The prohibition proved to be more honored in the breach than in the

observance. Coffee drinking continued in secret, instead of in the open.

And when, about 1580, Amurath III, at the further solicitation of the

churchmen, declared in an edict that coffee should be classed with wine,

and so prohibited in accordance with the law of the Prophet, the people

only smiled, and persisted in their secret disobedience. Already they

were beginning to think for themselves on religious as well as political

matters. The civil officers, finding it useless to try to suppress the

custom, winked at violations of the law; and, for a consideration,

permitted the sale of coffee privately, so that many Ottoman

"speak-easies" sprung up--places where coffee might be had behind shut

doors; shops where it was sold in back-rooms.

This was enough to re-establish the coffee houses by degrees. Then came

a mufti less scrupulous or more knowing than his predecessor, who

declared that coffee was not to be looked upon as coal, and that the

drink made from it was not forbidden by the law. There was a general

renewal of coffee drinking; religious devotees, preachers, lawyers, and

the mufti himself indulging in it, their example being followed by the

whole court and the city.

After this, the coffee houses provided a handsome source of revenue to

each succeeding grand vizier; and there was no further interference with

the beverage until the reign of Amurath IV, when Grand Vizier Kuprili,

during the war with Candia, decided that for political reasons, the

coffee houses should be closed. His argument was much the same as that

advanced more than a hundred years later by Charles II of England,

namely, that they were hotbeds of sedition. Kuprili was a military

dictator, with nothing of Charles's vacillating nature; and although,

like Charles, he later rescinded his edict, he enforced it, while it was

effective, in no uncertain fashion. Kuprili was no petty tyrant. For a

first violation of the order, cudgeling was the punishment; for a second

offense, the victim was sewn in a leather bag and thrown into the

Bosporus. Strangely enough, while he suppressed the coffee houses, he

permitted the taverns, that sold wine forbidden by the _Koran_, to

remain open. Perhaps he found the latter produced a less dangerous kind

of mental stimulation than that produced by coffee. Coffee, says Virey,

was too intellectual a drink for the fierce and senseless administration

of the pashas.

Even in those days it was not possible to make people good by law.

Paraphrasing the copy-book, suppressed desires will arise, though all

the world o'erwhelm them, to men's eyes. An unjust law was no more

enforceable in those centuries than it is in the twentieth century. Men

are humans first, although they may become brutish when bereft of

reason. But coffee does not steal away their reason; rather, it sharpens

their reasoning faculties. As Galland has truly said: "Coffee joins men,

born for society, in a more perfect union; protestations are more

sincere in being made at a time when the mind is not clouded with fumes

and vapors, and therefore not easily forgotten, which too frequently

happens when made over a bottle."

[Illustration: CHARACTERISTIC SCENE IN A TURKISH COFFEE HOUSE OF THE

SEVENTEENTH CENTURY]

Despite the severe penalties staring them in the face, violations of the

law were plentiful among the people of Constantinople. Venders of the

beverage appeared in the market-places with "large copper vessels with

fire under them; and those who had a mind to drink were invited to step

into any neighboring shop where every one was welcome on such an

account."

Later, Kuprili, having assured himself that the coffee houses were no

longer a menace to his policies, permitted the free use of the beverage

that he had previously forbidden.

_Coffee and Coffee Houses in Persia_

Some writers claim for Persia the discovery of the coffee drink; but

there is no evidence to support the claim. There are, however,

sufficient facts to justify a belief that here, as in Ethiopia, coffee

has been known from time immemorial--which is a very convenient phrase.

At an early date the coffee house became an established institution in

the chief towns. The Persians appear to have used far more intelligence

than the Turks in handling the political phase of the coffee-house

question, and so it never became necessary to order them suppressed in

Persia.

The wife of Shah Abbas, observing that great numbers of people were wont

to gather and to talk politics in the leading coffee house of Ispahan,

appointed a mollah--an ecclesiastical teacher and expounder of the

law--to sit there daily to entertain the frequenters of the place with

nicely turned points of history, law, and poetry. Being a man of wisdom

and great tact, he avoided controversial questions of state; and so

politics were kept in the background. He proved a welcome visitor, and

was made much of by the guests. This example was generally followed, and

as a result disturbances were rare in the coffee houses of Ispahan.

Adam Olearius[38] (1599-1671), who was secretary to the German Embassy

that traveled in Turkey in 1633-36, tells of the great diversions made

in Persian coffee houses "by their poets and historians, who are seated

in a high chair from whence they make speeches and tell satirical

stories, playing in the meantime with a little stick and using the same

gestures as our jugglers and legerdemain men do in England."

At court conferences conspicuous among the shah's retinue were always to

be seen the "kahvedjibachi," or "coffee-pourers."

_Early Coffee Manners and Customs_

Karstens Niebuhr[39] (1733-1815), the Hanoverian traveler, furnishes the

following description of the early Arabian, Syrian, and Egyptian coffee

houses:

They are commonly large halls, having their floors spread with

mats, and illuminated at night by a multitude of lamps. Being the

only theaters for the exercise of profane eloquence, poor scholars

attend here to amuse the people. Select portions are read, _e.g._

the adventures of Rustan Sal, a Persian hero. Some aspire to the

praise of invention, and compose tales and fables. They walk up and

down as they recite, or assuming oratorial consequence, harangue

upon subjects chosen by themselves.

In one coffee house at Damascus an orator was regularly hired to

tell his stories at a fixed hour; in other cases he was more

directly dependant upon the taste of his hearers, as at the

conclusion of his discourse, whether it had consisted of literary

topics or of loose and idle tales, he looked to the audience for a

voluntary contribution.

At Aleppo, again, there was a man with a soul above the common,

who, being a person of distinction, and one that studied merely for

his own pleasure, had yet gone the round of all the coffee houses

in the city to pronounce moral harangues.

In some coffee houses there were singers and dancers, as before, and

many came to listen to the marvelous tales, of the _Thousand and One

Nights_.

In Oriental countries it was once the custom to offer a cup of "bad

coffee," i.e., coffee containing poison, to those functionaries or other

persons who had proven themselves embarrassing to the authorities.

While coffee drinking started as a private religious function, it was

not long after its introduction by the coffee houses that it became

secularized still more in the homes of the people, although for

centuries it retained a certain religious significance. Galland says

that in Constantinople, at the time of his visit to the city, there was

no house, rich or poor, Turk or Jew, Greek or Armenian, where it was not

drunk at least twice a day, and many drank it oftener, for it became a

custom in every house to offer it to all visitors; and it was considered

an incivility to refuse it. Twenty dishes a day, per person, was not an

uncommon average.

Galland observes that "as much money must be spent in the private

families of Constantinople for coffee as for wine at Paris," and relates

that it is as common for beggars to ask for money to buy coffee, as it

is in Europe to ask for money to buy wine or beer.

At this time to refuse or to neglect to give coffee to their wives was a

legitimate cause for divorce among the Turks. The men made promise when

marrying never to let their wives be without coffee. "That," says

Fulbert de Monteith, "is perhaps more prudent than to swear fidelity."

Another Arabic manuscript by Bichivili in the Bibliothéque Nationale at

Paris furnishes us with this pen picture of the coffee ceremony as

practised in Constantinople in the sixteenth century:

In all the great men's houses, there are servants whose business it

is only to take care of the coffee; and the head officer among

them, or he who has the inspection over all the rest, has an

apartment allowed him near the hall which is destined for the

reception of visitors. The Turks call this officer _Kavveghi_, that

is, Overseer or Steward of the Coffee. In the harem or ladies'

apartment in the seraglio, there are a great many such officers,

each having forty or fifty _Baltagis_ under them, who, after they

have served a certain time in these coffee-houses, are sure to be

well provided for, either by an advantageous post, or a sufficient

quantity of land. In the houses of persons of quality likewise,

there are pages, called _Itchoglans_, who receive the coffee from

the stewards, and present it to the company with surprising

dexterity and address, as soon as the master of the family makes a

sign for that purpose, which is all the language they ever speak to

them.... The coffee is served on salvers without feet, made

commonly of painted or varnished wood, and sometimes of silver.

They hold from 15 to 20 china dishes each; and such as can afford

it have these dishes half set in silver ... the dish may be easily

held with the thumb below and two fingers on the upper edge.

[Illustration: SERVING COFFEE TO A GUEST.--AFTER A DRAWING IN AN EARLY

EDITION OF "ARABIAN NIGHTS"]

In his _Relation of a Journey to Constantinople in 1657_, Nicholas

Rolamb, the Swedish traveler and envoy to the Ottoman Porte, gives us

this early glimpse of coffee in the home life of the Turks:[40]

This [coffee] is a kind of pea that grows in _Egypt_, which the

_Turks_ pound and boil in water, and take it for pleasure instead

of brandy, sipping it through the lips boiling hot, persuading

themselves that it consumes catarrhs, and prevents the rising of

vapours out of the stomach into the head. The drinking of this

coffee and smoking tobacco (for tho' the use of tobacco is

forbidden on pain of death, yet it is used in _Constantinople_ more

than any where by men as well as women, tho' secretly) makes up all

the pastime among the _Turks_, and is the only thing they treat one

another with; for which reason all people of distinction have a

particular room next their own, built on purpose for it, where

there stands a jar of coffee continually boiling.

It is curious to note that among several misconceptions that were held

by some of the peoples of the Levant was one that coffee was a promoter

of impotence, although a Persian version of the Angel Gabriel legend

says that Gabriel invented it to restore the Prophet's failing

metabolism. Often in Turkish and Arabian literature, however, we meet

with the suggestion that coffee drinking makes for sterility and

barrenness, a notion that modern medicine has exploded; for now we know

that coffee stimulates the racial instinct, for which tobacco is a

sedative.

[Illustration: THE FIRST PRINTED REFERENCE TO COFFEE, AS IT APPEARS IN

RAUWOLF'S WORK, 1582]

CHAPTER IV

INTRODUCTION OF COFFEE INTO WESTERN EUROPE

_When the three great temperance beverages, cocoa, tea, and coffee,

came to Europe--Coffee first mentioned by Rauwolf in 1582--Early

days of coffee in Italy--How Pope Clement VIII baptized it and made

it a truly Christian beverage--The first European coffee house, in

Venice, 1645--The famous Caffè Florian--Other celebrated Venetian

coffee houses of the eighteenth century--The romantic story of

Pedrocchi, the poor lemonade-vender, who built the most beautiful

coffee house in the world_

Of the world's three great temperance beverages, cocoa, tea, and coffee,

cocoa was the first to be introduced into Europe, in 1528, by the

Spanish. It was nearly a century later, in 1610, that the Dutch brought

tea to Europe. Venetian traders introduced coffee into Europe in 1615.

Europe's first knowledge of coffee was brought by travelers returning

from the Far East and the Levant. Leonhard Rauwolf started on his famous

journey into the Eastern countries from Marseilles in September, 1573,

having left his home in Augsburg, the 18th of the preceding May. He

reached Aleppo in November, 1573; and returned to Augsburg, February 12,

1576. He was the first European to mention coffee; and to him also

belongs the honor of being the first to refer to the beverage in print.

Rauwolf was not only a doctor of medicine and a botanist of great

renown, but also official physician to the town of Augsburg. When he

spoke, it was as one having authority. The first printed reference to

coffee appears as _chaube_ in chapter viii of _Rauwolf's Travels_, which

deals with the manners and customs of the city of Aleppo. The exact

passage is reproduced herewith as it appears in the original German

edition of Rauwolf published at Frankfort and Lauingen in 1582-83. The

translation is as follows:

If you have a mind to eat something or to drink other liquors,

there is commonly an open shop near it, where you sit down upon the

ground or carpets and drink together. Among the rest they have a

very good drink, by them called _Chaube_ [coffee] that is almost as

black as ink, and very good in illness, chiefly that of the

stomach; of this they drink in the morning early in open places

before everybody, without any fear or regard, out of _China_ cups,

as hot as they can; they put it often to their lips but drink but

little at a time, and let it go round as they sit.

In this same water they take a fruit called _Bunnu_ which in its

bigness, shape and color is almost like unto a bayberry, with two

thin shells surrounded, which, as they informed me, are brought

from the _Indies_; but as these in themselves are, and have within

them, two yellowish grains in two distinct cells, and besides,

being they agree in their virtue, figure, looks, and name with the

_Bunchum_ of _Avicenna_, and _Bunca_, of _Rasis ad Almans_ exactly;

therefore I take them to be the same, until I am better informed by

the learned. This liquor is very common among them, wherefore there

are a great many of them that sell it, and others that sell the

berries, everywhere in their _Batzars_.

_The Early Days of Coffee in Italy_

It is not easy to determine just when the use of coffee spread from

Constantinople to the western parts of Europe; but it is more than

likely that the Venetians, because of their close proximity to, and

their great trade with, the Levant, were the first acquainted with it.

Prospero Alpini (Alpinus; 1553-1617), a learned physician and botanist

of Padua, journeyed to Egypt in 1580, and brought back news of coffee.

He was the first to print a description of the coffee plant and drink in

his treatise _The Plants of Egypt_, written in Latin, and published in

Venice, 1592. He says:

I have seen this tree at Cairo, it being the same tree that

produces the fruit, so common in Egypt, to which they give the name

_bon_ or _ban_. The Arabians and the Egyptians make a sort of

decoction of it, which they drink instead of wine; and it is sold

in all their public houses, as wine is with us. They call this

drink _caova_. The fruit of which they make it comes from "Arabia

the Happy," and the tree that I saw looks like a spindle tree, but

the leaves are thicker, tougher, and greener. The tree is never

without leaves.

Alpini makes note of the medicinal qualities attributed to the drink by

dwellers in the Orient, and many of these were soon incorporated into

Europe's materia medica.

Johann Vesling (Veslingius; 1598-1649), a German botanist and traveler,

settled in Venice, where he became known as a learned Italian physician.

He edited (1640) a new edition of Alpini's work; but earlier (1638)

published some comments on Alpini's findings, in the course of which he

distinguished certain qualities found in a drink made from the husks

(skins) of the coffee berries from those found in the liquor made from

the beans themselves, which he calls the stones of the coffee fruit. He

says:

Not only in Egypt is coffee in much request, but in almost all the

other provinces of the Turkish Empire. Whence it comes to pass that

it is dear even in the Levant and scarce among the Europeans, who

by that means are deprived of a very wholesome liquor.

From this we may conclude that coffee was not wholly unknown in Europe

at that time. Vesling adds that when he visited Cairo, he found there

two or three thousand coffee houses, and that "some did begin to put

sugar in their coffee to correct the bitterness of it, and others made

sugar-plums of the berries."

_Coffee Baptized by the Pope_

Shortly after coffee reached Rome, according to a much quoted legend, it

was again threatened with religious fanaticism, which almost caused its

excommunication from Christendom. It is related that certain priests

appealed to Pope Clement VIII (1535-1605) to have its use forbidden

among Christians, denouncing it as an invention of Satan. They claimed

that the Evil One, having forbidden his followers, the infidel Moslems,

the use of wine--no doubt because it was sanctified by Christ and used

in the Holy Communion--had given them as a substitute this hellish black

brew of his which they called coffee. For Christians to drink it was to

risk falling into a trap set by Satan for their souls.

[Illustration: AN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY ITALIAN COFFEE HOUSE

After Goldoni, by Zatta]

It is further related that the pope, made curious, desired to inspect

this Devil's drink, and had some brought to him. The aroma of it was so

pleasant and inviting that the pope was tempted to try a cupful. After

drinking it, he exclaimed, "Why, this Satan's drink is so delicious that

it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it. We

shall fool Satan by baptizing it, and making it a truly Christian

beverage."

