along with it. It is related by John Adams, who was an interested
listener. William Molyneux had a petition before the legislature which did
not succeed to his wishes, and for several evenings he had wearied the
company with his complaints of services, losses, sacrifices, etc., always
winding up with saying, "That a man who has behaved as I have should be
treated as I am is intolerable," with much more to the same effect. Otis
had said nothing, but the whole club were disgusted and out of patience,
when he rose from his seat with the remark, "Come, come, Will, quit this
subject, and let us enjoy ourselves. I also have a list of grievances;
will you hear it?" The club expected some fun, so all cried out, "Ay! ay!
let us hear your list."
"Well, then, in the first place, I resigned the office of
advocate-general, which I held from the crown, which produced me--how much
do you think?"
"A great deal, no doubt," said Molyneux.
"Shall we say two hundred sterling a year?"
"Ay, more, I believe," said Molyneux.
"Well, let it be two hundred. That, for ten years, is two thousand. In the
next place, I have been obliged to relinquish the greater part of my
business at the bar. Will you set that at two hundred pounds more?"
"Oh, I believe it much more than that!" was the answer.
"Well, let it be two hundred. This, for ten years, makes two thousand. You
allow, then, I have lost four thousand pounds sterling?"
"Ay, and more too," said Molyneux. Otis went on: "In the next place, I
have lost a hundred friends, among whom were men of the first rank,
fortune, and power in the province. At what price will you estimate them?"
"D--n them!" said Molyneux, "at nothing. You are better off without them
than with them."
A loud laugh from the company greeted this sally.
"Be it so," said Otis. "In the next place, I have made a thousand enemies,
among whom are the government of the province and the nation. What do you
think of this item?"
"That is as it may happen," said Molyneux, reflectively.
"In the next place, you know I love pleasure, but I have renounced
pleasure for ten years. What is that worth?"
"No great matter: you have made politics your amusement."
A hearty laugh.
"In the next place, I have ruined as fine health as nature ever gave to
man."
"That is melancholy indeed; there is nothing to be said on that point,"
Molyneux replied.
"Once more," continued Otis, holding down his head before Molyneux, "look
upon this head!" (there was a deep, half-closed scar, in which a man might
lay his finger)--"and, what is worse my friends think I have a monstrous
crack in my skull."
This made all the company look grave, and had the desired effect of making
Molyneux who was really a good companion, heartily ashamed of his childish
complaints.
[Illustration]
Another old inn of assured celebrity was the =Cromwell's Head=, in School
Street. This was a two-story wooden building of venerable appearance,
conspicuously displaying over the footway a grim likeness of the Lord
Protector, it is said much to the disgust of the ultra royalists, who,
rather than pass underneath it, habitually took the other side of the way.
Indeed, some of the hot-headed Tories were for serving _Cromwell's Head_
as that man of might had served their martyr king's. So, when the town
came under martial law, mine host Brackett, whose family kept the house
for half a century or more, had to take down his sign, and conceal it
until such time as the "British hirelings" should have made their
inglorious exit from the town.
[Illustration]
After Braddock's crushing defeat in the West, a young Virginian colonel,
named George Washington, was sent by Governor Dinwiddie to confer with
Governor Shirley, who was the great war governor of his day, as Andrew was
of our own, with the difference that Shirley then had the general
direction of military affairs, from the Ohio to the St. Lawrence, pretty
much in his own hands. Colonel Washington took up his quarters at
Brackett's, little imagining, perhaps, that twenty years later he would
enter Boston at the head of a victorious republican army, after having
quartered his troops in Governor Shirley's splendid mansion.
Major-General the Marquis Chastellux, of Rochambeau's auxiliary army,
also lodged at the _Cromwell's Head_ when he was in Boston in 1782. He met
there the renowned Paul Jones, whose excessive vanity led him to read to
the company in the coffee-room some verses composed in his own honor, it
is said, by Lady Craven.
From the tavern of the gentry we pass on to the tavern of the mechanics,
and of the class which Abraham Lincoln has forever distinguished by the
title of the common people.
Among such houses the =Salutation=, which stood at the junction of
Salutation with North Street, is deserving of a conspicuous place. Its
vicinity to the shipyards secured for it the custom of the sturdy North
End shipwrights, caulkers, gravers, sparmakers, and the like,--a numerous
body, who, while patriots to the backbone, were also quite clannish and
independent in their feelings and views, and consequently had to be
managed with due regard to their class prejudices, as in politics they
always went in a body. Shrewd politicians, like Samuel Adams, understood
this. Governor Phips owed his elevation to it. As a body, therefore, these
mechanics were extremely formidable, whether at the polls or in carrying
out the plans of their leaders. To their meetings the origin of the word
_caucus_ is usually referred, the word itself undoubtedly having come into
familiar use as a short way of saying caulkers' meetings.
