"Despite the confusion, the dirt and the decay, he who stands in the yard of this ancient inn may get an excellent idea of what it was like in the days of its prosperity, when not only travellers in coach or saddle rode into or out of the yard, but poor players and mountebanks set up their stage for the entertainment of spectators, who hung over the galleries or looked on from their rooms—a name by which the boxes of a theatre were first known."
The house must have been rebuilt after the Great Fire, which raged over this area. That it existed before is proved by the following odd advertisement of March, 1672-73:
"These are to give notice that Edward Bartlet, Oxford Carrier, hath removed his inn in London from the Swan at Holborn Bridge to the Oxford Arms in Warwick Lane, where he did Inn before the Fire. His coaches and waggons going forth on their usual days, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. He hath also a hearse and all things convenient to carry a Corps to any part of England."
The "Bell" Inn, also galleried, was on the east side of Warwick Lane. There Archbishop Leighton died in 1684. As Burnet tells us, he had often said that "if he were to choose a place to die in it should be an Inn; it looked like a pilgrim's going home, to whom this world was all as an Inn, and who was weary of the noise and confusion in it." Thus his desire was fulfilled. There is a view of the old house in Chambers' Book of Days, vol. i., p. 278. It was demolished in 1865, when the value of the unclaimed parcels, some of which had been there many years, is said to have been considerable. According to one statement, the jewellery was worth £700 or £800.
The few remaining inns to which reference will be made may best perhaps be taken in alphabetical order. The old "Angel" Inn, at the end of Wych Street, Strand, already existed in February, 1503, when a letter was directed to Sir Richard Plumpton "at the Angell behind St. Clement's Kirk." From this inn Bishop Hooper was taken to Gloucester in 1554 to be burnt at the stake. A trade token was issued there in 1657. Finally, the business, largely dependent on coaches, faded away; the building was rased to the ground in 1853, and the set of offices called Danes Inn built on the site. These in their turn have now succumbed. The "Axe" in Aldermanbury was a famous carriers' inn. It is mentioned in drunken Barnabee's Journal, and from there the first line of stage waggons from London to Liverpool was established about the middle of the seventeenth century. It took many days to perform the journey.
In Laurence Lane, near the Guildhall, was a noteworthy house called "Blossoms" Inn, which, according to Stow, had "to sign St. Laurence the Deacon in a border of blossoms of flowers." In 1522, when the Emperor Charles V. came to visit Henry VIII. in London, certain inns were set apart for the reception of his retinue, among them "St. Laurence, otherwise called Bosoms Yn, was to have ready XX beddes and a stable for LX horses." In Ben Jonson's Masque of Christmas, presented at Court in 1616, "Tom of Bosomes Inn," apparently a real person, is introduced as representing Mis-rule. That the house was early frequented by carriers is shown in the epistle dedicatory to Have at you at Saffron Walden, 1596:—"Yet have I naturally cherisht and hugt it in my bosome, even as a carrier at Bosome's Inne doth a cheese under his arm." A satirical tract about Bankes and his horse Marocco gives the name of the authors as "John Dande the wiredrawer of Hadley, and Harrie Hunt head ostler of Bosomes inn." There is a view of this famous hostelry in the Crace collection, date 1855; the yard is now a depôt for railway goods.
In 1852 London suffered a sad loss architecturally by the removal of the fine groined crypt of Gerard's Hall, Basing Lane, which dated perhaps from the end of the thirteenth century, and had formed part of the mansion of a famous family of citizens, by name Gysors. In Stow's time it was "a common hostrey for receipt of travellers." He gives a long account of it, mixing fact with fiction. The house and hall were destroyed in the Great Fire, but the crypt escaped, and on it an inn was built with, in front, a carved wooden effigy of that mythical personage, Gerard the Giant, which is now in the Guildhall Museum. On the removal of the crypt the stones were numbered and presented to the Crystal Palace Company, with a view to its erection in their building or grounds. It is said, however, that after a time the stones were used for mending roads.
A rather unimportant-looking inn was the "Nag's Head," on the east side of Whitcomb Street, formerly Hedge Lane, but it is worthy of mention for one or two reasons. We learn from a manuscript note-book, which was in the possession of the late Mr. F. Locker Lampson, that Hogarth in his later days, when he set up a coach and horses, kept them at the "Nag's Head." He was then living on the east side of Leicester Square. According to a pencil note on an old drawing, which belongs to the writer, "this inn did the posting exclusively for the Royal family from George I. to William IV." It was latterly used as a livery stable, but retained its picturesque galleries until, the lease having come to an end, it was closed in 1890. The space remained vacant for some years, and is now covered by the fine publishing office of Messrs. Macmillan & Co.
Two "Saracen's Head" inns have already been described, and though one feels how imperfect this account must of necessity be, and that some houses of note are altogether omitted, I am tempted to mention a third—the house with that sign in Friday Street. It came into the hands of the Merchant Taylors' Company as early as the year 1400, and after several rebuildings was finally swept away in 1844. The adjoining house, said by tradition to have been occupied by Sir Christopher Wren, was destroyed at the same time.
It was in the early thirties of last century that coaching reached its zenith, and perhaps the greatest coaching centre in London was the "Swan with Two Necks," Lad Lane. It was an old inn, mentioned by Machyn as early as 1556. In 1637 carriers from Manchester and other places used to lodge there, but it will be best remembered as it appears in a well-known print during the heyday of its prosperity, the courtyard crowded with life and movement. The gateway was so narrow that it required some horsemanship to drive a fast team out of the said courtyard, and some care on the part of the guard that his horn or bugle basket was not jammed against the gate-post. The proprietor of this establishment was Mr. William Chaplin who, originally a coachman, became perhaps the greatest coach proprietor that ever lived. About 1835 he occupied the yards of no fewer than five famous and important inns in London, to all of which allusion has been made—the "Spread Eagle" and "Cross Keys" in Gracechurch Street, the "Swan with Two Necks," the "White Horse," Fetter Lane, and the "Angel" behind St. Clement's. He had 1,300 horses at work on various roads, and about that time horsed fourteen out of the twenty-seven coaches leaving London every night. When the railways came he bowed to the inevitable, and, in partnership with Mr. Horne, established the great carrying business, which still flourishes on the site of the old "Swan with Two Necks." In 1845 Lad Lane was absorbed by Gresham Street. The origin of the sign has been often discussed, but it is perhaps well to conclude this chapter by adding a few words about it. The swans on the upper reaches of the Thames are owned respectively by the Crown and the Dyers and the Vintners' Company, and, according to ancient custom, the representatives of these several owners make an excursion each year up the river to mark the cygnets. The visitors' mark used to consist of the chevron or letter V and two nicks on the beak. The word nicks has been corrupted into necks, and as the Vintners were often tavern-keepers, the "Swan with Two Necks" became a common sign.