and selling a
sort of liquor called coffe, as a great nuisance and prejudice to
the neighborhood, etc., and who would then have thought London
would ever have had near three thousand such nuisances, and that
coffee would have been, as now, so much drank by the best of
quality and physicians?

[Illustration: FIRST ADVERTISEMENT FOR COFFEE--1652

Handbill used by Pasqua Rosee, who opened the first coffee house in
London From the original in the British Museum]

Hatton evidently attributed Fair's nuisance to the coffee itself,
whereas the presentment[72] clearly shows it was in Farr's chimney and
not in the coffee.

Mention has already been made that Sir Henry Blount was spoken of as
"the father of English coffee houses" and his claim to this distinction
would seem to be a valid one, for his strong personality "stamped itself
upon the system." His favorite motto, "_Loquendum est cum vulgo,
sentiendum cum sapientibus_" (the crowd may talk about it; the wise
decide it), says Robinson, "expresses well their colloquial purpose, and
was natural enough on the lips of one whose experience had been world
wide." Aubrey says of Sir Henry Blount, "He is now neer or altogether
eighty yeares, his intellectuals good still and body pretty strong."

Women played a not inconspicuous part in establishing businesses for the
sale of the coffee drink in England, although the coffee houses were not
for both sexes, as in other European countries. The London City
_Quaeries_ for 1660 makes mention of "a she-coffee merchant." Mary
Stringar ran a coffee house in Little Trinity Lane in 1669; Anne Blunt
was mistress of one of the Turk's-Head houses in Cannon Street in 1672.
Mary Long was the widow of William Long, and her initials, together with
those of her husband, appear on a token issued from the Rose tavern in
Bridge Street, Covent Garden. Mary Long's token from the "Rose coffee
house by the playhouse" in Covent Garden is shown among the group of
coffee-house keepers' tokens herein illustrated.

_The First Newspaper Advertisement_

The first newspaper advertisement for coffee appeared, May 26, 1657, in
the _Publick Adviser_ of London, one of the first weekly pamphlets. The
name of this publication was erroneously given as the _Publick
Advertiser_ by an early writer on coffee, and the error has been copied
by succeeding writers. The first newspaper advertisement was contained
in the issue of the _Publick Adviser