fault being that it was somewhat overdone. The
bet was for more than L100.

In the burial-ground of St. Michael's Church, hard by, rested all that
was mortal of one of the waiters of this tavern. His tomb, in Purbeck
stone, had the following epitaph:--

"Here lieth the bodye of Robert Preston, late drawer at the 'Boar's
Head Tavern,' Great Eastcheap, who departed this life March 16, Anno
Domini 1730, aged twenty-seven years.

"Bacchus, to give the toping world surprise,
Produc'd one sober son, and here he lies.
Tho' nurs'd among full hogsheads, he defy'd
The charm of wine, and every vice beside.
O reader, if to justice thou'rt inclined,
Keep honest Preston daily in thy mind.
He drew good wine, took care to fill his pots,
Had sundry virtues that outweighed his fauts (_sic_).
You that on Bacchus have the like dependence,
Pray copy Bob in measure and attendance."

Goldsmith visited the "Boar's Head," and has left a delightful essay
upon his day-dreams there, totally forgetting that the original inn had
perished in the Great Fire. "The character of Falstaff," says the poet,
"even with all his faults, gives me more consolation than the most
studied efforts of wisdom. I here behold an agreeable old fellow
forgetting age, and showing me the way to be young at sixty-five. Surely
I am well able to be as merry, though not so comical as he. Is it not in
my power to have, though not so much wit, at least as much vivacity?
Age, care, wisdom, reflection, be gone! I give you to the winds. Let's
have t'other bottle. Here's to the memory of Shakespeare, Falstaff, and
all the merry men of Eastcheap!

"Such were the reflections which naturally arose while I sat at the
'Boar's Head Tavern,' still kept at Eastcheap. Here, by a pleasant fire,
in the very room where old Sir John Falstaff cracked his jokes, in the
very chair which was sometimes honoured by Prince Henry, and sometimes
polluted by his immortal merry companions, I sat and ruminated on the
follies of youth, wished to be young again, but was resolved to make the
best of life whilst it lasted, and now and then compared past and
present times together. I considered myself as the only living
representative of the old knight, and transported my imagination back to
the times when the Prince and he gave life to the revel. The room also
conspired to throw my reflections back into antiquity. The oak floor,
the Gothic windows, and