Thus, whatever harmfulness its opponents try to attribute to coffee, the

fact remains (if we are to credit the story) that it has been baptized

and proclaimed unharmful, and a "truly Christian beverage," by his

holiness the pope.

The Venetians had further knowledge of coffee in 1585, when

Gianfrancesco Morosini, city magistrate at Constantinople, reported to

the Senate that the Turks "drink a black water as hot as they can suffer

it, which is the infusion of a bean called _cavee_, which is said to

possess the virtue of stimulating mankind."

Dr. A. Couguet, in an Italian review, asserts that Europe's first cup of

coffee was sipped in Venice, toward the close of the sixteenth century.

He is of the opinion that the first berries were imported by Mocengio,

who was called the _pevere_, because he made a huge fortune trading in

spices and other specialties of the Orient.

In 1615 Pierre (Pietro) Delia Valle (1586-1652), the well known Italian

traveler and author of _Travels in India and Persia_, wrote a letter

from Constantinople to his friend Mario Schipano at Venice:

The Turks have a drink of black color, which during the summer is

very cooling, whereas in the winter it heats and warms the body,

remaining always the same beverage and not changing its substance.

They swallow it hot as it comes from the fire and they drink it in

long draughts, not at dinner time, but as a kind of dainty and

sipped slowly while talking with one's friends. One cannot find any

meetings among them where they drink it not.... With this drink,

which they call _cahue_, they divert themselves in their

conversations.... It is made with the grain or fruit of a certain

tree called _cahue_.... When I return I will bring some with me and

I will impart the knowledge to the Italians.

[Illustration: NOBILITY IN AN EARLY VENETIAN CAFFÈ

From the Grevembroch collection in the Museo Civico]

Della Valle's countrymen, however, were in a fair way to become well

acquainted with the beverage, for already (1615) it had been introduced

into Venice. At first it was used largely for medicinal purposes; and

high prices were charged for it. Vesling says of its use in Europe as a

medicine, "the first step it made from the cabinets of the curious, as

an exotic seed, being into the apothecaries' shops as a drug."

The first coffee house in Italy is said to have been opened in 1645, but

convincing confirmation is lacking. In the beginning, the beverage was

sold with other drinks by lemonade-venders. The Italian word

_aquacedratajo_ means one who sells lemonade and similar refreshments;

also one who sells coffee, chocolate, liquor, etc. Jardin says the

beverage was in general use throughout Italy in 1645. It is certain,

however, that a coffee shop was opened in Venice in 1683 under the

_Procuratie Nuove_. The famous Caffè Florian was opened in Venice by

Floriono Francesconi in 1720.

The first authoritative treatise devoted to coffee only appeared in

1671. It was written in Latin by Antoine Faustus Nairon (1635-1707),

Maronite professor of the Chaldean and Syrian languages in the College

of Rome.

During the latter part of the seventeenth century and the first half of

the eighteenth, the coffee house made great progress in Italy. It is

interesting to note that this first European adaptation of the Oriental

coffee house was known as a _caffè_. The double _f_ is retained by the

Italians to this day, and by some writers is thought to have been taken

from _coffea_, without the double _f_ being lost, as in the case of the

French and some other Continental forms.

To Italy, then, belongs the honor of having given to the Western world

the real coffee house, although the French and Austrians greatly

improved upon it. It was not long after its beginning that nearly every

shop on the Piazza di San Marco in Venice was a _caffè_[41]. Near the

Piazza was the Caffè della Ponte dell' Angelo, where in 1792 died the

dog Tabacchio, celebrated by Vincenzo Formaleoni in a satirical eulogy

that is a parody of the oration of Ubaldo Bregolini upon the death of

Angelo Emo.

In the Caffè della Spaderia, kept by Marco Ancilloto, some radicals

proposed to open a reading-room to encourage the spread of liberal

ideas. The inquisitors sent a foot-soldier to notify the proprietor that

he should inform the first person entering the room that he was to

present himself before their tribunal. The idea was thereupon abandoned.

[Illustration: GOLDONI IN A VENETIAN CAFFÈ

From a painting by P. Longhi]

Among other celebrated coffee houses was the one called Menegazzo, from

the name of the rotund proprietor, Menico. This place was much

frequented by men of letters; and heated discussions were common there

between Angelo Maria Barbaro, Lorenzo da Ponte, and others of their

time.

The coffee house gradually became the common resort of all classes. In

the mornings came the merchants, lawyers, physicians, brokers, workers,

and wandering venders; in the afternoons, and until the late hours of

the nights, the leisure classes, including the ladies.

For the most part, the rooms of the first Italian _caffè_ were low,

simple, unadorned, without windows, and only poorly illuminated by

tremulous and uncertain lights. Within them, however, joyous throngs

passed to and fro, clad in varicolored garments, men and women chatting

in groups here and there, and always above the buzz there were to be

heard such choice bits of scandal as made worthwhile a visit to the

coffee house. Smaller rooms were devoted to gaming.

In the "little square" described by Goldoni[42] in his comedy _The

Coffee House_, where the combined barber-shop and gambling house was

located, Don Marzio, that marvelous type of slanderous old romancer, is

shown as one typical of the period, for Goldoni was a satirist. The

other characters of the play were also drawn from the types then to be

seen every day in the coffee houses on the Piazza.

In the square of St. Mark's, in the eighteenth century, under the

_Procuratie Vecchie_, were the _caffè_ Re di Francia, Abbondanza, Pitt,

l'eroe, Regina d'Ungheria, Orfeo, Redentore, Coraggio-Speranza, Arco

Celeste, and Quadri. The last-named was opened in 1775 by Giorgio Quadri

of Corfu, who served genuine Turkish coffee for the first time in

Venice.

Under the _Procuratie Nuove_ were to be found the _caffè_ Angelo

Custode, Duca di Toscana, Buon genio-Doge, Imperatore Imperatrice della

Russia, Tamerlano, Fontane di Diana, Dame Venete, Aurora Piante d'oro,

Arabo-Piastrelle, Pace, Venezia trionfante, and Florian.

Probably no coffee house in Europe has acquired so world-wide a

celebrity as that kept by Florian, the friend of Canova the sculptor,

and the trusted agent and acquaintance of hundreds of persons in and out

of the city, who found him a mine of social information and a convenient

city directory. Persons leaving Venice left their cards and itineraries

with him; and new-comers inquired at Florian's for tidings of those whom

they wished to see. "He long concentrated in himself a knowledge more

varied and multifarious than that possessed by any individual before or

since," says Hazlitt[43], who has given us this delightful pen picture

of _caffè_ life in Venice in the eighteenth century:

Venetian coffee was said to surpass all others, and the article

placed before his visitors by Florian was the best in Venice. Of

some of the establishments as they then existed, Molmenti has

supplied us with illustrations, in one of which Goldoni the

dramatist is represented as a visitor, and a female mendicant is

soliciting alms.

So cordial was the esteem of the great sculptor Canova for him,

that when Florian was overtaken by gout, he made a model of his

leg, that the poor fellow might be spared the anguish of fitting

himself with boots. The friendship had begun when Canova was

entering on his career, and he never forgot the substantial

services which had been rendered to him in the hour of need.

In later days, the Caffè Florian was under the superintendence of a

female chef, and the waitresses used, in the case of certain

visitors, to fasten a flower in the button-hole, perhaps allusively

to the name. In the Piazza itself girls would do the same thing. A

good deal of hospitality is, and has ever been, dispensed at Venice

in the cafés and restaurants, which do service for the domestic

hearth.

There were many other establishments devoted, more especially in

the latest period of Venetian independence, to the requirements of

those who desired such resorts for purposes of conversation and

gossip. These houses were frequented by various classes of

patrons--the patrician, the politician, the soldier, the artist,

the old and the young--all had their special haunts where the

company and the tariff were in accordance with the guests. The

upper circles of male society--all above the actually

poor--gravitated hither to a man.

For the Venetian of all ranks the coffee house was almost the last

place visited on departure from the city, and the first visited on

his return. His domicile was the residence of his wife and the

repository of his possessions; but only on exceptional occasions

was it the scene of domestic hospitality, and rare were the

instances when the husband and wife might be seen abroad together,

and when the former would invite the lady to enter a café or a

confectioner's shop to partake of an ice.

[Illustration: FLORIAN'S FAMOUS CAFFÈ IN THE PIAZZA DI SAN MARCO,

VENICE, NINETEENTH CENTURY]

The Caffè Florian has undergone many changes, but it still survives as

one of the favorite _caffè_ in the Piazza San Marco.

By 1775 coffee-house history had begun to repeat itself in Venice.

Charges of immorality, vice, and corruption, were preferred against the

_caffè_; and the Council of Ten in 1775, and again in 1776, directed the

Inquisitors of State to eradicate these "social cankers." However, they

survived all attempts of the reformers to suppress them.

The Caffè Pedrocchi in Padua was another of the early Italian coffee

houses that became famous. Antonio Pedrocchi (1776-1852) was a

lemonade-vender who, in the hope of attracting the gay youth, the

students of his time, bought an old house with the idea of converting

the ground floor into a series of attractive rooms. He put all his ready

money and all he could borrow into the venture, only to find there were

no cellars, indispensable for making ices and beverages on the premises,

and that the walls and floors were so old that they crumbled when

repairs were started.

He was in despair; but, nothing daunted, he decided to have a cellar

dug. What was his surprise to find the house was built over the vault

of an old church, and that the vault contained considerable treasure.

The lucky proprietor found himself free to continue his trade of

lemonade-vender and coffee-seller, or to live a life of ease. Being a

wise man, he adhered to his original plan; and soon his luxurious rooms

became the favorite rendezvous for the smart set of his day. In this

period lemonade and coffee frequently went together. The Caffè Pedrocchi

is considered one of the finest pieces of architecture erected in Italy

in the nineteenth century. It was begun in 1816, opened in 1831, and

completed in 1842.

Coffee houses were early established in other Italian cities,

particularly in Rome, Florence, and Genoa.

In 1764, _Il Caffè_, a purely philosophical and literary periodical,

made its appearance in Milan, being founded by Count Pietro Verri

(1728-97). Its chief editor was Cesare Beccaria. Its object was to

counteract the influence and superficiality of the Arcadians. It

acquired its title from the fact that Count Verri and his friends were

wont to meet at a coffee house in Milan kept by a Greek named Demetrio.

It lived only two years.

Other periodicals of the same name appeared at later periods.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER V

THE BEGINNINGS OF COFFEE IN FRANCE

_What French travelers did for coffee--The introduction of coffee

by P. de la Roque into Marseilles in 1644--The first commercial

importation of coffee from Egypt--The first French coffee

house--Failure of the attempt by physicians of Marseilles to

discredit coffee--Soliman Aga introduces coffee into

Paris--Cabarets à caffè--Celebrated works on coffee by French

writers_

We are indebted to three great French travelers for much valuable

knowledge about coffee; and these gallant gentlemen first fired the

imagination of the French people in regard to the beverage that was

destined to play so important a part in the French revolution. They are

Tavernier (1605-89), Thévenot (1633-67), and Bernier (1625-88).

Then there is Jean La Roque (1661-1745), who made a famous "Voyage to

Arabia the Happy" (_Voyage de l'Arabie Heureuse_) in 1708-13 and to

whose father, P. de la Roque, is due the honor of having brought the

first coffee into France in 1644. Also, there is Antoine Galland

(1646-1715), the French Orientalist, first translator of the _Arabian

Nights_ and antiquary to the king, who, in 1699, published an analysis

and translation from the Arabic of the Abd-al-Kâdir manuscript (1587),

giving the first authentic account of the origin of coffee.

Probably the earliest reference to coffee in France is to be found in

the simple statement that Onorio Belli (Bellus), the Italian botanist

and author, in 1596 sent to Charles de l'Écluse (1526-1609), a French

physician, botanist and traveler, "seeds used by the Egyptians to make a

liquid they call _cave_.[44]"

P. de la Roque accompanied M. de la Haye, the French ambassador, to

Constantinople; and afterward traveled into the Levant. Upon his return

to Marseilles in 1644, he brought with him not only some coffee, but

"all the little implements used about it in Turkey, which were then

looked upon as great curiosities in France." There were included in the

coffee service some findjans, or china dishes, and small pieces of

muslin embroidered with gold, silver, and silk, which the Turks used as

napkins.

Jean La Roque gives credit to Jean de Thévenot for introducing coffee

privately into Paris in 1657, and for teaching the French how to use

coffee.

De Thévenot writes in this entertaining fashion concerning the use of

the drink in Turkey in the middle of the seventeenth century:

They have another drink in ordinary use. They call it _cahve_ and

take it all hours of the day. This drink is made from a berry

roasted in a pan or other utensil over the fire. They pound it into

a very fine powder.

When they wish to drink it, they take a boiler made expressly for

the purpose, which they call an _ibrik_; and having filled it with

water, they let it boil. When it boils, they add to about three

cups of water a heaping spoonful of the powder; and when it boils,

they remove it quickly from the fire, or sometimes they stir it,

otherwise it would boil over, as it rises very quickly. When it has

boiled up thus ten or twelve times, they pour it into porcelain

cups, which they place upon a platter of painted wood and bring it

to you thus boiling.

One must drink it hot, but in several instalments, otherwise it is

not good. One takes it in little swallows[45] for fear of burning

one's self--in such fashion that in a _cavekane_ (so they call the

places where it is sold ready prepared), one hears a pleasant

little musical sucking sound.... There are some who mix with it a

small quantity of cloves and cardamom seeds; others add sugar.

[Illustration: TITLE PAGE OF LA ROQUE'S WORK, 1716]

It was really out of curiosity that the people of France took to coffee,

says Jardin; "they wanted to know this Oriental beverage, so much

vaunted, although its blackness at first sight was far from attractive."

About the year 1660 several merchants of Marseilles, who had lived for a

time in the Levant and felt they were not able to do without coffee,

brought some coffee beans home with them; and later, a group of

apothecaries and other merchants brought in the first commercial

importation of coffee in bales from Egypt. The Lyons merchants soon

followed suit, and the use of coffee became general in those parts. In

1671 certain private persons opened a coffee house in Marseilles, near

the Exchange, which at once became popular with merchants and travelers.

Others started up, and all were crowded. The people did not, however,

drink any the less at home. "In fine," says La Roque, "the use of the

beverage increased so amazingly that, as was inevitable, the physicians

became alarmed, thinking it would not agree with the inhabitants of a

country hot and extremely dry."

[Illustration: THE COFFEE TREE AS PICTURED BY LA ROQUE IN HIS "VOYAGE DE

L'ARABIE HEUREUSE"]

The age-old controversy was on. Some sided with the physicians, others

opposed them, as at Mecca, Cairo, and Constantinople; only here the

argument turned mainly on the medicinal question, the Church this time

having no part in the dispute. "The lovers of coffee used the physicians

very ill when they met together, and the physicians on their side

threatened the coffee drinkers with all sorts of diseases."

[Illustration: A CLOSE-UP OF RIPE COFFEE BERRIES]

Matters came to a head in 1679, when an ingenious attempt by the

physicians of Marseilles to discredit coffee took the form of having a

young student, about to be admitted to the College of Physicians,

dispute before the magistrate in the town hall, a question proposed by

two physicians of the Faculty of Aix, as to whether coffee was or was

not prejudicial to the inhabitants of Marseilles.

