onward the sales of the succeeding parts were ever on the increase.
Sam and the White Hart, then, had much to do with the career of
Dickens, for if "Pickwick" had failed it is more than probable that
he would have abandoned literature as a profession.

When Dickens wrote, the White Hart was still in existence. It is so
no longer. Till late in the last century this hostelry was spared
the fate which had overtaken so many Southwark taverns, even though,
in place of the nobles it had sheltered, its customers had become
hop-merchants, farmers, and others of lower degree. In 1889, in the
month of July, four hundred and thirty-nine years after it had
received Jack Cade under its roof, the last timbers of the old inn
were levelled to the ground.




CHAPTER II.

INNS AND TAVERNS EAST OF ST. PAUL'S.


Boswell relates how, in one of his numerous communicative moods, he
informed Dr. Johnson of the existence of a club at "the Boar's Head
in Eastcheap, the very tavern where Falstaff and his joyous
companions met; the members of which all assume Shakespeare's
characters. One is Falstaff, another Prince Henry, another Bardolph,
and so on." If the assiduous little Scotsman entertained the idea of
joining the club, a matter on which he does not throw any light,
Johnson's rejoinder was sufficient to deter him from doing so.