chapter III

) stated that, "he that would drink it for livelinesse sake, and to discusse slothfulnesse ... let him use much sweet meates with it, and oyle of pistaccioes, and butter. Some drink it with milk, but it is an error, and such as may bring in danger of the leprosy." Another writer observed that any ill effects caused by coffee, unlike those of tea, etc., ceased when its use was discontinued. In this connection it is interesting to note that in 1785 Dr. Benjamin Mosely, physician to the Chelsea Hospital, member of the College of Physicians, etc., probably having in mind the popular idea that the Arabic original of the word coffee meant force, or vigor, once expressed the hope that the coffee drink might return to popular favor in England as "a cheap substitute for those enervating teas and beverages which produce the pernicious habit of dram-drinking."

About 1628, Sir Thomas Herbert (1606-1681), English traveler and writer, records among his observations on the Persians that:

"They drink above all the rest _Coho_ or _Copha_: by Turk and Arab called _Caphe_ and _Cahua_: a drink imitating that in the Stigian lake, black, thick, and bitter: destrain'd from _Bunchy_, _Bunnu_, or Bay berries; wholesome, they say, if hot, for it expels melancholy ... but not so much regarded for those good properties, as from a Romance that it was invented and brew'd by Gabriel ... to restore the decayed radical Moysture of kind hearted Mahomet."[55]

In 1634, Sir Henry Blount (1602-82), sometimes referred to as "the father of the English coffee house," made a journey on a Venetian galley into the Levant. He was invited to drink _cauphe_ in the presence of Amurath IV; and later, in Egypt, he tells of being served the beverage again "in a porcelaine dish". This is how he describes the drink in Turkey:[56]

They have another drink not good at meat, called _Cauphe_, made of a _Berry_ as big as a small _Bean_, dried in a Furnace, and beat to Pouder, of a Soot-colour, in taste a little bitterish, that they seeth and drink as hot as may be endured: It is good all hours of the day, but especially morning and evening, when to that purpose, they entertain themselves two or three hours in _Cauphe-houses_, which in all Turkey abound more than _Inns_ and _Ale-houses_ with us; it is thought to be the old black broth used so much by the _Lacedemonians_, and dryeth ill Humours in the stomach, comforteth the Brain, never causeth Drunkenness or any other Surfeit, and is a harmless entertainment of good Fellowship; for there upon Scaffolds half a yard high, and covered with Mats, they sit Cross-leg'd after the _Turkish_ manner, many times two or three hundred together, talking, and likely with some poor musick passing up and down.

[Illustration: FIRST PRINTED REFERENCE TO "COFFEE" IN ENGLISH, IN ITS MODERN FORM, 1601

Photographed from the black-letter original of W. Parry's book in the Worth Library of the British Museum]

This reference to the Lacedæmonian black broth, first by Sandys, then by Burton, again by Blount, and concurred in by James Howell (1595-1666), the first historiographer royal, gave rise to considerable controversy among Englishmen of letters in later years. It is, of course, a gratuitous speculation. The black broth of the Lacedæmonians was "pork, cooked in blood and seasoned with salt and vinegar.[57]"

[Illustration: REFERENCES TO COFFEE AS FOUND IN BIDDULPH'S TRAVELS 1609

From the black-letter original in the British Museum]

William Harvey (1578-1657), the famous English physician who discovered the circulation of the blood, and his brother are reputed to have used coffee before coffee houses came into vogue in London--this must have been previous to 1652. "I remember", says Aubrey[58], "he was wont to drinke coffee; which his brother Eliab did, before coffee houses were the fashion in London." Houghton, in 1701, speaks of "the famous inventor of the circulation of the blood, Dr. Harvey, who some say did frequently use it."

Although it seems likely that coffee must have been introduced into England sometime during the first quarter of the seventeenth century, with so many writers and travelers describing it, and with so much trading going on between the merchants of the British Isles and the Orient, yet the first reliable record we have of its advent is to be found in the _Diary and Correspondence of John Evelyn, F.R.S._[59], under "Notes of 1637", where he says:

There came in my time to the college (Baliol, Oxford) one Nathaniel Conopios, out of Greece, from Cyrill, the Patriarch of Constantinople, who, returning many years after was made (as I understand) Bishop of Smyrna. He was the first I ever saw drink coffee; which custom came not into England till thirty years thereafter.

Evelyn should have said thirteen years after; for then it was that the first coffee house was opened (1650).

Conopios was a native of Crete, trained in the Greek church. He became _primore_ to Cyrill, Patriarch of Constantinople. When Cyrill was strangled by the vizier, Conopios fled to England to avoid a like barbarity. He came with credentials to Archbishop Laud, who allowed him maintenance in Balliol College.