The thesis recited that coffee had won the approval of all nations, had

almost wholly put down the use of wine, although it was not to be

compared even with the lees of that excellent beverage; that it was a

vile and worthless foreign novelty; that its claim to be a remedy

against distempers was ridiculous, because it was not a bean but the

fruit of a tree discovered by goats and camels; that it was hot and not

cold, as alleged; that it burned up the blood, and so induced palsies,

impotence, and leanness; "from all of which we must necessarily conclude

that coffee is hurtful to the greater part of the inhabitants of

Marseilles."

Thus did the good doctors of the Faculty of Aix set forth their

prejudices, and this was their final decision upon coffee. Many thought

they overreached themselves in their misguided zeal. They were handled

somewhat roughly in the disputation, which disclosed many false

reasonings, to say nothing of blunders as to matters of fact. The world

had already advanced too far to have another decision against coffee

count for much, and this latest effort to stop its onward march was of

even less force than the diatribes of the Mohammedan priests. The coffee

houses continued to be as much frequented as before, and the people

drank no less coffee in their homes. Indeed, the indictment proved a

boomerang, for consumption received such an impetus that the merchants

of Lyons and Marseilles, for the first time in history, began to import

green coffee from the Levant by the ship-load in order to meet the

increased demand.

Meanwhile, in 1669, Soliman Aga, the Turkish ambassador from Mohammed IV

to the court of Louis XIV, had arrived in Paris. He brought with him a

considerable quantity of coffee, and introduced the coffee drink, made

in Turkish style, to the French capital.

[Illustration: A COFFEE BRANCH WITH FLOWERS AND FRUIT AS ILLUSTRATED IN

LA ROQUE'S "VOYAGE DE L'ARABIE HEUREUSE"]

The ambassador remained in Paris only from July, 1669, to May, 1670, but

long enough firmly to establish the custom he had introduced. Two years

later, Pascal, an Armenian, opened his coffee-drinking booth at the fair

of St.-Germain, and this event marked the beginning of the Parisian

coffee houses. The story is told in detail in chapter XI.

The custom of drinking coffee having become general in the capital, as

well as in Marseilles and Lyons, the example was followed in all the

provinces. Every city soon had its coffee houses, and the beverage was

largely consumed in private homes. La Roque writes: "None, from the

meanest citizen to the persons of the highest quality, failed to use it

every morning or at least soon after dinner, it being the custom

likewise to offer it in all visits."

"The persons of highest quality" encouraged the fashion of having

_cabaréts à caffé_; and soon it was said that there could be seen in

France all that the East could furnish of magnificence in coffee houses,

"the china jars and other Indian furniture being richer and more

valuable than the gold and silver with which they were lavishly

adorned."

In 1671 there appeared in Lyons a book entitled _The Most Excellent

Virtues of the Mulberry, Called Coffee_, showing the need for an

authoritative work on the subject--a need that was ably filled that same

year and in Lyons by the publication of Philippe Sylvestre Dufour's

admirable treatise, _Concerning the Use of Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate_.

Again at Lyons, Dufour published (1684) his more complete work on _The

Manner of Making Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate_. This was followed (1715)

by the publication in Paris of Jean La Roque's _Voyage de l'Arabie

Heureuse_, containing the story of the author's journey to the court of

the king of Yemen in 1711, a description of the coffee tree and its

fruit, and a critical and historical treatise on its first use and

introduction to France.

La Roque's description of his visit to the king's gardens is interesting

because it shows the Arabs still held to the belief that coffee grew

only in Arabia. Here it is:

There was nothing remarkable in the King's Gardens, except the

great pains taken to furnish it with all the kinds of trees that

are common in the country; amongst which there were the coffee

trees, the finest that could be had. When the deputies represented

to the King how much that was contrary to the custom of the Princes

of Europe (who endeavor to stock their gardens chiefly with the

rarest and most uncommon plants that can be found) the King

returned them this answer: That he valued himself as much upon his

good taste and generosity as any Prince in Europe; the coffee tree,

he told them, was indeed common in his country, but it was not the

less dear to him upon that account; the perpetual verdure of it

pleased him extremely; and also the thoughts of its producing a

fruit which was nowhere else to be met with; and when he made a

present of that that came from his own Gardens, it was a great

satisfaction to him to be able to say that he had planted the trees

that produced it with his own hands.

The first merchant licensed to sell coffee in France was one Damame

François, a bourgeois of Paris, who secured the privilege through an

edict of 1692. He was given the sole right for ten years to sell coffees

and teas in all the provinces and towns of the kingdom, and in all

territories under the sovereignty of the king, and received also

authority to maintain a warehouse.

To Santo Domingo (1738) and other French colonies the café was soon

transported from the homeland, and thrived under special license from

the king.

In 1858 there appeared in France a leaflet-periodical, entitled _The

Café, Literary, Artistic, and Commercial_. Ch. Woinez, the editor, said

in announcing it: "The Salon stood for privilege, the Café stands for

equality." Its publication was of short duration.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VI

THE INTRODUCTION OF COFFEE INTO ENGLAND

_The first printed reference to coffee in English--Early mention of

coffee by noted English travelers and writers--The Lacedæmonian

"black broth" controversy--How Conopios introduced coffee drinking

at Oxford--The first English coffee house in Oxford--Two English

botanists on coffee_

English travelers and writers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

were quite as enterprising as their Continental contemporaries in

telling about the coffee bean and the coffee drink. The first printed

reference to coffee in English, however, appears as _chaoua_ in a note

by a Dutchman, Paludanus, in _Linschoten's Travels_, the title of an

English translation from the Latin of a work first published in Holland

in 1595 or 1596, the English edition appearing in London in 1598. A

reproduction made from a photograph of the original work, with the

quaint black-letter German text and the Paludanus notation in roman, is

shown herewith.

Hans Hugo (or John Huygen) Van Linschooten (1563-1611) was one of the

most intrepid of Dutch travelers. In his description of Japanese manners

and customs we find one of the earliest tea references. He says:

Their manner of eating and drinking is: everie man hath a table

alone, without table-clothes or napkins, and eateth with two pieces

of wood like the men of Chino: they drinke wine of Rice, wherewith

they drink themselves drunke, and after their meat they use a

certain drinke, which is a pot with hote water, which they drinke

as hote as ever they may indure, whether it be Winter or Summer.

Just here Bernard Ten Broeke Paludanus (1550-1633), Dutch savant and

author, professor of philosophy at the University of Leyden, himself a

traveler over the four quarters of the globe, inserts his note

containing the coffee reference. He says:

The Turks holde almost the same manner of drinking of their

_Chaona_[46], which they make of certaine fruit, which is like unto

the Bakelaer[47], and by the Egyptians called _Bon_ or _Ban_[48]:

they take of this fruite one pound and a half, and roast them a

little in the fire and then sieth them in twenty pounds of water,

till the half be consumed away: this drinke they take every morning

fasting in their chambers, out of an earthen pot, being verie hote,

as we doe here drinke _aquacomposita_[49] in the morning: and they

say that it strengtheneth and maketh them warme, breaketh wind, and

openeth any stopping.

Van Linschooten then completes his tea reference by saying:

The manner of dressing their meat is altogether contrarie unto

other nations: the aforesaid warme water is made with the powder of

a certaine hearbe called _Chaa_, which is much esteemed, and is

well accounted among them.

The _chaa_ is, of course, tea, dialect _t'eh_.

In 1599, "Sir" Antony (or Anthony) Sherley (1565-1630), a picturesque

gentleman-adventurer, the first Englishman to mention coffee drinking in

the Orient, sailed from Venice on a kind of self-appointed, informal

Persian mission, to invite the shah to ally himself with the Christian

princes against the Turks, and incidentally, to promote English trade

interests in the East. The English government knew nothing of the

arrangement, disavowed him, and forbade his return to England. However,

the expedition got to Persia; and the account of the voyage thither was

written by William Parry, one of the Sherley party, and was published in

London in 1601. It is interesting because it contains the first printed

reference to coffee in English employing the more modern form of the

word. The original reference was photographed for this work in the Worth

Library of the British Museum, and is reproduced herewith on page 39.

The passage is part of an account of the manners and customs of the

Turks (who, Parry says, are "damned infidells") in Aleppo. It reads:

They sit at their meat (which is served to them upon the ground) as

Tailers sit upon their stalls, crosse-legd; for the most part,

passing the day in banqueting and carowsing, untill they surfet,

drinking a certaine liquor, which they do call _Coffe_, which is

made of seede much like mustard seede, which will soone intoxicate

the braine like our Metheglin.[50]

Another early English reference to coffee, wherein the word is spelled

"coffa", is in Captain John Smith's book of _Travels and Adventure_,

published in 1603. He says of the Turks: "Their best drink is _coffa_ of

a graine they call _coava_."

This is the same Captain John Smith who in 1607 became the founder of

the Colony of Virginia and brought with him to America probably the

earliest knowledge of the beverage given to the new Western world.

Samuel Purchas (1527-1626), an early English collector of travels, in

_Purchas His Pilgrimes_, under the head of "Observations of William

Finch, merchant, at Socotra" (Sokotra--an island in the Indian Ocean) in

1607, says of the Arab inhabitants:

Their best entertainment is a china dish of _Coho_, a blacke

bitterish drinke, made of a berry like a bayberry, brought from

Mecca, supped off hot, good for the head and stomache.[51]

Still other early and favorite English references to coffee are those to

be found in the _Travels_ of William Biddulph. This work was published

in 1609. It is entitled _The Travels of Certayne Englishmen in Africa,

Asia, etc.... Begunne in 1600 and by some of them finished--this yeere

1608_. These references are also reproduced herewith from the

black-letter originals in the British Museum (see page 40).

Biddulph's description of the drink, and of the coffee-house customs of

the Turks, was the first detailed account to be written by an

Englishman. It also appears in _Purchas His Pilgrimes_ (1625). But, to

quote:

Their most common drinke is _Coffa_, which is a blacke kinde of

drinke, made of a kind of Pulse like Pease, called _Coaua_; which

being grownd in the Mill, and boiled in water, they drinke it as

hot as they can suffer it; which they finde to agree very well with

them against their crudities, and feeding on hearbs and rawe

meates. Other compounded drinkes they have, called _Sherbet_, made

of Water and Sugar, or Hony, with Snow therein to make it coole;

for although the Countrey bee hot, yet they keepe Snow all the

yeere long to coole their drinke. It is accounted a great curtesie

amongst them to give unto their frends when they come to visit

them, a Fin-ion or Scudella of _Coffa_, which is more holesome than

toothsome, for it causeth good concoction, and driveth away

drowsinesse.

Some of them will also drinke Bersh or Opium, which maketh them

forget themselves, and talk idely of Castles in the Ayre, as though

they saw Visions, and heard Revelations. Their _Coffa_ houses are

more common than Ale-houses in England; but they use not so much to

sit in the houses, as on benches on both sides the streets, neere

unto a Coffa house, every man with his Fin-ionful; which being

smoking hot, they use to put it to their Noses & Eares, and then

sup it off by leasure, being full of idle and Ale-house talke

whiles they are amongst themselves drinking it; if there be any

news, it is talked of there.

Among other early English references to coffee we find an interesting

one by Sir George Sandys (1577-1644), the poet, who gave a start to

classical scholarship in America by translating Ovid's _Metamorphoses_

during his pioneer days in Virginia. In 1610 he spent a year in Turkey,

Egypt, and Palestine, and records of the Turks:[52]

Although they be destitute of Taverns, yet have they their

Coffa-houses, which something resemble them. There sit they

chatting most of the day; and sippe of a drinke called Coffa (of

the berry that it is made of) in little _China_ dishes as hot as

they can suffer it: blacke as soote, and tasting not much unlike it

(why not that blacke broth which was in use amongst the

_Lacedemonians_?) which helpeth, as they say, digestion, and

procureth alacrity: many of the Coffa-men keeping beautifull boyes,

who serve as stales to procure them customers.

Edward Terry (1590-1660), an English traveler, writes, under date of

1616, that many of the best people in India who are strict in their

religion and drink no wine at all, "use a liquor more wholesome than

pleasant, they call coffee; made by a black Seed boyld in water, which

turnes it almost into the same colour, but doth very little alter the

taste of the water [!], notwithstanding it is very good to help

Digestion, to quicken the Spirits and to cleanse the Blood."

[Illustration#: FIRST PRINTED REFERENCE TO COFFEE IN ENGLISH, 1598

It appears as _Chaona_ (_chaoua_) in the second line of the roman text

notation by Paludanus]

In 1623, Francis Bacon (1561-1626), in his _Historia Vitae et Mortis_

says: "The Turkes use a kind of herb which they call _caphe_"; and, in

1624, in his _Sylva Sylvarum_[53] (published in 1627, after his death),

he writes:

They have in Turkey a drink called _coffa_ made of a berry of the

same name, as black as soot, and of a strong scent, but not

aromatical; which they take, beaten into powder, in water, as hot

as they can drink it: and they take it, and sit at it in their

coffa-houses, which are like our taverns. This drink comforteth the

brain and heart, and helpeth digestion. Certainly this berry coffa,

the root and leaf betel, the leaf tobacco, and the tear of poppy

(opium) of which the Turks are great takers (supposing it expelleth

all fear), do all condense the spirits, and make them strong and

aleger. But it seemeth they were taken after several manners; for

coffa and opium are taken down, tobacco but in smoke, and betel is

but champed in the mouth with a little lime.

Robert Burton (1577-1640), English philosopher and humorist, in his

_Anatomy of Melancholy_[54] writes in 1632:

The Turkes have a drinke called coffa (for they use no wine), so

named of a berry as blacke as soot and as bitter (like that blacke

drinke which was in use amongst the Lacedemonians and perhaps the

same), which they sip still of, and sup as warme as they can

suffer; they spend much time in those coffa-houses, which are

somewhat like our Ale-houses or Taverns, and there they sit,

chatting and drinking, to drive away the time, and to be merry

together, because they find, by experience, that kinde of drinke so

used, helpeth digestion and procureth alacrity.

Later English scholars, however, found sufficient evidence in the works

of Arabian authors to assure their readers that coffee sometimes breeds

melancholy, causes headache, and "maketh lean much." One of these, Dr.

Pocoke, (1659: see chapter III) stated that, "he that would drink it for

livelinesse sake, and to discusse slothfulnesse ... let him use much

sweet meates with it, and oyle of pistaccioes, and butter. Some drink it

with milk, but it is an error, and such as may bring in danger of the

leprosy." Another writer observed that any ill effects caused by coffee,

unlike those of tea, etc., ceased when its use was discontinued. In this

connection it is interesting to note that in 1785 Dr. Benjamin Mosely,

physician to the Chelsea Hospital, member of the College of Physicians,

etc., probably having in mind the popular idea that the Arabic original

of the word coffee meant force, or vigor, once expressed the hope that

the coffee drink might return to popular favor in England as "a cheap

substitute for those enervating teas and beverages which produce the

pernicious habit of dram-drinking."

