Also 1 ealo-benc, 6 alle benche. [ALE- 4.] A bench in or before an ale-house.
a. 1000. Beowulf, 2062. Gum-manna fela, in ealo-bence.
1547. Homilies, I. xii. I. (1640), 89. Which upon the Ale-benches or other places, delight to set forth certaine questions.
1556. Robinson, trans. More’s Utopia (1869), 26. An other sorte sytteth vpon their allebencheis … amonge their cuppes.
1644. Quarles, Whipper Whipt, in Chertsey Libr., I. 171. A pack of Alebench Whistlers.
1678. Bunyan, Pilgr., I. 134. So will he talk when he is on the Ale-bench.
1849. Macaulay, Hist. Eng., II. 429. Wild rumours … flew without ceasing from coffeehouse to coffeehouse and from alebench to alebench.
