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BOOKSTACKS

THE

LITTLE

WORLD
OF

OR,

~itnrc

in~1idth of foubi -life.

BY

CHARLES MANBY SMITH,
AUTHOR OF
"THE WOREING MAN'S WAY IN THE WORLD," " CURIOSITIES OF LONDON LIFE," ETC.

LONDON:
AIRTHUJR HALL, VIRTUE, AND CO.,
25, PATERNOSTER ROW.

1857.

LONDON:
JS. VIRTUE, PRINTER, CITY ROAD.

A FIRST WORD.

THE following pictures of the varied phases of London
life are presented to the public, not as finished per.formances challenging a critical judgment, but rather
as selections from the random sketches of an observer
accustomed to explore the metropolis occasionally with
an eye to the picturesque either in costume or character.
The several subjects have been delineated from different
points of view, as suited the convenience or the whim
of the writer, and the purposes of the different popular
journals in which they originally appeared. Some of
them are in the narrative form, and of those the framework has been necessarily fictitious; but they all embody
such truths and facts of our metropolitan life as lie open
to the discovery of any man who may choose to push
inquiry and remark in the directio traced out by the
author.
In making this selection from some hundreds of a
similar description printed within the last few years, I
have been guided by the wish to amuse and interest
the reader, while presenting to his consideration some
materials for thought not discernible at all times

4 37 18 1

vi

A FIRST WORD.

through the conventionalisms of a society so artificial as
ours. The surface-view and the undercurrent of London life are the light and shade of the pictures here
rudely sketched out; both are well worthy of attentive
regard, and both offer a wide field for not unprofitable
speculation; but in this case, as in most others, that
which coyly shrinks from the light of day and the
prying eye of the investigator, best rewards the trouble
of the search.
The metropolis of Britain, and of the world, is a
literary mine, which a round number of workers with
head and hand have been long quarrying out to the
public advantage, and, it is to be hoped, to their own.
I have had my share in the labour, and have no cause
to be dissatisfied with the reward: if the public had
not looked approvingly upon a former series of sketches
not very dissimilar to these, I should not have presumed
upon a second venture. With a grateful recollection of
past favours I may be allowed to commend the present
volume to their goodnatured sympathies.

CON TENT So
PAGE

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS

1
13
19
29

.

VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND-POINT
THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

A

.

.

.

CALM.IN.THE CITY.............

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY

r

..FIx: OP
MAc:
A~VIOMEI
~ND
lit
LTNI)BY

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY
JACK FROST AT OURt TERRACE
ORDER

RAINY DAY IN TOWN

..

A

70
81
93

.

A

LONDON RAILWAY STATION

THE.PRECATORY

102
109

PINCHER INVALIDED
BEATING THE BOUNDS.......

A

121
126

NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW

THE SIGNS OF THE TIME s

...

.
LAGSMANBURY........ ..

....

135
145

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON
"MOVINGHOUSE"............
CONFESSIONS'OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S
FLOWERS IN LONDON

RACE

155
160
185

WHAT'S O'CLOCK IN CHEAPSIDE? ....
.....

...

LETTING LODGINGS.

:01
BC

........

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN.......

THE EXPECTANT

.87
49
63

AWIDOW'S

CROCODILE COURT.............

TALE

..

190
195
.207
218

CONTENTS.

viii

PAGE
COMMERCIAL

ART.........................231

CRAP-PICTURES...............................239
THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.................251
HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.................267
GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS..........................278
FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE...........................2SS
GENESIS OF THE WOEKERS............................297
" CROWNER'S QUEST"......................................313
LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND

NEW..........................319

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW...................331

40

THE PHYSICIAN'S.LEVEE......................3
TWENTYFOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS:-

4

MORNING,
DAY...............................60'
EVENTIDE....................

...........

379

NIGHT.............................395

DUBLt
THE

LITTLE WORLD OF LONDON.

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.
A LIST of the amusements and recreations of London,
were it only those of a single season, would be a catalogue
comprising everything which the talent, the enterprise, and
the ingenuity of men have accomplished for the gratification
of their fellows' curiosity-their love of the beautiful, their
sense of humour, their literary and artistic predilections, and
their peculiar tastes, whether refined by cultivation on the
one hand, or coarse and demoralising on the other. Fancies
and hobbyhorses the oddest, the most grotesque and whimsical, have their enthusiastic patrons and votaries in this allembracing metropolis. We might run down the scale from
a morning concert at Hanover Square, admission one guinea,
to a midnight dog-show, or a duel of rats at Whitechapel,
entrance twopence, including a ticket for beer; and, in the
course of the descent, we should light upon whole classes of
exhibitions which one half the world would as carefully
avoid, as the other half would eagerly seek out. But such a
catalogue, comprehensive as it would be, would embrace very
few indeed of the gratuitous entertainments with which the
masses of London are amused. The number of those who
cannot afford to pay for recreation is, probably, quite as large
as those who can. To them it matters nothing that the theatres,
B

AMUSEMENTS

OF THE MONEYLESS.

the music-halls, the casinos, the gala-gardens, the panoramas,
or the free-and-easys, the public-houses, and the gin-shops,
stand perpetually open. They have no money to expend for
purposes of amusement, and must be recreated gratis, if
recreated at all. Confessedly, the amusements provided for
the populace are too few--that item appears to have been
entirely left out of the calculations of the authorities, who
have not condescended to recognise a claim that way for
The old athletic sports have long
many generations.
vanished, from want of space to practise them upon; and
the only relic of anything of that kind, are the games of the
London street-boys-games played on so puny a scale, and
in such feminine sort, as to excite the derision of the country
youth, accustomed to " ample room and verge enough "for
something like manly exercise. If the city boy contracts, as
he frequently does, a sporting taste, he spends his leisure in
catching fish, twenty-five to the pound, in the New River;
or, borrowing an old gun, in shooting at sparrows in the
brick-fields. But, says the bard of Rydal Mount'pleasure is spread through the earth

In stray gifts, to be claimed by whoever shal find;"
and amusement is spread through the metropolis in the same
way; and so it is that the needy Londoner has a share in
recreations and enjoyments of which his brother rustic knows
nothing. Let us glance at a few of these "stray gifts," and
note how they are relished.
It is a fine spring morning, the wintry frosts have all
vanished, and a dry March wind is blowing into the face of
an early April day. There is a review of one or two regiments to come off at ten o'clock in Hyde Park. The music
of the various bands, marching from the Horse Guards and
the neighbouring barracks, has drawn after them a prodigious
tail of idlers and supernumeraries from countless courts and
lanes within earshot; and by the time the several regiments

AMUSEMENTS OF THtE MONEYLESS.

have appeared upon the ground, they are surrounded, at a
respectful distance, by forty or fifty thousand spectators, the
majority of whom, it may be, will dine on that military spectacle, but who are none the less heroes and patriots for that.
The soldiers go through their exercise; they form in close
cdlumn, and march to the attack, banners flying and
trumpets sounding; they break into line, and deploy in
separate ranks; they fix bayonets, and rush to the charge;
they unite in a solid square, front-rank kneeling, and, amidst
the glitter of steel and the whiz and clink of ramrods, pour
forth a running-fire, which never ceases for full twenty
minutes. Look now, while this is going on, into the faces of
the penniless lads who have rushed to this gratuitous entertainment-mark the parted lips, the flashing eye, the
clenched hand, and rigidly erect. gait of yon tattered vagabond, and ask yourself the question, whether any scene of
mimic action before the footlights would yield him half the
excitement of this warlike exhibition which he gets for
nothing, and in consequence of which, in company with a
band of his fellows, he may be found, with a cockade in his
rimless hat, in the rear of the recruiting-sergeant before he is
a day older.
Again: it is mid-day, and the muddy highway of the
Thames is chequered with the shadows of a whole forest of
masts-and yards-shadows perpetually broken into shivers
by the rapid passage of innumerable craft up and down the
stream. The surface of the river swarms with life, for unemployed London is rushing to-day towards the docks at
Woolwich, where a war-steamer is to be launched; she is
pierced for 120 guns, and "Won't she give the .Rooshins
pepper?" is the note of admiration sung in her praise.
Everything floating around her is covered with-heads, while
the shores are lined with a motley multitude, who, paying
nothing for the spectacle, as the enormous mass swoops down
into the flood, rend the skies with such a shout as neither
B2

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

Middlesex nor Surrey will hear again till the dockyards of
Woolwich add another man-of-war to the fleet.
Or, it is the afternoon of the 1st of August, and now the
grand rowing-match of the year comes off, when the "jolly
young watermen " compete for the prize of Doggett's coat
and silver badge. All the bridges that cross the course are
crammed with eager spectators, and every point of vantage
on either bank is similarly blocked up with human headsthis being a species of combat in which the river-side
denizens of London especially delight. At regular intervals,
cannon-shots re-echo from the shores, while stentorian voices
are sounding along the water, warning penny-steamers and
-trespassing barges to leave the course clear. When at
length the racers, surrounded by a swarm of wherries that
dart out from every nook to join in the fun, and followed by
the ruck of all sorts as long as a comet's tail, make their appearance, and shoot rapidly past, not one in a hundred of the
straining eyes above and around can discern which are the
competitors, among the shoal of boats that rushes by. That
is of no consequence, however; the race is run, and the prize
is won-and they have seen the sport-if Charley Jones
isn't the winner, then somebody else is, and it will all come
out by means of the newspapers to-morrow.
The awkward fact, that a poor fellow has not a penny to
spare, does not necessarily prove that he has no dramatic
tastes and likings; and it happens, too, that having them,
the want of ,noney is not always an absolute bar to their
gratification. Penniless Jack contrives to see the great
tragedian, when there is one, or the star of the season, in
spite of his empty purse. If you condescend to go to the
gallery for an hour or two's amusement, and come away
when you have had enough of it, or your time is up while
yet half the performance is to come, you will find Jack at
the door civilly inquiring if you intend to return. If you
reply in the negative, he will beg your check; and without

AMUJEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

5

waiting to split hairs on the morality of such a proceeding,
will make use of it himself, and enjoy the after-piece as
much as though he had disbursed a day's earnings for the
privilege. Sometimes Jack has a penchant for studying
great men, and ' you catch him in the Court of Chancery,
conning the horse-hair wigs and the learned faces under
them with evident symptoms of satisfaction; or he wanders
from court to court, making acquaintance with the judges
and the lord-mayor. But his best opportunity is at the
entrance to the House of Commons, in Westminster; and
there you are pretty sure to meet with him, standing in
the rank of lookers-on, whenever the House is sitting,
and watching the members as they go in. He knows
Disraeli, Bulwer, and Lord John, Cobden and Bright, and
all the great guns, as well as they know each other; and
before now, at an early break-up, has had the honour of
calling a cab for a member of the cabinet. Of course, Jack
knows the Queen and the Prince-Consort; he has hoorayed
too often at Her Majesty's -state-carriage, on her progress toi
open or close the parliament, to be ignorant on that score.
If Penniless Jack does not know all the aristocracy by name,
it is not so much from want of observation, as from limited
means of information, and the perplexity of the study.
Having nothing particular to do, unfortunately, at any particular spot, he is often found leaning pensively over the
railings outside the ring in Hyde Park. Here he sees the
whole aristocracy of the realm during the hour which fashion
sets apart for exercise, defiling grandly before his eyes-the
dowagers and duchesses in their handsome equipages-the
lords and dukes in barouche and brougham, or mounted on
high-mettled steeds-fair ladies and faithful squires cantering and careering along Rotten Row-and the whole imposing assemblage of England's nobility drawn out for his
special amusement. What are his cogitations upon the
s'ene we do not pretend to know, though we suspect they

6

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

are not wholly free from the myths and romance of the
imaginative school.
The street-spectacles of the metropolis, however remunerative they may be to their projectors, yet supply gratuitous
entertainment to the mass of the spectators, inasmuch as not
a tithe of those who look on contribute to the recompense of
the perf6rmers. In some tranquil cul-de-sac of a street,
perhaps abutting on the river, or ending in some wilderness
of building-ground, one comes occasionally upon a wandering
company of acrobats, conjurors, or jugglers, or all three
united. They are dressed from head to foot in a lightfitting cotton suit, displaying their perfect symmetry of form;
they may be five or six in company, but there is no fool or
clown, " no nonsense," as they would say, about them. They
mean business; and the stolid, matter-of-fact expression of
their faces says that plainly. One of them bangs a big drum
and blows a few inspiriting notes on the Pandean pipes,
which is the signal for a general rush to that quarter from
all the outlets of the neighbourhood. As the crowd gathers,
the musician deposits his big drum on the ground, and as
master of the ceremonies begins arranging the company in
a grand circle. This he accomplishes by means of a wooden
cannon-ball, attached to a string a couple of yards in length,
which he flourishes vigorbusly around him on all sides, compelling all who have any regard for their shoulders or shins
to keep at a respectful distance: if the spectators are few,
he is content with a small area; but as the crowd increases,
he enlarges the circle with despotic impartiality, so that all
may have a fair view. Meanwhile; a patch of old carpeting
is spread in the centre of the circle, and the first performer
steps upon it; casting a tragic glance around, he immediately
begins tying himself up in an inextricable knot, till he presents the figure of a compact ball rolling about under the
impetus of the director's foot; then a sudden transformation
is effected-the performer's heels are clasped together behind

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

7

his n'eck; his hands, thrust beneath his hams, represent the
claws of a fowl; and upon his outspread fingers he hops
about in the character of that "strornary bird what was
cotched in China." A burst of laughter acknowledges the
merit of this exhibition, and a few stray coins begin to drop
on the carpet. Now another professor seats himself on the
ground, and begins whirling round his head a whole galaxy
of golden balls; in a moment the balls drop into a box, and
their place is supplied by a constellation of bowie-knives,
gleaming, flashing, and shimmering in the sun, and the
handle of each dropping momentarily into the man's hand,
whence it whirls aloft to repeat its circular flight. This
handy fellow finishes his display by a game at cup-and-ball,
played in an ominous fashion :-tying a small cup round his
temples, and inserting a thick padding between that and his
skull, he seizes a golden ball twice as big as your fist, and
hurls it aloft in the air far above the chimneys, till it diminishes to a speck;-as it comes down with a momentum
that threatens to smash it to shivers, he pops his bold brow
beneath and receives it in the cup; had it missed the mark,
you feel assured it would have crashed through the fellow's
occiput. This feat brings another dribble of coppers, and the
third performer now steps out. He flourishes an old silk handkerchief, holding it at one corner, and drawing it through his
left hand, fast clenched, a dozen times in a minute. "What
will you have, ladies and gentlemen?" he asks. "Did you say
eggs ?"-and incontinently the passage of the handkerchief
through his clenched hand is stopped by three or four eggs
in succession, which are carefully taken out and laid on the
drum. "Did you say a pint pot ?"-and immediately the
silk, which an instant before was waving loose in the air, is
seen to contain a pewter pot, which also is taken out and
laid with the eggs. "Did you say rabbit-pie ?"-and the
next moment a live rabbit is struggling in the folds of the
handkerchief, and has to be let loose. "Did you say some-

AMUSEMENTS

OF THE MONEYLESS.

thing to drink, sir ? Certainly, sir. Here, you little boy
with the speckled face-come here, sir. Hold that funnel to
your chin, sir." Then seizing an ale-glass, the wizard works
the boy's elbow as though it were the handle of a pump,
draws off a glass of ale from the spout of the funnel, and
drinks it to the health of the company. When the wizard
has finished his marvels, there follows a gymnastic display
of the whole company united, remarkable chiefly for feats of
agility and strength, which we need not describe, and generally closing with a grand pyramid, inwhich three men
support two on their shoulders, and the two support another,
all standing erect; sometimes the pyramid can't be done for
want of hands, and then it is a pillar of three men, the
second climbing to the shoulders of the first, and the third
to those of the second. The whole performance is over in half
an hour; and if one in a dozen of the spectators pay a copper
for the,spectacle, the troop is not ill remunerated, as it will get
a small sprinkling of silver besides in the course of the day.
But instead of acrobats and conjurors, we may chance to
light, in a similar spot, upon a curious fellow who, with a
taste for natural history, has devoted all his time and energies
to the education of birds and animals. He has a platform
upon wheels, flanked with a large cage in compartments, the
residence of his performing pupils. There is a tight rope
stretched upon the platform, upon which a canary has been
taught to dance, and does dance too, gracefully, whistling the
while. There is a pistol lying on the board,which a lop-eared
rabbit has been taught to fire; and there is a bullfinch trained
to sham dead, and lie motionless on its back at the moment
of the discharge. There is a mouse which gallops a guineapig round the circus, and we know not what besides-except
that there is a flea harnessed to a brass cannon on wheels,
which it actually drags along-though this last curiosity is
not a gratuitous exhibition, being only shown to those who
pay their penny.