About 1628, Sir Thomas Herbert (1606-1681), English traveler and writer,

records among his observations on the Persians that:

"They drink above all the rest _Coho_ or _Copha_: by Turk and Arab

called _Caphe_ and _Cahua_: a drink imitating that in the Stigian

lake, black, thick, and bitter: destrain'd from _Bunchy_, _Bunnu_,

or Bay berries; wholesome, they say, if hot, for it expels

melancholy ... but not so much regarded for those good properties,

as from a Romance that it was invented and brew'd by Gabriel ... to

restore the decayed radical Moysture of kind hearted Mahomet."[55]

In 1634, Sir Henry Blount (1602-82), sometimes referred to as "the

father of the English coffee house," made a journey on a Venetian galley

into the Levant. He was invited to drink _cauphe_ in the presence of

Amurath IV; and later, in Egypt, he tells of being served the beverage

again "in a porcelaine dish". This is how he describes the drink in

Turkey:[56]

They have another drink not good at meat, called _Cauphe_, made of

a _Berry_ as big as a small _Bean_, dried in a Furnace, and beat to

Pouder, of a Soot-colour, in taste a little bitterish, that they

seeth and drink as hot as may be endured: It is good all hours of

the day, but especially morning and evening, when to that purpose,

they entertain themselves two or three hours in _Cauphe-houses_,

which in all Turkey abound more than _Inns_ and _Ale-houses_ with

us; it is thought to be the old black broth used so much by the

_Lacedemonians_, and dryeth ill Humours in the stomach, comforteth

the Brain, never causeth Drunkenness or any other Surfeit, and is a

harmless entertainment of good Fellowship; for there upon Scaffolds

half a yard high, and covered with Mats, they sit Cross-leg'd after

the _Turkish_ manner, many times two or three hundred together,

talking, and likely with some poor musick passing up and down.

[Illustration: FIRST PRINTED REFERENCE TO "COFFEE" IN ENGLISH, IN ITS

MODERN FORM, 1601

Photographed from the black-letter original of W. Parry's book in the

Worth Library of the British Museum]

This reference to the Lacedæmonian black broth, first by Sandys, then

by Burton, again by Blount, and concurred in by James Howell

(1595-1666), the first historiographer royal, gave rise to considerable

controversy among Englishmen of letters in later years. It is, of

course, a gratuitous speculation. The black broth of the Lacedæmonians

was "pork, cooked in blood and seasoned with salt and vinegar.[57]"

[Illustration: REFERENCES TO COFFEE AS FOUND IN BIDDULPH'S TRAVELS 1609

From the black-letter original in the British Museum]

William Harvey (1578-1657), the famous English physician who discovered

the circulation of the blood, and his brother are reputed to have used

coffee before coffee houses came into vogue in London--this must have

been previous to 1652. "I remember", says Aubrey[58], "he was wont to

drinke coffee; which his brother Eliab did, before coffee houses were

the fashion in London." Houghton, in 1701, speaks of "the famous

inventor of the circulation of the blood, Dr. Harvey, who some say did

frequently use it."

Although it seems likely that coffee must have been introduced into

England sometime during the first quarter of the seventeenth century,

with so many writers and travelers describing it, and with so much

trading going on between the merchants of the British Isles and the

Orient, yet the first reliable record we have of its advent is to be

found in the _Diary and Correspondence of John Evelyn, F.R.S._[59],

under "Notes of 1637", where he says:

There came in my time to the college (Baliol, Oxford) one Nathaniel

Conopios, out of Greece, from Cyrill, the Patriarch of

Constantinople, who, returning many years after was made (as I

understand) Bishop of Smyrna. He was the first I ever saw drink

coffee; which custom came not into England till thirty years

thereafter.

Evelyn should have said thirteen years after; for then it was that the

first coffee house was opened (1650).

Conopios was a native of Crete, trained in the Greek church. He became

_primore_ to Cyrill, Patriarch of Constantinople. When Cyrill was

strangled by the vizier, Conopios fled to England to avoid a like

barbarity. He came with credentials to Archbishop Laud, who allowed him

maintenance in Balliol College.

It was observed that while he continued in Balliol College he made

the drink for his own use called Coffey, and usually drank it every

morning, being the first, as the antients of that House have

informed me, that was ever drank in Oxon.[60]

[Illustration: MOL'S COFFEE HOUSE, EXETER, ENGLAND, NOW WORTH'S ART

ROOMS]

In 1640 John Parkinson (1567-1650), English botanist and herbalist,

published his _Theatrum Botanicum_[61], containing the first botanical

description of the coffee plant in English, referred to as "_Arbor Bon

cum sua Buna._ The Turkes Berry Drinke".

His work being somewhat rare, it may be of historical interest to quote

the quaint description here:

Alpinus, in his Booke of Egiptian plants, giveth us a description

of this tree, which as hee saith, hee saw in the garden of a

certain Captaine of the _Ianissaries_, which was brought out of

_Arabia felix_ and there planted as a rarity, never seene growing

in those places before.

The tree, saith _Alpinus_, is somewhat like unto the _Evonymus_

Pricketimber tree, whose leaves were thicker, harder, and greener,

and always abiding greene on the tree; the fruite is called _Buna_

and is somewhat bigger then an Hazell Nut and longer, round also,

and pointed at the end, furrowed also on both sides, yet on one

side more conspicuous than the other, that it might be parted in

two, in each side whereof lyeth a small long white kernell, flat on

that side they joyne together, covered with a yellowish skinne, of

an acid taste, and somewhat bitter withall and contained in a

thinne shell, of a darkish ash-color; with these berries generally

in _Arabia_ and _Egipt_, and in other places of the _Turkes_

Dominions, they make a decoction or drinke, which is in the stead

of Wine to them, and generally sold in all their tappe houses,

called by the name of _Caova_; _Paludanus_ saith _Chaova_, and

_Rauwolfius_ _Chaube_.

This drinke hath many good physical properties therein; for it

strengthened a week stomacke, helpeth digestion, and the tumors and

obstructions of the liver and spleene, being drunke fasting for

some time together.

In 1650, a certain Jew from Lebanon, in some accounts Jacob or Jacobs by

name, in others Jobson[62], opened "at the Angel in the parish of St.

Peter in the East", Oxford, the earliest English coffee house and "there

it [coffee] was by some who delighted in noveltie, drank". Chocolate was

also sold at this first coffee house.

Authorities differ, but the confusion as to the name of the coffee-house

keeper may have arisen from the fact that there were two--Jacobs, who

began in 1650; and another, Cirques Jobson, a Jewish Jacobite, who

followed him in 1654.

The drink at once attained great favor among the students. Soon it was

in such demand that about 1655 a society of young students encouraged

one Arthur Tillyard, "apothecary and Royalist," to sell "coffey

publickly in his house against All Soules College." It appears that a

club composed of admirers of the young Charles met at Tillyard's and

continued until after the Restoration. This Oxford Coffee Club was the

start of the Royal Society.

Jacobs removed to Old Southhampton Buildings, London, where he was in

1671.

Meanwhile, the first coffee house in London had been opened by Pasqua

Rosée in 1652; and, as the remainder of the story of coffee's rise and

fall in England centers around the coffee houses of old London, we shall

reserve it for a separate chapter.

[Illustration: EARLY ENGLISH REFERENCE TO COFFEE BY SIR GEORGE SANDYS

From the seventh edition of _Sandys' Travels_, London, 1673]

Of course, the coffee-house idea, and the use of coffee in the home,

quickly spread to other cities in Great Britain; but all the coffee

houses were patterned after the London model. Mol's coffee house at

Exeter, Devonshire, which is pictured on page 41, was one of the first

coffee houses established in England, and may be regarded as typical of

those that sprang up in the provinces. It had previously been a noted

club house; and the old hall, beautifully paneled with oak, still

displays the arms of noted members. Here Sir Walter Raleigh and

congenial friends regaled themselves with smoking tobacco. This was one

of the first places where tobacco was smoked in England. It is now an

art gallery.

When the Bishop of Berytus (Beirut) was on his way to Cochin China in

1666, he reported that the Turks used coffee to correct the

indisposition caused in the stomach by the bad water. "This drink," he

says, "imitates the effect of wine ... has not an agreeable taste but

rather bitter, yet it is much used by these people for the good effects

they find therein."

In 1686, John Ray (1628-1704), one of the most celebrated of English

naturalists, published his _Universal History of Plants_, notable among

other things for being the first work of its kind to extol the virtues

of coffee in a scientific treatise.

R. Bradley, professor of botany at Cambridge, published (1714) _A Short

Historical Account of Coffee_, all trace of which appears to be lost.

Dr. James Douglas published in London (1727) his _Arbor Yemensis fructum

Cofe ferens; or, a description and History of the Coffee Tree_, in which

he laid under heavy contribution the Arabian and French writers that had

preceded him.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VII

THE INTRODUCTION OF COFFEE INTO HOLLAND

_How the enterprising Dutch traders captured the first world's

market for coffee--Activities of the Netherlands East India

Company--The first coffee house at the Hague--The first public

auction at Amsterdam in 1711, when Java coffee brought forty-seven

cents a pound, green_

The Dutch had early knowledge of coffee because of their dealings with

the Orient and with the Venetians, and of their nearness to Germany,

where Rauwolf first wrote about it in 1582. They were familiar with

Alpini's writings on the subject in 1592. Paludanus, in his coffee note

on _Linschoten's Travels_, furnished further enlightenment in 1598.

The Dutch were always great merchants and shrewd traders. Being of a

practical turn of mind, they conceived an ambition to grow coffee in

their colonial possessions, so as to make their home markets

headquarters for a world's trade in the product. In considering modern

coffee-trading, the Netherlands East India Company may be said to be the

pioneer, as it established in Java one of the first experimental gardens

for coffee cultivation.

The Netherlands East India Company was formed in 1602. As early as 1614,

Dutch traders visited Aden to examine into the possibilities of coffee

and coffee-trading. In 1616 Pieter Van dan Broeck brought the first

coffee from Mocha to Holland. In 1640 a Dutch merchant, named Wurffbain,

offered for sale in Amsterdam the first commercial shipment of coffee

from Mocha. As indicating the enterprise of the Dutch, note that this

was four years before the beverage was introduced into France, and only

three years after Conopios had privately instituted the breakfast coffee

cup at Oxford.

About 1650, Varnar, the Dutch minister resident at the Ottoman Porte,

published a treatise on coffee.

When the Dutch at last drove the Portuguese out of Ceylon in 1658, they

began the cultivation of coffee there, although the plant had been

introduced into the island by the Arabs prior to the Portuguese invasion

in 1505. However, it was not until 1690 that the more systematic

cultivation of the coffee plant by the Dutch was undertaken in Ceylon.

Regular imports of coffee from Mocha to Amsterdam began in 1663. Later,

supplies began to arrive from the Malabar coast.

Pasqua Rosée, who introduced the coffee house into London in 1652, is

said to have made coffee popular as a beverage in Holland by selling it

there publicly in 1664. The first coffee house was opened in the Korten

Voorhout, the Hague, under the protection of the writer Van Essen;

others soon followed in Amsterdam and Haarlem.

At the instigation of Nicolaas Witsen, burgomaster of Amsterdam and

governor of the East India Company, Adrian Van Ommen, commander of

Malabar, sent the first Arabian coffee seedlings to Java in 1696,

recorded in the chapter on the history of coffee propagation. These were

destroyed by flood, but were followed in 1699 by a second shipment, from

which developed the coffee trade of the Netherlands East Indies, that

made Java coffee a household word in every civilized country.

A trial shipment of the coffee grown near Batavia was received at

Amsterdam in 1706, also a plant for the botanical gardens. This plant

subsequently became the progenitor of most of the coffees of the West

Indies and America.

The first Java coffee for the trade was received at Amsterdam 1711. The

shipment consisted of 894 pounds from the Jakatra plantations and from

the interior of the island. At the first public auction, this coffee

brought twenty-three and two-thirds _stuivers_ (about forty-seven cents)

per Amsterdam pound.

The Netherlands East India Company contracted with the regents of

Netherlands India for the compulsory delivery of coffee; and the natives

were enjoined to cultivate coffee, the production thus becoming a forced

industry worked by government. A "general system of cultivation" was

introduced into Java in 1832 by the government, which decreed the

employment of forced labor for different products. Coffee-growing was

the only forced industry that existed before this system of cultivation,

and it was the only government cultivation that survived the abolition

of the system in 1905-08. The last direct government interest in coffee

was closed out in 1918. From 1870 to 1874, the government plantations

yielded an average of 844,854 piculs[63] a year; from 1875 to 1878, the

average was 866,674 piculs. Between 1879 and 1883, it rose to 987,682

piculs. From 1884 to 1888, the average annual yield was only 629,942

piculs.

Holland readily adopted the coffee house; and among the earliest coffee

pictures preserved to us is one depicting a scene in a Dutch coffee

house of the seventeenth century, the work of Adriaen Van Ostade

(1610-1675), shown on page 586.

History records no intolerance of coffee in Holland. The Dutch attitude

was ever that of the constructionist. Dutch inventors and artisans gave

us many new designs in coffee mortars, coffee roasters, and coffee

serving-pots.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VIII

THE INTRODUCTION OF COFFEE INTO GERMANY

_The contributions made by German travelers and writers to the

literature of the early history of coffee--The first coffee house

in Hamburg opened by an English merchant--Famous coffee houses of

old Berlin--The first coffee periodical, and the first

kaffee-klatsch--Frederick the Great's coffee-roasting

monopoly--Coffee persecutions--"Coffee-smellers"--The first coffee

king_

As we have already seen, Leonhard Rauwolf, in 1573, made his memorable

trip to Aleppo and, in 1582, won for Germany the honor of being the

first European country to make printed mention of the coffee drink.

Adam Olearius (or Oelschlager), a German Orientalist (1599-1671),

traveled in Persia as secretary to a German embassy in 1633-36. Upon his

return he published an account of his journeys. In it, under date of

1637, he says of the Persians:

They drink with their tobacco a certain black water, which they

call _cahwa_, made of a fruit brought out of Egypt, and which is in

colour like ordinary wheat, and in taste like Turkish wheat, and is

of the bigness of a little bean.... The Persians think it allays

the natural heat.

In 1637, Joh. Albrecht von Mandelsloh, in his _Oriental Trip_, mentions

"the black water of the Persians called _Kahwe_", saying "it must be

drunk hot."

Coffee drinking was introduced into Germany about 1670. The drink

appeared at the court of the great elector of Brandenburg in 1675.

Northern Germany got its first taste of the beverage from London, an

English merchant opening the first coffee house in Hamburg in 1679-80.

Regensburg followed in 1689; Leipsic, in 1694; Nuremberg, in 1696;

Stuttgart, in 1712; Augsburg, in 1713; and Berlin, in 1721. In that year

(1721) King Frederick William I granted a foreigner the privilege of

conducting a coffee house in Berlin free of all rental charges. It was

known as the English coffee house, as was also the first coffee house in

Hamburg. And for many years, English merchants supplied the coffees

consumed in northern Germany; while Italy supplied southern Germany.

Other well known coffee houses of old Berlin were, the Royal, in Behren

_Strasse_; that of the Widow Doebbert, in the Stechbahn; the City of

Rome, in Unter-den-Linden; Arnoldi, in Kronen _Strasse_; Miercke, in

Tauben _Strasse_, and Schmidt, in Post _Strasse_.

Later, Philipp Falck opened a Jewish coffee house in Spandauer

_Strasse_. In the time of Frederick the Great (1712-1786) there were at

least a dozen coffee houses in the metropolitan district of Berlin. In

the suburbs were many tents where coffee was served.

The first coffee periodical, _The New and Curious Coffee House_, was

issued in Leipsic in 1707 by Theophilo Georgi. The full title was _The

New and Curious Coffee House, formerly in Italy but now opened in

Germany. First water debauchery. "City of the Well." Brunnenstadt by

Lorentz Schoepffwasser_ [draw-water] 1707. The second issue gave the

name of Georgi as the real publisher. It was intended to be in the

nature of an organ for the first real German kaffee-klatsch. It was a

chronicle of the comings and goings of the savants who frequented the

"Tusculum" of a well-to-do gentleman in the outskirts of the city. At

the beginning the master of the house declared:

I know that the gentlemen here speak French, Italian and other

languages. I know also that in many coffee and tea meetings it is

considered requisite that French be spoken. May I ask, however,

that he who calls upon me should use no other language but German.

