good dinner was an object did so; and
no nobler sight was there in Bristol, amidst all its wealth and
hospitality, than that of honest John Weeks at the head of his table,
lustily carving and pressing his guests to 'Eat, drink, and be merry.'
Nor did his generosity content itself with this.

[Illustration: MURAL TABLET IN BRISTOL CATHEDRAL.]

"It was the custom of the house and of the day, when the repast was
ended, that each person should go to honest John Weeks in the bar and
there receive his cordial wishes for many happy returns of the genial
season. They received something more, for according to their several
necessities a small gift of money was pressed upon each. To one man a
crown; to another, half-a-guinea; to a third, as more needing it a
guinea. On the whole some twenty or thirty guineas were thus disbursed.

"On one particular year it had been noticed during the months of
November and December, that a middle-aged man, whom no frequenter of the
Bush Inn appeared to know, and who appeared to know no one, used to
visit about noon every day, and calling for a sixpenny glass of brandy
and water, sit over it until he had carefully gone through the perusal
of the London paper of the previous evening. On Christmas Eve, honest
John Weeks, anxious that the decayed gentleman should have one meal at
least in the 'Bush,' delicately hinted that on the following day he kept
open table. Punctually at one o'clock, being the appointed hour, he
appeared at the Bush in his usual seedy attire. John Weeks called his
head waiter, a sagacious, well-powdered, steady man, to whom he
confidently entrusted the donation which he had set aside for the
decayed gentleman. The decayed gentleman quietly put it in his pocket,
from which he drew a card. The inscription on the card was simply
'Thomas Coutts, 59, Strand.' Amongst the heirlooms which she most
particularly prized, the late Duchess of St. Albans, widow of Thomas
Coutts, used to show a coin richly mounted in a gorgeous bracelet, which
coin bore the name of 'The Bush Guinea.'"

Numerous as the passengers were by the many coaches starting from the
Bush Inn, yet evidently John Weeks was in the habit of finding enough
food for them to eat, and the wherewithal to fortify themselves with,
ere they set out on their long coach journeys. The Bill of Fare for the
guests at that hostelry during the festive season of 1790 shows that our
ancestors had an excellent conception of Christmas che