“I hold it right, my friend, to mix these convivialia with our antiquarian discussions, because I know that they are not only ancient, but in a manner peculiar to this part of the water-side; for we find Stephanides, _Stephanus ab Stephano_, as I may jocularly call him, whom I before quoted, saying at folio 32, ‘_Præterea est in Londonia super ripam fluminis_,’ &c. but we’ll give the quotation in plain English. ‘And moreover, on the banks of the river, besides the wine sold in ships’--that is to say, foreign wines of Anjou, Auxere, and Gascoigne, though even then we had some Saxon and Rhenish wines well worth the drinking,--‘besides the wines sold in ships and vaults, there is a public eating-house, or cook’s shop. Here, according to the season, you may find victuals of all kinds, roasted, baked, fried, or boiled. Fish, large and small, with coarse viands for the poorer sort, and more delicate ones for the rich, such as venison, fowls, and small birds. In case a friend should arrive at a Citizen’s house, much wearied with his journey, and chuses not to wait, an-hungered as he is, for the buying and cooking of meat, The water’s served, the bread’s in baskets brought, _Virg. Æn._ i. 705. and recourse is immediately had to the bank above-mentioned, where every thing desirable is instantly procured. No number so great, of knights or strangers, can either enter the city at any hour of day or night, or leave it, but all may be supplied with provisions, so that those have no occasion to fast too long, nor these to depart the city without their dinner. To this place, if they be so disposed, they resort, and there they regale themselves, every man according to his abilities. Those who have a mind to indulge, need not to hanker after sturgeon, nor a guinea-fowl, nor a gelinote de bois,’--which some call red-game, and others a godwit--‘for there are delicacies enough to gratify their palates. It is a public eating-house, and is both highly convenient and useful to the city, and is a clear proof of its civilization.’ “Thus speaks Fitz-Stephen of the time of Henry II. between the years 1170 and 1182; and if you look but two centuries later, you shall find that John Holland, Duke of Exeter, held his Inn here at Cold Harbour, and gave to his half-brother, King Richard the Second, a sumptuous dinner, in 1397. Then too, when this spot became the property of the merry Henry Plantagenet, Prince of Wales, by the gift of Henry the Fourth, the same King filled his cellars with ‘twenty casks and one pipe of red wine of Gascoigne, free of duty.’ This you have on the authority of John Stow, on the one part, in his ‘_Survey of London_,’ the best edition by John Strype, &c. London, 1754, folio, volume i. page 523; and of Master Thomas Pennant, on the other, in his ‘_Account of London_,’ 2nd edition, London, 1791, 4to, page 330.”