Customs and Fashions in Old New England
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strict laws governing them. The landlords could not sell sack or strong water ; nor permit games to be played in their precincts; nor allow dancing or singing ; nor could tobacco be used within their walls ; nor could they sell cakes or buns indiscriminately. Samuel Cole, the Boston comfit-maker, received his license in 1634, though one can hardly understand, with such manifold rules of narrow limit, how he could wish it. Previously other freemen had obtained per-mission "to draw wine and beer" to sell at retail to their neighbors and to travellers. In New Haven the tavern-keeper had been given twenty acres of land in 1645, in which travellers' horses could be pastured. In Hartford and other river towns the establishment of taverns was compulsory. The ordinaries quickly multiplied in number and increased in pretension. In Boston, in 1651, the King's Arms and its furniture were held to be worth £600. Board was cheap enough. In 1634 the Court set the price of a single meal at sixpence, and an ale quart of beer at a penny. At the Ship Tavern a man had "fire and bed, dyet, wyne and beere betweene meals" for three shillings a day. The wine was limited to "a cupp each man at dynner & supp & no more." Following the English fashion of Shakespeare's time, the inn chambers were each named : The Exchange Chamber, Rose and Sun Chamber, Star Chamber, Court Chamber, Jerusalem Chamber, etc. The names of the inns also followed English nomenclature : The Bunch of Grapes, Dog & Pot, Turk's Head, Green Dragon, Blue Anchor. King's Head, etc. The Good Woman bore on its painted sign the figure of a headless woman. The Ship in Distress had these lines:
"With sorrows I am compassed round,
Pray lend a hand-my ship's aground." Another Boston tavern had this rhyme: "This is the bird that never flew,
This is the tree that never grew, This is the ship that never sails, This is the can that never fails." The Sun Tavern bore these words: "The Best Ale and Beer under the Sun."
This tavern was removed to Moon Street, and was kept by Mrs. Milk. Her neighbors' names were Waters, Beer, and Legg. The Salutation Inn, with its sign-board bearing the picture of two men shaking hands, was commonly known as the Two Palaverers. I know no more attractive picture of olden-time hospitality, nothing better "under the notion of a tavern," than the old Palaverer tavern at Medford. On either side of its front door grew a great tree, and in the spreading branches of each tree was built a platform or balcony. The two were connected by a hanging bridge or scaffolding, and also connected by a similar foot-bridge with the tavern itself. In these leafy tree-arbors, through the sunny summer months, from dawn till twilight, whilom travellers rested and drank their drams, or, perchance, their cups of tea, These pages are © Laurel O'Donnell, 2005, all rights reserved
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