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

9

Or, the street-exhibition shall be a gladiator rat, champion
of all England, ready at any moment to fight any rat that
ever wore a tail. The champion rat lives in his master's
bosom, and is produced whenever the challenge is accepted,
and invariably " kills his man." This is rather a secret than
a public exhibition, and takes place in by-corners and out-ofthe-way localities; but it is sure to be attended by a swarm
of idlers, take place where it may. Or, it may be Punch
and Judy, which is all the world's drama, and which all the
world stops to laugh at. Or, it may be that nocturnal
comedy played on the Punch-and-Judy stage, and by the
same proprietor, in which the shadows of the performing
figures are projected on a transparent curtain, and in which
:an unfortunate cobbler, suspected by a too jealous wife of an
intrigue with a customer, undergoes all sorts of domestic
miseries and mishaps, to the uproarious amusement of the
Or, it may be a chorus of ballad-singers and
audience.
patterers, bawling the last new political ballad, with interlocutory explanations-or a lament for the Crimean armyor a dirge for Nicholas, from which we learn that the czar
lies "buried in a hole in famed Sebastypol." A hundred
other things might be mentioned, and a hundred more to that,
which the idler in search of amusement in London may participate in, if he choose, without being called upon to pay.
But, after all, the grand source of gratuitous entertainment
in London is the shop-windows and the shops. Here lies
the veritable Great Exhibition, which is perpetually open to
all comers, and of which nobody ever tires. It is an awful
blunder to suppose that those only profit by the display in
Every
shop-windows who are in a position to purchase.
shop-front is an open volume, which even he that runs may
read, while he that stands still may study it, and gather
wisdom at the cheapest source, which may be useful for a
whole life. To the moneyless million, the shops of London
are what the university is to the collegian: they teach them

10

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

all knowledge; they are history, geography, astronomy,
chemistry, photography, numismatics, dynamics, mechanics
in a word, they are science in all its practicaldevelopmentsand, glorious addition, they are art in all its latest and
noblest achievements. While to one class of observers they
are a source of inexhaustible amusement, to another they are
a source equally inexhaustible of instruction. Therefore it
is that the mechanic and artisan, out of work and out of
money, wanders along the interminable miles of shop-fronts,
peering here, puzzling there, guessing in this place, solving
in that, some one or other of the mechanical problems presented to his view. A common thing with men and lads
thus circumstanced, is to sally forth in groups, to dissipate
the weary hours of enforced idleness by gazing in at the
shop-windows, and speculating upon this or that unknown
material or contrivance; andguessing or, if practicable,
inquiring into the circumstances of its produce or construction.
A well-known source of gratis recreation to the
unemployed is what is called "a picture-fuddle," when a
party of idle hands will hunt up all the print-shops and
picture-shops of a whole district, and spend perhaps the
whole day in the contemplation of this gratuitous gallery,
which, having the charm of novelty, recommends itself to
them more than do the rooms of the National Collection or
the long chambers of the British Museum. Others may prefer
"a book-fuddle," and these roam from stall to stall in the
second-hand book-districts, beguiling the time by a chapter
from a dog's-eared "Pickwick," or a brown-study over the
columns of an old "Mechanic's Magazine." There is no end
to the entertainment derivable in tolerable weather from
shop-stalls and shop-windows ; and it isour notion that he
need be a clever fellow, indeed, who would undertake to
specify in-set. terms the influence they have had in forming
the mind, character, and habits of our city populations.
But once a week comes Sunday, when the shops are shut

AMUSEMENTS OF THE MONEYLESS.

11

up; and with the Sunday comes another phase of gratuitous
recreation, not altogether pleasant to contemplate. People
without money are not, as we all know, overmuch given to
attending church and chapel. Unfortunately they find no
recreation in that quarter, and they seek it elsewhere. If
the weather be fine, the dark and squalid slums of the City
vomit forth myriads of them into the fields and suburbs.
For these there is a class of missionaries deputed to meet
them in their favourite haunts, and collect them, if possible,
within the sound of Wisdom's voice and the words of instruction; but the missionaries are met on this neutral ground by
propagandists of another kind-by Netheists, Theists, Setheists, and Pantheists-by Reasoners and Secularists-by
Southcotites and Mormonites; and from this it has followed,
that some of the suburban parks and commons have become
the scene of a species of amusement not always edifying,
arising out of the discussions and disputes consequent upon
the clashing of theological elements of so opposite a description. In winter, the ice, and not the fields and commons, is
the resort of this numerous class; and there, in company
with their superiors in the social scale, you shall find from
thirty to three hundred thousand in the course of the day,
enjoying a gratification all the more welcome that it is
flavoured with the probability of peril.
There are shadows in the motley picture of gratuitous
amusements in London, upon which we are not disposed to
dwell. We have said nothing of the degraded and morbid
taste which urges masses of the populace to be present at
miserable, cruel, and harrowing spectacles-which drives
crowds to the criminal courts, when wife-beaters and murderers
are on their trial-which sets them yelling, like mongrel curs,
on the trail of an unpopular candidate for public favourwhich sends multitudes tramping over the swamps of Surrey,
after the steam-boat laden with a couple of prize-fighters and
their backers, bound for the borders of Kent, which they

12

AMUSEMENTS OF THE M0NEYLESS.

must reach ere they can try conclusions-which drives a tenfold greater multitude to all the avenues leading to the
scaffold, long before the hour of an execution draws near,
and goads them, in the presence of a murderous and disgusting ceremony, to the display of loathsome wit and brutal
jocularity. We must leave these things to time and a better
day; we would ignore them if possible, and shut them from
the light.
We can pretend to have afforded the reader no more than
a glance at the many-sided subject we have taken up. Ve
have passed over unnoticed many things which we are perfectly aware are equally entitled to remark with those we
have selected; but we are not the wizard described above,
and cannot cram into the limits of an article more than it
will hold. We have shown, in some rude sort, how penniless
London may be amused by the spectacle of London itself.
That it is so amused, is a fact beyond question. The close
association of large masses of mankind as certainly gives rise
to the elements of mirth and entertainment as it does to
those of misery and necessity; that the former are sometimes
born of the latter, a philosopher might tell us, is no valid bar
to their acceptance ; and, in truth, it never is a bar to those
who are in search of gratuitous enjoyment; they are the last
persons upon earth to look the gift-horse in the mouth, and
maunder over his teeth. We may do well to learn a lesson
even from Penniless Jack, though it is possible we may not
sympathise in the vagabond recreations he snatches for
nothing. But, sings the poet already quoted"They dance not for me,
Yet mine is their glee;"

and in the same spirit, though we may decline Jack's
pleasures, we may make a pleasure out of Jack, and be all
the wiser and better for the manufacture.

VIEWS OF LIFE F11OM A FIXED STAND-POINT.
I AM not a philosopher. I know nothing of logic and
metaphysics, and abstract sciences and speculations; I wasn't
brought up to it,'or else I might, perhaps. But I see a good
deal of human life and human nature, and other nature too,
without being a philosopher; and there is many a story I
could tell that is well worth the telling, if I knew how to tell
a story to purpose. I am an Omnibus Conductor, and the
stand-point-I can't be very far wrong in calling it that, for
I stand on it sixt6en hours a day, and no sitting allowedthe stand-point from which I contemplatemen and things is
the "monkey-board," as it is called in the profession, at the
tail of my 'bus. I consider that that's not by any means a
disadvantageous position from which to regard my fellowcreatures: if not a very elevated one, it is sufficiently so to
exalt me above the general level, and enables me to look
over the heads as well as into the faces of all that section of
mankind that comes in my way. I travel through six miles
of city and suburbs, and I do it, there and back again, six
times a day. If there is a great sameness in leading this sort
of life-doing the same journey, one way and the other, four
thousand times and more a year-there is also a great variety,
taking into account the times and seasons, and changes in the
aspect of the weather. Seven years' experience in the position I occupy, have enabled ,meto make some observations
upon that portion of man and womanldnd that rides in omnibuses; and a very respectable class they are, upon the whole,
though I say it that get my living by them. But it is a class

14

VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND-POINT.

that comprises a good many classes-an omnibus is everybody's coach-and-pair, and everybody gets into it that's tired
of walking, or afraid of the wet, and has threepence or sixpence to spare; but notwithstanding that it belongs to everybody, it is curious to note how regularly it is monopolised by
certain people at certain hours of the day, days of the week,
and weeks and months of the year. Thus, the first journey
to town of a morning, all the year through, winter and
summer, wet or dry, is the quickest journey of the whole
day, because the 'bus carries a cargo of office-clerks, the old
gentlemen inside pushing about their silver snuff-boxes and
exchanging the news, and the young ones outside smoking
cigars. The second journey is pretty much the same, with a
mixture of masters and merchants, bankers, and so on, who
are as regular as time itself; so that I see the same faces
inside, and mostly sitting in the same places, about three
hundred times in the course of the year, at these morningtrips.
Now, I dare say, any one of the gentlemen that gets out
every morning at ten o'clock, or thereabouts, at the Bank, or
within a quarter of a mile of it, would be taken aback a little
if he knew how much I know of him-though it would do
him no harm, for the matter of that. Only just look at one
gentleman-for instance, Mr. Philpotts-and mark what I
know about him, though neither he nor anybody else ever
told me a word of it intentionally. Mr. Philpotts was born
at Truro, in Cornwall; his father saved money in the pilchardfishery, and articled his son to a drysalter in Thames Street,
with whom he did business forty years ago. Young Philpotts turned ship-broker when he attained his majority. The
old man died, and left him his money, and he lost every
penny of it in unwise speculations before he was thirty; and
had to begin the world again, with a wife and two daughters
-and nothing else. His wife's father, who was a wealthy
cotton-spinner, got him a Manchester agency, and he had to

VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND-POINT.

15

put the screw on pretty tight to make both ends meet: he
worked the screw so long that he couldn't leave off working
it when-there was no longer any occasion for it; and he
works it now as tight as ever-living in a two-storied cottage
in a second-rate street, when he might live in a mansion, and
riding in a 'bus when he- might keep his own carriage. His
two daughters are in danger of growing old maids, because
he won't come down with a portion as long as he lives; and
She has. kept them in seclusion' until their juvenile charms
are vanishing. Philpotts has more money than he knows
what to do with, and is deep in every well-paying speculation
of the day; he is verging on sixty, and is rather fond of good
living when it costs him nothing or 'not much-and is as
likely to live ten or fifteen years longer as not. All this I
learned concerning Mr. Philpotts from the conversation of
his companions, chiefly during his own absence. Now, I
never wanted to learn a word of it; and it doesn't concern
me a morsel, though I do feel sorry for theyoung ladies that
ought to have been married years ago. I could tell a tale
almost equally particular with regard to nearly every one of
the twelve gentlemen whom I pick up and drop down every
morning, though they little think of it; and I have a notion
there is. not a-single one of them who knows as much of the
private history of either of the others as I do of the whole
twelve.
After the purposes of business are served in the morning,
come those of pleasure. I have a suspicion that more people
ride for play than for work, judging from the fact, that
during summer and fine weather my family is always larger
than it is in the wet and wintry days. Towards mid-day,
the ladies begin to honour me with their company; if the
sun shines fair, they are abroad shopping in multitudes, and
. I am continually taking up and setting down at the most
splendid shops on my route the wives and daughters of the
identical clerks, merchants, and gentlemen, who make up the

16

VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND-POINT.

cargoes of the morning. That younger Miss Philpotts, by
the way, let me say, is not an old maid yet, if I'm anything
of a judge: I set her down at the new bonnet-shop yesterday afternoon, and she don't look as if she had seen sevenand-twenty yet.
The ladies, when they are mammas, are fond of taking the
children a ride in the 'bus. Sometimes I get a whole family
of children; the other night I had eleven young mothers,
each with a baby in arms, and only one gentleman-twentythree altogether, th6ugh we're only licensed to carry twelve.
Summer afternoons and evenings are the children's holidays;
not a week passes but I take out a dozen or two to the fields,
and bring them back again at sundown, loaded with buttercups, cowslips, daisies, or May-blossom, which makes me feel
like a nosegay all the way to the Strand. My 'bus is always
pretty full as business-hours draw to a close. There are
people going out in the suburbs to spend the evening; there
are more going home to dinner, or it may be an early tea;
there are people going into the City to theatre or concertso that, travel which way I will, I mostly travel full of an
evening. If I'm not full before I get so far as the railway
station, I'm sure to fill there, especially in excursion-times,
when the train is just come in. If you was to look into my
'bus then, you wouldn't know it for the same-twelve people
up to their chins in egg-baskets, boxes, carpet-bags, and
packages, look so different from twelve city gentlemen, with
nothing bigger than a snuff-box apiece. Poor Mr. Philpotts
hailed me the other night*when I was full of excursioners,
and would have had to ride outside if a civil young fellow
hadn't offered to turn on to the roof, to make room for
him. It was odd, I thought, that after old P. had got
out, and turned up the lane to his cottage, the young fellow
got down and joined the younger Miss P. not a hundred
yards further on-but, of course, that was no business of
mine.

VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND-POINT.

17

People talk, and write, too, sometimes, about the influence
of the weather and the state of the atmosphere upon people's
nervous systems. I don't profess to understandnervous systems myself, but I know, from pretty goodexperience, that
Swet weather is very trying to the temper, not to mention
the rheumatism. It's mostly gentlemen that ride in rainy
seasons; and the few ladies that get into my 'bus, do so
because they can't help themselves, and must go the distance.
Politeness, I have observed, like many other things that are
more for ornament than use, is very much damaged by
moisture: civility, which is all we conductors pretend to, is
a much tougher article, and more waterproof, though it
won't keep out the rain any more than the other. Rain is
a wonderful damper to sociability as well as to broadcloth:
when the water is dropping from people's clothes, conversation drops too; and as for a joke, it isn't always safe to
venture upon one in the wet, because when folks are dripping they won't stand roasting-which, of Course, is natural
enough. There's a prodigious rush sometimes of a splashy
night to catch the last 'bus; and then it is that your
model-gentleman stands at one side, and lets others be
accommodated before he takes thought for himself-though
I've never had the pleasure of being introduced to that
gentleman yet.
It came down dismally this morning, more like a waier..
spout than a storm of rain. We pulled up as usual at Grinder
Lane for Mr. Philpotts, but he never came. I thought it
was the foul weather kept him at home. It wasn't though,
as I found out before we'd gone a mile further. It's a fact
that thp young fellow that was so civil to him the other
night, has bolted off with the younger Miss Philpotts, and
married her clean out. He's a lawyer, they say, and in
doing business for the father, has found out that the Misses
P. have each fortunes in their own right, inherited from their
mother's father, of which the old gentleman has the manageC

18VIEWS OF LIFE FROM A FIXED STAND POINT.
ment. Young Circuit has taken his choice of the two; and
tiow the thing has got wind, it is thought the other will go
bzy hook or by crook, in spite of all the -unwilling father can
do to prevent it-and very proper too. I shall look out for
the old gentleman when he has got over the surprise, and
see how he bears it.

