforts of this body in improving the status of the public-house. Its methods and the rules laid down for the management of the houses under its control are worthy of all praise. Theforesight and self-denial of its directorate are especially commendable, in that the society seeks to co-operate in the formation of separate county trusts, rather than to aggrandize itself by acquiring an unlimited number of licences. The danger of a gigantic trust, as of a national monopoly, would be that enormous power might, in the second generation, fall into the hands of an ambitious and tyrannical central staff. One fear only we have with regard to the P.R.H.A. Its establishments are so attractive and altogether so desirable, that like all philanthropic efforts they will end by benefiting a higher class than was at first intended. The lady cyclist and the weekender will avail themselves of their advantages rather than the rural labourer. And we hope that the wise authorities at headquarters will guard against this difficulty by encouraging games, and providing magazines for the users of the tap-room.
A worthy country cleric of our acquaintance takes exception to the preferential commission which the Association allows to its local managers in order to push the sale of temperance drinks. He urges that no temperance drink has hitherto been invented which is either thirst quenching or wholesome. The teaand coffee habit would end by making the villager as neurotic as his cockney cousin. Aerated waters, flavoured with narcotic drugs and saturated with gaseous mineral carbonic dioxide, put a severe strain on the action of the heart; fruit syrups are doctored with nerve-destroying formaline to prevent natural fermentation. Even the popular ginger beer and ginger ale are not unimpeachable. Ginger is a drug injurious to the coating of the stomach; and in some modern brands the more poisonous capsicum is employed as a cheaper substitute.
But on general grounds, we think this encouragement of temperance drinks is altogether a judicious move. The public-house exists for the benefit and use of all classes and sections of the community; the teetotaller has as much right there as anybody else, and it is desirable that he should exercise that right as frequently as possible. The popular idea that the tavern is only a place for the consumption of certain alcoholic drinks must be dispelled; such liquors have to be on sale there merely because a large majority of Englishmen habitually desire them as beverages, and it is not the duty of those in charge to decide whether they shall, or shall not,continue to do so. Wine, beer and spirits are an essential part, but still only one department of the tavern-keeper’s business.
The “Bell” Inn, Bell Common, Epping
Village trusts have been introduced with success in some rural districts. A body of trustees is elected by the whole parish for a term of years, on much the same lines as the Parish Council. Management on a democratic basis has its good points, if only the natives can be roused to take a keen interest in the subject. But all these revolutionary displacements of “the trade” are unnecessary. The good conduct of the public-house depends not so much on those who manage it as on those who habitually use it, and on the growth of a healthy national appreciation of its value. If only men of good-will made it a rule to visit from time to time the various licensed houses of the neighbourhood, their very presence would be a wonderful help to the cause of morality. A good understanding with the landlord should be established, and then suggestions for the improvement of the house quietly and considerately discussed with him. We know of parish priests who, facing sneers about “Beer and Bible,” have pursued this course, and their efforts have brought blessing and reward. But it must beunderstood that all genuine progress is slow. ThePublic-house is not so much the moulder as the index of public morals; and any violent attempts at reforming it are as absurd as to manipulate a barometer with a view to improving the weather.
In a recent speech the Bishop of Birmingham cited as his ideal of the public-house, an establishment in Barcelona which he had visited several times, and which struck him as being specially delightful. He described it as an immense room in which there must have been about a thousand people. They were of all classes; a good many of them were artisans who wore their blouses, and they were there with their wives and children constantly. They were drinking all sorts of things—beer, wine, tea, coffee, or milk, and some of them were drinking a peculiar compound of a kind of pink colour, the nature of which he was not able to ascertain through an imperfect knowledge of the language. There was rather a good band, but one could not hear it much because all were talking and laughing and making themselves extremely agreeable to one another. He asked himself every time he went there—Was not that type of place of public resort, public refreshment, and publicamusement entirely desirable? He had been there on Sundays and week-days, and he never felt that he had seen or heard anything that was not entirely desirable. Every time he went there—and he could find the same thing in other countries and cities—he said to himself: What was there in the nature of things why we could not have exactly this kind of place of public amusement and recreation—this kind of public-house with regard to which they would not feel the slightest desire for any legislation to restrict the opportunity of women or children or of anybody else going into it?
There are several public-houses in England where the presence of an enlightened thinker like Dr. Gore would be welcomed. One in particular occurs to us as we write—theShipat Ospringe, near Faversham. The climate of the Swale marshes will not admit of a hall to contain over a thousand people, but here there is a room which on Saturday nights might contain any number up to a hundred and fifty. There is no band—the police would speedily interfere at the first trumpet blare; nor any children—thanks to a recent Act of Parliament. But his lordship would find a happy good-humoured company, youngmen and old, wives and sweethearts, some drinking beer, some lemonade, young girls eating their supper of bread and cheese or fish, all engaged in merry converse, or listening with uncritical good-nature to songs and recitations provided by such among their number as are inclined to oblige. If a pianist happens to turn up, so much the better; otherwise the vocalist does his best without accompaniment. All is homely and hearty. We have visited theShipmany times and never perceived any signs of objectionable conduct. If it lacks any of the advantages of its Barcelona rival, we must blame the law and the licensing authorities—certainly not the institution.
In Spain, as in Germany, the inn or the tavern is regarded as an essential element of civic life, not as a place to be discouraged and despised. A century or two ago all good and respectable Britons avoided the theatre, and the drama in England became a byword for immorality and licentiousness. A better spirit arose; churchmen and ladies of refinement interested themselves in the theatre; the ban was removed, and now we can take our sisters, cousins and aunts to see an English play without fear of incurring their reproaches.Perchance, also, a new era may await the public-house, and its value as an educative and steadying influence on the democracy will be understood.
Angel Inn, Woolhampton
We live in the midst of a period when great revolutionary changes are impending. Never before has the struggle for existence among the masses been so keenly felt, or the cruel differences of opportunity of rich and poor so widely ventilated. Class privilege and hereditary endowment seem alike destined for the melting-pot. What will emerge none can tell. We have shown how in previous ages, whenever there were great political or social changes, the tavern played its part. Within the doors of the public-house all men are brethren. There alone class can meet class and discuss their difficulties freely and even dispassionately. Society has too long left the lower orders to estimate the advantage of culture from its Tony Lumpkins. It is a great opportunity. The venerable house of call, bequeathed to us by the ages, beckons all to come within its kindly shelter, out of the storms of class hatred and political prejudice. Churlish and short-sighted indeed will those be who reject the invitation.
For, after all, the old antiquary whom wemet with in the chapter on the Church Inns was right. The keynote of the public-house and its true purpose in life is Christian Charity. Charity which suffereth long and is kind, bearing all things, envying not, nor believing any evil; and without which we are nothing. The greatest thing in Earth or Heaven.