4 Early Social Life of Royal Society 



On 2nd April 1668, after attending the meeting of the 

 Society and being induced to contribute 40 towards the 

 building of a College as the future home of the Royal Society, 

 Pepys states that " thence with Lord Brouncker and several 

 of them to the King's Head Taverne by Chancery Lane, and 

 there did drink and eat and talk and, above the rest, I did 

 hear of Mr. Hooke and my Lord an account of the reason of 

 concords and discords in musique, which they say is from the 

 equality of vibrations ; but I am not satisfied in it, but 

 will at my leisure think of it more, and see how far that 

 do go to explain it. So, late at night, home." 



These and other passages in the journal of the great 

 Diarist show that, for some years after the foundation of 

 the Royal Society, it was a common practice for the Fellows 

 to dine or sup together, not merely on St. Andrew's day, 

 the anniversary of the Society, but at all times of the year, 

 and that these social gatherings were known as " Club- 

 suppers/' In one of the entries just quoted allusion is 

 made to a " Dr. Floyd, a divine admitted this day." No 

 one of the name of Floyd or Lloyd belonged at that time 

 to the Royal Society. The " admission " must therefore 

 have been to the convivial union at the tavern. It would 

 thus seem that some degree of care was taken to keep the 

 company select by imposing some formality in the case of 

 outsiders who were not Fellows, such as requiring them to 

 be introduced by the President or one of the Fellows who 

 usually formed the social company. 



That at the beginning of the eighteenth century there 

 was a recognised convivial club connected with the Royal 

 Society may be inferred from a scurrilous anonymous 

 volume which then appeared with the title " A compleat 

 and humorous Account of all the remarkable Clubs and 

 Societies in the Cities of London and Westminster, from 



the R 1 S y down to the Lumber-troop etc." The 



author was afterwards ascertained to be the notorious 

 Edward (or Ned) Ward, keeper of a London tavern, who 

 published a number of pamphlets in prose and verse, dis- 

 tinguished above all for their extraordinary coarseness and 



