CHAPTER VIII.
THE BUSH TAVERN, BRISTOL'S FAMOUS COACHING INN, AND JOHN WEEKS, ITS WORTHY BONIFACE, 1775-1819.—THE WHITE LION COACHING HOUSE, BRISTOL. ISAAC NIBLETT.—THE WHITE HART, BATH.
It appears that John Weeks was landlord of the Bush Tavern, Bristol, from 1775 to 1801, and continued to be a coach proprietor until 1806. In the Eastern cloister of Bristol Cathedral there is a mural tablet erected to his memory, with a well-executed medallion portrait of him in profile, with inscription as shown in the illustration.
Verger Sproule, of old time, who was born in the first year of the nineteenth century, once told Mr. Morgan, present senior lay clerk, that he well remembered John Weeks, and that the portrait on the tablet was an excellent likeness of him.
In "Mornings at Matlock," by Robey Skelton Mackenzie, D.C.L., author of "Titian: an Art Novel" (London, Henry Colburn, publisher, 1850), a book which contains a collection of twenty-six short stories supposed to have been told by people stopping at Matlock, there is an interesting story relating to what was known as the Bush Guinea. Briefly told, Dr. Mackenzie's Bush Guinea story runs thus:—"It was the delight of this Boniface (John Weeks) on every Christmas Day, to cover the great table with a glorious load of roast beef and plum pudding, flanked most plenteously with double home-brewed of such mighty strength and glorious flavour that we might well have called it malt wine rather than malt liquor. At this table on that day every one who pleased was welcome to sit down and feast. Many to whom a good dinner was an object did so; and no nobler sight was there in Bristol, amidst all its wealth and hospitality, than that of honest John Weeks at the head of his table, lustily carving and pressing his guests to 'Eat, drink, and be merry.' Nor did his generosity content itself with this.
MURAL TABLET IN BRISTOL CATHEDRAL.
"It was the custom of the house and of the day, when the repast was ended, that each person should go to honest John Weeks in the bar and there receive his cordial wishes for many happy returns of the genial season. They received something more, for according to their several necessities a small gift of money was pressed upon each. To one man a crown; to another, half-a-guinea; to a third, as more needing it a guinea. On the whole some twenty or thirty guineas were thus disbursed.