It was observed that while he continued in Balliol College he made the drink for his own use called Coffey, and usually drank it every morning, being the first, as the antients of that House have informed me, that was ever drank in Oxon.[60]

[Illustration: MOL'S COFFEE HOUSE, EXETER, ENGLAND, NOW WORTH'S ART ROOMS]

In 1640 John Parkinson (1567-1650), English botanist and herbalist, published his _Theatrum Botanicum_[61], containing the first botanical description of the coffee plant in English, referred to as "_Arbor Bon cum sua Buna._ The Turkes Berry Drinke".

His work being somewhat rare, it may be of historical interest to quote the quaint description here:

Alpinus, in his Booke of Egiptian plants, giveth us a description of this tree, which as hee saith, hee saw in the garden of a certain Captaine of the _Ianissaries_, which was brought out of _Arabia felix_ and there planted as a rarity, never seene growing in those places before.

The tree, saith _Alpinus_, is somewhat like unto the _Evonymus_ Pricketimber tree, whose leaves were thicker, harder, and greener, and always abiding greene on the tree; the fruite is called _Buna_ and is somewhat bigger then an Hazell Nut and longer, round also, and pointed at the end, furrowed also on both sides, yet on one side more conspicuous than the other, that it might be parted in two, in each side whereof lyeth a small long white kernell, flat on that side they joyne together, covered with a yellowish skinne, of an acid taste, and somewhat bitter withall and contained in a thinne shell, of a darkish ash-color; with these berries generally in _Arabia_ and _Egipt_, and in other places of the _Turkes_ Dominions, they make a decoction or drinke, which is in the stead of Wine to them, and generally sold in all their tappe houses, called by the name of _Caova_; _Paludanus_ saith _Chaova_, and _Rauwolfius_ _Chaube_.

This drinke hath many good physical properties therein; for it strengthened a week stomacke, helpeth digestion, and the tumors and obstructions of the liver and spleene, being drunke fasting for some time together.

In 1650, a certain Jew from Lebanon, in some accounts Jacob or Jacobs by name, in others Jobson[62], opened "at the Angel in the parish of St. Peter in the East", Oxford, the earliest English coffee house and "there it [coffee] was by some who delighted in noveltie, drank". Chocolate was also sold at this first coffee house.

Authorities differ, but the confusion as to the name of the coffee-house keeper may have arisen from the fact that there were two--Jacobs, who began in 1650; and another, Cirques Jobson, a Jewish Jacobite, who followed him in 1654.

The drink at once attained great favor among the students. Soon it was in such demand that about 1655 a society of young students encouraged one Arthur Tillyard, "apothecary and Royalist," to sell "coffey publickly in his house against All Soules College." It appears that a club composed of admirers of the young Charles met at Tillyard's and continued until after the Restoration. This Oxford Coffee Club was the start of the Royal Society.

Jacobs removed to Old Southhampton Buildings, London, where he was in 1671.

Meanwhile, the first coffee house in London had been opened by Pasqua Rosée in 1652; and, as the remainder of the story of coffee's rise and fall in England centers around the coffee houses of old London, we shall reserve it for a separate chapter.

[Illustration: EARLY ENGLISH REFERENCE TO COFFEE BY SIR GEORGE SANDYS

From the seventh edition of _Sandys' Travels_, London, 1673]

Of course, the coffee-house idea, and the use of coffee in the home, quickly spread to other cities in Great Britain; but all the coffee houses were patterned after the London model. Mol's coffee house at Exeter, Devonshire, which is pictured on page 41, was one of the first coffee houses established in England, and may be regarded as typical of those that sprang up in the provinces. It had previously been a noted club house; and the old hall, beautifully paneled with oak, still displays the arms of noted members. Here Sir Walter Raleigh and congenial friends regaled themselves with smoking tobacco. This was one of the first places where tobacco was smoked in England. It is now an art gallery.

When the Bishop of Berytus (Beirut) was on his way to Cochin China in 1666, he reported that the Turks used coffee to correct the indisposition caused in the stomach by the bad water. "This drink," he says, "imitates the effect of wine ... has not an agreeable taste but rather bitter, yet it is much used by these people for the good effects they find therein."

In 1686, John Ray (1628-1704), one of the most celebrated of English naturalists, published his _Universal History of Plants_, notable among other things for being the first work of its kind to extol the virtues of coffee in a scientific treatise.

R. Bradley, professor of botany at Cambridge, published (1714) _A Short Historical Account of Coffee_, all trace of which appears to be lost.

Dr. James Douglas published in London (1727) his _Arbor Yemensis fructum Cofe ferens; or, a description and History of the Coffee Tree_, in which he laid under heavy contribution the Arabian and French writers that had preceded him.

[Illustration]

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