We are all Germans, we are in Germany; shall we not conduct

ourselves like true Germans?

In 1721 Leonhard Ferdinand Meisner published at Nuremberg the first

comprehensive German treatise on coffee, tea, and chocolate.

During the second half of the eighteenth century coffee entered the

homes, and began to supplant flour-soup and warm beer at breakfast

tables.

Meanwhile coffee met with some opposition in Prussia and Hanover.

Frederick the Great became annoyed when he saw how much money was paid

to foreign coffee merchants for supplies of the green bean, and tried to

restrict its use by making coffee a drink of the "quality". Soon all the

German courts had their own coffee roasters, coffee pots, and coffee

cups.

Many beautiful specimens of the finest porcelain cups and saucers made

in Meissen, and used at court fêtes of this period, survive in the

collections at the Potsdam and Berlin museums. The wealthy classes

followed suit; but when the poor grumbled because they could not afford

the luxury, and demanded their coffee, they were told in effect: "You

had better leave it alone. Anyhow, it's bad for you because it causes

sterility." Many doctors lent themselves to a campaign against coffee,

one of their favorite arguments being that women using the beverage must

forego child-bearing. Bach's _Coffee Cantata_[64] (1732) was a notable

protest in music against such libels.

On September 13, 1777, Frederick issued a coffee and beer manifesto, a

curious document, which recited:

It is disgusting to notice the increase in the quantity of coffee

used by my subjects, and the amount of money that goes out of the

country in consequence. Everybody is using coffee. If possible,

this must be prevented. My people must drink beer. His Majesty was

brought up on beer, and so were his ancestors, and his officers.

Many battles have been fought and won by soldiers nourished on

beer; and the King does not believe that coffee-drinking soldiers

can be depended upon to endure hardship or to beat his enemies in

case of the occurrence of another war.

[Illustration: RICHTER'S COFFEE HOUSE IN LEIPSIC--SEVENTEENTH CENTURY]

For a time beer was restored to its honored place; and coffee continued

to be a luxury afforded only by the rich. Soon a revulsion of feeling

set in; and it was found that even Prussian military rule could not

enforce coffee prohibition. Whereupon, in 1781, finding that all his

efforts to reserve the beverage for the exclusive court circles, the

nobility, and the officers of his army, were vain, the king created a

royal monopoly in coffee, and forbade its roasting except in royal

roasting establishments. At the same time, he made exceptions in the

cases of the nobility, the clergy, and government officials; but

rejected all applications for coffee-roasting licenses from the common

people. His object, plainly, was to confine the use of the drink to the

elect. To these representatives of the cream of Prussian society, the

king issued special licenses permitting them to do their own roasting.

Of course, they purchased their supplies from the government; and as the

price was enormously increased, the sales yielded Frederick a handsome

income. Incidentally, the possession of a coffee-roasting license became

a kind of badge of membership in the upper class. The poorer classes

were forced to get their coffee by stealth; and, failing this, they fell

back upon numerous barley, wheat, corn, chicory, and dried-fig

substitutes, that soon appeared in great numbers.

This singular coffee ordinance was known as the "_Déclaration du Roi

concernant la vente du café brûlé_", and was published January 21, 1781.

[Illustration: COFFEE HOUSE IN GERMANY--MIDDLE OF THE SEVENTEENTH

CENTURY]

After placing the coffee _regie_ (revenue) in the hands of a Frenchman,

Count de Lannay, so many deputies were required to make collections that

the administration of the law became a veritable persecution. Discharged

wounded soldiers were mostly employed, and their principal duty was to

spy upon the people day and night, following the smell of roasting

coffee whenever detected, in order to seek out those who might be found

without roasting permits. The spies were given one-fourth of the fine

collected. These deputies made themselves so great a nuisance, and

became so cordially disliked, that they were called "coffee-smellers" by

the indignant people.

Taking a leaf out of Frederick's book, the elector of Cologne,

Maximilian Frederick, bishop of Münster, (Duchy of Westphalia) on

February 17, 1784, issued a manifesto which said:

To our great displeasure we have learned that in our Duchy of

Westphalia the misuse of the coffee beverage has become so extended

that to counteract the evil we command that four weeks after the

publication of this decree no one shall sell coffee roasted or not

roasted under a fine of one hundred dollars, or two years in

prison, for each offense.

Every coffee-roasting and coffee-serving place shall be closed, and

dealers and hotel-keepers are to get rid of their coffee supplies

in four weeks. It is only permitted to obtain from the outside

coffee for one's own consumption in lots of fifty pounds. House

fathers and mothers shall not allow their work people, especially

their washing and ironing women, to prepare coffee, or to allow it

in any manner under a penalty of one hundred dollars.

All officials and government employees, to avoid a penalty of one

hundred gold florins, are called upon closely to follow and to keep

a watchful eye over this decree. To the one who reports such

persons as act contrary to this decree shall be granted one-half of

the said money fine with absolute silence as to his name.

This decree was solemnly read in the pulpits, and was published besides

in the usual places and ways. There immediately followed a course of

"telling-ons", and of "coffee-smellings", that led to many bitter

enmities and caused much unhappiness in the Duchy of Westphalia.

Apparently the purpose of the archduke was to prevent persons of small

means from enjoying the drink, while those who could afford to purchase

fifty pounds at a time were to be permitted the indulgence. As was to be

expected, the scheme was a complete failure.

While the king of Prussia exploited his subjects by using the state

coffee monopoly as a means of extortion, the duke of Württemberg had a

scheme of his own. He sold to Joseph Suess-Oppenheimer, an unscrupulous

financier, the exclusive privilege of keeping coffee houses in

Württemberg. Suess-Oppenheimer in turn sold the individual coffee-house

licenses to the highest bidders, and accumulated a considerable fortune.

He was the first "coffee king."

But coffee outlived all these unjust slanders and cruel taxations of too

paternal governments, and gradually took its rightful place as one of

the favorite beverages of the German people.

[Illustration: KOLSCHITZKY, THE GREAT BROTHER-HEART, IN HIS BLUE BOTTLE

CAFÉ, VIENNA, 1683

From a lithograph after the painting by Franz Schams, entitled "Das

Erste (Kulczycki'sche) Kaffee Haus"]

CHAPTER IX

TELLING HOW COFFEE CAME TO VIENNA

_The romantic adventure of Franz George Kolschitzky, who carried "a

message to Garcia" through the enemy's lines and won for himself

the honor of being the first to teach the Viennese the art of

making coffee, to say nothing of falling heir to the supplies of

the green beans left behind by the Turks; also the gift of a house

from a grateful municipality, and a statue after

death--Affectionate regard in which "brother-heart" Kolschitzky is

held as the patron saint of the Vienna kaffee-sieder--Life in the

early Vienna cafés_

A romantic tale has been woven around the introduction of coffee into

Austria. When Vienna was besieged by the Turks in 1683, so runs the

legend, Franz George Kolschitzky, a native of Poland, formerly an

interpreter in the Turkish army, saved the city and won for himself

undying fame, with coffee as his principal reward.

It is not known whether, in the first siege of Vienna by the Turks in

1529, the invaders boiled coffee over their camp fires that surrounded

the Austrian capital; although they might have done so, as Selim I,

after conquering Egypt in 1517, had brought with him to Constantinople

large stores of coffee as part of his booty. But it is certain that when

they returned to the attack, 154 years later, they carried with them a

plentiful supply of the green beans.

Mohammed IV mobilized an army of 300,000 men and sent it forth under his

vizier, Kara Mustapha, (Kuprili's successor) to destroy Christendom and

to conquer Europe. Reaching Vienna July 7, 1683, the army quickly

invested the city and cut it off from the world. Emperor Leopold had

escaped the net and was several miles away. Nearby was the prince of

Lorraine, with an army of 33,000 Austrians, awaiting the succor promised

by John Sobieski, king of Poland, and an opportunity to relieve the

besieged capital. Count Rudiger von Starhemberg, in command of the

forces in Vienna, called for a volunteer to carry a message through the

Turkish lines to hurry along the rescue. He found him in the person of

Franz George Kolschitzky, who had lived for many years among the Turks

and knew their language and customs.

On August 13, 1683, Kolschitzky donned a Turkish uniform, passed through

the enemy's lines and reached the Emperor's army across the Danube.

Several times he made the perilous journey between the camp of the

prince of Lorraine and the garrison of the governor of Vienna. One

account says that he had to swim the four intervening arms of the Danube

each time he performed the feat. His messages did much to keep up the

morale of the city's defenders. At length King John and his army of

rescuing Poles arrived and were consolidated with the Austrians on the

summit of Mount Kahlenberg. It was one of the most dramatic moments in

history. The fate of Christian Europe hung in the balance. Everything

seemed to point to the triumph of the crescent over the cross. Once

again Kolschitzky crossed the Danube, and brought back word concerning

the signals that the prince of Lorraine and King John would give from

Mount Kahlenberg to indicate the beginning of the attack. Count

Starhemberg was to make a sortie at the same time.

[Illustration: FRANZ GEORGE KOLSCHITZKY, PATRON SAINT OF VIENNA COFFEE

LOVERS]

The battle took place September 12, and thanks to the magnificent

generalship of King John, the Turks were routed. The Poles here rendered

a never-to-be-forgotten service to all Christendom. The Turkish invaders

fled, leaving 25,000 tents, 10,000 oxen, 5,000 camels, 100,000 bushels

of grain, a great quantity of gold, and many sacks filled with

coffee--at that time unknown in Vienna. The booty was distributed; but

no one wanted the coffee. They did not know what to do with it; that is,

no one except Kolschitzky. He said, "If nobody wants those sacks, I will

take them", and every one was heartily glad to be rid of the strange

beans. But Kolschitzky knew what he was about, and he soon taught the

Viennese the art of preparing coffee. Later, he established the first

public booth where Turkish coffee was served in Vienna.

This, then, is the story of how coffee was introduced into Vienna, where

was developed that typical Vienna café which has become a model for a

large part of the world. Kolschitzky is honored in Vienna as the patron

saint of coffee houses. His followers, united in the guild of coffee

makers (_kaffee-sieder_), even erected a statue in his honor. It still

stands as part of the facade of a house where the Kolschitzygasse merges

into the Favoritengasse, as shown in the accompanying picture.

Vienna is sometimes referred to as the "mother of cafés". Café Sacher is

world-renowned. Tart à la Sacher is to be found in every cook-book. The

Viennese have their "_jause_" every afternoon. When one drinks coffee at

a Vienna café one generally has a _kipfel_ with it. This is a

crescent-shaped roll--baked for the first time in the eventful year

1683, when the Turks besieged the city. A baker made these crescent

rolls in a spirit of defiance of the Turk. Holding sword in one hand and

_kipfel_ in the other, the Viennese would show themselves on top of

their redoubts and challenge the cohorts of Mohammed IV.

Mohammed IV was deposed after losing the battle, and Kara Mustapha was

executed for leaving the stores--particularly the sacks of coffee

beans--at the gates of Vienna; but Vienna coffee and Vienna _kipfel_ are

still alive, and their appeal is not lessened by the years.

[Illustration: THE FIRST COFFEE HOUSE IN THE LEOPOLDSTADT

From a cut so titled in Bermann's _Alt und Neu Wien_]

The hero Kolschitzky was presented with a house by the grateful

municipality; and there, at the sign of the Blue Bottle, according to

one account, he continued as a coffee-house keeper for many years.[65]

This, in brief, is the story that--although not authenticated in all

its particulars--is seriously related in many books, and is firmly

believed throughout Vienna.

It seems a pity to discredit the hero of so romantic an adventure; but

the archives of Vienna throw a light upon Kolschitzky's later conduct

that tends to show that, after all, this Viennese idol's feet were of

common clay.

It is said that Kolschitzky, after receiving the sacks of green coffee

left behind by the Turks, at once began to peddle the beverage from

house to house, serving it in little cups from a wooden platter. Later

he rented a shop in Bischof-hof. Then he began to petition the municipal

council, that, in addition to the sum of 100 ducats already promised him

as further recognition of his valor, he should receive a house with good

will attached; that is, a shop in some growing business section. "His

petitions to the municipal council", writes M. Bermann[66], "are amazing

examples of measureless self-conceit and the boldest greed. He seemed

determined to get the utmost out of his own self-sacrifice. He insisted

upon the most highly deserved reward, such as the Romans bestowed upon

their Curtius, the Lacedæmonians upon their Pompilius, the Athenians

upon Seneca, with whom he modestly compared himself."

At last, he was given his choice of three houses in the Leopoldstadt,

any one of them worth from 400 to 450 gulden, in place of the money

reward, that had been fixed by a compromise agreement at 300 gulden. But

Kolschitzky was not satisfied with this; and urged that if he was to

accept a house in full payment it should be one valued at not less than

1000 gulden. Then ensued much correspondence and considerable haggling.

To put an end to the acrimonious dispute, the municipal council in 1685

directed that there should be deeded over to Kolschitzky and his wife,

Maria Ursula, without further argument, the house known at that time as

30 (now 8) Haidgasse.

It is further recorded that Kolschitzky sold the house within a year;

and, after many moves, he died of tuberculosis, February 20, 1694, aged

fifty-four years. He was courier to the emperor at the time of his

death, and was buried in the Stefansfreithof Cemetery.

[Illustration: STATUE OF KOLSCHITZKY ERECTED BY THE COFFEE MAKERS GUILD

OF VIENNA]

Kolschitzky's heirs moved the coffee house to Donaustrand, near the

wooden Schlagbrücke, later known as Ferdinand's _brücke_ (bridge). The

celebrated coffee house of Franz Mosee (d. 1860) stood on this same

spot.

In the city records for the year 1700 a house in the

Stock-im-Eisen-Platz (square) is designated by the words "_allwo das

erste kaffeegewölbe_" ("here was the first coffee house").

Unfortunately, the name of the proprietor is not given.

Many stories are told of Kolschitzky's popularity as a coffee-house

keeper. He is said to have addressed everyone as _bruderherz_

(brother-heart) and gradually he himself acquired the name _bruderherz_.

A portrait of Kolschitzky, painted about the time of his greatest vogue,

is carefully preserved by the Innung der Wiener Kaffee-sieder (the

Coffee Makers' Guild of Vienna).

Even during the lifetime of the first _kaffee-sieder_, a number of

others opened coffee houses and acquired some little fame. Early in the

eighteenth century a tourist gives us a glimpse of the progress made by

coffee drinking and by the coffee-house idea in Vienna. We read:

The city of Vienna is filled with coffee houses, where the

novelists or those who busy themselves with the newspapers delight

to meet, to read the gazettes and discuss their contents. Some of

these houses have a better reputation than others because such

_zeitungs-doctors_ (newspaper doctors--an ironical title) gather

there to pass most unhesitating judgment on the weightiest events,

and to surpass all others in their opinions concerning political

matters and considerations.

All this wins them such respect that many congregate there because

of them, and to enrich their minds with inventions and foolishness

which they immediately run through the city to bring to the ears of

the said personalities. It is impossible to believe what freedom is

permitted, in furnishing this gossip. They speak without reverence

not only of the doings of generals and ministers of state, but also

mix themselves in the life of the Kaiser (Emperor) himself.

