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Gray's Inn Coffee-House Also
mentioned in David Copperfield.
The Jolly Sandboys Fictional.
The Valiant Soldier Fictional.
The Wilderness Quilp's favourite
haunt, where he drinks Scheidam, a particularly fiery version of gin.
Frustrated in his attempt to find out more of the whereabouts
of Nell and grandfather, Quilp suggests he and Swiveller go to 'a house
by the waterside where they have some of the noblest Schiedam' [Schiedam
= gin].
The landlord knows me. There's a little summer-house overlooking the
river, where we might take a glass of this delicious liqour with a whiff
of the best tobacco - it's in this case, and of the rarest quality,
to my certain knowledge - and be perfectly snug and happy, could we
possibly contrive it; or is there any very particular engagement that
peremptorily takes you another way, Mr Swiveller, eh?'
...
The summer-house of which Mr Quilp had spoken was a rugged wooden box,
rotten and bare to see, which overhung the river's mud, and threatened
to slide down into it. The tavern to which it belonged was a crazy building,
sapped and undermined by the rats, and only upheld by great bars of
wood which were reared against its walls, and had propped it up so long
that even they were decaying and yielding with their load, and of a
windy night might be heard to creak and crack as if the whole fabric
were about to come toppling down. The house stood - if anything so old
and feeble could be said to stand - on a piece of waste ground, blighted
with the unwholesome smoke of factory chimneys, and echoing the clank
of iron wheels and rush of troubled water. Its internal accommodations
amply fulfilled the promise of the outside. The rooms were low and damp,
the clammy walls were pierced with chinks and holes, the rotten floors
had sunk from their level, the very beams started from their places
and warned the timid stranger from their neighbourhood.
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