In the early part of the eighteenth century there were said to be no fewer than 2,000 coffee-houses in London. Every profession, trade, class, party, had its favourite coffee-house. The lawyers discussed law or literature, criticized the last new play, or retailed the legal scandal at Nando’s or the Grecian, not very far away from the Temple. At such places the young bloods of the Inns of Court paraded their gowns in the morning, and swaggered in their lace coats and Mechlin ruffles at night, after the theatre. City men met to discuss the rise and fall of stocks, and to settle the rate of insurance, at Garraway’s or Jonathan’s; parsons exchanged University gossip or discussed points of theology at Truby’s or at Child’s, in St. Paul’s Churchyard; whilst military men mustered to grumble over their grievances at Old or Young Man’s, near Charing Cross. The St. James’s and the Smyrna were the headquarters of the Whig politicians, whereas the Tories frequented the Cocoa-tree or Ozinda’s, in St. James’s Street; Scotchmen had their house of call at Forrest’s, Frenchmen at Giles’s or Old Slaughter’s, in St. Martin’s Lane; the gamesters shook their elbows in White’s and the chocolate-houses round Covent Garden; and the leading wits gathered at Will’s, Button’s, or Tom’s, in Great Russell Street, where, after the theatre, there was piquet and the best of conversation till midnight. At all these places, except a few of the most aristocratic coffee or chocolate houses of the West End, smoking was allowed. Many of these old taverns must have been exceedingly comfortable places, and the few which survive have an especial charm. They carry one’s thoughts irresistibly to the days when Dr. Johnson blew his cloud by the side of an old-fashioned fireplace, and occasionally floored some unhappy wight with the sledge-hammer of his conversation. One of the last, if not the last, hostelries, which still retains its ancient appearance, is the Cheshire Cheese. This well-known house is half-way up Fleet Street, on the northern side. It remains, I believe, substantially as it was when, seven years after the Restoration, it was rebuilt on the site of that older Cheshire Cheese where Shakespeare and many other Elizabethan wits were wont to meet. Ben Jonson was a frequent visitor, and here occurred his dispute with Sylvester as to which of them could make the best couplet in the shortest time. The latter began: “I, Sylvester, Kiss’d your sister.” The other’s retort was: “I, Ben Jonson, Kiss’d your wife.” “But that’s not rhyme,” said Sylvester. “No,” said Jonson, “but it’s true.”