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.
MANY years ago-it must be more than forty by this time
-there stood, at the corner of a lane in the heart of the city
of London, a dim, dusty-loolking house of some thirty feet
frontage, upon which the sun rarely shone save for a few
hours in the afternoon, and which you might pass a hundred
times, so unpretentious was its aspect, without noticing it&
existence. It had two windows, with a broad space of
brown brick wall between them, on the ground-floor; and
when the scaled and blistered shutters, which were once
green, were thrown open, as they were every morning about
eight o'clock, you might have seen an elderly maiden personage sitting at the smaller one behind a white muslin
blind, hemming the frill of a cap, stitching the wristband of
a shirt, or darning woollen hose. At the other and larger
window the blind was of green gauze, very faded and worn,
and did not half conceal the figure of a lean invalid-looking
man, of about fifty, who stood behind a sort of counter
covered with padded felt, polishing now a silver salver, now
a soup-tureen of the same metal, by the friction of his bare
palm. Sometimes two or three pale lads wrought with him
at the same silent labour; and if you had entered at the
private door-whose knocker was half confined with a staple
driven into the panel to prevent your alarming the nerves of
the proprietor by indulging in a thundering rap-and had
ascended to the floor above, you might have found a party of
young girls, preparing with their soft hands more work of
the same kind for the finishing-touches of the master. The
c2

20

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

lane in which the house of the plate-polisher stood had been
once a solitary cul-de-sac, leading to nowhere, and compelling
all explorers after a north-west passage to retrace their steps;
but a few years before the time of which we speak, the
pulling downi of some old houses at the end of it had converted the cul-de-sac into a " short cut" and much-used
thoroughfare between two or more of the most busy and
populous haunts of commerce. In consequence, the lane
began to assume an appearance of more liveliness and importance; there was scrubbing and washing, and painting of
fronts, pointing of bricks, enlarging of front-windows, and
the conversion of dingy front-parlours and neglected warehouses into sprightly-looking shops. But the plate-polisher
made no alteration-did not even renew the old green blind,
pumice-stone his blistered shutters, or bestow a little of his
craft on the rusty knocker of his door. Rusty as it was,
however, Death did not disdain to lift it with his skeleton
fingers; he sounded his summons in the middle of the night,
and the next morning the shutters were not thrown open, but
the blinds of the upper windows were drawn down, and
there was no more " plate-polishing done here" from that day
forth. For a few weeks the old maiden-lady, shrouded in
bombazine and crape, might be seen occasionally flitting
about the premises, and then she vanished from the neighbourhood.
She was no sooner gone, than up rose a hoarding of lofty
planks in front of the old house, begirt with a planked footway for passengers, and, in less time than you could imagine,
stuck all over with posters of lottery-bills in all the colours of
the rainbow, and with announcements of a hundred different
kinds, laid on so thick, that you might as well think of looking
through a millstone as of obtaining by a furtive peep any
hint of what was going on within. However, the lane didn't
care much about it, and manifested no remarkable curiosity.
Old gentlemen, who dropped into the little tavern three

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

21

doors off, in the morning, to discuss the current-prices and
the gooseberry-brandy, tiffed at the hoarding, as it brought
them up suddenly; and hasty messengers, availing themselves of the short-cut, found it all the longer for the
temporary obstruction. But the hoarding flew off one Saturday night, and displayed to the Sunday gazers a handsome
set of new shutters, surmounted by a Corinthian cornice,
and a new private door, splendid, in imitative walnut and
shining varnish. When the shutters came down on Monday
morning, they disclosed a handsome mahogany sash, the two
lower rows of panes guarded by a stout trellis-work of brasswire, resting upon a single plate of brass, inscribed in the
centre with the name of the new proprietor, John Cambit.
Behind the wire-work and the glass, lay scattered in careless
profusion, as though Cambit didn't value it a straw, an absolute mine of wealth. There were big-bodied wooden bowls,
positively split at the sides with the weight of old English
guineas, every one of which was worth seven-and-twenty
shillings apiece--there were louis-d'ors, just as plentiful,
from France-bulging piles of yellow ducats from Spainbursting bags of rupees from India-and huge bars and solid
ingots of the precious gold heaped in pyramids, ready for
the Mint. As for silver, it lay in masses, like so much rubbish, beneath the golden store, and seemed to invite the
shbvel of the scavenger to clear it away. Then, scattered
like scraps of waste-paper over all, were the notes of all
nations, promises to pay, scrip, coupons, bonds and securities,
and everything in the shape of a marketable pledge for
untold sums and fabulous amounts of wealth. Cambit meant
business-that was plain; and he did business too; for the
new shop became a sort of shrine for the luckier tribes of
Israel, who were continually going in and out, and for travellers, besides, from all parts of Europe. How long Cambit
dwelt in the lane, we don't exactly recollect; but we found
him unexpectedly one morning promoted to Lombard Street:

22

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

and on passing the old shop in the afternoon, beheld the
identical boards upon which his masses of bullion had reposed, occupied by a dozen or so of wig blocks, all in a row.
These were days, be it remembered, when wigs were wigs,
and no trifles; and when Finnigan bought Cambit's lease,
and went into the lane in the wig line, he knew what he was
about. If gentlemen of substance in those days succumbed
to Time, they had too much pluck to allow the bald-pated
old mower to be conscious of his triumph. As for parading
his victory and their own defeat in the shape of a bunch of
grey whiskers on each side of the face, the generality of
them would as soon have thought of suicide. As yet, whiskers were not-and the trade of the barber was anything
but the mere pretence it is now. The wrhole face was shaven
clean as wax-work every morning, and the unborn beard
cropped out of existence before it could betray its colour,
whether red, white, or blue. Heads scant of hair mounted
a scalp cunningly devised to match the natural hue; heads
totally bald went into wigs; and not a few of the heads,
maturely or prematurely grizzled or grey, did the same.
Full-bottoms were out, except for official purposes; but Brutuses were in, and a decent Brutus cost five guineas, and
considered cheap at that; and if you were extravagant
enough, you might go as high as ten or fifteen guineasFinnigan often had fifteen guineas. His chefs-d'ceuvre were
real masterpieces, and, as he was wont to declare, far more
natural than the real hair. To look at them, you would rather
have thoutght that the wearer's head did not belong to his
shoulders than that the wig did not belong to the head.
Finnigan was a scientific man, and not only had his wigs
woven under his own eye, but grew his own hair. He had
a talpa-farm in Brittany, where a whole district of Celtic
damsels were under his sway, and bound down not to part
with a single lock or ringlet to any one but him. Every
autumn he crossed the Channel in person, gathered his crop,

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

23

and brought it home in readiness for winter orders. He
never troubled himself with the operative tonsorial department, or the supplementary trade of combs, brushes, perfumery, and cutlery. All that he left to his foreman and
assistants, concentrating the whole force of his superior mind
upon the wigs and their welfare. Of course he made a
fortune. It was not in the nature of things that, with his
genius, he should do otherwise. He retired rather suddenly,
disgusted with the too coarse innovation of horse-tails upon
the magisterial head, and built himself a neat villa at
Wighampton, where he spent the remainder of his days
peacefully.
The world is full of contrasts. The next tenant of the
Fortunate Shop was the very antithesis of Finnigan, and was
no other than little Pounce, the notary and law-stationer,
who had an utter contempt for wigs, and wore his own head
Polished and
as bald as one of Finnigan's own blocks.
shining, his little round pate was seen, on a gloomy day, glimmering in the darkness of the shop like the red round moon
in the fog of a November night. He filled his window with
bodkins, spikes, and circular prickers; with bundles of red-tape
and sealing-wax, and round and flat rulers; with ink- stands,
and pencils, and Indian-rubber, and bundles of cut quill-pens,
with their noses baptised in ink; with bottles of Wa/lkden's
best Japan and Scot's blue; with reams of copy-paper and
rolls of vellum; and huge sheets of parchment, with Qis
gbnrnurt and a blue stamp at the upper left-hand corner.
Instead of a blind, he hung whole fathoms of engrossed
vellum across a brass rod, and there he sat at a desk behind
them, ploughing away with his pen, and spelling every word,
as he wrote it, with his lips, so plainly that one might almost
read from his grimaces as easy as from his writing: when he
did write, that is to say, which was not oftener than he could
help, and only when all his clerks were fully engaged.
Pounce came into the world to rub his hands, and he never

24

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

seemed to do anything else with such thorough good-will and
energy. Hie must have used whole tons of Hood's "invisible
soap," and oceans of "imperceptible water ;"for he rubbed
from morning to night the moment his fingers quitted their
He rubbed when he was taking an
grasp of anything.
order, or giving directions for its execution; he rubbed while
waiting for his dinner at the chop-house, and laid down his,
knife and fork to rub a dozen times during its consumption;
he rubbed half the time he was serving a customer, and all
the time that there were no customers to serve, and nothing
else to occupy his hands. Of course he rubbed on, and got
on, as his predecessors had done in the Fortunate Shop,
When he went away, it was into larger premises, fitted to
accommodate a larger staff, and situated somewhat nearer
'Change.
After Pounce came Pungent, the pickle-dealer, who
blocked up the window with bottles and jars, and preservepots and neats' tongues and dried salmon, and a shoal of
other savoury and relishing etceteras; and covered the floor
with tubs and barrels and kegs, and amphora; and did a
wonderful trade among the diners and givers of dinners, and
lovers of good eating, with which the city abounds. Then
he made the grand discovery of a new fish-sauce, and blazoned it abroad, even to the ends of the earth; and had to
enlarge his premises by buying out the newsman next door,
and throwing both houses into one, to make room for his
increasing trade. Over all the wide world flew the renowned
Pungent Sauce-to "India, to China, to Valparaiso, to the
furthest skirts of civilisation, and beyond;' and brought gold
in heaps to Pungent's pocket. And ever the demand increased as the hunger of the nations grew with that it fed on;
till Pungent, out of sheer compassion to the human race in
general, and to aristocratic eaters in particular, had to turn
out of the narrow lane into a grand establishment further
west, and consummate his destiny by devoting himself solely

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

25

to the satisfaction of the universal clamour for the immortal
sauce.
Who it 'as that first occupied the shop after Pungent had
departed, we cannot state with certainty. We think it was
a jeweller, who, to the usual traffic in the emblems of modern
vanity, added a commerce in old coins, old cameos, intaglios,
statuettes in precious metal, and everything curious and
diminutive in the world of ancient art. Besides him, we
recollect a fruiterer, who made a magnificent display of
melons and pine-apples, and hot-house grapes at a crown a
pound, and all the horticultural delicacies of the season,
collected from the home or foreign nurseries. He was a bold
speculative fellow, who didii't care what price he paid for
the best articles: he knew his market, and kept such an
astounding show of luxuries ever on hand as put Covent
Garden to the blush. He found the lane a short-cut to the
Mansion House, and soon had to furnish the desserts at all
the civic feasts-sending in bills of three figures after a single
banquet. He was Alderman Somebody when he retired to
his seat in Surrey; and very likely was Lord Mayor Somebody as well, when his turn came.
We need not charge ourselves with the narrative of the
career of every man who had the good-luck to get into the
Fortunate Shop, and find it a short-cut, as they all did, to
prosperity and competence; but must hasten on to the
climax of its history, which is not far off.
At the end of the lane, where he had lived ever since it
had been converted from a cul-de-sac to a thoroughfare,
dwelt Mr. Christopher Cinnamon, who got his living, and
brought up a family of five respectably, by exercising the
trade of a grocer. Kit, who was a sleek, quiet, observant
fellow, had long had his eye on the Fortunate Shop, and
more than once had made an unsuccessful bid for the lease,
whose expiry was yet far off, and which was renewable, at
the option of the tenant, for twenty-one years. About nine

26

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

years ago, however, having compassed a little money by a
prudent speculation in nutmegs, he astonished the whole lane
by outbidding all competitors, and purchasing the lease at a
price which set them a speculating on the man's sanity. Kit
said nothing in reply to the innuendoes thrown out in his
hearing, but smiled quietly, and moved into the house,
without making any fuss about it. The result justified his
conduct; his business and his profits doubled within six
months, and quadrupled within the year. He removed his
family to a country-house, and came every morning early to
town to look after his shop, which promised to maintain its
old character, and realise a fortune for them all, with due
care in its management, by the time the lease had expired.
But Kit was not destined to wait for that. One morning,
as he was sitting in his counting-house scanning the Pricecurrent for the day, he received a visit from one of the
corporation solicitors. That gentleman opened his business
at once by demanding, in the name of the corporation, what
amount Mr. Cinnamon would be disposed to accept for the
surrender of his lease. One might have supposed thatKit
would have been taken aback by such a demand; on the
contrary, he received it with remarkable equanimity-merely
smiled his customary smile, bowed his customary bow, and
replied that he had no intention of parting with his lease on
any terms. The lawyer returned to the charge, but with no
effect; and finally, after a little jocular skirmishing, withdrew. A day or two after, he came again, and renewed the
discussion.
Kit was immovable as ever-nothing should
induce him to turn out. "But it must be done," said the
lawyer. "We are going to pull down the opposite row of
houses, rebuild your side in grand style, and run the street
half a mile westward." "So I hear," said Kit; "but I do
not give up my lease for all that. I shall not stand in
the way of improvement. Pull down, and rebuild in any
style you like; but provide me a place to carry on my

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

27

business the while, and give me the occupancy of the new
house when it is finished until my term-which, of course, I
shall renew according to the covenants-is expired." There
was no help for it. Kit would admit of no other conclusion;
and as the improvements had to be carried out at once, the
authorities were obliged to arrange affairs according to his
wishes.
So Kit moved out into capital premises in an adjoining
street, while the old buildings vanished in a cloud of dust,
that hung over the neighbourhood for a twelvemonth, and
the new ones rose in lofty magnificence upon their site.
When Kit saw his old corner-shop-lately buried in a lane
not a dozen feet wide-standing seventy feet high, with a
huge semicircular fagade, superb in pillars, pilasters, and
carved cornices, fronting one of the most imposing approaches
to the very centre of the city, he hardly knew what to make
of it. The house, he saw, would be roomy enough to domicile
a small colony, and thought it would make a stupendous
grocer's shop; and he longed, with a natural instinct, to be
fitting it out in a style to eclipse the whole trade; yet he
began to ponder on the propriety of so doing, taking all
circumstances into consideration. It was not long before
some aids to reflection came to him in the shape of overtures
from a house-agent with whom he had a gossipping acquaintance, who offered him an annuity of £500 a year during the
term of his lease, relieving him at the same time of the old
rent-charge. Kit was in no hurry. It would be some
months yet before the new house was habitable, and he
would take time to make up his mind. The house-agent
came again, and increased his bid-came a third time, and
doubled it: all to no purpose. Other competitors now
stepped in; among the rest, a banking-firm offered at first
£1500, then £2000 a year for the house, paying, besides, the
old rent. Kit, who had been wide awake all the time, became
wider awake than ever. He was determined to give the com-

28

THE FORTUNATE SHOP.

petitors as much line as they would run out-and they ran
out a pretty considerable length. The upshot of it was,
after a furious and protracted struggle between various associated bodies and private speculators, that Mr. Cinnamon
retained the lease of the house in his own hands, letting the
several floors to tenants of his own choice: the ground-floor
for 1500 a year to an assurance company; the first-floor to
another public company, for the same sum; and the rest of
the house in smaller holdings, for a variable but considerable
sum besides.
Christopher Cinnamon, Esquire, is no longer a grocer.
The Fortunate Shop has landed him also on a propitious
shore. He has disposed of his business to a man of capital
for a swinging sum, and has retired to the groves of Norwood,
where he cultivates his own cabbages for his amusement,
and the society of a select circle of genteel people for his
edification.
Whether the Fortunate Shop will continue to maintain
its character, and indemnify the assurance company who
have had the assurance to pay so high a price for its
countenance- and that other company who have been
equally liberal-is more than we can say. For the sake of
consistency, it ought to do so; and for the sake of shareholders and assurers, who are on the look-out for dividends,
bonuses, and that sort of thing, we most cordially hope it
will.

