Good Wine needs no Bush

It was customary to hang out ivy, boughs of trees, flowers, etc., at public houses to notify to travellers that “good cheer” might be had within.

“Some ale-houses upon the road I saw,

And some with bushes showing they wine did draw.”

Poor Robin’s Perambulations (1678).

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.