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Devil was the favourite haunt of John Cottington, generally known as
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Mull Sack, from his favourite beverage of spiced sherry negus. This impudent rascal, a sweep who had turned highwayman, with the most perfect impartiality rifled the pockets alternately of Cavaliers and Roundheads. Gold is of no religion; and your true cut-purse is of the broadest and most sceptical Church. He emptied the pockets of Lord Protector Cromwell one day, and another he stripped Charles II., then a Bohemian exile at Cologne, of plate valued at £1,500. One of his most impudent exploits was stealing a watch from Lady Fairfax, that brave woman who had the courage to denounce, from the gallery at Westminster Hall, the persons whom she considered were about to become the murderers of Charles I.
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This lady (and a portly handsome woman she was, to judge by the old portraits), says a pamphlet-writer of the day,
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DEVIL
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I walk the Strand and Westminster, and scorn To march i' the City, though I bear the horn. My feather and my yellow band accord, To prove me courtier; my boot, spur, and sword, My smoking-pipe, scarf, garter, rose on shoe, Show my brave mind t' affect what gallants do. I sing, dance, drink, and merrily pass the day, And, like a chimney, sweep all care away.
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Devil became frequented by lawyers and physicians. The talk now was about drugs and latitats, jalap and the law of escheats. Yet, still good company frequented it, for Steele describes Bickerstaff's sister Jenny's wedding entertainment there in October, 1709; and in 1710 (Queen Anne) Swift writes one of those charming letters to Stella to tell her that he had dined on October 12th at the
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Devil, with Addison and Dr. Garth, when the good-natured doctor, whom every one loved, stood treat, and there must have been talk worth hearing. In the Apollo chamber the intolerable court odes of Colley Cibber, the poet laureate, used to be solemnly rehearsed with fitting music; and Pope, in
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The Dunciad,
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Back to the 'Devil' the loud echoes roll, And 'Coll' each butcher roars in Hockly Hole.
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When laureates make odes, do you ask of what sort? Do you ask if they're good or are evil? You may judge: from the 'Devil' they come to the Court, And go from the Court to the 'Devil.'
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Shakespeare, Johnson laughingly replied,
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That he was not going to be bound by Kenrick's rules.
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Devil was on a memorable spring evening in 1751. Dr. Johnson (aged forty-two), then busy all day with his six amanuenses in a garret in Gough Square compiling his Dictionary, at night enjoyed his elephantine mirth at a club in Ivy Lane, Paternoster Row. One night at the club, Johnson proposed to celebrate the appearance of Mrs. Lennox's first novel,
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The Life of Harriet Stuart, by a supper at the
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Devil Tavern. Mrs. Lennox was a lady for whom Johnson--ranking her afterwards above Mrs. Carter, Mrs. Hannah More, or even his favourite, Miss Burney--had the greatest esteem. Sir John Hawkins, that somewhat malign rival of Boswell, describes the night in a manner, for him, unusually genial.
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Johnson, says Hawkins (and his words are too pleasant to condense),
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(The club consisted of Hawkins, an attorney; Dr. Salter, father of a master of the Charter House; Dr. Hawkesworth, a popular author of the day; Mr. Ryland, a merchant; Mr. John Payne, a bookseller; Mr. Samuel Dyer, a young man training for a Dissenting minister; Dr. William M'Ghie, a Scotch physician; Dr. Barker and Dr. Bathurst, young physicians.)
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The place appointed was the 'Devil Tavern;' and there, about the hour of eight, Mrs. Lennox and her husband (a tide-waiter in the Customs), a lady of her acquaintance, with the club and friends, to the number of twenty, assembled. The supper was elegant; Johnson had directed that a magnificent hot apple-pie should make a part of it, and this he would have stuck with bay leaves, because, forsooth, Mrs. Lennox was an authoress and had written verses; and, further, he had prepared for her a crown of laurel, with which, but not till he had invoked the Muses by some ceremonies of his own invention, he encircled her brows. The night passed, as must be imagined, in pleasant conversation and harmless mirth, intermingled at different, periods with the refreshment of coffee and tea. About five a.m., Johnson's face shone with meridian splendour, though his drink had been only lemonade; but the far greater part of the company had deserted the colours of Bacchus, and were with difficulty rallied to partake of a second refreshment of coffee, which was scarcely ended when the day began to dawn. This phenomenon began to put us in mind of our reckoning; but the waiters were all so overcome with sleep that it was two hours before a bill could be had, and it was not till near eight that the creaking of the street-door gave the signal of our departure. How one longs to dredge up some notes of such a night's conversation from the cruel river of oblivion! The Apollo Court, on the opposite side of Fleet Street, still preserves the memory of the great club-room at the
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Devil.
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Devil on modern oratory. In 1776 some young lawyers founded there a Pandemonium Club; and after that there is no further record of the
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Devil till it was pulled down and annexed by the neighbouring bankers. In Steele's time there was a
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Devil Tavern at Charing Cross, and a rival
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Devil Tavern
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Cock Tavern (201), opposite the Temple, has been immortalised by Tennyson as thoroughly as the
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Devil
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The violet of a legend blow Among the chops and steaks
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Diary, mentions bringing pretty Mrs. Knipp, an actress, of whom his wife was very jealous, here; and the gay couple
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On his way home to Seething Lane, the amorous Navy Office clerk with difficulty avoided two thieves with clubs, who met him at the entrance into the ruins of the Great Fire near St. Dunstan's. These dangerous meetings with Mrs. Knipp went on till one night Mrs. Pepys came to his bedside and threatened to pinch him with the red-hot tongs. The waiters at the
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Cock