A CALM IN THE CITY.
WHEN, far away from the banks of the Thames, the recollection of London comes across the mind, it comes like the
vision of a whirling vortex-a confused malstr6m of heady
life and activity, to plunge into which is to be borne along
in an irresistible current, to be dinned with noise and tumult,
and to be chafed with excitement and anxiety, until cast Up
again upon some quiet shore. And this vision is no exaggeration, but just the simple fact. London is a vortex, into
which everybody and everything that comes near is drawn,
and kept whirling round a common centre, from one week's
end to another. But when the week is over, and the Sabbath-morning bells ring in the Day of Rest, then comes a
remarkable change-a contrast so marked as probably no
other spot on earth exhibits. Whatever may be the case in
some parts of the vast area of the metropolis, in the old
city district, which is under the immediate jurisdiction of
the corporation, Commerce, folding herself to sleep with
the last breath of Saturday, moves not a limb till Monday
morning dawns, and for four-and-twenty hours upon this
usually turbid sea of conflict there is a dead calm.
It is drawing towards eleven, on a summer Sunday morning, as we find ourselves crossing the area in front of the
Exchange, bound for a lonely ramble among the solitudes.
As we traverse Cornhill, there is but a single figure in view,
and that is the policeman, whose footfall, echoed from the
opposite side of the way, is the only sound, until it is broken
by the rattle of the wheels of a distant omnibus, which

30

A CALM IN THE CITY.

reverberates with unwonted distinctness from the lofty walls
around us, and then dies away. We turn down a court in
which the clear song of a blackbird, perched somewhere
above in his lone cage, echoes among the chimney-tops. No
sign of life greets us in the court, which opens into another,
where also silence and sunshine reign together.- The court
debouches into Lombard Street-"a shore where all is
dumb." We read on signs aloft of "coupons" and "rates of
exchange ;" but there is not a chink of coin, not a blink
from a single half-opened shutter among all the banks, whose
wealth might purchase a kingdom. Alone and thoughtful,
we proceed along the street-the spectacle of carved stonecherubs and death's-heads-of battered foliage and mingled
cross-bones, upon the lintels of a narrow entrance, beguiles
us into exploring it; and we find ourselves, after a few steps,
standing in front of Allhallows Church-a church literally
jammed against the walls of surrounding houses, and all but
hermetically closed from the air of heaven. While we are
speculating on the probability of finding a congregation in a
neighbourhood apparently deserted, we hear the voice of the
minister reading the lesson of the day, and, softly opening
the door wide enough for a scrutiny, perceive that the congregation consists of four figures in bonnets, who alone
occupy the body of the church. We decline figuring as the
fifth part of a congregation, and retreat softly. As we regain
the street, distant St. Paul's peals out the hour, and in the
echo of each note we can distinguish, so unbroken is the
calm, the octave, fifth and twelfth, which makes the perfect
tone. Looking into the church of St. Edmond's, in the same
street, we find a congregation of full twenty people at their
devotions; and again peeping into St. Mary Woolnoth, at
the corner of the street, there almost as many as thirty more.
Three national churches standing all within a stone's-cast,
and containing on a fine morning in summer not threescore
individuals of the nation among them, strikes us as an

A CALM IN THE CITY.

31

exceedingly liberal allowance of church-accommodation to the
privileged Londoners; and we cannot help contrasting it for
a moment with the alleged wants on that score in distant
parts of the realm.
And now we dive among the narrow ways that abut upon
the river's brink below the bridges. Here, somnolent in dust
and sunshine, stand the tall warehouses crammed with the
cargoes of that countless fleet of vessels which sleeps this
morning in the Pool. They are all fast locked in a noonday
slumber-the only sounds are the incessant twittering of
sparrows, and the stilly surge of the river, that runs lazily
by as the high tide begins to flag in its landward course.
Now and then a lean cat stalks across the road, and disappears through some shivered pane or fractured panel. The
chain-cables from the cranes and windlasses in the upper
stories hang down motionless-the half-loaded wain stands
motionless below, nd beneath its cool shadow a brood of
aldermanic ducks have settled themselves for a comfortable sleep after a morning's forage in the mud of the
river.
Back to Cheapside, where a few listless loungers are taking
the air in shirt-sleeves, shaven chins, and slippers, which
constitute the Sunday toilet of an unmistakeable class who
all the week long are toiling in the service of eating and
drinking and conviviality-loving man. They do not come
boldly forth to promenade. Here a waiter, swinging his
body from heel to toe, while his hands are clasped behind
him, puffs a surreptitious cigar-then retires for a moment,
and comes forth again, looking now up at the sky, now down
at his neat slippers-and then dives again into the darkness
of his peculiar den. There'a chambermaid, in neat muslin
gown, with lace sleeves of her own working,-with bare head
half hidden in shining ringlets, with neat ancle and on
tripping foot, darts out and in from the clean-swept court,
and flirts coyly with the sunshine or with her own

32

A CALM IN THE CITY.

.shadow, for want of better entertainment. Then there is the
old stager, portly and bald-headed, plush-waistcoated, with
an enormous allowance of shirt-front brilliant with sparkling
studs, divested, for one day of the week, of his everlasting
white apron, and of that atmosphere of steaming-hot joints,
which he respires from Monday morning to Saturday night,
and cool, comfortable, and convalescent after the six days'
fever of his avocation. He blinks peacefully at the sun, and
listens to the unwonted music of the green leaves he hears
rustling in the solitary tree opposite, which was once a
thriving rookery, with a populous colony of feathered
Cockneys, and where yet the last rook's eyrie lingers in the
topmost branches, and sheds from time to time its decaying
fragments, as they are scattered by the breeze upon the heads
of the passers-by.
A booming hum comes stealing along from St. Paul's
Cathedral as we cross over the end of Cheapside. It is the
deep-toned organ pealing a chant, which dies into silence as
we enter Paternoster Row. There the posts which guard
the narrow footpath from the intrusion of wheels on the
week-day are now enjoying a quiet holiday, and have it all
to themselves. There is no sign of life or motion-so still is
the hush, that the flutter of a torn placard taps audibly upon
the shutter as it flaps in the wind. We read on the lintels,
signboards, and panels around, the names that have figured,
some for many generations, on the title-pages of millions of
volumes; and we think of the myriads of books upon the
weary miles of shelves piled up in this narrow repository,
now silent as the grave-and perhaps we speculate for a
moment on their fate, and ask how many of them has the
past week, or the past year, consigned to an oblivion of which
the present moment is so suggestive a type. But we feel
instinctively that such a question is too personal for the sole
scribbler at this crisis in the Row, and we defer its consideration to another opportunity-running away from it, and from

A CALM IN THE CITY.

33

a nauseous smell of tallow-and crossing over into Doctors'
Commons.
There is nothing in Doctors' Commons, save and except a
convocation of sparrows, which have met to decide some important case, whether of bigamy or divorce, of brawling in
church, or a disputed will, we do not pretend to say; but they
are extremely earnest and vociferous in argument, and make,
for such small fry, a prodigious noise-all the noise, in fact, that
is audible just now in this famous district, As to the courts,
they are as silent and dumb as their worst enemies could
wish them to be-not so much as the ghost of a proctor or
doctor, or dean or judge-advocate, or a single clerk of one of
them, or even a touter in white apron, or anything legal or
ecclesiastical, or vagabond, save the sparrows aforesaid, which
may be all three, for aught we know, is either to be seen or
heard. The place looks exceedingly dingy and bewitched in
spite of the pleasant sunshine; and we move away from it
involuntarily-past Carter Lane, where there are no carters
-past Shoemaker Row, where shoes are never made-past
Printing-house Square, where the thunder of the Times is
hushed into temporary repose-and so down into Bridge
Street, where we cross over into watery XVhitefriars, meeting
but few stragglers by the way, and on into the Temple.
The Temple this morning is a temple of repose. There is
a whispering of leaves from the tall trees, and a soothing
murmur from the river;.but we hear nothing beyond that,
except now and then the echo of a lonely footfall in one or
other of the shady penetralia of the place. The gardens
bounding the river show a gleaming sward, which invites us
by its softness; but the gates are closed, and entrance forbidden. We are attracted towards the fountain, playing its
never-ending tun6, to which the small birds in the trees above
respond in a fitful, twittering, quiet kind; of chorus, which
harmonises well with the pattering fall of water. By the
side of the fountain, watching in contemplative mood the

34

A CALM IN THE CITY.

sparkling, glittering, flying drops of spray, and the busy
bubbles beneath, stands-not a Niobe, or a nymph, or a
naiad-but a rather brawny-looking man in top-boots, and
wearing a hat and coat, both of them a couple of sizes at
least too big for him. He has his back towards us at first;
but the echo of our footstep wakes him from his reverie, and
he'turns round-and we see that it is Mr. Figg, of Birchin
Lane. We know Figg, who is a very fair type of a peculiar
class; and it may serve to give a little life to this dreamy
sketch, if we introduce him to the reader.
Figg is a humble client-one of a very considerable
number-of the corporation of London. He was born
beneath the shadow of the old Exchange; and if he has ever
been, in his whole life, out of the sound of Bow Bells, we may
be sure that it was but for a few hours, and then on some
municipal excursion up or down the river. Among his ancestors, whom he can trace further back than, judging from
the cut of his second-hand coat, you would expect, there
flourished one who was a common-councilman in his day-a
fact which has an influence even yet upon the destiny of his
remote descendant. But Figg was born poor; he saw the
light in a garret in Little Bell Alley, and he saw there little
besides, the garret having been stripped bare by the necessities of his parents before he opened his eyes upon its emptiness. As soon as he was able to run, the City helped him
into a Charity-school, where he got what little education he
was capable of receiving. Because he was a Figg, the corporation regarded him kindly, and put bread into his mouth
by putting occupation into his hands when he grew up. In
process of time, Figg became a licensed porter, authorised to
ply in Billingsgate Market, and master of an average income
of five shillings a day. Then he found out that it would be
a matter of economy in him to marry, and of course he
married; and from the first hour of his wedded life, up to
the. present moment, he will tell you, if you-get into his con-

A CALM IN THE CITY.

35

fidence, that he has not paid a halfpenny of rent. For why?
-the descendant of the common-councilman, as soon as he
possessed a wife, found no difficulty in getting the charge of
a set of chambers-in other words, of getting the basement
floor of a noble house to live in, on the condition of his wife's
sweeping and dusting the several apartments, and carrying
up coal from the cellar in the winter; and receiving from the
tenants of each floor five shillings a week for her trouble.
With a blissful ignorance of taxes, and poor-rates, and
quarter-day, and all such abominations, Mr. Figg has led a
He has
tolerably comfortable life for a labouring-man.
brought up his boy to tread in his steps; and the youngster
will become a licensed porter in his turn before many months
are over his head. Figg has grown exceedingly broad in
the shoulders, and heavy and square about those facial
muscles, which his Billingsgate friends denominate "the
gills;" and it is thought that he will retire from active life,
and repose for the rest of his days in the ground-floor of the
banking-house, which has been so long under his protection.
" Good-morning, Mr. Figg; who would have thought of
meeting you here ? We imagined you would be keeping
guard on Sunday over the gold in your charge."
"The same to you, sir. No, sir-never of a Sunday, sirleastways, not till the evening, sir."
"Then you have no fear of robberies by daytime-is that
it ?"
" No, sir, by your leave, that's not it neither. The bank
is never left, sir, day nor night. But the clerks takes it turn
about, and keeps guard on Sundays. My wife, sir, cooks
their dinner for 'em. 'Tis Mr. Bailey's turn to-day, sir, and
she'll cook his dinner. He'll go home at six o'clock, or
maybe seven, and by that time, and afore, I shall be back.
No, sir, the bank is never left. If you was to go into any
bank in all Lombard Street, at this moment, you'd find one
D 2

36

A CALM IN THE CITY.

or other of the clerks there-they does it everywhere by
turns, sir--turn and turn about."
Figg is as positive as he is explicit and oracular upon this
point, and no doubt his assertion is true. As he finishes
speaking, he looks complacently at his top-boots, and flaps a
little Aust from them with a snuff-coloured handkerchief.
We bid him good-day, and saunter on into Pump Court,
wondering in our own mind what upon earth can induce
Figg, who in noway differs from his brethren of the knot on
other days, to array his nether extremities in breeches and
top-boots onSunday, as he has done every Sunday for these
twenty years past. Pump Court offers no solution to the
mystery-it is a particularly dull, old-world, and drabby
area, silent just now as a crypt-paved with cracked and
crumbling flags, each one of which looks as though it .were
the monumental stone over some buried life. How many
hungry litigants have worn hollows in these irresponsive
witnesses of their fears and their despairs! and how many
more shall pace them in distracted thought under the anguish
of hope deferred ? "Tong !" goes the bell from the old
church, where the grim templars lie cross-legged on the cold
stones; and at the same moment comes the boom of the
organ, telling us that in another minute the congregation will
be upon us, and the sleeping echoes awake once more. We
are startled out of our reverie, and into Fleet Street, where
already the publicans are opening their doors and windows,
and the dead calm of Sunday morning in the City wakes up
into the current of common life.

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.
PATERNOSTER Row, which, as most people know, stands
north of St. Paul's Churchyard, began its career as a straggling
row or rank of dumpy wooden houses, inhabited by the
turners of beads and rosaries, and the writers of Paternosters,
Aves, and Creeds, in days prior-to the invention of printing.
Its proximity to the metropolitan church, and its central
position in the capital, made it a desirable situation for the
scribes and the artificers of those days, whose occupation it
was to supply the literature and the machinery of devotion.
The Row then consisted but of a single rank of houses,
looking out upon old St. Paul's Church; and the sale of its
merchandise, we may reasonably conclude, augmented or
declined with the religious fervour of the people, and with
the periodical celebration of ecclesiastical ceremonies.
When the Reformation came, and England grew Protestant, the beads and the rosaries, the Paternosters, Ayes,
and Creeds-and the poor friars of the religious houses,
"white, black, and grey, with all their trumpery," had to
decamp without beat of drum. In their place came a swarm
of mercers, silkmen, lacemen, and tirewomen and seamstresses.
Church-goers no longer wanted beads and breviaries, but
handsome Sunday garments---and the new tenants of the
Row administered to the necessities of a new species of
devotion, not much better, it is to be feared, than the old.
The Row now began to grow famous as a market for rich
velvets and stuffs. It was here the gentry of the court of
Charles II. came a-shopping in their equipages; and by

38

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

this time the Row must have become, to some extent, what
it is at the present day-a narrow lane, unsuitable for the
passage of vehicles-for we read that the thoroughfare was
often blocked up by the carriages of the court ladies. Pepys
records, in his diary (1660), that he came here to buy
"moyre for a morning waistcoat " and again, in 1662, that
he came on foot to purchase "satin for a petticoat for his
wife against the queen's coming."
But the mercers, lacemen, &c., had not the whole place to
themselves. A century before Pepys bought his wife's satin
petticoat, one Henry Denham, a bookseller, had opened shop
at the sign of the Star, and had written on his sign-board
the motto: Os homini sublime dedit. It was not, however,
until the reign of Queen Anne that the booksellers in a body
removed to the Row from Little Britain. From that time to
this, the reputation of the Row has spread further and wider
through the world with each revolving year; and for many
generations past, the well-known name has been familiar to
the eye of every man, woman, and child of the realm to
whom a book is either a necessary or a luxury of life. It is
not our purpose to trace the history of the commerce in
books, of which the Row is the great centre, and where as
many as five millions of volumes have been sold in a year by
a single firm. To do.that, would require more space than we
have at command, and would involve researches and calculations that might perplex and appal a Bidder. The Row is
fed, now-a-days, by fifty thousand authors at least, and a
thousand or so of steam-presses; and what the amount of
printed paper may be which is turned into it and turned out
of it in the course of a year, let those declare, if there be
such, who have the means of judging. There are firms there
of above a century's standing, who might throw some light
on that subject, if they chose; and to them we leave itpreferring, on the present occasion, to introduce the reader to
Paternoster Row under its existing aspect, and contemplate

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

39

at leisure such of its activities as may help us to some
general idea of its way of life.
The aspect of the Row, enter it from what quarter you
may-and you may take your choice of very numerous
different entrances-is pretty sure to disappoint the expectations of a stranger. To say the best of it, it is but a narrow,
curving, irregular thoroughfare, leading from near Ludgate
Hill to Cheapside-a lane of brick and mortar, with erections
of all dates and all styles and no styles of building-with a
fqot-pavement scarcely wide enough for two individuals to
pass each other, and a roadway through a good part of which
vehicles can pass only in single file. The shops, which, with
the exception of two or three, are all those of publishers,
have a business rather than an attractive air, and except on
certain periodical occasions, are not much troubled by the
rush of customers. Into this lane, a number of narrower
lanes, of courts and alleys, disembogue themselves-some
leading to Newgate Market, whose shambles are in unpleasant contiguity to the rears of the houses on the northern
side-some into St. Paul's Churchyard, some into Newgate
Street and Warwick Square, and some to nowhere particular,
only to a cul-de-sac, which sends the wanderer back again
into the Row. At the west end, in a small dusty square,
accessible through close-paved courts, leading by a byway to
Ludgate Hill, stands a noble sycamore of perhaps a century's
growth, whose leaves rustle pleasantly in hot summer-time,
and whose leafless boughs in the winter are the parliamnent
of the sparrows of the ward, which are observed to sit there
in deafening convocation daily during the short half-hour of
winter's twilight..
Viewed, then, in connection with the immediate neighbourhoods of Ludgate Hill, Cheapside, and Newgate Street,
which, from early morn to midnight, are resounding with the
continuous roar and rumble of wheels, the Row is, in general,
a remarkably quiet place. The fever of business is inter-

