Stage-coach and Tavern Days. Earle Alice Morse

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СКАЧАТЬ was made from a plate engraved by Paul Revere. This tavern was kept for over half a century by members of the Brackett family. It was distinctly the tavern of the gentry, and many a distinguished guest had “board, lodging, and eating” within its walls, as well as the wine, punch, porter, and liquor named on the bill. It will be noted that the ancient measure – a pottle – is here used. Twenty years before the Revolutionary War, and just after the crushing defeat of the British general, Braddock, in what was then the West, an intelligent young Virginian named George Washington, said to be a good engineer and soldier, lodged at the Cromwell’s Head Tavern, while he conferred with Governor Shirley, the great war Governor of the day, on military affairs and projects. When this same Virginian soldier entered Boston at the head of a victorious army, he quartered his troops in Governor Shirley’s mansion and grounds.

      The sign-board of this tavern bore a portrait of the Lord Protector, and it is said it was hung so low that all who passed under it had to make a necessary reverence.

      While British martial law prevailed in Boston, the grim head of Cromwell became distasteful to Tories, who turned one side rather than walk under the shadow of the sign-board, and at last Landlord Brackett had to take down and hide the obnoxious symbol.

      The English traveller Melish was loud in his praise of the taverns throughout New York State as early as 1806. He noted at Little Falls, then in the backwoods, and two hundred miles from New York, that on the breakfast table were “table-cloth, tea tray, tea-pots, milk-pot, bowls, cups, sugar-tongs, teaspoons, casters, plates, knives, forks, tea, sugar, cream, bread, butter, steak, eggs, cheese, potatoes, beets, salt, vinegar, pepper,” and all for twenty-five cents. He said Johnstown had but sixty houses, of which nine were taverns.

      Another English traveller told of the fare in American hotels in 1807. While in Albany at “Gregory’s,” which he said was equal to many of the London hotels, he wrote: —

      “It is the custom in all American taverns, from the highest to the lowest, to have a sort of public table at which the inmates of the house and travellers dine together at a certain hour. It is also frequented by many single gentlemen belonging to the town. At Gregory’s upwards of thirty sat down to dinner, though there were not more than a dozen who resided in the house. A stranger is thus soon introduced to an acquaintance with the people, and if he is travelling alone he will find at these tables some relief from the ennui of his situation. At the better sort of American taverns very excellent dinners are provided, consisting of almost everything in season. The hour is from two to three o’clock, and there are three meals in the day. They breakfast at eight o’clock upon rump steaks, fish, eggs, and a variety of cakes with tea or coffee. The last meal is at seven in the evening, and consists of as substantial fare as the breakfast, with the addition of cold fowl, ham, &c. The price of boarding at these houses is from a dollar and a half to two dollars per day. Brandy, hollands, and other spirits are allowed at dinner, but every other liquor is paid for extra. English breakfasts and teas, generally speaking, are meagre repasts compared with those of America, and as far as I observed the people live with respect to eating in a much more luxurious manner than we do. Many private families live in the same style as at these houses; and have as great variety. Formerly pies, puddings, and cyder used to grace the breakfast table, but now they are discarded from the genteeler houses, and are found only in the small taverns and farm-houses in the country.”

      In spite of the vast number of inns in Philadelphia, another English gentleman bore testimony in 1823 that he deemed the city ill-provided with hostelries. This gentleman “put up” at the Mansion House, which was the splendid Bingham Mansion on Third Street. He wrote: —

“The tavern-keepers will not receive you on any other terms except boarded at so much a day or week; you cannot have your meals by yourself, or at your own hours. This custom of boarding I disliked very much. The terms are, however, very moderate, only ten dollars per week. The table is always spread with the greatest profusion and variety, even at breakfast, supper, and tea; all of which meals indeed were it not for the absence of wine and soup, might be called so many dinners.”

