In this tavern the Society of Antiquaries used to meet, before apartments were obtained in Somerset House.
“The Society hitherto having no house of their own, meet every Thursday evening, about seven o’clock, at the Mitre Tavern in Fleet Street, where antiquities are produced and considered, draughts and impressions thereof taken, dissertations read, and minutes of the several transactions entered, and the whole economy under such admirable regulations, that probably in a short time they may apply for a royal power of incorporation.”[467]
In the bar of the Mitre Tavern in St James’ Market, which was kept by her aunt, (Mrs Voss, formerly the mistress of Sir Godfrey Kneller,) Captain Farquhar overheard Miss Nancy Oldfield read the play of “The Scornful Lady,” and was so struck with the proper emphasis and agreeable turn she gave to each character, that he swore the girl was cut out for the stage. Captain (afterwards Sir John) Vanbrugh, a friend of the family, recommended her to Rich, and shortly after she made her debut at Covent Garden, with an allowance of fifteen shillings a week.
Though a dozen other famous Mitre Taverns might be mentioned, these are sufficient to show how general a sign it was; the partiality of tavern-keepers for it is somewhat accounted for in the following stanza of the “Quack Vintners,” 1712:—
“May Smith, whose prosperous mitre is his sign,
To shew the church no enemy to wine;
Still draw such Christian liquor none may think,
Tho’ e’er so pious, ’tis a sin to drink.”[468]
The Mitre also is found in a few combinations, as the Mitre and Dove, i.e., the Holy Ghost, in King Street, Westminster; the Mitre and Keys, in Leicester—evidently the Cross Keys, which are a charge in the arms of several bishoprics; and the Mitre and Rose, which, from trades tokens, appears to have been the sign of a tavern in the Strand, as well as in Wood Street, Cheapside.
That the friars were also honoured on the signboard appears from “Fryar Lane, on the south side of Thames Street, near Dowgate. It was formerly called Greenwich Lane, but of later years Fryar’s Lane, from the sign of a Fryar sometime there.”[469] Probably it was a Black Friar, or Dominican Monk, for that order, above all others, had the reputation of being great topers, and therefore were not out of place on a signboard. There is a prayer extant of the holy fathers, addressed to St Dominic:—
“Sanctus Dominicus sit nobis semper amicus
Qui canimus nostro jugiter præconia rostro,
De cordis venis, siccatis ante lagenis;
Ergo tuas laudes si tu nos pangere gaudes,
Tempore paschali, fac ne potu puteali
Conveniat uti; quod si fit, undique muti
Semper erunt patres qui, non curant nisi fratres.”[470]
And an old French couplet gives the following gradations of the potatory capacities of the different orders, in which the Franciscans only are said to beat the Dominicans:—