The original courtyard of the Cheshire Cheese is now roofed over with glass, and here may be seen some interesting old prints. These include two by H. Bunbury—“A City Hunt” and “Hyde Park, 1780”; while others are, “Destruction of the Bastille, July 14, 1789,” after a painting by H. Singleton, and a line engraving by James Heath, from a painting by F. Wheatley of “The Riot in Broad Street on the 17th of June, 1773.” Dr. Johnson is supposed to have passed many an evening here, and from his time down to the present day unbroken links of tradition connect the Cheshire Cheese of the twentieth century with the Cheshire Cheese of the eighteenth. The seat on which legend reports that the redoubtable lexicographer sat is one of the most treasured relics of the dining-room. Above it hangs a copy of the famous portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds, now preserved in the National Gallery. Underneath may be read the following inscription: “The Favourite Seat of Dr. Johnson. Born 18th Septr., 1709. Died 13th Decr., 1784. In him a noble understanding and a masterly intellect were united with grand independence of character and unfailing goodness of heart, which won the admiration of his own age and remain as recommendations to the reverence of posterity. ‘No, Sir! there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man by which so much happiness has been produced as by a good tavern.’—JOHNSON.” A number of quaint pictures and prints are to be found scattered over the house. Upstairs is another copy of Sir Joshua’s oil-painting of the Doctor. This, it is said, dates back to Johnson’s time, and was painted in order that it might adorn the room at the Mitre, in Chancery Lane, where the club founded by Dr. Johnson first held its meetings. Dr. Johnson’s Mitre has long since been pulled down, but the club he founded still exists, and it meets several times a year in what was formerly the coffee-room. This is now known as “William’s room,” on account of the portrait of William Simpson which hangs over the fireplace. William began to be a waiter at Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese Chop-house in 1829, and his portrait, as the inscription below says, “was subscribed for by the gentlemen frequenting the coffee-room, and presented to Mr. Dolamore (the landlord) to be handed down as an heirloom to all future landlords of ‘Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese,’ Wine Office Court, Fleet Street.” The name of the artist is unknown. In the opposite room is a picture of another waiter—a portrait of Henry Todd, as the inscription informs us, who commenced as waiter at Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese February 27, 1812. It was painted by Wageman, July 1827, and “subscribed for by the gentlemen frequenting the coffee-room, and presented to Mr. Dolamore (the landlord) in trust to be handed down as an heirloom to all future landlords of the Old Cheshire Cheese, Wine Office Court, Fleet Street.”