E. Cobham Brewer 1810–1897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
Molly Mog.
This celebrated beauty was an innkeeper’s daughter, at Oakingham, Berks. She was the toast of all the gay sparks, in the former half of the eighteenth century, and died in 1766, at an advanced age. Gay has a ballad on this Fair Maid of the Inn.
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Molly Mog died at the age of sixty-seven, a spinster; Mr. Standen, of Arborfield, the enamoured swain alluded to in the ballad, died 1730. It is said that Molly’s sister Sally was the greater beauty. A portrait of Gay still hangs in the inn.