40

PATERNOSTER

ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

mittent, and the crises occur only at regular intervals.
During the quiet times, the place is frequented chiefly by
two classes: the publishers, their booksellers and their
agents-and literary men. There is a good deal of gossipping in the shops among clerical-looking gentlemen in white
ties, and much lounging and reading of newspapers and
magazines over the counter among clerks and shopmen.
Now and then, the old blind fiddler strays into the Row, and
tunes up a sentimental air, followed by rapid variations, in a
masterly style, to whom his regular patrons are not slow in
awarding the customary meed of coin. Anon comes a brass
band of Germans, who draw up in rank on the kerb, intoning
the patriotic harmonies of Fatherland, and who, in their
turn, gather a shower of coppers, cunningly aimed from
upper stories into the open throat of French horn or ophicleide by publishers' clerks in want of more profitable amuseminent. Here and there, a collector, bag on shoulder, strolls
from shop to shop, to make up some extra parcel for a
country customer-or a hungry bookworm lounges from
window to window, to catch a glimpse of some new work;
but there are no great signs of activity-except it be the
sudden taking to his heels of the bookworm aforesaid, from a
sudden effluvium that hits him clean off the pavement, and
sends him staggering down the nearest court; and which
proceeds from a tallow-melting establishment, as appropriately fixed as would be a pig in an Opera-box, in the
very focus and centre of the literary world. Once a week,
however, the Row puts on a vivacious look, and bustle and
business are the order of the hour. By post-time on Friday,
the weekly papers march off in sacks, bags, and parcels to
the post-office, and of these the Row furnishes a liberal
quota. The procuring of the papers from the publishers of
each, which is often attended with no small amount of
squabbling and delay-the packing for agents-the addressing to private customers-the invoicing and final bundling

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

41

off on the back of the boy-to the post.office-all together
put the whole force of the publisher upon their mettle, and
make his shop-counter the arena of a contest against time, in
which, if he come off the winner by a minute or so, he is
perfectly satisfied. Before the clock strikes six, the whole
affair is over-the crisis past, and the Row has relapsed into
its former state of tranquillity.
But the grandest demonstration of all occurs on that day
of days, which is the test and touchstone of the publisher's
commerce, known among printers, binders, booksellers, and
men of the Row of all denominations as Magazine-day. On
this day, which is the last day of every month, the Row is
as much alive as an Egyptian pot of vipers, and far more
wide awake. Every house, from garret to cellar, is in a
thrill of agitation that stirs the dust in theremotest crannies.
Such pulling and lugging and hauling, and unpacking and
brown-papering and pigeon-holing, as then takes place, upstairs and down, is a thing to be seen only then and there,
and at no other time or place. It is a thing worth seeing,
too, only we would advise no unauthorised intrusion of
spectators who cannot compromise their dignity, and consent
to be carried with the tide.
The business of Magazine-day invariably commences on
the night before the important day dawns-a night which
goes among the trade by the denomination of "late night,"
from the fact that its duties, when business is brisk, rarely
terminate before twelve or one o'clock. By the morning
post of this day of preparation, the orders of the country
booksellers have all arrived. From their orders the invoices
have to be made out; a process which; in some houses, is
facilitated by means of printed lists of the monthly magazines
and of the publisher's own books. Each regular customer
has his allotted pigeon-hole, or other place of deposit, into
which his invoice is put as soon as it is copied, together with
such of the books he has ordered as the publisher has on his

42

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

premises. In this way, a considerable part of the work of
Magazine-day is done during "late night;" and in houses
where the business is extensive, it is indispensable that all
that can possibly be done should be done before the labours
of the night cease. Because, ina case where a man has to
supply in one day the monthly parcel of a hundred or more
of country booksellers, each of whom would think there
ws a design to ruin him if his parcel did not arrive on the
first of the month, he cannot afford the risk of a moment's
avoidable delay.
As soon as breakfast is swallowed on Magazine-day, the
business of dispatch begins. The printers have sent the
magazines perhaps overnight, or, at the latest, by early
morning. The object is now to complete the order of each
customer; and the moment it is completed, to pack it up
with the invoice, and direct the parcel. Were nothing more
to be done than to add the magazines and monthly publications to such books as form part of the publisher's own stock,
the affair would be comparatively easy and simple; but as
country booksellers deal mostly with but one publisher, each
publisher has to supply his customers with all they want;
and it will happen that, for one book of his own, he is compelled to procure ten or a dozen of other people's, upon which
all the profit he gets is a trifling commission. Let him be as
provident as he will in reference to this contingency, he
finds, on Magazine-day, that he has to send not only to
every house in the Row, but to half the publishers scattered
over the metropolis besides, for books or pamphlets he has
not got. His hands are so busy packing, sorting, and
arranging, that he cannot spare enough of them to run half
over the town for the whole day; so he has recourse to the
book-collector, who at this moment comes forward with his
services, and of whom, notwithstanding the hurry of the
occasion, we must say a word or two before we proceed.
The "collector," so indispensable to, the Row, is a rather

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE DAY.

43

anomalous subject, and may rank as a curiosity among London industrials. He is, for the most part, neither man nor
boy, but in that transition period of existence known as
For the outward and visible signs of
hobbledehoyhood.
respectability, judging from appearances, he cares not a doit.
He wears a seedy suit, surmounted by a cloth cap or a
crushed hat; and he carries on his shoulders a dust-coloured
canvas-bag, which had parted with its original and legal hue
before it came into his possession. His voice is loud, his
bearing independent, and his speech sharp, rapid, and abbreviated. Perhaps you would not be inclined to trust him with
much, measuring him by your instincts; but if you were a
publisher, you would be compelled to trust him often, and
with a good deal. In the financial conduct of small and
serial publications, ready cash is the standing rule; and you
must give your collector the cash, or he can't collect the
goods. Fortunately, you may trust him without incurring
any great risk: there is honesty in him, and a proud feeling
of caste, and he will account for your cash to the last fraction; and if he should do so with an air as though, if there
were any delinquency to be suspected, it would be on your
part, and not on his, you need not be surprised-it is his
way. When you have given him your cash and your commission, he knows what to do, and is off like a shot. A
specific sort of knowledge he has in perfection-a knowledge
of little books and low-priced publications, and who their
publishers are, and where they may be got. He will not
travel half the distance for the things you want that your
own clerk would do if you were to send him after them.
Then, he can crush into a,crowd, and "chaff" and bully his
way to the counters in a style which your clerk would never
learn, and get his business done all the quicker for it-and
he will fill his bag, and return with the load, leaving you
ample time for packing before the carts come for the parcels.
He is well known at all the news-offices-was, in fact, a

44

PATERNOSTERI1 ROW AND

MAGAZINE-DAY.

news-boy himself as long as he was a boy at all-is well
used to accounts, and the mental addition of fractions especially; and though more than a trifle pert and slangy, and
given to stare at you in a way that savours of impudence, he
is, upon the whole, a reasonably reliable, indifferent, happygo-lucky sort of fellow enough.
As fast as the several orders are completed, the collected
books and publications, together with the invoices, are carried to the packing-department, which may be a cellar, gaslighted, below the shop, to be packed. The packets of the
smaller traders are mostly cleared off early in the day, and
stacked ready for the carters; but the completion of a large
order is a thing not to be got over in a hurry, and is only
effected at last by, the success of the collectors in their rambling mission. Often enough, as the country booksellers
know to their mortification, an order is not completed at all
-tracts and pamphlets being returned as " out of print"
when they are only "out of reach"-far off on the shelves of
some WYest-end publisher, to whom there is not time to send.
As the day grows older, faster and more furious grows the
strife of business. Every publisher has not only his own
dozens, scores, or hundreds of parcels to despatch, but he is
himself a quarry of more or less importance to fifty other
publishers, whose agents and collectors are goading him on
all sides with eager and hurried demands, which it is as
much to his interest to supply instantaneously as it is to
execute the orders he has himself received. Within doors,
the shops are crammed with messengers, bag-laden and
clamorous, from all parts of London; and without, the Row
is thronged like a market with figures darting to and fro,
and across and back again-with bulging sacks on shoulder
-with paper parcels and glittering volumes grasped under
each arm-and with piles of new books a yard high, resting
on clasped hands, and steadied beneath the chin. It is of no
use now for the blind fiddler or the brass-band to make

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

45

their appearance, and they know that perfectly well, being
never caught in the Row on Magazine-day.
Let us enter one of the shops while the business of the
day is at its height, and note what is going on. The apartment is not particularly large, the convenience of space being
the one thing in which the Row is awkwardly deficient; but
it is well furnished with goods, the walls, from floor to ceiling,
being on all sides one conglomerate of pigeon-holes; further,
there are screens of double-sided pigeon-holes, dividing the
shop from the offices, and all are stuffed to repletion with
books, mostly of small size, and tracts or pamphlets in prodigious numbers. A crowd of boys and lads are pressing
to the counter, behind which clerks, with pen in hand or ear,
and shopmen-now climbing ladders,-now ducking and
diving into dark corners-are busy in supplying their clamorous demands. From a trap-door in the floor, the gaslight
glimmers pale from the cellar below, whence now and then a
head emerges, and descends again with an unpacked pile.
Amid the jingle of cash, the shuffling of feet, and the lumping
of books on the counter, rise the imperative voices of the
collectors, in tones none of the gentlest, and in terms not
the most intelligible to the ears of the uninitiated.
"Come, it's my turn," bawls one; " am I to wait here all
day? Pots of manna, six; and phials of wrath, thirteen as
twelve. Look alive, will you?"
While the shopman is rummaging for the pots and phials,
another voice ejaculates-" Coming struggles, twenty-six as
twenty-four; two devices of Satan; and one little Tommy
Tubbs."
"Do you keep the pious pieman ?" roars a lanky "litherlad," half doubled up beneath his corpulent bag.
"No," says the shopman, "over the way for the pious
pieman."
"Well, give us a dozen blaspheming blacksmiths-thirteen, you know. Anything off the blacksmith?"

46

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

Shiopman shakes his head.
"Nine broken pitchers and Jacob's well," screams a shrill
youth; "and what's a church, and wheat or chaff."
"Ten garments of faith, and fifty bands of hope," cries
another.
"Come!" adds a third, "give us old brown and the new
jerusalem, and I'll be off."
" Do you keep the two thieves ?" asks a fourth.
"Yes; how many?"
"Two two thieves and thoughts in prison."
The traffic here, as you perceive, is of a peculiar kind,
being mostly in publications of a low price, and of a religious
character. The moment a customer gets what he wants, he
is off elsewhere for serials or volumes of a different description. The demand of the present day being chiefly for cheap
or low-priced literature of one kind or another, we find the
greatest crowds where that is dispensed in the greatest
quantity. In places where volumes and the dear magazines
form the whole, or nearly the whole, of the materials of
traffic, there is time, even on Magazine-day, to conduct the
business with more deliberation and decorum.
But time
must not be lost; and the dinner-hour comes at this particular crisis with but an apology for dinner, or not even that,
to the majority of the actors in the busy scene.
As the afternoon wanes, the collectors gradually disappear,
and that for an obvious reason, as their burdens have to be
sorted, packed, and sent off before six o'clock. As other
people's collectors desert the publisher's shop his own begin
to return, having fulfilled their commissions; and now there
is an hour and a half, or two hours, in which the work of
packing has to be completed.
The packing of books is an
art, not an intuition. If it is not well done, the books suffer
in their transit to the bookseller, and may be refused by the
customer; and if it is not done quickly on Magazine-day,
it may as well not be done at all. Practice, however, renders

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE:DAY.

47

the packers adroit; and it is amusing as well as surprising to
note how rapidly a heap of books, of all sizes and a1 shapes,
of'damp magazines and flimsysheets, is transformed into a
neat brown-paper parcel, corded and directed, and ready for
carriage. This all-important work employs all hands, and
consumes the last labouring-hours of the day. As time
draws on, symptoms begin to appear of the conclusion of the
labour. Head-clerks and shopmen button on their coats, and
march off to a late dinner; chops, steaks, and cups of coffee
walk in, to the solace of those who are left behind to see to
the termination of the day's business;and carts and waggons
begin to defile into the Row from the western entrance, to
carry off the parcels to the carriers' dephts. According to a
very necessary regulation, well understood, the carts and
vehicles performing this service enter theRow from the
western or Ludgate Hill end, and draw up with lorses' heads
towards Cheapside. As a compensation for any trouble this
rule may occasion, the carters have a small monthly gratuity
allowed them. The carriers send for the goods at their own
expense, receiving only the usual booking-fee for each
parcel. Notwithstanding these regulations, however, the
carting process rarely goes off without a bout at wrangling
and squabbling among the drivers. Now and then an unsalaried carter, hired for the single job, and ignorant of the
etiquette which requires that all vehicles shall depart at the
Cheapside end of the Row, will obstinately persist in crushing
his way in the contrary direction, and-though he is-generally
defeated in the attempt-he does not submit to fate without
the usual demonstrations characteristic of his class. When
the carts have all been filled and driven off, the Row assumes
a sudden tranquillity, in remarkable contrast with the bustle
By the time its shops are
and turmoil of the past day.
finally closed for the night, some million or so of copies of
the latest productions of the press have taken to themselves
wings of steam, and are all flying from London, as a common

48

PATERNOSTER ROW AND MAGAZINE-DAY.

centre, to all parts of the realm; and before to-morrow night
the greater portion of them will be affording to the reading
public their monthly literary treat.
The above glance at the operations of the publishing-trade
furnishes us with a reason sufficiently obvious why publishers
should congregate-in so doing they do but practise what is
mutually convenient and profitable. It shows us, moreover, that
the convenience at present derived from association is capable
of very considerable enhancement. What to us appears to be
wanting is, the establishment of a publishers' ball of commerce, in which, of everything published, not only in London
but in all parts of the country, copies sbould be deposited
for sale at the wholesale prices to all the members. The
establishment need not be large, nor its management expensive; and the expense should be defrayed by a rate
chargeable to each member, and deducted from the sums
handed over to him in payment for his deposits. If the
publishing trade goes on increasing for the next thirty years
in the same proportion as during the last thirty years, Paternoster Row, with its present limits, cannot long continue to
form its principal store-house. As other nuclei arise in other
places, the necessity for some common area for the despatch
of business will become more imperative and indisputable;
and something equivalent to what-we here suggest will arise,
as most improvements in commercial systems have arisen,
out of the urgent requirements of the hour.

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.
FRoM the fact of Our Terrace standing in the line of
cattle transit from the rearing-grounds in the north of the
island to the market of Smithfield, we are all invariably
awakened on the Sunday morning by the ba-a-ing of sheep,
the lowing and bellowing of cattle, the bawling of drovers,
and the barking of drovers' dogs. This matutinal concert
begins, whatever the season of the year, before it is light,
and continues at intervals, rarely of long duration, throughout
the whole of the day. It is not by any means so monotonous
a performance as a stranger might suppose, being enlivened
by a variety of little accidents and pleasantries on the part of
the fourfooted pilgrims, all of which we can hear and perfectly'comprehend as we lie comfortably in our beds, which,
on this morning of the week alone, a commercial people may
be said fully to enjoy. Sometimes it is a vivacious ox, that,
seized with Nan unforeboding whim of friskiness, takes it into
his head to leap out of the road to the high pavement of the
terrace, and thence into one of the small gardens, where he
marches straight to the house-door, and butts at it with his
horns, as though bent on a morning call to some particular
friend of his own. Sometimes it is a flock of Norfolk wethers
that have made an irruption into the doctor's garden at the
villa over the way, through the negligence of the boy, who,
after polishing the brass-plate on Saturday night, and getting
up a bright face on it for the morrow, forgot to lock the gate.
* This sketch ;epresents a state of things which has undergone considerable modification since the removal of the cattle-market from the city.