      There lies before me a collection of twoscore old hotel bills of fare about a half century old. They are of dates when stage-coaching had reached its highest point of perfection, and the coaching tavern its glory. There were railroads, – comparatively few lines, however, – but they had not destroyed the constant use of coaches.

      These hotels were the best of their kind in the country, such as the United States Hotel of Philadelphia, Foley’s National Hotel of Norfolk, Virginia, Union Place Hotel and New York Hotel of New York, Union Hotel of Richmond, Virginia, American House of Springfield, Massachusetts, Dorsey’s Exchange Hotel and Barnum’s City Hotel of Baltimore, Maryland, the Troy House, the Tremont House of Boston, Massachusetts, etc. At this time all have become hotels and houses, not a tavern nor an inn is among them.

      The menus are printed on long narrow slips of poor paper, not on cardboard; often the names of many of the dishes are written in. They show much excellence and variety in quality, and abundant quantity; they are, I think, as good as hotels of similar size would offer to-day. There are more boiled meats proportionately than would be served now, and fewer desserts. Here is what the American House of Springfield had for its guests on October 2, 1851: Mock-turtle soup; boiled blue-fish with oyster sauce; boiled chickens with oyster sauce; boiled mutton with caper sauce; boiled tongue, ham, corned beef and cabbage; boiled chickens with pork; roast beef, lamb, chickens, veal, pork, and turkey; roast partridge; fricasseed chicken, oyster patties, chicken pie, boiled rice, macaroni; apple, squash, mince, custard, and peach pies; boiled custard; blanc mange, tapioca pudding, peaches, nuts, and raisins. Vegetables were not named; doubtless every autumnal vegetable was served.

      At the Union Place Hotel in 1850 the vegetables were mashed potatoes, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, boiled rice, onions, tomatoes, squash, cauliflower, turnips, and spinach. At the United States Hotel in Philadelphia the variety was still greater, and there were twelve entrées. The Southern hotels offered nine entrées, and egg-plant appears among the vegetables. The wine lists are ample; those of 1840 might be of to-day, that is, in regard to familiar names; but the prices were different. Mumm’s champagne was two dollars and a half a quart; Ruinard and Cliquot two dollars; the best Sauterne a dollar a quart; Rudesheimer 1811, and Hockheimer, two dollars; clarets were higher priced, and Burgundies. Madeiras were many in number, and high priced; Constantia (twenty years in glass) and Diploma (forty years in wood) were six dollars a bottle. At Barnum’s Hotel there were Madeiras at ten dollars a bottle, sherries at five, hock at six; this hotel offered thirty choice Madeiras – and these dinners were served at two o’clock. Corkage was a dollar.

      Certain taverns were noted for certain fare, for choice modes of cooking special delicacies. One was resorted to for boiled trout, another for planked shad. Travellers rode miles out of their way to have at a certain hostelry calves-head soup, a most elaborate and tedious dish if properly prepared, and a costly one, with its profuse wine, but as appetizing and rich as it is difficult of making. More humble taverns with simpler materials but good cooks had wonderful johnny-cakes, delightful waffles, or even specially good mush and milk. Certain localities afforded certain delicacies; salmon in one river town, and choice oysters. One landlord raised and killed his own mutton; another prided himself on ducks. Another cured his own hams. An old Dutch tavern was noted for rolliches and head-cheese.

      During the eighteenth century turtle-feasts were eagerly attended – or turtle-frolics as they were called. A travelling clergyman named Burnaby wrote in 1759: —

      “There are several taverns pleasantly situated upon East River, near New York, where it is common to have these turtle-feasts. These happen once or twice a week. Thirty or forty gentlemen and ladies meet and dine together, drink tea in the afternoon, fish, and amuse themselves till evening, and then return home in Italian chaises, a gentleman and lady in each chaise. On the way there is a bridge, about three miles distant from New York, which you always pass over as you return, called the Kissing Bridge, where it is part of the etiquette to salute the lady who has put herself under your protection.”

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