Vienna liked the coffee house so well that by 1839 there were eighty of

them in the city proper and fifty more in the suburbs.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER X

THE COFFEE HOUSES OF OLD LONDON

_One of the most picturesque chapters in the history of coffee--The

first coffee house in London--The first coffee handbill, and the

first newspaper advertisement for coffee--Strange coffee

mixtures--Fantastic coffee claims--Coffee prices and coffee

licenses--Coffee club of the Rota--Early coffee-house manners and

customs--Coffee-house keepers' tokens--Opposition to the coffee

house--"Penny universities"--Weird coffee substitutes--The proposed

coffee-house newspaper monopoly--Evolution of the club--Decline and

fall of the coffee house--Pen pictures of coffee-house life--Famous

coffee houses of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries--Some Old

World pleasure gardens--Locating the notable coffee houses_

The two most picturesque chapters in the history of coffee have to do

with the period of the old London and Paris coffee houses of the

seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Much of the poetry and romance of

coffee centers around this time.

"The history of coffee houses," says D'Israeli, "ere the invention of

clubs, was that of the manners, the morals and the politics of a

people." And so the history of the London coffee houses of the

seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is indeed the history of the

manners and customs of the English people of that period.

_The First London Coffee House_

"The first coffee house in London," says John Aubrey (1626-97), the

English antiquary and folklorist, "was in St. Michael's Alley, in

Cornhill, opposite to the church, which was sett up by one ... Bowman

(coachman to Mr. Hodges, a Turkey merchant, who putt him upon it) in or

about the yeare 1652. 'Twas about four years before any other was sett

up, and that was by Mr. Farr. Jonathan Paynter, over-against to St.

Michael's Church, was the first apprentice to the trade, viz., to

Bowman."[67]

Another account, for which we are indebted to William Oldys (1696-1761),

the bibliographer, relates that Mr. Edwards, a London merchant, acquired

the coffee habit in Turkey, and brought home with him from Ragusa, in

Dalmatia, Pasqua Rosée, an Armenian or Greek youth, who prepared the

beverage for him. "But the novelty thereof," says Oldys, "drawing too

much company to him, he allowed the said servant with another of his

son-in-law to set up the first coffee house in London at St. Michael's

Alley, in Cornhill."

From this it would appear that Pasqua Rosée had as partner in this

enterprise, the Bowman, who, according to Aubrey, was coachman to Mr.

Hodges, the son-in-law of Mr. Edwards, and a fellow merchant traveler.

Oldys tells us that Rosée and Bowman soon separated. John Timbs

(1801-1875), another English antiquary, says they quarreled, Rosée

keeping the house, and his partner Bowman obtaining leave to pitch a

tent and to sell the drink in St. Michael's churchyard.

Still another version of this historic incident is to be found in

_Houghton's Collection_, 1698. It reads:

It appears that a Mr. Daniel Edwards, an English merchant of

Smyrna, brought with him to this country a Greek of the name of

Pasqua, in 1652, who made his coffee; this Mr. Edwards married one

Alderman Hodges's daughter, who lived in Walbrook, and set up

Pasqua for a coffee man in a shed in the churchyard in St. Michael,

Cornhill, which is now a scrivener's brave-house, when, having

great custom, the ale-sellers petitioned the Lord Mayor against him

as being no freeman. This made Alderman Hodges join his coachman,

Bowman, who was free, as Pasqua's partner; but Pasqua, for some

misdemeanor, was forced to run the country, and Bowman, by his

trade and a contribution of 1000 sixpences, turned the shed to a

house. Bowman's apprentices were first, John Painter, then Humphry,

from whose wife I had this account.

This account makes it appear that Edwards was Hodges' son-in-law.

Whatever the relationship, most authorities agree that Pasqua Rosée was

the first to sell coffee publicly, whether in a tent or shed, in London

in or about the year 1652. His original shop-bill, or handbill, the

first advertisement for coffee, is in the British Museum, and from it

the accompanying photograph was made for this work. It sets forth in

direct fashion: "The Vertue of the _COFFEE_ Drink First publiquely made

and sold in England, by _Pasqua Rosée_ ... in St. _Michaels Alley_ in

_Cornhill_ ... at the Signe of his own Head."[68]

H.R. Fox Bourne[69] (about 1870) is alone in an altogether different

version of this historic event. He says:

"In 1652 Sir Nicholas Crispe, a Levant merchant, opened in London the

first coffee house known in England, the beverage being prepared by a

Greek girl brought over for the work."

There is nothing to substantiate this story; the preponderance of

evidence is in support of the Edwards-Rosée version.

Such then was the advent of the coffee house in London, which introduced

to English-speaking people the drink of democracy. Oddly enough, coffee

and the Commonwealth came in together. The English coffee house, like

its French contemporary, was the home of liberty.

Robinson, who accepts that version of the event wherein Edwards marries

Hodges's daughter, says that after the partners Rosée and Bowman

separated, and Bowman had set up his tent opposite Rosée, a zealous

partisan addressed these verses "To Pasqua Rosée, at the Sign of his own

Head and half his Body in St. Michael's Alley, next the first

Coffee-Tent in London":

Were not the fountain of my Tears

Each day exhausted by the steam

Of your Coffee, no doubt appears

But they would swell to such a stream

As could admit of no restriction

To see, poor Pasqua, thy Affliction.

What! Pasqua, you at first did broach

This Nectar for the publick Good,

Must you call Kitt down from the Coach

To drive a Trade he understood

No more than you did then your creed,

Or he doth now to write or read?

Pull Courage, Pasqua, fear no Harms

From the besieging Foe;

Make good your Ground, stand to your Arms,

Hold out this summer, and then tho'

He'll storm, he'll not prevail--your Face[70]

Shall give the Coffee Pot the chace.

Eventually Pasqua Rosée disappeared, some say to open a coffee house on

the Continent, in Holland or Germany. Bowman, having married Alderman

Hodges's cook, and having also prevailed upon about a thousand of his

customers to lend him sixpence apiece, converted his tent into a

substantial house, and eventually took an apprentice to the trade.

Concerning London's second coffee-house keeper, James Farr, proprietor

of the Rainbow, who had as his most distinguished visitor Sir Henry

Blount, Edward Hatton[71] says:

I find it recorded that one James Farr, a barber, who kept the

coffee-house which is now the Rainbow, by the Inner Temple Gate

(one of the first in England), was in the year 1657, prosecuted by

the inquest of St Dunstan's in the West, for making and selling a

sort of liquor called coffe, as a great nuisance and prejudice to

the neighborhood, etc., and who would then have thought London

would ever have had near three thousand such nuisances, and that

coffee would have been, as now, so much drank by the best of

quality and physicians?

[Illustration: FIRST ADVERTISEMENT FOR COFFEE--1652

Handbill used by Pasqua Rosée, who opened the first coffee house in

London From the original in the British Museum]

Hatton evidently attributed Fair's nuisance to the coffee itself,

whereas the presentment[72] clearly shows it was in Farr's chimney and

not in the coffee.

Mention has already been made that Sir Henry Blount was spoken of as

"the father of English coffee houses" and his claim to this distinction

would seem to be a valid one, for his strong personality "stamped itself

upon the system." His favorite motto, "_Loquendum est cum vulgo,

sentiendum cum sapientibus_" (the crowd may talk about it; the wise

decide it), says Robinson, "expresses well their colloquial purpose, and

was natural enough on the lips of one whose experience had been world

wide." Aubrey says of Sir Henry Blount, "He is now neer or altogether

eighty yeares, his intellectuals good still and body pretty strong."

Women played a not inconspicuous part in establishing businesses for the

sale of the coffee drink in England, although the coffee houses were not

for both sexes, as in other European countries. The London City

_Quaeries_ for 1660 makes mention of "a she-coffee merchant." Mary

Stringar ran a coffee house in Little Trinity Lane in 1669; Anne Blunt

was mistress of one of the Turk's-Head houses in Cannon Street in 1672.

Mary Long was the widow of William Long, and her initials, together with

those of her husband, appear on a token issued from the Rose tavern in

Bridge Street, Covent Garden. Mary Long's token from the "Rose coffee

house by the playhouse" in Covent Garden is shown among the group of

coffee-house keepers' tokens herein illustrated.

_The First Newspaper Advertisement_

The first newspaper advertisement for coffee appeared, May 26, 1657, in

the _Publick Adviser_ of London, one of the first weekly pamphlets. The

name of this publication was erroneously given as the _Publick

Advertiser_ by an early writer on coffee, and the error has been copied

by succeeding writers. The first newspaper advertisement was contained

in the issue of the _Publick Adviser_ for the week of May 19 to May 26,

and read:

In _Bartholomew_ Lane on the back side of the Old Exchange, the

drink called _Coffee_, (which is a very wholsom and Physical drink,

having many excellent vertues, closes the Orifice of the Stomack,

fortifies the heat within, helpeth Digestion, quickneth the

Spirits, maketh the heart lightsom, is good against Eye-sores,

Coughs, or Colds, Rhumes, Consumptions, Head-ach, Dropsie, Gout,

Scurvy, Kings Evil, and many others is to be sold both in the

morning, and at three of the clock in the afternoon).

Chocolate was also advertised for sale in London this same year. The

issue of the _Publick Adviser_ for June 16, 1657, contained this

announcement:

In Bishopgate Street, in Queen's Head Alley, at a Frenchman's house

is an excellent West India drink called chocolate, to be sold,

where you may have it ready at any time, and also unmade at

reasonable rates.

Tea was first sold publicly at Garraway's (or Garway's) in 1657.

_Strange Coffee Mixtures_

The doctors were loath to let coffee escape from the mysteries of the

pharmacopoeia and become "a simple and refreshing beverage" that any

one might obtain for a penny in the coffee houses, or, if preferred,

might prepare at home. In this they were aided and abetted by many

well-meaning but misguided persons (some of them men of considerable

intelligence) who seemed possessed of the idea that the coffee drink was

an unpleasant medicine that needed something to take away its curse, or

else that it required a complex method of preparation. Witness "Judge"

Walter Rumsey's _Electuary of Cophy_, which appeared in 1657 in

connection with a curious work of his called _Organon Salutis: an

instrument to cleanse the stomach_.[73] The instrument itself was a

flexible whale-bone, two or three feet long, with a small linen or silk

button at the end, and was designed to be introduced into the stomach to

produce the effect of an emetic. The electuary of coffee was to be taken

by the patient before and after using the instrument, which the "judge"

called his _Provang_. And this was the "judge's" "new and superior way

of preparing coffee" as found in his prescription for making electuary

of cophy:

Take equal quantity of Butter and Sallet-oyle, melt them well

together, but not boyle them: Then stirre them well that they may

incorporate together: Then melt therewith three times as much

Honey, and stirre it well together: Then add thereunto powder of

Turkish Cophie, to make it a thick Electuary.

A little consideration will convince any one that the electuary was most

likely to achieve the purpose for which it was recommended.

[Illustration: THE FIRST NEWSPAPER ADVERTISEMENT FOR COFFEE--1657]

Another concoction invented by the "judge" was known as "wash-brew",

and included oatmeal, powder of "cophie", a pint of ale or any wine,

ginger, honey, or sugar to please the taste; to these ingredients butter

might be added and any cordial powder or pleasant spice. It was to be

put into a flannel bag and "so keep it at pleasure like starch." This

was a favorite medicine among the common people of Wales.

The book contained in a prefix an interesting historical document in the

shape of a letter from James Howell (1595-1666) the writer and

historiographer, which read:

Touching coffee, I concurre with them in opinion, who hold it to be

that black-broth which was us'd of old in Lacedemon, whereof the

Poets sing; Surely it must needs be salutiferous, because so many

sagacious, and the wittiest sort of Nations use it so much; as they

who have conversed with Shashes and Turbants doe well know. But,

besides the exsiccant quality it hath to dry up the crudities of

the Stomach, as also to comfort the Brain, to fortifie the sight

with its steem, and prevent Dropsies, Gouts, the Scurvie, together

with the Spleen and Hypocondriacall windes (all which it doth

without any violance or distemper at all.) I say, besides all these

qualities, 'tis found already, that this Coffee-drink hath caused a

greater sobriety among the nations; for whereas formerly

Apprentices and Clerks with others, used to take their mornings'

draught in Ale, Beer or Wine, which by the dizziness they cause in

the Brain, make many unfit for business, they use now to play the

Good-fellows in this wakefull and civill drink: Therefore that

worthy Gentleman, Mr. Mudiford[74], who introduced the practice

hereof first to London, deserves much respect of the whole nation.

The coffee drink at one time was mixed with sugar candy, and also with

mustard. In the coffee houses, however, it was usually served black;

"few people then mixed it with either sugar or milk."

_Fantastic Coffee Claims_

One can not fail to note in connection with the introduction of coffee

into England that the beverage suffered most from the indiscretions of

its friends. On the one hand, the quacks of the medical profession

sought to claim it for their own; and, on the other, more or less

ignorant laymen attributed to the drink such virtues as its real

champions among the physicians never dreamed of. It was the favorite

pastime of its friends to exaggerate coffee's merits; and of its

enemies, to vilify its users. All this furnished good "copy" for and

against the coffee house, which became the central figure in each new

controversy.

From the early English author who damned it by calling it "more

wholesome than toothsome", to Pasqua Rosée and his contemporaries, who

urged its more fantastic claims, it was forced to make its way through a

veritable morass of misunderstanding and intolerance. No harmless drink

in history has suffered more at hands of friend and foe.

Did its friends hail it as a panacea, its enemies retorted that it was a

slow poison. In France and in England there were those who contended

that it produced melancholy, and those who argued it was a cure for the

same. Dr. Thomas Willis (1621-1673), a distinguished Oxford physician

whom Antoine Portal (1742-1832) called "one of the greatest geniuses

that ever lived", said he would sometimes send his patients to the

coffee house rather than to the apothecary's shop. An old broadside,

described later in this chapter, stressed the notion that if you "do but

this Rare ARABIAN cordial use, and thou may'st all the Doctors Slops

Refuse."

As a cure for drunkenness its "magic" power was acclaimed by its

friends, and grudgingly admitted by its foes. This will appear presently

in a description of the war of the broadsides and the pamphlets. Coffee

was praised by one writer as a deodorizer. Another (Richard Bradley), in

his treatise concerning its use with regard to the plague, said if its

qualities had been fully known in 1665, "Dr. Hodges and other learned

men of that time would have recommended it." As a matter of fact, in

Gideon Harvey's _Advice against the Plague_, published in 1665, we find,

"coffee is commended against the contagion."

This is how the drink's sobering virtue was celebrated by the author of

the _Rebellious Antidote_:

Come, Frantick Fools, leave off your Drunken fits.

Obsequious be and I'll recall your Wits,

From perfect Madness to a modest Strain

For farthings four I'll fetch you back again,

Enable all your mene with tricks of State,

Enter and sip and then attend your Fate;

Come Drunk or Sober, for a gentle Fee,

Come n'er so Mad, I'll your Physician be.

Dr. Willis, in his _Pharmaceutice Rationalis_ (1674), was one of the

first to attempt to do justice to both sides of the coffee question. At

best, he thought it a somewhat risky beverage, and its votaries must,

in some cases, be prepared to suffer languor and even paralysis; it may

attack the heart and cause tremblings in the limbs. On the other hand it

may, if judiciously used, prove a marvelous benefit; "being daily drunk

it wonderfully clears and enlightens each part of the Soul and disperses

all the clouds of every Function."

It was a long time before recognition was obtained for the truth about

the "novelty drink"; especially that, if there were any beyond purely

social virtues to be found in coffee, they were "political rather than

medical."

Dr. James Duncan, of the Faculty of Montpellier, in his book _Wholesome

Advice against the Abuse of Hot Liquors_, done into English in 1706,

found coffee no more deserving of the name of panacea than that of

poison.