The _Salutation_ became the point of fusion between leading Whig
politicians and the shipwrights. More than sixty influential mechanics
attended the first meeting, called in 1772, at which Dr. Warren drew up a
code of by-laws. Some leading mechanic, however, was always chosen to be
the moderator. The "caucus," as it began to be called, continued to meet
in this place until after the destruction of the tea, when, for greater
secrecy, it became advisable to transfer the sittings to another place,
and then the Green Dragon, in Union Street, was selected.
The _Salutation_ had a sign of the sort that is said to tickle the popular
fancy for what is quaint or humorous. It represented two citizens, with
hands extended, bowing and scraping to each other in the most approved
fashion. So the North-Enders nicknamed it "The Two Palaverers," by which
name it was most commonly known. This house, also, was a reminiscence of
the _Salutation_ in Newgate Street, London, which was the favorite haunt
of Lamb and Coleridge.
The =Green Dragon= will probably outlive all its contemporaries in the
popular estimation. In the first place a mural tablet, with a dragon
sculptured in relief, has been set in the wall of the building that now
stands upon some part of the old tavern site. It is the only one of the
old inns to be so distinguished. Its sign was the fabled dragon, in
hammered metal, projecting out above the door, and was probably the
counterpart of the _Green Dragon_ in Bishopsgate Street, London.
[Illustration: THE GREEN DRAGON TAVERN]
As a public house this one goes back to 1712, when Richard Pullen kept
it; and we also find it noticed, in 1715, as a place for entering horses
to be run for a piece of plate of the value of twenty-five pounds. In
passing, we may as well mention the fact that Revere Beach was the
favorite race-ground of that day. The house was well situated for
intercepting travel to and from the northern counties.
[Illustration: THE GREEN DRAGON.]
To resume the historical connection between the _Salutation_ and _Green
Dragon_, its worthy successor, it appears that Dr. Warren continued to be
the commanding figure after the change of location; and, if he was not
already the popular idol, he certainly came little short of it, for
everything pointed to him as the coming leader whom the exigency should
raise up. Samuel Adams was popular in a different way. He was cool,
far-sighted, and persistent, but he certainly lacked the magnetic quality.
Warren was much younger, far more impetuous and aggressive,--in short, he
possessed all the more brilliant qualities for leadership which Adams
lacked. Moreover, he was a fluent and effective speaker, of graceful
person, handsome, affable, with frank and winning manners, all of which
added no little to his popularity. Adams inspired respect, Warren
confidence. As Adams himself said, he belonged to the "cabinet," while
Warren's whole make-up as clearly marked him for the field.
In all the local events preliminary to our revolutionary struggle, this
_Green Dragon_ section or junto constituted an active and positive force.
It represented the muscle of the Revolution. Every member was sworn to
secrecy, and of them all one only proved recreant to his oath.
These were the men who gave the alarm on the eve of the battle of
Lexington, who spirited away cannon under General Gage's nose, and who in
so many instances gallantly fought in the ranks of the republican army.
Wanting a man whom he could fully trust, Warren early singled out Paul
Revere for the most important services. He found him as true as steel. A
peculiar kind of friendship seems to have sprung up between the two,
owing, perhaps, to the same daring spirit common to both. So when Warren
sent word to Revere that he must instantly ride to Lexington or all would
be lost, he knew that, if it lay in the power of man to do it, the thing
would be done.
Besides the more noted of the tavern clubs there were numerous private
coteries, some exclusively composed of politicians, others more resembling
our modern debating societies than anything else. These clubs usually met
at the houses of the members themselves, so exerting a silent influence on
the body politic. The non-importation agreement originated at a private
club in 1773. But all were not on the patriot side. The crown had equally
zealous supporters, who met and talked the situation over without any of
the secrecy which prudence counselled the other side to use in regard to
their proceedings. Some associations endeavored to hold the balance
between the factions by standing neutral. They deprecated the
encroachments of the mother-country, but favored passive obedience. Dryden
has described them:
"Not Whigs nor Tories they, nor this nor that,
Nor birds nor beasts, but just a kind of bat,--
A twilight animal, true to neither cause,
With Tory wings but Whiggish teeth and claws."
