It is worth while to revert to the earlier tenancy of the Coffee-house, which was, wholly or in part, the original printing office of Richard Tottel, law-printer to Edward VI., Queens Mary and Elizabeth; the premises were attached to No. 7, Fleet-street, which bore the sign of "The Hand and Starre," where Tottel lived, and published the law and other works he printed. No. 7 was subsequently occupied by Jaggard and Joel Stephens, eminent law-printers, temp. Geo. I.-III.; and at the present day the house is most appropriately occupied by Messrs. Butterworth, who follow the occupation Tottel did in the days of Edward VI., being law-publishers to Queen Victoria; and they possess the original leases, from the earliest grant, in the reign of Henry VIII., the period of their own purchase. THE "LLOYD'S" OF THE TIME OF CHARLES II. During the reign of Charles II., Coffee-houses grew into such favour, that they quickly spread over the metropolis, and were the usual meeting-places of the roving cavaliers, who seldom visited home but to sleep. The following song, from Jordan's _Triumphs of London_, 1675, affords a very curious picture of the manners of the times, and the sort of conversation then usually met with in a well-frequented house of the sort,--the "Lloyd's" of the seventeenth century:-- "You that delight in wit and mirth, And love to hear such news That come from all parts of the earth, Turks, Dutch, and Danes, and Jews: I'll send ye to the rendezvous, Where it is smoaking new; Go hear it at a coffee-house, It cannot but be true. "There battails and sea-fights are fought, And bloudy plots displaid; They know more things than e'er was thought, Or ever was bewray'd: No money in the minting-house Is half so bright and new; And coming from the _Coffee-House_, It cannot but be true. "Before the navies fell to work, They knew who should be winner; They there can tell ye what the Turk Last Sunday had to dinner. Who last did cut Du Ruiter's[3] corns, Amongst his jovial crew; Or who first gave the devil horns, Which cannot but be true. "A fisherman did boldly tell, And strongly did avouch, He caught a shole of mackerell, They parley'd all in Dutch; And cry'd out _Yaw, yaw, yaw, mine hare_, And as the draught they drew, They stunk for fear that Monk[4] was there: This sounds as if 'twere true. "There's nothing done in all the world, From monarch to the mouse; But every day or night 'tis hurl'd Into the coffee-house: What Lilly[5] what Booker[6] cou'd By art not bring about, At Coffee-house you'll find a brood, Can quickly find it out. "They know who shall in times to come, Be either made or undone, From great St. Peter's-street in Rome, To Turnbal-street[7] in London.