50

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

Sometimes it is a vociferous exchange of compliments between
a couple of north-country drovers, who, without the slightest
suspicion that a hundred pair of ears are cognisant of every
syllable they utter, are lavishing affectionate endearments
upon each other. These little incidents serve to vary the
monotony of the perpetual ba-a-ing and boo-o-ing, and
have a further effect in inducing us at length to rouse up,
turn out, and confront the cold-water ewer, in preparation
for getting down to breakfast.
As early as seven or eight o'clock in the morning, if we
are up so early, which is not always the case with all of us,
we may see, on looking out of window, detached groups of
artisans, and apprentices to humble handicrafts not a few, in
fustian and second-hand garb, but with unmistakeable holiday
faces, passing onwards towards Highgate or Hornsey, and
the picturesque country in the neighbourhood of both,
resolved on the enjoyment of a rural holiday in the fields and
lanes-where they will spend the entire day in the full
appreciation of such pleasures as perfect idleness and perfect
freedom can afford. These are soon followed by groups of
anglers, with their tackle and rods in canvas-bags. A sense
of propriety makes these fishermen, who catch no fish, set
forth on their expeditions at an early hour. It would be a
scandal, they think, to be seen with a fishing-rod at an hour
when church-going people are abroad with their prayerbooks; and, in consequence, the two discordant spectacles
are seldom visible at once on the pavement of London.
Comfortable anglers of mature years, who lie abed late on
Sunday morning, and go a-fishing after breakfast, lock up
their tackle at the fishing-stations, and are never seen
carrying it at all. Next to the angler, it is as likely as not
that the fowler passes along the terrace; he has generally
with him an assistant in the shape of a ragged boy or lad,
tolerably well loaded both on the outward and homeward
bound march. Besides the nets and the poles, which,

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

51

together, make up something considerably above a hundredweight, there is a whole cluster of cages to be carried, each
containing one or more call-birds, and a pot of bird-lime,
with sundry bundles of forked twigs, intended to serve as a
snare for some desiderated songster. If you talk to the
fowler on the subject of Sabbath desecration, he will tell you
impudently that he cannot afford to be idle on the Sundaythat it is the best day for catching birds, and he had better
give up any two days in the Week than Sunday. He spreads
his nets in the neighbourhood of the furthest and newest of
the brickfields, where, from some cause or other, the goldfinches, linnets, and titlarks most do congregate, and where
on Sunday the brickmakers are not at work to scare them off
the ground. He is a perfect model of patience in his way;
and he had need to be so, for he will often have to trudge
under his heavy apparatus, out and in, a distance of ten
miles, and lie or kneel watching his traps all day, for no
better remuneration than four or five small birds, marketable,
perhaps, for 6d. apiece, with perhaps a score of sparrows
for the shooting-trap at 8d. a dozen, or for his own supper if
they are not in demand to be shot; and sometimes he gets
through his whole day's desecration for no remuneration at
all. About this time of the morning, too, we see silently
plodding past the terrace, every now and then, a race of
demure-looking fellows, each propelling a truck or hand-cart,
laden with fruit, nuts, or oranges, or with ginger-beer,
lemonade, and sweet stuffs. These fellows are bound for the
very furthest limits of London, and will bring their establishments to a halt at the foot of Highgate Hill, or somewhere in
the neighbourhood of Hornsey Wood House, or at one of
the gates or stiles leading to some favourite public or eel-pie
house, whither the denizens of London's smokiest holes love
to resort when Sunday emancipates them from the toils of
labour. Here they will display their wares in a form as
tempting as may be, taking advantage, where possible, of
E2

52

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

some natural bank or prostrate treetrunk, which may serve
as a seat for their customers; and here, if the day prove propitious, they will do a good trade among the pleasure-seekers,
nor think of returning to town until darkness has set in.
At an hour somewhat later comes that lazy, lounging,
blackguard tribe, who invariably infest the outskirts of
London on a Sunday, and whose amateur. vocation, if it is
not their professional one, is dog-fancying and rat-hunting.
In the pockets of the first half-dozen that lounge past, it is
odds that a score at least of live rats would be found, which
are carried out into the fields on a Sunday morning, to afford
,entertainment and training for that yelping tribe of terriers
and terriers' pups clustering round their heels. When all
,the rats have been duly hunted and killed by the dogs,
ferrets will be let loose among the hedges and corn-ricks,
and more rats hunted and slain; and in these congenial
pursuits the morning will be spent, until the approach of one
o'clock, at which hour the tippling-shops will be opened to
supply a more potent temptation.
There live on Our Terrace at least half-a-dozen Sundayschool teachers; and about nine o'clock, or perhaps a few
minutes before, we see them go past one after the other, as
sure as fate-some of them to the church, and some to the
dissenting chapel further on. It does not seem to signify
what may be the state of the weather to these friends of the
poor girls and boys of the district. If the whole terrace
stays at home in consequence of the rain, snow, or tempest,
no matter-the teachers always brave it, and meet their
classes. They generally pass by while we are at breakfast,
in which we are apt to indulge somewhat more at length, or
at least to conduct with more becoming ceremony, than on
other days. After they are gone, there is a pause in the
succession of human footsteps; and we are struck with the
solemn and Sabbath-like silence that prevails. There are
no omnibuses passing Our Terrace on Sunday-morning-no

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

53

cabs ever come wandering this way at that hour-not the
faintest echo of the customary roar of London traffic reaches
us. We should know by that circumstance alone that it was
Sunday: the very cats know it, and not one of the whole
number thinks of going to look out for the catsmeat-man.
Our old Stalker, instead of coming to sit in the parlour-window to wait for that officer, goes down into the kitchen, and
torments Betty for his allowance, who, as he knows well
enough, took it in yesterday, and shut it up in the dresserdrawer along with the shoe-brushes. This quiet time soon
passes away; and while it is going, the sexton passes the
window. Then the silence is broken by the sudden rush of
a railway-train, whizzing like the discharge of a tremendous
rocket, and cough-cough-coughing like a Titan with a fit
of the asthma. The whole terrace seems to vibrate with the
sudden shock as the train rushes along underground within a
few yards of where we sit.
"Dong ! dong !, That is the bell from the chapel-of.ease at the north end of the villas, warning for church-time.
Now it stops; now it warns again! then the clock strikes
the hour, and is followed by the peals of the bell in regular
succession, which have quite a pastoral sound, mingled as
they are with the bleating of a new flock of sheep, and the
distant lowing of cattle not yet in sight. The sheep and the
cattle go off, but the bell goes on-dong, dong-for half an
hour. Soon, in response to its brazen voice, hundreds of
doors are opened, and from almost every house pours forth
the morning congregation, all having their faces turned
towards the quarter whence the sounds proceed. Now is the
terrace swarming with well-dressed people. It is wonderful,
as Betty says, what a swell some of us do cut on this
important occasion. There goes the butcher, with his wife
and two daughters! Who upon earth would suppose that
portly and majestic figure in senatorial raiment to be the
same man who yesterday, in blue blouse, and with a steel

54

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

dangling between his legs, brought us that quarter of lamb
we hope to see smoking on the table at two o'clock ? There
goes the grocer ! Who wouldn't think him a magistrate at
least ?--and who would guess -that the magnificent dame at
his side weighed out the currants:last night which Betty is
at this moment mixing in the pudding ? There go the
furniture-broker and his vhole family! Here comes Smith,
smirking-lucky dog !-with the pretty Miss Robinson on
his arm, and shaking his cane at an advancing drove of oxen,
of which- she pretends-it :is nothing but pretence-to be
:afraid. Yonder is Jones doing the genteelest of knocks at
No. 9, of the villas, with the intention of escorting Miss
Goodall-who, he says, is his cousin, and whom, according
to Brown's version of that story, he has been "sticking up"
to for these three months past-to the parish church, nearly
a mile off. Now the grooms lead out the pony-chaises to
draw the elderly people over the. way in the villas to their
several places of worship; and there they stand, both horses
,and vehicles, as clean as a new pin, for a full quarter of an
hour before the old folks come out and climb into their seats,
and amble steadily off.
Now you may discern among the crowds of respectables
on both sides of the road, here and there a slipshod damsel,
with bare elbows and bare head, carefully edging her way as
she carries a joint of meat resting on a substratum of solid
pudding to the baker's at the corner of the next street.
Children follow, still more cautiously, with gigantic pies from
the cottages in the rear of the main road-and now and then
a busy, fiery-faced woman darts past like a phantom, with
ribs of beef and potatoes bound for the oven. Now comes a
column of tall boys, dwindling by degrees into a line of very
small ones from the Rev. Mr. Leatherlad's boarding and
educational establishment, from a neighbouring terrace,
which is not Our Terrace. They defile past slowly, the
lanky leaders with an oppressive sense of dignity, and the

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

55

subjugated small tail with an equally oppressive sense of
supervision, under the eye of the Rev. Mr. Leatherlad himself, who, arm-in-arm with his friend and confidant the
mathematical master, brings up the rear. When they have
all gone clean past the villas-for, being the genteelest of
schools, they always lead out their procession on the genteeler
side of the way-then the Misses Backboard, who invariably
wait and watch for that event, ' discharge from their own
front-door an equally imposing column of young ladies, comprising bodily proportions of equal variety-the members of
their unimpeachable seminary. Before all the good people
have gone off to church, it is odds that some of them feel
considerably scandalised by the presence of a series of very
equivocal equipages, which about this time make their
appearance in the road. It may be, that the first is a sorry
hack (which ought in justice to have fed the city cats long
ago) harnessed to a rickety cart, into which half-a-dozen
chairs have been thrown to serve for seats; upon each chair
sits an unshaven fellow, in greasy costume, and with folded
arms, and all are puffing volumes of smoke from black stumpy
pipes. The drivers of the crazy, rickety vehicle, which is
mounted on wheels of different colours, are two: he who
holds the reins has enough to do with both hands to guide
the hard-mouthed anatomy of a horse clear of obstructions,
while the other is laboriously at work supplying the incentive
of a whip to his bony flanks. The next is a Whitechapel
butcher's cart, and a fast-trotting horse, in the rear of which
sit a whole family packed together in a solid lump. Then
follows a coster's equipage similarly loaded-and this is followed in its turn by a long, flat board upon wheels, drawn
by a couple of donkeys, bound for some Cockney Arcadia,
and freighted with a cargo of veritable gamins. After them
comes a three-wheeled velocipede, labouring along under
the weight of a couple of blacksmith's apprentices, who take
it by turns to steer and work the treddles by which the

56

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

useless machine is propelled, at a cost of considerably more
exertion than it would take to get over the ground without it.
By and by, the bell ceases tolling; and now, with the
exception of a few belated stragglers, with whom it is a
constitutional habit to be late at church, and a group or
two of idle mechanics in working-garb, lounging lazily at
intervals towards the outskirts, the terrace is comparatively
silent and deserted. But anon comes more ba-a-ing of sheep
and boo-o-ing of cattle, of which, being unfortunately confined to the house by a slight indisposition, we have the
especial benefit. Now the drovers, as if aware that they
have the world pretty much to themselves, indulge in unusual
latitude of speech, and their sturdy voices reverberate angrily
from the tall buildings on either side of the way. There goes
a whole flock of sheep, leaping over one another's backs, and
plunging hbadlong into the doctor's garden-and out rushes
the doctor's cook, armed with a long broom, to drive them
back again; but in at the same moment scampers the
drover's dog, and cook is driven back herself-there is a
prodigious barking and bellowing, and roaring and ba-a-ing
for the next twenty minutes, until all are turned out againall but one unfortunate mutton, that has got maimed in the
mdlee, and is unable to move, and which the drover, finding
that neither he nor his dog can prevail upon him to join the
march, tethers to a tree in the garden, promising to fetch
him in' the afternoon. More boo-o-ing and ba-a-ing, more
drover's rhetoric, more barking of dogs, more intervals of
quiet, more rushing past of railway-trains; and thus, hour
after hour, passes away the suburban Sabbath morning.
So soon as the church-clocks have rung out One, we begin
to perceive a gathering, from various quarters, of figures in
exceedingly various costume, all converging towards the
baker's shop at the corner. The slipshod girl who slunk so
stealthily among the crowd three hours ago with her brown

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

57

dish, is now neat, and trim, and tidy, like a good-looking
lass as she is, and marches proudly home with the family
dinner'; the working-carpenter, dressed in his Sunday's best
all but his coat, which he is afraid of greasing with the gravy,
walks into the baker's in his shirt-sleeves, and comes out
again with that scored leg of pork browned over with
crackling, of which he is so fond, and whose savoury odour
reaches us as we sit at this distance at the open window.
That fiery-faced matron, who was in such a heat and hurry
at ten o'clock, is now calm and composed enough as she
emerges with the beef and potatoes she is about to dispense
at the head of her own table. The dinners are scarcely
cleared off from the baker's, when, if the road should happen
to be free from cattle, we may hear the hum of the organ in
the chapel-of-ease pealing the final voluntary, and forthwith
the whole congregation come streaming forth, and Our
Terrace is, for the next ten minutes, alive with indisputable
gentility and fashion. Amidst the pattering of feet and the
subdued hum of pleasant and complimentary voices, there is
a prodigious alarm of knockers, among which the portentous
sis-e-ra-ra of Jones, as he assaults Mr. Goodall's door in
behalf of his fair cousin or sweetheart, whichever it may be,
is pre-eminently audible. Positively the fellow walks in when
the door is opened, and no doubt means to.stay and dine with
the charming girl and her wealthy papa. Sure Brown was
right after all: there is something in it; we shall keep an
, and get at the rights of it
eye upon Jones and Miss G
before long by hook or by crook. There goes our ldndlord,
who nods us a good-day as he passes. There goes our butcher,
looking, for all the world, as though he had just waked up
out of a dream, which, considering how late- his shop was
open last night, and thathe is upon his legs some fourteen
hours every day in the week, we have a strong suspicion is
the fact. There goes the grocer, who wafts us a polite bend,
in virtue, no doubt, of the little bill which Betty pays him

58

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

every Saturday night. Robinson is looking well, but that
pretty daughter of his hanging upon Smith's arm looks
better. Good-morning to you, Mr. Scriven; glad to see you
about again. Ha! here comes our better-half-rat-a-tat-tat.
Now, we shall soon see what to-day's dinner is made of.
Just as we are sitting down to dinner, comes the milkman
from the monstrous far-famed establishment in the immediate
neighbourhood. He, too, is dressed in his Sunday garb,
with a clean snow-white smock and glazed hat inscribed
with the address of the firm to which he belongs, and
rejoices this day in polished boots. He never cries "Meeho!" on a Sunday, but gently tingles the area-bell, and
quietly deposits your allowance in a small tin can within
the railings, gathering up his numerous vessels when the
servants have withdrawn their contents. The dinner-hour
is generally a very quiet time on the terrace, barring the
accidental presence of the herds and flocks, and barring, too,
the apparition of Silly Willy on the pavement, who, if he
happens to be dinnerless himself, is yery likely to come by,
and to favour some of us with an angry jobation on the subject
of gluttony, delivered in a stentorian voice, with his grimy
face jammed between the garden railings-gluttony, in his
view, consisting in people barbarously eating their own
dinners without inviting him ii to take a share. After
dinner, we dwellers on the terrace are accustomed to indulge
on the Sunday in a modest glass of wine; and before the
decanters are glittering on the table, we hear the voices of
three or four fellows at 'once bellowing: "Walnuts, ten a
penny! very fine wa-a-a-lnuts! Oranges! fine oranges !
fine oranges!1" as though these geniuses were convinced
that it is part of a Londoner's religion to partake of a dessert
of fruit after the Sunday's dinner, and that they were commissioned to furnish him with the means. Never, by any
chance, is this hebdomadal supply of the fruits in season,
whatever they may happen to be, wanting between the

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

59

hours of two and six on the Sunday afternoon; and very
rarely indeed are the members of the very numerous commissariat, who cater for what must be a pretty universal
demand, out of hearing.
But while we crack our nuts, and temperately sip a glass
or two of sherry, and are cosy and happy within the sacred
walls of home, a .change-a melancholy change-steals
gradually over the world without. As Our Terrace lies in
the immediate route to several church-yards and buryinggrounds, and to Highgate Cemetery to boot; and as, of the
thousand persons who die weekly in the metropolis, at least
seven-tenths are buried on the Sunday afternoon, it follows
that we have more than an average share of funerals to
witness. The mortuary bell begins to toll while we yet sit
.at table, and its sad note mingles discordantly with the clatter
of the knives and forks. Anon comes the ponderous hearse
with its nodding plumes, preceded by the stalking mutes,
and followed by a train of mourning-coaches, all slowly
wending onward to the distant and populous cemetery which
overlooks the huge living world of London. Then there is a
walking funeral, followed by -a party-coloured train of weeping relatives. At the heels of this comes the coffin of a child
aloft on the shoulders of a single bearer, and followed only
by the sorrowing members of the family. Then, perhaps, a
young girl is borne to her last home by her maiden companions, all in white, and carrying flowers to cast into her
grave. Or, it may be, that the remains of some parish pauper,
in unseemly shell, is carried to earth without a single follower
to justify the assertion of the poet, that
There is a tear for all that die,
A mourner o'er the humblest grave.