George Cheyne (1671-1743), the noted British physician, proclaimed his

neutrality in the words, "I have neither great praise nor bitter blame

for the thing."

_Coffee Prices and Coffee Licenses_

Coffee, with tea and chocolate, was first mentioned in the English

Statute books in 1660, when a duty of four pence was laid upon every

gallon made and sold, "to be paid by the maker." Coffee was classed by

the House of Commons with "other outlandish drinks."

It is recorded in 1662 that "the right coffee powder" was being sold at

the Turk's Head coffee house in Exchange Alley for "4s. to 6s. 8d. per

pound; that pounded in a mortar, 2s; East India berry, 1s. 6d.; and the

right Turkie berry, well garbled [ground] at 3s. The ungarbled [in the

bean] for less with directions how to use the same." Chocolate was also

to be had at "2s. 6d. the pound; the perfumed from 4s. to 10s."

At one time coffee sold for five guineas a pound in England, and even

forty crowns (about forty-eight dollars) a pound was paid for it.

In 1663, all English coffee houses were required to be licensed; the fee

was twelve pence. Failure to obtain a license was punished by a fine of

five pounds for every month's violation of the law. The coffee houses

were under close surveillance by government officials. One of these was

Muddiman, a good scholar and an "arch rogue", who had formerly "written

for the Parliament" but who later became a paid spy. L'Estrange, who had

a patent on "the sole right of intelligence", wrote in his

_Intelligencer_ that he was alarmed at the ill effects of "the ordinary

written papers of Parliament's news ... making coffee houses and all the

popular clubs judges of those councils and deliberations which they have

nothing to do with at all."

The first royal warrant for coffee was given by Charles II to Alexander

Man, a Scotsman who had followed General Monk to London, and set up in

Whitehall. Here he advertised himself as "coffee man to Charles II."

Owing to increased taxes on tea, coffee, and newspapers, near the end of

Queen Anne's reign (1714) coffee-house keepers generally raised their

prices as follows: Coffee, two pence per dish; green tea, one and a half

pence per dish. All drams, two pence per dram. At retail, coffee was

then sold for five shillings per pound; while tea brought from twelve to

twenty-eight shillings per pound.

_Coffee Club of The Rota_

"Coffee and Commonwealth", says a pamphleteer of 1665, "came in together

for a Reformation, to make 's a free and sober nation." The writer

argues that liberty of speech should be allowed, "where men of differing

judgements croud"; and he adds, "that's a coffee-house, for where should

men discourse so free as there?" Robinson's comments are apt:

Now perhaps we do not always connect the ideas of sociableness and

freedom of discussion with the days of Puritan rule; yet it must be

admitted that something like geniality and openness characterized

what Pepys calls the Coffee Club of the Rota. This "free and open

Society of ingenious gentlemen" was founded in the year 1659 by

certain members of the Republican party, whose peculiar opinions

had been timidly expressed and not very cordially tolerated under

the Great Oliver. By the weak Government that followed, these views

were regarded with extreme dislike and with some amount of terror.

"They met", says Aubrey, who was himself of their number, "at the Turk's

Head [Miles's coffee house] in New Palace Yard, Westminster, where they

take water, at one Miles's, the next house to the staires, where was

made purposely a large ovall table, with a passage in the middle for

Miles to deliver his coffee."

Robinson continues:

This curious refreshment bar and the interest with which the

beverage itself was regarded, were quite secondary to the

excitement caused by another novelty. When, after heated

disputation, a member desired to test the opinion of the meeting,

any particular point might, by agreement, be put to the vote and

then everything depended upon "our wooden oracle," the first

balloting-box ever seen in England. Formal methods of procedure and

the intensely practical nature of the subjects discussed, combined

to give a real importance to this Amateur Parliament.

[Illustration: A COFFEE HOUSE IN THE TIME OF CHARLES II

From a wood cut of 1674]

The Rota, or Coffee Club, as Pepys called it, was essentially a debating

society for the dissemination of republican opinions. It was preceded

only, in the reign of Henry IV, by the club called La Court de Bone

Compagnie; by Sir Walter Raleigh's Friday Street, or Bread Street, club;

the club at the Mermaid tavern in Bread Street, of which Shakespeare,

Beaumont, Fletcher, Raleigh, Selden, Donne, _et al._, were members; and

"rare" Ben Jonson's Devil tavern club, between Middle Temple Gate and

Temple Bar.

The Rota derived its name from a plan, which it was designed to promote,

for changing a certain number of members of parliament annually by

rotation. It was founded by James Harrington, who had painted it in

fairest colors in his _Oceana_, that ideal commonwealth.

Sir William Petty was one of its members. Around the table, "in a room

every evening as full as it could be crammed," says Aubrey, sat Milton

(?) and Marvell, Cyriac Skinner, Harrington, Nevill, and their friends,

discussing abstract political questions.

The Rota became famous for its literary strictures. Among these was "The

censure of the Rota upon Mr. Milton's book entitled _The ready and easie

way to establish a free commonwealth_" (1660), although it is doubtful

if Milton was ever a visitor to this "bustling coffee club." The Rota

also censured "Mr. Driden's _Conquest of Granada_" (1673).

_Early Coffee-House Manners and Customs_

Among many of the early coffee-house keepers there was great anxiety

that the coffee house, open to high and low, should be conducted under

such restraints as might secure the better class of customers from

annoyance. The following set of regulations in somewhat halting rhyme

was displayed on the walls of several of the coffee houses in the

seventeenth century:

THE RULES AND ORDERS OF THE COFFEE HOUSE.

Enter, Sirs, freely, but first, if you please,

Peruse our civil orders, which are these.

First, gentry, tradesmen, all are welcome hither,

And may without affront sit down together:

Pre-eminence of place none here should mind,

But take the next fit seat that he can find:

Nor need any, if finer persons come,

Rise up to assigne to them his room;

To limit men's expence, we think not fair,

But let him forfeit twelve-pence that shall swear;

He that shall any quarrel here begin,

Shall give each man a dish t' atone the sin;

And so shall he, whose compliments extend

So far to drink in _coffee_ to his friend;

Let noise of loud disputes be quite forborne,

No maudlin lovers here in corners mourn,

But all be brisk and talk, but not too much,

On sacred things, let none presume to touch.

Nor profane Scripture, nor sawcily wrong

Affairs of state with an irreverent tongue:

Let mirth be innocent, and each man see

That all his jests without reflection be;

To keep the house more quiet and from blame,

We banish hence cards, dice, and every game;

Nor can allow of wagers, that exceed

Five shillings, which ofttimes much trouble breed;

Let all that's lost or forfeited be spent

In such good liquor as the house doth vent.

And customers endeavour, to their powers,

For to observe still, seasonable hours.

Lastly, let each man what he calls for pay,

And so you're welcome to come every day.

The early coffee houses were often up a flight of stairs, and consisted

of a single large room with "tables set apart for divers topics." There

is a reference to this in the prologue to a comedy of 1681 (quoted by

Malone):

In a coffee house just now among the rabble

I bluntly asked, which is the treason table?

This was the arrangement at Man's and others favored by the wits, the

_literati_, and "men of fashionable instincts." In the distinctly

business coffee houses separate rooms were provided at a later time for

mercantile transactions. The introduction of wooden partitions--wooden

boxes, as at a tavern--was also of somewhat later date.

A print of 1674 shows five persons of different ranks in life, one of

them smoking, sitting on chairs around a coffee-house table, on which

are small basins, or dishes, without saucers, and tobacco pipes, while a

coffee boy is serving coffee.

In the beginning, only coffee was dispensed in the English coffee

houses. Soon chocolate, sherbert, and tea were added; but the places

still maintained their status as social and temperance factors.

Constantine Jennings (or George Constantine) of the Grecian advertised

chocolate, sherbert and tea at retail in 1664-65; also free instruction

in the part of preparing these liquors. "Drams and cordial waters were

to be had only at coffee houses newly set up," says Elford the younger,

writing about 1689. "While some few places added ale and beer as early

as 1669, intoxicating liquors were not items of importance for many

years."

[Illustration: A LONDON COFFEE HOUSE OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

From a wood cut of the period]

After the fire of 1666, many new coffee houses were opened that were not

limited to a single room up a flight of stairs. Because the coffee-house

keepers over-emphasized the sobering qualities of the coffee drink, they

drew many undesirable characters from the taverns and ale houses after

the nine o'clock closing hour. These were hardly calculated to improve

the reputation of the coffee houses; and, indeed, the decline of the

coffee houses as a temperance institution would seem to trace back to

this attitude of false pity for the victims of tavern vices, evils that

many of the coffee houses later on embraced to their own undoing. The

early institution was unique, its distinctive features being unlike

those of any public house in England or on the Continent. Later on, in

the eighteenth century, when these distinctive features became

obscured, the name coffee house became a misnomer.

[Illustration: COFFEE HOUSE, QUEEN ANNE'S TIME--1702-14

Showing coffee pots, coffee dishes, and coffee boy]

However, Robinson says, "the close intercourse between the habitués of

the coffee house, before it lost anything of its generous social

traditions and whilst the issue of the struggle for political liberty

was as yet uncertain, was to lead to something more than a mere jumbling

or huddling together of opposites. The diverse elements gradually united

in the bonds of common sympathy, or were forcibly combined by

persecution from without until there resulted a social, political and

moral force of almost irresistible strength."

_Coffee-House Keepers' Tokens_

The great London fire of 1666 destroyed some of the coffee houses; but

prominent among those that survived was the Rainbow, whose proprietor,

James Farr, issued one of the earliest coffee-house tokens, doubtless in

grateful memory of his escape. Farr's token shows an arched rainbow

emerging from the clouds of the "great fire," indicating that all was

well with him, and the Rainbow still radiant. On the reverse the medal

was inscribed, "In Fleet Street--His Half Penny."

A large number of these trade coins were put out by coffee-house keepers

and other tradesmen in the seventeenth century as evidence of an amount

due, as stated thereon, by the issuer to the holder. Tokens originated

because of the scarcity of small change. They were of brass, copper,

pewter, and even leather, gilded. They bore the name, address, and

calling of the issuer, the nominal value of the piece, and some

reference to his trade. They were readily redeemed, on presentation, at

their face value. They were passable in the immediate neighborhood,

seldom reaching farther than the next street. C.G. Williamson writes:

Tokens are essentially democratic; they would never have been

issued but for the indifference of the Government to a public need;

and in them we have a remarkable instance of a people forcing a

legislature to comply with demands at once reasonable and

imperative. Taken as a whole series, they are homely and quaint,

wanting in beauty, but not without a curious domestic art of their

own.

Robinson finds an exception to the general simplicity in the tokens

issued by one of the Exchange Alley houses. The dies of these tokens are

such as to have suggested the skilled workmanship of John Roettier. The

most ornate has the head of a Turkish sultan at that time famed for his

horrible deeds, ending in suicide; its inscription runs:

Morat ye Great Men did mee call;

Where Eare I came I conquer'd all.

A number of the most interesting coffee-house keepers' tokens in the

Beaufoy collection in the Guildhall Museum were photographed for this

work, and are shown herewith. It will be observed that many of the

traders of 1660-75 adopted as their trade sign a hand pouring coffee

from a pot, invariably of the Turkish-ewer pattern. Morat (Amurath) and

Soliman were frequent coffee-house signs in the seventeenth century.

J.H. Burn, in his _Catalogue of Traders' Tokens_, recites that in 1672

"divers persons who presumed ... to stamp, coin, exchange and distribute

farthings, halfpence and pence of brass and copper" were "taken into

custody, in order to a severe prosecution"; but upon submission, their

offenses were forgiven, and it was not until the year 1675 that the

private token ceased to pass current.

[Illustration: PLATE 1--COFFEE-HOUSE KEEPERS' TOKENS OF THE 17TH

CENTURY

Drawn for this work from the originals in the British Museum, and in the

Beaufoy collection at the Guildhall Museum]

A royal proclamation at the close of 1674 enjoined the prosecution of

any who should "utter base metals with private stamps," or "hinder the

vending of those half pence and farthings which are provided for

necessary exchange." After this, tokens were issued stamped "necessary

change."

[Illustration: A BROAD-SIDE OF 1663]

_Opposition to the Coffee House_

It is easy to see why the coffee houses at once found favor among men of

intelligence in all classes. Until they came, the average Englishman had

only the tavern as a place of common resort. But here was a public house

offering a non-intoxicating beverage, and its appeal was instant and

universal. As a meeting place for the exchange of ideas it soon attained

wide popularity. But not without opposition. The publicans and ale-house

keepers, seeing business slipping away from them, made strenuous

propaganda against this new social center; and not a few attacks were

launched against the coffee drink. Between the Restoration and the year

1675, of eight tracts written upon the subject of the London coffee

houses, four have the words "character of a coffee house" as part of

their titles. The authors appear eager to impart a knowledge of the

town's latest novelty, with which many readers were unacquainted.

One of these early pamphlets (1662) was entitled _The Coffee Scuffle_,

and professed to give a dialogue between "a learned knight and a

pitifull pedagogue," and contained an amusing account of a house where

the Puritan element was still in the ascendant. A numerous company is

present, and each little group being occupied with its own subject, the

general effect is that of another Babel. While one is engaged in quoting

the classics, another confides to his neighbors how much he admires

Euclid;

A third's for a lecture, a fourth a conjecture,

A fifth for a penny in the pound.

Theology is introduced. Mask balls and plays are condemned. Others again

discuss the news, and are deep in the store of "mercuries" here to be

found. One cries up philosophy. Pedantry is rife, and for the most part

unchecked, when each 'prentice-boy "doth call for his coffee in Latin"

and all are so prompt with their learned quotations that "'t would make

a poor Vicar to tremble."

The first noteworthy effort attacking the coffee drink was a satirical

broadside that appeared in 1663. It was entitled _A Cup of Coffee: or,

Coffee in its Colours_. It said:

For men and Christians to turn Turks, and think

T'excuse the Crime because 'tis in their drink,

Is more than Magick....

Pure English Apes! Ye may, for ought I know,

Would it but mode, learn to eat Spiders too.

The writer wonders that any man should prefer coffee to canary, and

refers to the days of Beaumont, Fletcher, and Ben Jonson. He says:

They drank pure nectar as the gods drink too,

Sublim'd with rich Canary....

shall then

These less than coffee's self, these coffee-men,

These sons of nothing, that can hardly make

Their Broth, for laughing how the jest doth take;

Yet grin, and give ye for the Vine's pure Blood

A loathsome potion, not yet understood,

Syrrop of soot, or Essence of old Shooes,

Dasht with Diurnals and the Books of news?

The author of _A Cup of Coffee_, it will be seen, does not shrink from

using epithets.

[Illustration: PLATE 2--COFFEE-HOUSE KEEPERS' TOKENS OF THE 17TH

CENTURY

Drawn for this work from the originals in the British Museum, and in the

Beaufoy collection at the Guildhall Museum]

_The Coffee Man's Granado Discharged upon the Maiden's Complaint

Against Coffee_, a dialogue in verse, also appeared in 1663.

_The Character of a Coffee House, by an Eye and Ear Witness_ appeared in

1665. It was a ten-page pamphlet, and proved to be excellent propaganda

for coffee. It is so well done, and contains so much local color, that

it is reproduced here, the text Museum. The title page reads:

The

CHARACTER

OF A

COFFEE-HOUSE

wherein

Is contained a Description of the Persons

usually frequenting it, with their Discourse

and Humors,

As Also

The Admirable Vertues of

COFFEE

By an Eye and Ear Witness

_When Coffee once was vended here,

The Alc'ron shortly did appear,

For our Reformers were such Widgeons.

