All the statesmen of the South stopped at taverns on the old National road: Harrison, Houston, Taylor, Polk, and Allen. Homespun Davy Crockett, popular General Jackson, stately Henry Clay, furnished a show for the country by-standers to gape at. In the Northern states Daniel Webster was the god whose coming was adored. A halo of glory shed by his presence still hangs round many a tavern room, and well it may, for he was a giant among men.
Washington Tavern, North Wilbraham, Massachusetts.
To show the variety of the tavern panorama let me quote what Edwin Lasseter Bynner wrote of the inns of Boston:—
“They were the centres of so much of its life and affairs, the resort at once of judge and jury, of the clergy and the laity, of the politician and the merchant; where the selectmen came to talk over the affairs of the town, and higher officials to discuss the higher interests of the province; where royal governors and distinguished strangers were entertained alike with the humblest wayfarer and the meanest citizen; where were held the carousals of roistering red-coat officers, and the midnight plottings of muttering stern-lipped patriots; where, in fine, the swaggering ensign of the royal army, the frowning Puritan, the obnoxious Quaker, the Huguenot refugee, and the savage Indian chief from the neighboring forest might perchance jostle each other in the common taproom.”
Naturally the tavern proved the exhibition place and temporary lodging-place of all secular shows which could not be housed in the meeting-house. It contained the second assembly room in size, and often the only other large room in town save that devoted to religious gatherings. Hence, when in Salem in 1781 “the Sentimentalists and all Volontiers who are pleased to encourage the extensive Propogation of Polite Literature” were invited to attend a book auction by a “Provedore and Professor of Auctioneering,” this sale of books was held at Mr. Goodhue’s tavern. At the American Coffee-house in Boston the firm that vendued books within doors also sold jackasses on the street.
“Monstrous Sights” found at the tavern a congenial temporary home, where discussion of their appearance was held before the tavern bar, while the tavern barn restrained and confined the monster if he chanced to be a wild beast. A moose, a walrus, a camel, a lion, a leopard, appeared in succession in Salem taverns, chiefly at the Black Horse. Then came a wonder of natural history, a Pygarg, said to be from Russia. We have a description of it: it had “the likeness of a camel, bear, mule, goat, and common bullock”; it is spoken of in the book of Deuteronomy, Chapter XIV. I am not sure that we would recognize our native American moose if he were not called by name, in the creature advertised as having “a face like a mouse, ears like an ass, neck and back like a camel, hind-parts like a horse, tail like a rabbit, and feet like a heifer.” Cassowaries, learned pigs, learned horses, and rabbits were shown for petty sums. Deformed beasts and persons were exhibited. Pictures, “prospects,” statues, elaborate clocks, moving puppets, and many mechanical contrivances could be viewed in the tavern parlor.
“Electrical machines” were the wonder of their day. Solemn professors and gay “fakirs” exhibited them from tavern to tavern. The first lightning-rods also made a great show. Shortly after the invention of balloons, came their advent as popular shows in many towns. They often ascended from the green in front of the tavern. They bore many pompous names,—“Archimedial Phaetons,” “Vertical Aerial Coaches,” “Patent Fœderal Balloons.” The public was assured that “persons of timid nature” would find nothing to terrify them in the ascent. They were not only recommended as engines of amusement and wonder, but were urged upon “Invaletudinarians” as hygienic factors, in that they caused in the ascent the “sudden revulsion of the blood and humours” of aeronautic travellers.
The Bunch of Grapes housed Mr. Douglas when he delivered his famous lecture on “Heads, Coats of Arms, Wigs, Ladies’ Head Dresses,” etc.; it was an office for John Hurd, an early insurance broker, chiefly for marine risks. Nearly all the first insurance offices were in taverns.