Toll-toll goes the weary, weary bell, and on, with slow and
solemn step, go the funeral-trains in all their sad varieties.
That is the sixth-seven-eight-nine-ten-eleventwelve, this afternoon, while we, bound for the same journey,

60

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

and the destined objects of a similar ceremony, sit in selfsatisfied ease and luxury, living, loving, laughing, and enjoying, with that to come! Such are life and death, and such
are habit and custom, which, by a merciful provision, have
been made "to lie upon us with a weight" heavy enough
sufficiently to counterbalance the inevitable future, in order
that we may make a wise use of the present. But adieu to
moralising.
By the time dinner is cleared away, the servant-girls on
Our Terrace are for the most part released for an hour or
two, and may be seen filing off, some of them to the afternoon service at the Methodist chapel down the road, and
some to enjoy a gossip and a walk with friends or "cousins."
Betty is off with the servant next door, and after she is
gone, we are apt sometimes to forget ourselves in our easychair, starting up every now and then at the renewed bleating and clamour of the sheep and cattle, and catching just an
inkling of the tinkling of the muffin.bell, but no cry of
"muffins," which the baker would not think respectable on
a Sunday. We are roused before five o'clock, by a single
dab at the door-it is Betty's sister come to take a sisterly
cup of tea; she is despatched down stairs to the kitchen, and
a few minutes later Betty lets herself in with the street-door
key. Tea is served in double-quick time by the aid of an
extra pair of hands in the kitchen, and that is no sooner
discussed and cleared away, than the church-bells ring out
again for evening service. There is shortly a repetition of
the ceremonial gathering of the morning, minus, however,
the columns of young gentlemen from the Rev. Mr. Leatherlad's, and of young ladies from.the Misses Backboard, neither
of whom attend the services of the evening at the chapel-ofease, though both undergo a course of homiletical instruction
-at least, so say the prospectuses-at home. The evening
gathering is not followed by a tranquil season, like that of
the morning. The cattle and sheep now begin to increase

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

61

very considerably and very rapidly in numbers, and the dogs
and drovers, having harder work to do, grow more impatient and more noisy. The anglers begin to.return, wearied
out with their day's no-sport; and the country pedestrians,
"dusty and deliquescent" with their long rounds, are
seen marching back towards the city, bearing with them
some verdant trophy ravished from the country-sidebranches of blossoms or of berries, or handfuls of mosses or
wild flowers-to decorate their dull chambers at home in the
smoky city. Then comethe characteristic charioteers of the
morning, in high spirits and in high voice, audibly proclaiming their practical dissent from the doctrines of Father
Mathew.
As twilight comes down upon us, Our Terrace is almost
as crowded as Cheapside on a week-day, owing to the simultaneous return of the tens of thousands of straggling pedestrians whom the fine weather had seduced into the country.
The congregation which the chapel-of-ease pours forth after
the conclusion of the service, makes hardly a sensible difference in their number. For an hour or more, this tide of
returning population rolls on, continuing till past supper-time.
Supper-time on Sunday has but little effect on the publichouses at each end of Our Terrace; they are crowded just
then by the cattle and sheep drovers; and we think it as
well not to send our servants among them, except upon a
mission of absolute necessity. By the time we have finished
our supper, the returning pedestrians have for the most part
passed on to theirs. At about ten o'clock, if you walk out
upon the terrace, it is ten to one that you hear Smith grinding away on his semi-grand at one of Handel's choruses;
but you must wait till that lot of sheep is gone by to hear it
Perhaps Jones and Co. are there, too,
advantageously.
singing in parts; but the din outside is so great, that it is
impossible to say. We are all so much used to this boo-o-ing
and ba-a-ing, however, that we think nothing of it, and shall

62

OUR TERRACE ON SUNDAY.

assuredly miss it when it is gone, as go it soon will, now that
the new cattle-.market is fairly on its way to completion: it
is not unlikely, such is the force of habit, that we may even
regret its loss, though, of course, we have none of us ever
failed to exercise our undoubted privilege of abusing it as an
intolerable nuisance.
As the voices of cattle and sheep are the, first accents that
awake us in the morning of Sunday, so are they the last we
hear at night. We are lulled to rest by the ba-a-ing, boo-oing, and bow-wow-ing of the brute creation; and if we
dream, as we are likely to do, of beeves and flocks, and
patriarchal times, and fancy ourselves wandering with Abraham on the pastoral plains of Mamre, or sitting with his
angel-guests under the shadow of his milk-white tent, it is
an agreeable and innocent delusion which beguiles the last
moments of Sunday on Our Terrace.

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.
WE must confess to a friendly feeling for Jack Frost, as
an old acquaintance, who in times past has contributed not a
little to those bracing exercises out-of-doors which are worth
all the doctor's stuff in the world in a s4anitary point of view.
Jack, moreover, is a picturesque fellow, dealing in strong
contrasts of colour, depths of rich brown and black beneath
mountainous mantles of white; and in odd and grotesque
shapes, as well as forms rare and fanciful-in involuted snowdrifts, curling like the capital of an Ionic column-in gigantic
icicles ranged in jagged rows, like the teeth of some preadamite monster, or sharp, glittering, and terrible, as the
sword of Michael. These doings of Jack's, we say, are
picturesque and suggestive; they set the imagination scampering off on a new track, occasionally breaking up a little
fallow-ground in a man's fancy, and awakening old associations, or creating new, which one would not like to be without
altogether. Wherefore we welcome Jack Frost as a friend;
and when he comes writing his beautiful and flourishing signature on our window-panes, we show him a cheerful face on
the warm side of the glass, and wish him a merry time of it.
But a man may have too much of a good thing; and the
best friend in the world may become a bore if he is always
at your elbow; and on this account we would take the liberty
of suggesting to our friend Old Jack Frost, that it would be
quite as well if he would content himself with his own side
of the street-door, and not be playing the burglar as he has
done of late, and turning things upside down, besides per-

64

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.

petrating all manner of mischief in our peculiar domiciles.
The fellow came in unceremoniously, "last Wednesday was
a week," as Boniface says, and took possession like a broker's
man; and here he stays, and won't be got rid of, do what
we will. Betty, having a presentiment of his intention, did
all she could to keep him out, by cramming the vents of the
attic stoves, and shutting the windows tight, not to mention
the lighting of rousing fires on every floor. But Jack found
his way in somehow, and has had his own way ever since.
The first thing he did was to crack the water-bottles by the
expansion of their contents; then he glewed the ewers to
the basins, so that they couldn't be got apart; then he
transformed our private and particular sponge into a piece
of pumice-stone; changed the tooth-brush into a lump of
something as hard as the kitchen-poker, but of a colder
flavour; and starched the towels to such a state of dignity,
that each one thought fit to declare himself independent of
the towel-horse, and would ride a pick-a-back no longer, but
stand stubbornly on end. These exploits, however, were
but trifles compared with what was to follow. Notwithstanding that we have regularly paid our water-rates, and
have all our receipts on the file ready to produce at any
time, Jack had the impudence to treat us as defaulters, and
to manifest an intention to cut off the water. Betty, who
had suspected his design, made up her mind to defeat it.
With this view she commenced a course of friendly overtures and good offices to the pipe, which running through
the kitchen, pierces the wall, and disembogues into the
cistern in the back-garden. Never was pipe the object of
more tender care or solicitous coddling-a part she swathed
in warm flannels, a part she bandaged surgically with haybands, and another portion she boxed off with boards, filling
the interstices with sifted coal-ashes. After all this skilful
engineering, Betty grew defiant against Jack; and, we must
say that for her, certainly kept her kettle boiling without the

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.
I

65

help of foreign resources for days after our neighbours were
frozen up. But, alas for the triumphs of the beau sexe Ithe first thing we heard on coming down to breakfast on
Tuesday morning last was, that that pipe had frozen and
burst in the night, and that all the water in the house would
have to be dipped out through ice three inches thick, from
the half-empty cistern. There was no help for it; and we
had to submit, especially as the plumber, upon being called
in, declined operations till the thermometer should rise above
the freezing-point.
At the moment we write, the whole
capillary system of the New River Company is suffering
from congestion, and the arterial circulation of that leviathan
body is represented by a few perpendicular plugs stuck up
in odd corners and out-of-the-way places. Upon these extemporised fountains, Our Terrace, and the whole parish, for
that matter, are thrown for their indispensable supply of
water. The capture of a pailful of the precious liquid is no
easy matter. The plug, being besieged all day long by tubs,
buckets, pails, pans, and garden-pots, in the possession of
every description of bare red-elbowed matron, serving-maid,
small girl, and errand-boy, is not readily approachable, particularly as it is surrounded by a slippery glacier, a foot or
more in thickness, caused by the spillings and overflowings.
There is a continual quarrelling for priority; and though the
law of "first come first served" is recognised in theory,.it is
not amicably carried out in practice-the strong supplant the
weak, and the sure-footed upset the timid; and it is at the
water-plug as it is all the world over, that the feeble go to
the wall, and the strong-willed have their way. Now and
then comes the sound of a splash, followed by a roar of
laughter, and perhaps a faint cry: this time it is a little girl
lugging a water-pot with a spout as long as herself, which
she has been waiting half an hour to get filled, and having
upset it through 'falling, is limping off to beg a kettleful ftom
a neighbour.

66

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.

There is another plug at the other end of the Terrace, but
that is in the possession of the water-hawkers, a race who,
according to a law which ever operates in London, have
sprung up to supply the necessities of the moment. Their
voices, in every tone and key, are heard all the morning long,
bawling as they march slowly along the pavement, "Waterwater! any water wanted?" They pull bells and bang at
doors without ceremony, and will fetch you a yoke of water
for twopence "in your own pails." They are pretty well
employed in the forenoon, but disappear about one 6'clock
until to-morrow. They are the same race-in fact, the same
individuals-who but a short time ago performed the part
of "snow-birds" in clearing away the snow from the doors
and house-fronts-a duty which the law, as they are perfectly aware, will compel you to perform, if you do not set
about it spontaneously before ten o'clock or so-and which,
for a "trifle of coppers" they are ready to perform for you.
The only man in the neighbourhood of Our Terrace who
has fought victoriously with Jack Frost, and beaten him on
his own ground, is the water-man of the cab-stand round the
corner. But Old Tom Buckle seized Time by the forelock;
and when-he.scented Jack a-coming, took the precaution to
bury the fountain from which he fills his horse-tubs in a
pyramid of stable manure five feet high, and nearly as wide
at its base. Into this pyramid Old Buckle has to make an
excavation to get at the tap for every bucketful he draws;
but he gets the water he wants without buying, begging, or
borrowing, and therein he differs from his neighbours the
householders.
The peripatetic tradesmen appear to care less for Jack
Frost than one might expect. Their sonorous cries penetrate
further than usual through the clear atmosphere, and are intelligible to a greater distance. "Live soles" and "Live
cod" keep alive longer in ice, and cook never questions their
freshness when they come to band frozen. Charley Coster

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.

67

continues to maintain as abundant a show of vegetables as
though frosty weather were no bar to their productionthough, notwithstanding his obstinate assertions to the contrary, it is our conviction that his potatoes at a penny a
pound are not the better but the worse for being frostbitten,
and eating sugary. The larder of the cats-meat man is
frozen as stiff as a brick wall, and Stalker just now has to
crunch his daily ration as noisily as though it were so much
overbaked biscuit, unless when Betty chances to get hold of
it first, and, in mercy to his old teeth, thaws it for him.
Just now, the road in front of our dwellings is alive with
stooping figures, and noisy with the click of pickaxes. Two
or three dozen of poor fellows, who, having been frozen out
of their employment in the fields or gardens, or on houses in
process of building, have applied to the parish for relief, have
been set by the overseers to cut channels in the ice next the
kerb-stone, in readiness for the thaw when it shall come
They form, however, but a small proportion of the unfortunate
crowd whom the severity of the season has driven to apply
for parish relief. We find the door of the workhouse
besieged by numbers, pass it at what hour we may; and we
see in other places sufficient evidence of cruel personal
sufferings borne by the industrious poor, who yet disdain the
relief of alms. On the other hand, Jack Frost is welcomed
by a numerous band of his special followers and admirers.
There is Mr. Brown, who goes a-skating in Regent's Park
every day, and is seen coming home at dusk, dangling his
steel blades and straps, and steaming after the exhilarating
exercise like a locomotive. There is Robinson, who wasn't
at church all day yesterday, but was seen starting from home
at nine o'clock with a suspicious swelling hunch at his coattail, which looked more like a pair of pocketed skates than a
prayer-book, and who didn't return till after dark. Then
there is that Jones, who has rushed home at three o'clock
every afternoon since the ice would bear, and started thence
v2

68

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.

at a trot to IHornsey Wood House, where the lake is as
smooth as a mirror, and kept select for subscribers, and
where he stays cutting: all manner of figures by lamplight,
until it is time to come home to supper and to bed. It was
but Friday afternoon last that, happening to walk over to
take a look at the sport, we surprised him in the very act
, who, it was
of giving lessons in skating to Miss G
evident from the ease with which she swept an arc on one
little foot, must have had a pretty liberal course of instruction before.
Betty summons us to .the coal-cellar, and we go down,
feeling alarmed at our consumption of the black diamonds,
and wondering if it be possible that the liberal supply which
came in at Christmas can show symptoms of exhaustion.
She brings a candle; and then we see a sight worth seeing
-Jack Frost, among his other tricks, has converted the
coal-cellar, which runs under the front garden, into a crystal
palace; the walls and ceiling are apparently incrusted
beneath a massive frieze of silver-the old cobwebs are
pendulous with frosted silver instead of dust-and spumylooking cascades of frostwork exude from every fissure and
crevice, reflecting the light of the candle at every angle.
We have just taken our fill of this natural curiosity, when
there comes a message from the landlord to say, that he
hopes we shall be thoughtful enough to have the roof
cleared of snow before the thaw comes, and perchance floods
the upper rooms unawares. So we send Betty off to Mr.
Scriven, and he sends his man with a shovel to do the
needful service. Stump, stump, he plods upstairs, and disappears through the trap-door. A minute after, his big
voice is heard bawling out "BE-low !" and down comes a
succession of snowy avalanches, plump into the middle of
the road, with a shock that rattles the parlour-windows as
we sit by the fire watching the lumbering shower. This
practice of snow-balling on a grand scale excites the com-

JACK FROST AT OUR TERRACE.

69

bative organ of the doctor's boy opposite, who evidently
itches to be returning the compliment to the man on the
roof, but has no time for such experiments, having too many
pills of a different description to distribute.
Which brings us to the notice of the melancholy fact, that
this season of extreme cold is alarmingly sickly and trying
to the invalid and the old. Cough-lozenges, delectables and
jujubes, are notthe only medicines now at a premium. Medical
men are active night and day; and so, alas! are the coffinmakers and undertakers. The number of funeral processions that passed Our Terrace yesterday, amounted to
nearly a score. The bills of mortality have risen as much as
forty per cent. since Jack Frost housed himself in every
dwelling; and many a sad heart, and many a weary head,
are looking forward prayerfully for the arrival of the gentle
south wind, which shall snap the iron chain that binds the
world, and restore them to liberty and health.

THiE PRECATORY ORDER.