New Liquors brought in new Religions._

Printed in the Year, 1665.

The text and the arrangement of the body of the pamphlet are as follows:

THE

CHARACTER

OF A

COFFEE-HOUSE

THE DERIVATION OF

A COFFEE-HOUSE

A _Coffee-house_, the learned hold

It is a place where _Coffee's_ sold;

This derivation cannot fail us,

For where _Ale's_ vended, that's an _Ale-house_.

This being granted to be true,

'Tis meet that next the _Signs_ we shew

Both _where_ and _how_ to find this house

Where men such _cordial broth_ carowse.

And if _Culpepper_ woon some glory

In turning the _Dispensatory_

From _Latin_ into _English_; then

Why should not all good _English men_

Give him much thanks who shews a _cure_

For all diseases men endure?

SIGNS: HOW TO

FIND IT OUT

As you along the streets do trudge,

To take the pains you must not grudge,

To view the Posts or Broomsticks where

The Signs of _Liquors_ hanged are.

And if you see the great _Morat_

With Shash on's head instead of hat,

Or any _Sultan_ in his dress,

Or picture of a _Sultaness_,

Or _John's_ admir'd curled pate,

Or th' great _Mogul_ in's Chair of State,

Or _Constantine_ the _Grecian_,

Who fourteen years was th' onely man

That made _Coffee_ for th' great _Bashaw_,

Although the man he never saw;

Or if you see a _Coffee_-cup

Fil'd from a Turkish pot, hung up

Within the clouds, and round it _Pipes_,

_Wax Candles_, _Stoppers_, these are types

And certain signs (with many more

Would be too long to write them 'ore,)

Which plainly do Spectators tell

That in that house they _Coffee_ sell.

Some wiser than the rest (no doubt,)

Say they can by the smell find't out;

In at a door (say they,) but thrust

Your Nose, and if you scent _burnt Crust_,

Be sure there's _Coffee_ sold that's good,

For so by most 'tis understood.

Now being enter'd, there's no needing

Of complements or gentile breeding,

For you may seat you any where,

There's no respect of persons there;

Then comes the _Coffee-man_ to greet you,

With welcome Sir, let me entreat you,

To tell me what you'l please to have,

For I'm your humble, humble slave;

But if you ask, what good does Coffee?

He'l answer, Sir, don't think I scoff yee,

If I affirm there's no disease

Men have that drink it but find ease.

THE VERTUES

OF COFFEE

Look, there's a man who takes the steem

In at his Nose, has an extreme

_Worm_ in his pate, and giddiness,

Ask him and he will say no less.

There sitteth one whose Droptick belly

Was hard as flint, now's soft as jelly.

There stands another holds his head

'Ore th' _Coffee_-pot, was almost dead

Even now with Rhume; ask him hee'l say

That all his Rhum's now past away.

See, there's a man sits now demure

And sober, was within this hour

Quite drunk, and comes here frequently,

For 'tis his daily Malady,

More, it has such reviving power

'Twill keep a man awake an houre,

Nay, make his eyes wide open stare

Both Sermon time and all the prayer.

Sir, should I tell you all the rest

O' th' cures 't has done, two hours at least

In numb'ring them I needs must spend,

Scarce able then to make an end.

Besides these vertues that's therein.

For any kind of _Medicine_,

The _Commonwealth-Kingdom_ I'd say,

Has mighty reason for to pray

That still _Arabia_ may produce

Enough of Berry for it's use:

For't has such strange magnetick force,

That it draws after't great concourse

Of all degrees of persons, even

From high to low, from morn till even;

Especially the _sober Party_,

And News-mongers do drink't most hearty

Here you'r not thrust into a _Box_

As _Taverns_ do to catch the _Fox_,

But as from th' top of _Pauls_ high steeple,

Th' whole _City's_ view'd, even so all _people_

May here be seen; no secrets are

At th' _Court_ for _Peace_, or th' _Camp_ for _War_,

But straight they'r here disclos'd and known;

Men in this Age so wise are grown.

Now (Sir) what profit may accrew

By this, to all good men, judge you.

With that he's loudly call'd upon

For _Coffee_, and then whip he's gone.

THE COMPANY

Here at a Table sits (perplext)

A griping _Usurer_, and next

To him a gallant _Furioso_,

Then nigh to him a _Virtuoso_;

A _Player_ then (full fine) sits down,

And close to him a _Country Clown_.

O' th' other side sits some _Pragmatick_,

And next to him some sly _Phanatick_.

THE SEVERAL

LIQUORS

The gallant he for _Tea_ doth call,

The _Usurer_ for nought at all.

The _Pragmatick_ he doth intreat

That they will fill him some _Beau-cheat_,

The _Virtuoso_ he cries hand me

Some _Coffee_ mixt with _Sugar-candy_.

_Phanaticus_ (at last) says come,

Bring me some _Aromaticum_.

The _Player_ bawls for _Chocolate_,

All which the _Bumpkin_ wond'ring at,

Cries, ho, my _Masters_, what d' ye speak,

D' ye call for drink in Heathen Greek?

Give me some good old _Ale_ or _Beer_,

Or else I will not drink, I swear.

Then having charg'd their _Pipes_ around.

THEIR DISCOURSE

They silence break; First the profound

And sage _Phanatique_, Sirs what news?

Troth says the _Us'rer_ I ne'r use

To tip my tongue with such discourse,

'Twere news to know how to disburse

A summ of mony (makes me sad)

To get ought by't, times are so bad.

The other answers, truly Sir

You speak but truth, for I'le aver

They ne'r were worse; did you not hear

What _prodigies_ did late appear

At _Norwich, Ipswich, Grantham, Gotam_?

And though prophane ones do not not'em,

Yet we--Here th' _Virtuoso_ stops

The current of his speech, with hopes

Quoth he, you will not tak'd amiss,

I say all's lies that's news like this,

For I have Factors all about

The Realm, so that no _Stars_ peep out

That are unusual, much less these

Strange and unheard-of _prodigies_

You would relate, but they are tost

To me in letters by first Post.

At which the _Furioso_ swears

Such chat as this offends his ears

It rather doth become this Age

To talk of bloodshed, fury, rage,

And t' drink stout healths in brim-fill'd _Nogans_.

To th' downfall of the _Hogan Mogans_.

With that the _Player_ doffs his Bonnet,

And tunes his voice as if a Sonnet

Were to be sung; then gently says,

O what delight there is in _Plays_!

Sure if we were but all in _Peace_,

This noise of _Wars_ and _News_ would cease;

All sorts of people then would club

Their pence to see a Play that's good.

You'l wonder all this while (perhaps)

The _Curioso_ holds his chaps.

But he doth in his thoughts devise,

How to the rest he may seem wise;

Yet able longer not to hold,

His tedious tale too must be told,

And thus begins, Sirs unto me

It reason seems that liberty

Of speech and words should be allow'd

Where men of differing judgements croud,

And that's a _Coffee-house_, for where

Should men discourse so free as there?

_Coffee_ and _Commonwealth_ begin

Both with one letter, both came in

Together for a _Reformation_,

To make's a free and sober _Nation_.

But now--With that _Phanaticus_

Gives him a nod, and speaks him thus,

Hold brother, I know your intent,

That's no dispute convenient

For this same place, truths seldome find

Acceptance here, they'r more confin'd

To _Taverns_ and to _Ale-house_ liquor,

Where men do vent their minds more quicker

If that may for a truth but pass

What's said, _In vino veritas_.

With that up starts the _Country Clown_,

And stares about with threatening frown.

As if he would even eat them all up.

Then bids the boy run quick and call up,

A _Constable_, for he has reason

To fear their Latin may be _treason_

But straight they all call what's to pay,

Lay't down, and march each several way.

THE COMPANY

At th' other table sits a Knight,

And here _a grave old man_ ore right

Against his _worship_, then perhaps

That _by_ and _by_ a _Drawer_ claps

His bum close by them, there down squats

_A dealer in old shoes and hats_;

And here withouten any panick

Fear, dread or care a bold _Mechanick_.

HEIR DISCOURSE

The _Knight_ (because he's so) he prates

Of matters far beyond their pates.

_The grave old man_ he makes a bustle,

And his wise sentence in must justle.

Up starts th' _Apprentice boy_ and he

Says boldly so and so't must be.

_The dealer in old shoes to_ utter

His saying too makes no small sputter.

Then comes the pert _mechanick blade_,

And contradicts what all have said.

* * * * *

There by the fier-side doth sit,

One freezing in an _Ague_ fit.

Another poking in't with th' tongs,

Still ready to cough up his lungs

Here sitteth one that's melancolick,

And there one singing in a frolick.

Each one hath such a prety gesture,

At Smithfield fair would yield a tester.

Boy reach a pipe cries he that shakes,

The songster no Tobacco takes,

Says he who coughs, nor do I smoak,

Then _Monsieur Mopus_ turns his cloak

Off from his face, and with a grave

Majestick beck his pipe doth crave.

They load their guns and fall a smoaking

Whilst he who coughs sits by a choaking,

Till he no longer can abide.

And so removes from th' fier side.

Now all this while none calls to drink,

Which makes the _Coffee boy_ to think

Much they his pots should so enclose,

He cannot pass but tread on toes.

With that as he the _Nectar_ fills

From pot to pot, some on't he spills

Upon the _Songster_. Oh cries he.

Pox, what dost do? thou'st burnt my knee;

No says the boy, (to make a bald

And blind excuse.) _Sir 'twill not scald_.

With that the man lends him a cuff

O' th' ear, and whips away in snuff.

The other two, their pipes being out,

Says _Monsieur Mopus_ I much doubt

My friend I wait for will not come,

But if he do, say I'm gone home.

Then says the _Aguish man_ I must come

According to my wonted custome,

To give ye' a visit, although now

I dare not drink, and so _adieu_.

The boy replies, O Sir, however

You'r very welcome, we do never

Our _Candles_, _Pipes_ or _Fier_ grutch

To daily customers and such,

They'r _Company_ (without expence,)

For that's sufficient recompence.

Here at a table all alone,

Sits (studying) _a spruce youngster_, (one

Who doth conceipt himself fully witty,

And's counted _one o' th' wits o' th' City_,)

Till by him (with a stately grace,)

A Spanish _Don_ himself doth place.

Then (cap in hand) a brisk _Monsieur_

He takes his seat, and crowds as near

As possibly that he can come.

Then next a _Dutchman_ takes his room.

The Wits glib tongue begins to chatter,

Though't utters more of noise than matter,

Yet 'cause they seem to mind his words,

His lungs more battle still affords

At last says he to _Don_, I trow

You understand me? _Sennor no_

Says th' other. Here the Wit doth pause

A little while, then opes his jaws,

And says to _Monsieur_, you enjoy

Our tongue I hope? _Non par ma foy_,

Replies the _Frenchman_: nor you, Sir?

Says he to th' _Dutchman, Neen mynheer_,

With that he's gone, and cries, why sho'd

He stay where _wit's_ not understood?

There in a place of his own chusing

(Alone) some _lover_ sits a musing,

With arms across, and's eyes up lift,

As if he were of sence bereft.

Till sometimes to himself he's speaking,

Then sighs as if his heart were breaking.

Here in a corner sits a _Phrantick_,

And there stands by a frisking Antick,

Of all sorts some and all conditions

Even _Vintners_, _Surgeons_ and _Physicians_.

The _blind_, the _deaf_, and _aged cripple_

Do here resort and Coffee tipple.

Now here (perhaps) you may expect

My _Muse_ some trophies should erect

In high flown verse, for to set forth

The _noble praises_ of its _worth_.

Truth is, _old Poets_ beat their brains

To find out high and lofty strains

To praise the (now too frequent) use

Of the bewitching _grapes strong juice_,

Some have strain'd hard for to exalt

The _liquor_ of our _English Mault_

Nay _Don_ has almost crackt his _nodle_

Enough t'applaud his _Caaco Caudle_.

The _Germans Mum_, _Teag's Usquebagh_,

(Made him so well defend _Tredagh_,)

_Metheglin_, which the _Brittains_ tope,

Hot _Brandy_ wine, the _Hogans_ hope.

Stout _Meade_ which makes the _Russ_ to laugh,

Spic'd _Punch_ (in bowls) the _Indians quaff_.

All these have had their pens to raise

Them _Monuments_ of lasting praise,

Onely poor _Coffee_ seems to me

No subject fit for _Poetry_

At least 'tis one that none of mine is,

So I do wave 't, and here write--

FINIS.

[Illustration: A BROAD-SIDE OF 1667]

_News from the Coffe House; in which is shewn their several sorts of

Passions_ appeared in 1667. It was reprinted in 1672 as _The Coffee

House or News-mongers' Hall_.

Several stanzas from these broadsides have been much quoted. They serve

to throw additional light upon the manners of the time, and upon the

kind of conversation met with in any well frequented coffee house of the

seventeenth century, particularly under the Stuarts. They are finely

descriptive of the company characteristics of the early coffee houses.

The fifth stanza of the edition of 1667, inimical to the French, was

omitted when the broadside was amended and reprinted in 1672, the year

that England joined with France and again declared war on the Dutch. The

following verses with explanatory notes are from Timbs:

NEWS FROM THE COFFE HOUSE

You that delight in Wit and Mirth,

And long to hear such News,

As comes from all Parts of the _Earth_,

_Dutch_, _Danes_, and _Turks_, and _Jews_,

I'le send yee to a Rendezvouz,

Where it is smoaking new;

Go hear it at a _Coffe-house_,

_It cannot but be true_.

There Battles and Sea-Fights are Fought,

And bloudy Plots display'd;

They know more Things then ere was thought

Or ever was betray'd:

No Money in the Minting-house

Is halfe so Bright and New;

And comming from a _Coffe-house_

_It cannot but be true_.

Before the _Navyes_ fall to Work,

They know who shall be Winner;

They there can tell ye what the _Turk_

Last _Sunday_ had to Dinner;

Who last did Cut _Du Ruitters_[75] Corns,

Amongst his jovial Crew;

Or Who first gave the _Devil_ Horns,

_Which cannot but be true_.

A _Fisherman_ did boldly tell,

And strongly did avouch,

He Caught a Shoal of Mackarel,

That Parley'd all in _Dutch_,

And cry'd out _Yaw, yaw, yaw Myne Here_;

But as the Draught they Drew

They Stunck for fear, that _Monck[76] was there_,

_Which cannot but be true_.

* * * * *

There's nothing done in all the World,

From _Monarch_ to the _Mouse_

But every Day or Night 'tis hurld

Into the _Coffe-house_.

What _Lillie_[77] or what _Booker_[78] can

By Art, not bring about,

At _Coffe-house_ you'l find a Man,

_Can quickly find it out_.

They know who shall in Times to come,

Be either made, or undone,

From great _St. Peters street_ in _Rome_,

To _Turnbull-street_[79] in _London_;

* * * * *

They know all that is Good, or Hurt,

To Dam ye, or to Save ye;

There is the _Colledge_, and the _Court_,

The _Country_, _Camp_ and _Navie_;

So great a _Universitie_,

I think there ne're was any;

In which you may a Schoolar be

For spending of a Penny.

* * * * *

Here Men do talk of every Thing,

With large and liberal Lungs,

Like Women at a Gossiping,

With double tyre of Tongues;

They'l give a Broad-side presently,

Soon as you are in view,

With Stories that, you'l wonder at,

Which they will swear are true.