It should be mentioned that Gridley, the father of the Boston Bar,
undertook, in 1765, to organize a law club, with the purpose of making
head against Otis, Thatcher, and Auchmuty. John Adams and Fitch were
Gridley's best men. They met first at Ballard's, and subsequently at each
other's chambers; their "sodality," as they called it, being for
professional study and advancement. Gridley, it appears, was a little
jealous of his old pupil, Otis, who had beaten him in the famous argument
on the Writs of Assistance. Mention is also made of a club of which Daniel
Leonard (_Massachusettensis_), John Lowell, Elisha Hutchinson, Frank
Dana, and Josiah Quincy were members. Similar clubs also existed in most
of the principal towns in New England.
The =Sons of Liberty= adopted the name given by Colonel Barré to the
enemies of passive obedience in America. They met in the counting-room of
Chase and Speakman's distillery, near Liberty Tree.[3] Mackintosh, the man
who led the mob in the Stamp Act riots, is doubtless the same person who
assisted in throwing the tea overboard. We hear no more of him after this.
The "Sons" were an eminently democratic organization, as few except
mechanics were members. Among them were men like Avery, Crafts, and Edes
the printer. All attained more or less prominence. Edes continued to print
the _Boston Gazette_ long after the Revolution. During Bernard's
administration he was offered the whole of the government printing, if he
would stop his opposition to the measures of the crown. He refused the
bribe, and his paper was the only one printed in America without a stamp,
in direct violation of an Act of Parliament. The "Sons" pursued their
measures with such vigor as to create much alarm among the loyalists, on
whom the Stamp Act riots had made a lasting impression. Samuel Adams is
thought to have influenced their proceedings more than any other of the
leaders. It was by no means a league of ascetics, who had resolved to
mortify the flesh, as punch and tobacco were liberally used to stimulate
the deliberations.
[Illustration: THE LIBERTY TREE]
No important political association outlived the beginning of hostilities.
All the leaders were engaged in the military or civil service on one or
the other side. Of the circle that met at the _Merchants'_ three were
members of the Philadelphia Congress of 1774, one was president of the
Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, the career of two was closed by
death, and that of Otis by insanity.
IV.
SIGNBOARD HUMOR.
Another tavern sign, though of later date, was that of the =Good Woman=,
at the North End. This _Good Woman_ was painted without a head.
[Illustration: THE GOOD WOMAN]
Still another board had painted on it a bird, a tree, a ship, and a
foaming can, with the legend,--
"This is the bird that never flew,
This is the tree which never grew,
This is the ship which never sails,
This is the can which never fails."
The =Dog and Pot=, =Turk's Head=, =Tun and Bacchus=, were also old and
favorite emblems. Some of the houses which swung these signs were very
quaint specimens of our early architecture. So, also, the signs themselves
were not unfrequently the work of good artists. Smibert or Copley may have
painted some of them. West once offered five hundred dollars for a red
lion he had painted for a tavern sign.
[Illustration: DOG AND POT.]
Not a few boards displayed a good deal of ingenuity and mother-wit, which
was not without its effect, especially upon thirsty Jack, who could hardly
be expected to resist such an appeal as this one of the _Ship in
Distress_:
"With sorrows I am compass'd round;
Pray lend a hand, my ship's aground."
We hear of another signboard hanging out at the extreme South End of the
town, on which was depicted a globe with a man breaking through the crust,
like a chicken from its shell. The man's nakedness was supposed to
betoken extreme poverty.
So much for the sign itself. The story goes that early one morning a
continental regiment was halted in front of the tavern, after having just
made a forced march from Providence. The men were broken down with
fatigue, bespattered with mud, famishing from hunger. One of these
veterans doubtless echoed the sentiments of all the rest when he shouted
out to the man on the sign, "'List, darn ye! 'List, and you'll get through
this world fast enough!"
[Illustration: "HOW SHALL I GET THROUGH THIS WORLD?"]
In time of war the taverns were favorite recruiting rendezvous. Those at
the waterside were conveniently situated for picking up men from among the
idlers who frequented the tap-rooms. Under date of 1745, when we were at
war with France, bills were posted in the town giving notice to all
concerned that, "All gentlemen sailors and others, who are minded to go on
a cruise off of Cape Breton, on board the brigantine _Hawk_, Captain
Philip Bass commander, mounting fourteen carriage, and twenty swivel guns,
going in consort with the brigantine _Ranger_, Captain Edward Fryer
commander, of the like force, to intercept the East India, South Sea, and
other ships bound to Cape Breton, let them repair to the Widow Gray's at
the =Crown Tavern=, at the head of Clark's Wharf, to go with Captain Bass,
or to the =Vernon's Head=, Richard Smith's, in King Street, to go in the
_Ranger_." "Gentlemen sailors" is a novel sea-term that must have tickled
an old salt's fancy amazingly.
