CHAPTER IV THE "WHITE HART," BOROUGH
The pursuit of Jingle and Miss Wardle by the lady's father and Mr. Pickwick, culminates in the "White Hart," which, in days gone by, was one of the most famous of the many famous inns that then stood in the borough of Southwark. Long before Dickens began to write, the "White Hart" was the centre of the coaching activity of the metropolis south of the Thames, and .was one of the oldest inns in the country.
Travellers from the Continent and the southern and eastern counties of England to London made it their halting-place, whilst from a business standpoint it had scarcely a rival. Coaches laden with passengers and wagons full of articles of commerce made the courtyard of the inn always a bustling and busy corner of a hustling and busy neighbourhood. In the coaching era, therefore, the "White Hart" was a household word to travellers and business men. Dickens, with his magic pen and inventive genius, made it a household word to the inhabitants of the whole globe, who never had occasion to visit it either for business or pleasure.
Its history goes back many centuries: as far back as 1400, and possibly earlier than that. Its sign was taken from the badge of Richard II, who adopted the emblem of the "White Hart" from the crest of his mother, Joanna of Kent. A fine old inn of the highest type, the "White Hart" no doubt was the resort of the most prominent nobles and retainers of the time, public men of the period and ambassadors of commerce. It is not surprising, therefore, that it figures in English history generally, and was particularly mentioned by Shakespeare. It certainly was the centre of many a stirring scene, and events of feasting and jollity, besides being a place where great trade was transacted.
It is often mentioned in the Paston Letters in reference to Jack Cade, who made it his headquarters in 1450. In Hall's Chronicles it is recorded that the Captain, being made aware of the King's absence, came first to Southwark, and there lodged at the "White Hart." In Henry VI, Part II, Jack Cade is made to say, "Hath my sword therefore broke through London gates, that you should leave me at the 'White Hart' in Southwark?"
Thomas Cromwell, Henry Vlll's most able minister, was also associated with the borough of Southwark, and on one occasion (in 1529) it is recorded that he received a message to the effect that one R. awaited him at the "White Hart" on important business. Again the inn has mention in connection with the rebellion brought about by Archbishop Laud's attitude to the Scottish and Puritan Churches, when we are told that the populace and soldiers associated with it lodged at the "White Hart." And in a like manner mention might be made of other occasions during which, in those far-off days, the "White Hart" played some notable part in history and in the social round of the period.
In 1676 it was entirely destroyed by the great fire of Southwark, but was rebuilt immediately afterward on the old site and on the old model. It was described by Strype about this time as a very large inn, and we believe that it was able to accommodate between one and two hundred guests and their retinue, with ample rooms left for their belongings, horses and goods. It did a considerable trade and was esteemed one of the best inns in Southwark, and so it continued as a favourite place of resort for coaches and carriers until the end of the coaching days.
When, therefore, Mr. Pickwick set all the world agog with his adventures, the "White Hart" was recognized as a typical old English inn, and was really at its best. It had arrived at this prosperous state by easy stages during its previous 180 years, and had a reputation for comfort and generous hospitality during the best days of the coaching era, which had reached the golden age when Mr. Pickwick discovered Sam Weller cleaning boots in its coach yard one historic morning in the early nineteenth century.
It is not to be wondered at, then, that Dickens, who knew this district so well and intimately, should introduce the "White Hart" into his book as a setting for one of his most amusing scenes. After speaking of London's inns in general, he makes special mention of those in the Borough, where, he says, there still remained some half-dozen old inns, "which have preserved their external features unchanged, and which have escaped alike the rage for public improvement and the encroachments of private speculation." Since these words were written public improvement has "improved" all of them, except one, the "George," right out of existence.
But let us use Dickens's own words to describe these inns in general and the "White Hart" in particular, for none of ours can improve his picture.
"Great, rambling, queer old places they are, with galleries and passages and staircases, wide enough and antiquated enough to furnish materials for a hundred ghost stories, supposing we should ever be reduced to the lamentable necessity of inventing any, and that the world should exist long enough to exhaust the innumerable veracious legends connected with old London Bridge and its adjacent neighbourhood on the Surrey side.
"It was in the yard of one of these inns—of no less celebrated a one than the 'White Hart'—that a man was busily employed in brushing the dirt off a pair of boots, early on the morning succeeding the events narrated in the last chapter. He was habited in a coarse-striped waistcoat, with black calico sleeves, and blue glass buttons, drab breeches and leggings. A bright red handkerchief was wound in a very loose and unstudied style round his neck, and an old white hat was carelessly thrown on one side of his head. There were two rows of boots before him, one cleaned and the other dirty, and at every addition he made to the clean row, he paused from his work, and contemplated its results with evident satisfaction."
This, we need hardly say, was the inimitable Sam Weller, and it was his first introduction to the story with which his name is now inseparable.
[illustration: The White Hart Inn, Southwark, in 1858. From an engraving by Fairholt, after a drawing by J. Sachs]
Dickens then goes on to give further particulars of how the yard looked on the particular morning of which he writes:
"The yard presented none of that bustle and activity which are the usual characteristics of a large coach inn. Three or four lumbering wagons, each with a pile of goods beneath its ample canopy, about the height of the second-floor window of an ordinary house, were stowed away beneath a lofty roof which extended over one end of the yard; and another, which was probably to commence its journey that morning, was drawn out into the open space. A double tier of bedroom galleries, with old, clumsy balustrades, ran round two sides of the straggling area, and a double row of bells to correspond, sheltered from the weather by a little sloping roof, hung over the door. . . . Two or three gigs and chaise-carts were wheeled up under different little sheds and penthouses; and the occasional heavy tread of a carthorse or rattling of a chain at the further end of the yard announced to anybody who cared about the matter that the stable lay in that direction. When we add that a few boys in smock frocks were lying asleep on heavy packages, wool-packs and other articles that were scattered about on heaps of straw, we have described as fully as need be the general appearance of the yard of the White Hart Inn, High Street, Borough, on the particular morning in question."
This was the inn, then, to which Mr. Pickwick and Mr. Wardle came in search of the runaway couple, and Sam Weller was the first person they interviewed on the subject. The reader will refer to Chapter X of the book should he want his memory refreshed regarding the amusing scene with Sam, which has been so faithfully pictured by Phiz in one of his illustrations. How they discovered the misguided Rachael, how they bought off the adventurer, Jingle, and how Mr. Pickwick, Wardle and the deserted lady set forth the next day by the Muggleton heavy coach is duly set forth in Dickens's own way.
The "White Hart" remained very much as Dickens found it and described it in 1836 until it was finally demolished in 1889. Following the advent of railways it lost a good deal of its glamour, and in its last years the old galleries on two of its sides were let out in tenements, and the presence of the occupants gave a certain animation to the scene. In the large inner yard were some quaint old house which were crowded with lodgers, but it still hung on to its old traditions of the coaching times, and even up to its last days the old inn was the halting-place of the last of the old-fashioned omnibuses which plied between London Bridge and Clapham.
Nothing now remains to remind us of the old inn which Dickens and Sam Weller have made immortal in the annals of coaching but a narrow turning bearing its name, where is established a Sam Weller Club.