At the time of the visit of Dickens and Wilkie Collins to this rare old inn, the proprietor was one Joseph Sly, and Dickens occupied what he termed the state bedroom, "with two enormous red four-posters in it, each as big as Charley's room at Gads Hill." He described the inn as "a very remarkable old house ... with genuine rooms and an uncommonly quaint staircase." A certain portion of the "lazy notes" for the book were, we are told, written at the King's Arms Hotel. [Illustration: THE KING'S ARMS, LANCASTER _Drawn by L. Walker_] On their arrival, Dickens and Collins sat down to a good hearty meal. The landlord himself presided over the serving of it, which, Dickens writes in a letter, comprised "two little salmon trout; a sirloin steak; a brace of partridges; seven dishes of sweets; five dishes of dessert, led off by a bowl of peaches; and in the centre an enormous bride-cake. 'We always have it here, sir,' said the landlord, 'custom of the house.' Collins turned pale, and estimated the dinner at half a guinea each." Mr. Sly became quite good friends with the two distinguished novelists, and cherished with great pride the signed portrait of Dickens which the author of _Pickwick_ presented him with. He left the old place in 1879 and it was soon afterwards pulled down and replaced by an ordinary commercial hotel. Although the bride-cake custom was abandoned, and the haunted chamber with its fantastic story swept away, it is interesting to know that the famous oak bedstead, in which Dickens himself slept, was acquired by the Duke of Norfolk. Mr. Sly, who died in 1895, never tired of recalling the visit of the two famous authors. He took the greatest pride in his wonderful old inn, and found real delight in conducting visitors over the building and telling amusing stories about Dickens and Wilkie Collins. Indeed, he was so proud of the association that he obtained Dickens's permission to reprint those passages of _The Lazy Tour of Two Idle Apprentices_ relating to the hostelry, in pamphlet form, with an introductory note saying, "The reader is perhaps aware that Mr. Charles Dickens and his friend Wilkie Collins, in the year 1857, visited Lancaster, and during their sojourn stayed at Mr. Sly's King's Arms Hotel." There is a further association with the inn and Dickens to be found in "Doctor Marigold's Prescriptions." We find it recorded there that Doctor Marigold and his Library Cart, as he called his caravan, "were down at Lancaster, and I had done two nights' more than the fair average business (though I cannot in honour recommend them as a quick audience) in the open square there, near the end of the street where Mr. Sly's King's Arms and Royal Hotel stands."