The Mitre Tavern, Fleet Street 25 



some time to master the spelling which their owners used 

 and preferred. Thus when the astronomer Maskelyne first 

 appeared as a visitor at the Club, the Treasurer, unfamiliar 

 with the name, of which he could only catch the sound as 

 pronounced, wrote it down in his register as " Mr. Mas- 

 culine." This spelling he varied on subsequent occasions 

 into "Mascarline," "Mascaline," &c., and not until the dis 

 tinguished physicist became, as Astronomer Royal, an ex 

 officio member of the Club, was his name generally written 

 correctly, though still with occasional lapses. 



As long as the Royal Society held its meetings at Gresham 

 College the social dinners and suppers of the Fellows took 

 place in some of the taverns in the City within easy reach 

 of that centre. When in November 1710 the Society moved 

 to Crane Court, Fleet Street, it was more convenient to dine 

 or sup in quarters nearer to the new meeting-place. The 

 place chosen by those Fellows who laid the foundation 

 of the Royal Society Club was " The Mitre Tavern, in Fleet 

 Street over against Fetter Lane " one of the most noted 

 resorts in London, especially famous as the favourite supper- 

 house of Johnson and his associates. 1 In this house the 

 Royal Philosophers continued to dine from their first gather- 

 ings for nearly forty years until 2ist December 1780. Their 

 dinner hour, which had once been at what is now the time 

 for luncheon, had been slowly made later. Previous to 

 1784 it was fixed for 4 p.m. In that year it became 4.30, 

 which was successively altered to 5, 5.30, 6 and 6.30, as 

 in later pages will be shown from the minutes of the Club. 



with the movement. Certainly he succeeded in keeping both the cookery 

 of the Club and its language fairly free from French contamination until 

 towards the end of his long reign. 



1 Pepys mentions four Mitre taverns in London : " The Mitre," Cheap- 

 side, " The Mitre," Fenchurch Street, " The Mitre," Fleet Street, and 

 " The Mitre," Wood Street. It was the Fleet Street house that Johnson 

 and Boswell have made famous. Possibly to some of the more literaiy 

 among the Royal Philosophers or their guests when they went to the 

 Mitre, Matthew Prior's distich might now and then occur : 



Thus to the place where Johnson sat we climb, 

 Leaning on the same rail that guided him. 



