“For the fact is; Sir, public-houses are the great land-marks of the country. Whether you are benighted in a Northumberland moor; lost in a Devonshire lane (the one thing in nature which it is well known has no end); whether you are cast away in a river; left without a clue upon Salisbury Plain; or reduced to a state of topographical despair in a Warwickshire wood; the first person you meet—be it he or she, gentle or simple, old or young, a genius or an idiot—will assuredly convince you that the only rural means of directing you are the names and signs of places of public entertainment. ‘Go on straight till you come to the Green Lion, then turn to the left close to the Goat and Compasses, and after you have passed the Plough, bear off to the right; and, opposite the Jolly Gardeners, you will see a lane: go down that lane till you have to cross a brook by the side of the Bottle and Bagpipes, and when you have got to the Three Whistles and Cockchafer further down, get over a stile next to the Tinker and Turkey-Cock, take the first to the left—and that’s it.’ Such were the directions by which I found my old friend, Groggles, last Monday. Without the signs I have mentioned, I never should have found Groggles to this day. “Now, Sir, I trust the advocates of temperance will pause before they wash away the land-marks of England (Tooting included), in order to substitute water-marks. How are we to find our way about without signs, I wonder? for I suppose these will not be allowed to stand when the houses behind them are taken away. Do the great Father Mathews of this age intend—like the monks of old—to christen the wells, and to give names to the pumps, and springs, and fountains, and conduits? Indeed I hope they do; for these I venture to say will be the only taps they intend leaving to a future generation.