The following notice, given at the same date in the most public manner, is
now curious reading. "To be sold, a likely negro or mulatto boy, about
eleven years of age." This was in Boston.
The Revolution wrought swift and significant change in many of the old,
favorite signboards. Though the idea remained the same, their symbolism
was now put to a different use. Down came the king's and up went the
people's arms. The crowns and sceptres, the lions and unicorns, furnished
fuel for patriotic bonfires or were painted out forever. With them
disappeared the last tokens of the monarchy. The crown was knocked into a
cocked-hat, the sceptre fell at the unsheathing of the sword. The heads of
Washington and Hancock, Putnam and Lee, Jones and Hopkins, now fired the
martial heart instead of Vernon, Hawk, or Wolfe. Allegiance to old and
cherished traditions was swept away as ruthlessly as if it were in truth
but the reflection of that loyalty which the colonists had now thrown off
forever. They had accepted the maxim, that, when a subject draws his sword
against his king, he should throw away the scabbard.
Such acts are not to be referred to the fickleness of popular favor which
Horace Walpole has moralized upon, or which the poet satirizes in the
lines,--
"Vernon, the Butcher Cumberland, Wolfe, Hawke,
Prince Ferdinand, Granby, Burgoyne, Keppell, Howe,
Evil and good have had their tithe of talk,
And filled their sign-post then like Wellesly now."
Rather should we credit it to that genuine and impassioned outburst of
patriotic feeling which, having turned royalty out of doors, indignantly
tossed its worthless trappings into the street after it.
Not a single specimen of the old-time hostelries now remains in Boston.
All is changed. The demon demolition is everywhere. Does not this very
want of permanence suggest, with much force, the need of perpetuating a
noted house or site by some appropriate memorial? It is true that a
beginning has been made in this direction, but much more remains to be
done. In this way, a great deal of curious and valuable information may be
picked up in the streets, as all who run may read. It has been noticed
that very few pass by such memorials without stopping to read the
inscriptions. Certainly, no more popular method of teaching history could
well be devised. This being done, on a liberal scale, the city would
still hold its antique flavor through the records everywhere displayed on
the walls of its buildings, and we should have a home application of the
couplet:
"Oh, but a wit can study in the streets,
And raise his mind above the mob he meets."
APPENDIX.
BOSTON TAVERNS TO THE YEAR 1800.
The =Anchor=, or =Blue Anchor=. Robert Turner, vintner, came into
possession of the estate (Richard Fairbanks's) in 1652, died in 1664, and
was succeeded in the business by his son John, who continued it till his
own death in 1681; Turner's widow married George Monck, or Monk, who kept
the _Anchor_ until his decease in 1698; his widow carried on the business
till 1703, when the estate probably ceased to be a tavern. The house was
destroyed in the great fire of 1711. The old and new Globe buildings stand
on the site. [See communication of William R. Bagnall in _Boston Daily
Globe_ of April 2, 1885.] Committees of the General Court used to meet
here. (Hutchinson Coll., 345, 347.)
=Admiral Vernon=, or =Vernon's Head=, corner of State Street and
Merchants' Row. In 1743, Peter Faneuil's warehouse was opposite. Richard
Smith kept it in 1745, Mary Bean in 1775; its sign was a portrait of the
admiral.
=American Coffee-House.= See _British Coffee-House_.
=Black Horse=, in Prince Street, formerly Black Horse Lane, so named from
the tavern as early as 1698.
=Brazen-Head.= In Old Cornhill. Though not a tavern, memorable as the
place where the Great Fire of 1760 originated.
=Bull=, lower end of Summer Street, north side; demolished 1833 to make
room "for the new street from Sea to Broad," formerly Flounder Lane, now
Atlantic Avenue. It was then a very old building. Bull's Wharf and Lane
named for it.
=British Coffee-House=, mentioned in 1762. John Ballard kept it. Cord
Cordis, in 1771.
=Bunch of Grapes.= Kept by Francis Holmes, 1712; William Coffin, 1731-33;
Edward Lutwych, 1733; Joshua Barker, 1749; William Wetherhead, 1750;
Rebecca Coffin, 1760; Joseph Ingersoll, 1764-72. [In 1768 Ingersoll also
had a wine-cellar next door.] Captain John Marston was landlord 1775-78;
William Foster, 1782; Colonel Dudley Colman, 1783; James Vila, 1789, in
which year he removed to Concert Hall; Thomas Lobdell, 1789. Trinity
Church was organized in this house. It was often described as being at the
head of Long Wharf.
