SHUTER, AND HIS TAVERN-PLACES.
Shuter, the actor, at the age of twelve, was pot-boy at the Queen's Head (afterwards Mrs. Butler's), in Covent Garden, where he was so kind to the rats in the cellar, by giving them sops from porter, (for, in his time, any person might have a toast in his beer,) that they would creep about him and upon him; he would carry them about between his shirt and his waistcoat, and even call them by their names. Shuter was next pot-boy at the Blue Posts, opposite Brydges-street, then kept by Ellidge, and afterwards by Carter, who played well at billiards, on account of the length of his arms. Shuter used to carry beer to the players, behind the scenes at Drury-lane Theatre, and elsewhere, and being noticed by Hippisley, was taken as his servant, and brought on the stage. He had also been at the house next the Blue Posts,—the Sun, in Russell-street, which was frequented by Hippisley. Mr. Theophilus Forrest, when he paid Shuter his money, allowed him in his latter days, two guineas per week, found him calling for gin, and his shirt was worn to half its original size. Latterly, he was hooted by the boys in the street: he became a Methodist, and died at King John's Palace, Tottenham Court Road.
THE ROSE TAVERN, COVENT GARDEN.
This noted Tavern, on the east side of Brydges-street, flourished in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and from its contiguity to Drury-lane Theatre, and close connection with it, was frequented by courtiers and men of letters, of loose character, and other gentry of no character at all. The scenes of The Morning Ramble, or the Town Humour, 1672, are laid "at the Rose Tavern, in Covent Garden," which was constantly a scene of drunken broils, midnight orgies, and murderous assaults, by men of fashion, who were designated "Hectors," and whose chief pleasure lay in frequenting taverns for the running through of some fuddled toper, whom wine had made valiant. Shadwell, in his comedy of the Scowrers, 1691, written at a time when obedience to the laws was enforced, and these excesses had in consequence declined, observes of these cowardly ruffians: "They were brave fellows, indeed! In those days a man could not go from the Rose Tavern to the Piazza once, but he must venture his life twice."
Women of a certain freedom of character frequented taverns at the commencement of the last century, and the Rose, doubtless, resembled the box-lobby of a theatre. In the Rake Reformed, 1718, this tavern is thus noticed:
"Not far from thence appears a pendent sign,
Whose bush declares the product of the vine,
Whence to the traveller's sight the full-blown Rose
Its dazzling beauties doth in gold disclose;