=Castle Tavern=, afterward the =George Tavern=. Northeast by Wing's Lane
(Elm Street), front or southeast by Dock Square. For an account of
Hudson's marital troubles, see Winthrop's _New England_, II. 249. Another
house of the same name is mentioned in 1675 and 1693. A still earlier name
was the "Blew Bell," 1673. It was in Mackerel Lane (Kilby Street), corner
of Liberty Square.
=Cole's Inn.= See the referred-to deed in _Proc. Am. Ant. Soc._, VII. p.
51. For the episode of Lord Leigh consult _Old Landmarks of Boston_, p.
109.
=Cromwell's Head=, by Anthony Brackett, 1760; by his widow, 1764-68; later
by Joshua Brackett. A two-story wooden house advertised to be sold, 1802.
=Crown Coffee-House.= First house on Long Wharf. Thomas Selby kept it
1718-24; Widow Anna Swords, 1749; then the property of Governor Belcher;
Belcher sold to Richard Smith, innholder, who in 1751 sold to Robert
Sherlock.
=Crown Tavern.= Widow Day's, head of Clark's Wharf; rendezvous for
privateersmen in 1745.
[Illustration: THE CROWN COFFEE HOUSE (Site of Fidelity Trust Building)]
=Cross Tavern=, corner of Cross and Ann Streets, 1732; Samuel Mattocks
advertises, 1729, two young bears "very tame" for sale at the _Sign of the
Cross_. Cross Street takes its name from the tavern. Perhaps the same as
the =Red Cross=, in Ann Street, mentioned in 1746, and then kept by John
Osborn. Men who had enlisted for the Canada expedition were ordered to
report there.
=Dog and Pot=, at the head of Bartlett's Wharf in Ann (North) Street, or,
as then described, Fish Street. Bartlett's Wharf was in 1722 next
northeast of Lee's shipyard.
=Concert Hall= was not at first a public house, but was built for, and
mostly used as, a place for giving musical entertainments, balls, parties,
etc., though refreshments were probably served in it by the lessee. A
"concert of musick" was advertised to be given there as early as 1755.
(See _Landmarks of Boston_.) Thomas Turner had a dancing and fencing
academy there in 1776. As has been mentioned, James Vila took charge of
Concert Hall in 1789. The old hall, which formed the second story, was
high enough to be divided into two stories when the building was altered
by later owners. It was of brick, and had two ornamental scrolls on the
front, which were removed when the alterations were made.
=Great Britain Coffee-House=, Ann Street, 1715. The house of Mr. Daniel
Stevens, Ann Street, near the drawbridge. There was another house of the
same name in Queen (Court) Street, near the Exchange, in 1713, where
"superfine bohea, and green tea, chocolate, coffee-powder, etc.," were
advertised.
=George=, or =St. George, Tavern=, on the Neck, near Roxbury line. (See
_Landmarks of Boston_.) Noted as early as 1721. Simon Rogers kept it
1730-34. In 1769 Edward Bardin took it and changed the name to the =King's
Arms=. Thomas Brackett was landlord in 1770. Samuel Mears, later. During
the siege of 1775 the tavern was burnt by the British, as it covered our
advanced line. It was known at that time by its old name of the _George_.
=Golden Ball.= Loring's Tavern, Merchants' Row, corner of Corn Court,
1777. Kept by Mrs. Loring in 1789.
=General Wolfe=, Town Dock, north side of Faneuil Hall, 1768. Elizabeth
Coleman offers for sale utensils of Brew-House, etc., 1773.
=Green Dragon=, also _Freemason's Arms_. By Richard Pullin, 1712; by Mr.
Pattoun, 1715; Joseph Kilder, 1734, who came from the =Three Cranes=,
Charlestown. John Cary was licensed to keep it in 1769; Benjamin Burdick,
1771, when it became the place of meeting of the Revolutionary Club. St.
Andrews Lodge of Freemasons bought the building before the Revolution, and
continued to own it for more than a century. See p. 46.
=Hancock House=, Corn Court; sign has Governor Hancock's portrait,--a
wretched daub; said to have been the house in which Louis Philippe lodged
during his short stay in Boston.
=Hat and Helmet=, by Daniel Jones; less than a quarter of a mile south of
the Town-House.