A MAN may live for fifty years in the very heart and focus
of social bustle and turmoil-shall know the ways of mankind
so well, and manage them so much to his own advantage as
to place the world under his feet-shall be, so far as the
known and recognised usages of social life are concerned, a
very Solon, whose verdict is invaluable on affairs legal, political, parochial, municipal, commercial, and what not-yet
it shall happen all the while, that he is as innocent as a babe
of all knowledge respecting what, for the want of a better
name, we shall call the Precatory Science; and that he shall
have been from his youth up, and shall continue to be from
his maturity down, the unsuspecting tee-totum of its ingenious
professors, who will never leave him nor forsake him until
the family-vault shrouds him from their polite attentions.
The extent and importance of the undeniably respectable
body to which we have given the above denomination have
dawned upon us by slow degrees; and we have only been
made fully sensible of their unity of purpose, their systematic
persistency in labour, and the philanthropic end they have
in view, by a series of condescensions on their part, and a
sort of semi-mesmeric semi-sympathetic experience on ours,
which, notwithstanding all the benefit we have derived from
them, we are ungrateful enough to own we would rather have
been without. Every man or woman that comes into the
world, according to a prevailing figure of speech, has a
mission to accomplish; and that of the Precatory Order is,

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

71

to teach stingy humanity to be liberal-to inculcate the
divine maxim that charity is the essence of religion-to open
the hearts of the niggard and the churl to the claims of want
and wretchedness-to impress the wealthy and the proud
with the obligation they are under of showing to the poor
and needy that mercy " which blesseth him that gives and
him that takes"-to do all this and more-and to pocket the
contributions they receive from their pupils in return for the
trouble they take in imparting the lesson. How we came
to be thus far enlightened on the subject of this hitherto
unrecognised benevolent association, we shall, with the
reader's permission, unfold, by simply narrating some few
of the incidents of our own experience. It is many years
ago since we took our first lesson, and thus it happened.
It was during the transitory and fragile season of the
honey-moon, when we had just returned from the weddingtour. Twilight was brooding over London, and we were
pacing up and down in that apology for a garden which
London offers to her denizens, when a low, rumbling,
genteel rap at the door aroused us from a pleasant reverie,
and we were summoned to the parlour to meet a gentleman,
"who would not detain us five minutes." A tall and rather
aristocratic-looking stranger bowed low as we entered the
room, and sighing deeply, looked despondingly round, as if
at a loss for words. We mechanically pointed to a seat, into
which he sank gracefully, heaving another deep sigh, and,
directing a tearful glance at the lady whom we had hardly
yet learned to call "my wife," invoked a blessing on her
head. We hinted, somewhat apologetically, that he had
the advantage of us, that we had not the pleasure of knowing, or at least of recollecting him, at the moment-a hint
which opened the floodgates of his eloquence, and was the
signal for the commencement of 'a dolorous narrative, as
long, at least, as the story of ZEneas before Dido, and
abounding in details of personal suffering and domestic

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

calamity' of the most pathetic character. Our better-half
actually shed tears at the touching recital, coupled with
the spectacle of a gentleman, a scholar, and father of an
interesting family, reduced to such heart-rending distress.
He wound up his history with ill-concealed emotion and
half-suppressed sobs, and in a faltering voice besought us, if
Providence had blessed us with the means, to stretch out a
helping-hand towards him--not for his sake; he disclaimed
that: nothing should have induced him to humiliate himself
before a fellow-mortal on his own account merely, but for
the sake of those whose necessities had driven him to an act
so desperate as an appeal to the sympathy of strangers on
their behalf. We are not going to be overcandid on the
subject of the effect of his oratory. Enough to say, that when
he had taken his leave-with few expressions, but the most
significant looks of the profoundest gratitude, we felt all the
pleasure of having performed a good action, and experienced,
both of us, to the fullest extent, the truth of the declaration,
that "it is more blessed to give than to receive." The unhappy gentleman was the subject of conversation occasionally
for months, nay, for years afterwards, and figured in many
an air-built castle, ihe foundations of which were laid for
his especial benefit. We had served an apprenticeship to
the business of housekeeping before we accidentally discovered, owing to a chance visit to the Cold Bath Prison;
that our distressed gentleman was none other than a rather
maudlin member of the Precatory Order, who had invaded
the sanctuary of our wedded bliss to experiment upon our
charitable tendencies, at a moment when he probably considered they might be in a favourable state. From a habit
of observing and remembering faces, we recollected him at
once. He was undergoing the exercises peculiar to the
Metropolitan Cold Bath, being engaged in getting up a
very harmless kind of revolution, by accelerating the gyrations of a wheel which is not that of fortune.

THE PRECATORY

ORDER.

73

"A card, "Miss Caroline A. Johnson," is laid upon our
desk as we are busy with arrears of correspondence: we
had thought we heard the knocker slip through a lady's
fingers. "Show Miss Johnson into the drawing-room."
Miss Johnson, we find, as we approach within ceremonious
distance, is a lady of uncertain age, enveloped voluminously
in clouds of bombazin, and carrying a broad bluish face in
the recesses of a black bonnet, a poke or two in the rear of
the fashion, behind a very thick veil. Though by no means
a lively-looking personage, the tone of her voice is both
lively and decided, as she expresses a most resolute convicA
tion that we will excuse the liberty she has taken in invading our domestic privacy, when we know what has induced
her to do so. "You know Codger's Fields, my dear sir ?
WTe can't help knowing Codger's Fields, whence emanates
the smell of burnt bricks, which, when the wind is northerly,
invades our domestic privacy with even less ceremony than
Miss Johnson herself; so we acknowledge that much.
"Well, there's that poor Dab the brickmaker has tumbled
off the kiln, and dislocated his shoulder, and broken his leg
in two places, and the bones are come through the skin, they
say, because the stupid people carried him home in a wheelbarrow instead of on a shutter; and he's too ill to be moved
to the hospital; and there's his poor wretched wife and five
little children-and what are they to do, my dear sir ?what are they to do, unless some good Christians like yourself will help them a little to get over this unfortunate time.
So I've taken them in hand myself, and I've determined to
leave no stone unturned to supply them with the necessaries
of life, till the poor man is able to get about again. You see
what I have done. I am getting on famously. Here is my
's advice, and
book; I have taken the Reverend Mr. HI
limited the subscription to five shillings; that's the maximum, though I take any smaller sum I can get-a shilling,
or even less. It's a capital plan-don't you think so ? You

74

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

see, it gives everybody an opportunity, and-though it is
not polite to say so-leaves nobody an excuse."
With that the lady submits her book for inspection, where
we see unmistakably enough the autographs of several of
our neighbours opposite to small sums subscribed to ameliorate the condition of the family of the tumbling brickmaker.
We are ashamed to torture our invention for an excuse for
not affixing our own, and though not particularly relishing
the invasion, as the lady has very justly termed it, down it
goes with a dash of the pen, and the shillings vanish with
a farewell chink into the fair collector's bulky reticule.
"Many thanks on behalf of the distressed wife and chil'
dren, my dear sir;" and with that Miss Johnson trips down
stairs, and a moment after we hear the creaking of our
neighbour's gate, and the dribbling knock at his door, as the
ceremony recommences at No. 25.
A few days after, we happen, in an evening stroll towards
the locality of the Codger's Fields, to fall in with our medical
man. The sight of him and the damp bricks together recalls
the calamity of poor Dab, and, imagining that the doctor has
been to-visit him, we inquire how he is getting on. The
doctor, whose wife had been induced to subscribe during his
absence, is savagely jocose on the subject, and anathematises
Miss Caroline A. Johnson and Dab into the bargain. It
appears that, anxious to have something to do with a case
of compound fracture, he has been for the last two hours in
search of the crippled brickmaker, and has just arrived at
the irrefragable conclusion, that Dab himself, his dislocated
shoulder, doubly-fractured limb, skin, bones, and all, with
his disconsolate wife and five children into the bargain,
never had any other existence than in the fertile brain of
Miss Johnson, and that, together withthe £10 which she
had heroically made up her mind to collect for their necessities, they and she had vanished for ever from the paradise
of Codger's Fields. And so it turns out to be. Miss C. A.

THE PREOATORY ORDER.

75

Johnson is a benevolent member of the Precatory Order,
and Dab is not, and never was anything but a convenient
myth, endowed for the nonce with "a local habitation and
a name" by that ingenious lady, to assist in the laudable
purpose of arousing a comfortable and self-complacent neighbourhood to the delightful sensations attendant upon the
exercise of Christian charity.
An unctuous elder, with broad shining buckles on his
shoes, with silk stockings shining too-in solemn sable garb
-the coat of straight cut and single collar, and all of the
newest broad-cloth, waited upon us graciously a few months
back to solicit a subscription on behalf of a certain foreign
mission, in aid of which, he informed us-what, indeed, we
knew already, from placards on the church-door and on
the walls in the neighbourhood, that the Rev. Mr.
was about to preach a sermon on the coming Sunday
morning in the parish church. He produced from his
side-pocket a copy of the last annual report of one of the
missionary societies, bound up, together with a dozen ortwo
of ruled memorandum leaves, in black morocco, and lettered
on the side "African Mission-Subscriptions." We naturally
connected him in our mind with the coming ecclesiastic, and
if we had had any suspicions, they would have been put to
flight by the gracious ease and dignity of his manner, and
the undeniable good sense which marked his conversation.
He spoke with great feeling of the degraded condition of
the African races, who, by making war upon one another,
and selling the prisoners taken in battle to the white dealers,
are the source and origin of the slave-trade; and talked
with much enthusiasm of the necessity of making a grand
and united effort to overthrow the reign of violence and
bloodshed by the influence of Christianity. A dignitary of
the church had suggested the plan of a domiciliary canvas
for subscriptions, and he and a few of his brethren had
undertaken each a specified district, and, at the risk even of

76

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

an equivocal welcome-for he knew it was not always a
pleasant thing to be thus appealed to-had resolved to call
in person upon all the inhabitants whose circumstances
enabled them to contribute, and to endeavour to enlist their
co-operation on behalf of these poor benighted heathen. He
must say it was a burdensome, and, in some respects, a
humiliating commission to undertake; but still he found a
pleasure in it, from the consciousness of the good which,
under the blessing of Providence, might result from his
feeble endeavours.
What this sleek, silver-tongued, and self-sacrificing individual scraped together on behalf of the benighted Africans,
we had no opportunity of ascertaining; but a brief commentary upon his proceedings from the lips of the preacher
at the close of the promised sermon on the following Sunday
morning effectually put to flight the satisfaction that any
of us might have entertained from the consciousness of
having charitably interfered to effect their reformation. The
reverend gentleman denounced their eloquent advocate as a
plundering impostor, and gave us regretfully to understand,
that we had parted with our money to augment the ill-gotten
gains of an unprincipled and godless deceiver. Thus did a
son of Mother Church stigmatise a full-blown professor of
the precatory science-who, on his part, modest man, returned not railing for railing, but, with characteristic
humility, forbore to emerge from his placid retirement, even
for the vindication of his good name.
We forget exactly how long it is ago since we were
favoured with a visit from the honorary secretary of the
Cramp Hospital, or something of the kind-a gentlemanlywhiskered man of five-and-forty, who in a most confident
and persevering manner enforced upon our attention the
claims of that most useful institution. He was armed with
printed documents in the shape of begging-circulars, and
some copies of a column apparently cut from a London

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

77

newspaper, recommending the hospital, now languishing for
lack of funds, to the generous sympathies of the public.
Happening to be intimate with the locality in which the
hospital was said to exist, and having no recollection of any
building that could possibly subserve such a purpose, we put
off the honorary secretary to a future day, promising to
make inquiries, and act according to the information we
Our suspicions in this case turned out well
received.
founded. On investigation, it proved that no hospital of
the kind, or indeed of any kind, had existed in the neighbourhood within the memory of man. The begging-circulars, signed with names purporting to be those of the
trustees, resident surgeon, &c., were a pure invention; and
the newspaper column, we have little doubt, was equally so.
The hospital, with all its wards and patients, nurses and
medical men, was nothing more than the stock-in-trade of
the soi-disant honorary secretary, an independent member
of the Precatory Order, who in this instance lost his labour,
and deprived us of the pleasure of bestowing upon him a
substantial token of regard, by not calling to receive it.
When Grace Darling performed the heroic exploit which
rendered her name familiar to the whole kingdom, the members of the Pracatory Order took up her cause, and boldly
canvassed the country in various directions, with the praiseworthy object of collecting a substantial testimonial of the
public regard. When the news of the imprisonment of the
Madiai was first brought to England, they did the same in
behalf of the persecuted prisoners of the Grand Duke. They
-make it a matter of conscience to "improve" every public
event which is of sufficient magnitude to be talked about,
and capable of being used as an incentive to a contributory
purpose. Shocking calamities, heroic deeds, unmerited sufferings, or visitations of Providence-all are manageable
materials in their industrious hands, and all are texts on
which they build their instructive homilies to teach the

7'8

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

world the obligations of charity and sympathy. We might
add to the examples we have already cited of their ingenuity
and perseverance, by the narration of many others; but we
have probably said enough to acquaint the reader with the
merits of this disinterested school of practical philosophers.
They are the living embodiments, in forms ever changing,
and with which it is difficult, therefore, to become familiar,
of a spirit which has been always prevalent with a not very
distinguished or distinguishable order of humanity. It
would almost appear that there is a certain and settled
amount of the precatory faculty ever existing in all social
communities, which it is impossible, by legislative or other
means, to suppress or to transmute into any other kind of
energy. Acts of parliament may shut up the unsightly
ragged pauper in the workhouse, and drive the tattered
professional mendicant from our streets-but they touch
not the ladies and gentlemen of the Precatory Order.
These, in the garb of gentility, and under the gentle aspect
of angels of charity and mercy, penetrate to our parlours and
firesides, and awakening our tenderest emotions, give us
lessons of virtue in the abstract, lest our sympathies should
decline from want of exercise, and we should forget the
duties of compassion towards our humbler neighbours. In
the accomplishment of their instructive mission they display
a most remarkable ingenuity, and avail themselves of all the
ills and calamities that flesh is heir to, to arouse the general
benevolence. Does the-cholera smite its victims ?-the
precatory professor brings you the news, and summons you
to aid in withstanding the grim destroyer. Does a terribleinundation desolate a whole valley ?-he comes at the heels
of the inundation, demanding your sorrows and compassion
for the sufferers. Does a fearful conflagration, destroy life
and property, overwhelming both rich and poor in one
desolation '?--he is as alert as the fire -brigade to secure your
benevolent co-operation in alleviating their woes. True,

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

79

the sufferers never know anything of his enthusiastic labours
They get your pity,
in their cause. But what of that
and he gets your pay; and thus the proceeds are equitably
divided, at least according to the regulations of the Order.
When real misfortunes are wanting on which to found a
valid claim upon your sensibilities, they condescend to the
department of fiction to furnish it-and, as we have shown
above, are extremely happy and fertile ii such resources.
Because-their mission must be accomplished-the genial
current of human affections must not be allowed to stagnate.
They have devoted their lives to the purpose of keeping it
in constant and active circulation; and if some of them
occasionally become martyrs to their calling, and incur the
opprobrium of a class incapable of appreciating it, their
merit is none the less.
Occasionally a member of this Order will dispense with
the formality of knocking at your door, and introducing
himself to your family; he will generously pick you up in
the highway, and this mostly happens at the soothing hour
of twilight, or when darkness has settled down upon the
stony-hearted streets of London. Perhaps he will request
the liberty of a moment's speechwith you-he does not
wish to detain you-but as you walk along. It is demonstrably a gentleman that accosts you, and you do not think
of objecting. He pours a tale of woe into your ear, a touching and pathetic romance. You hear that he was educated
at Trinity College, Dublin, perhaps-that he was intended
for a learned profession-but that, seduced by the charms of
black bright eyes, he married secretly while yet a student-affronted his guardians and relatives by the step, who cast
him upon the world and upon his own resources-that be
maintained himself and wife by his literary talents, writing
for one of the Dublin papers in the patriotic interest which
exploded in the rebellion of 1848, when the journal was
stopped, and he of course lost his engagement. After this

80

THE PRECATORY ORDER.

he came to London, where for the last four or five years he
has led a struggling life, enduring the most abject poverty
and deprivation while obliged to maintain a respectable appearance, without which he would fall into utter destitution,
now unhappily impending over him through a change in the
proprietorship of a periodical from which he has latterly
derived a small weekly payment of a few shillings. His
wife and three small children are at the present moment in
a most wretched garret, where they await his return. He
hopes by your benevolence to be enabled to carry them a
meal, if it be but of dry bread, to allay the pangs of hunger.
Such, at least, in substance was the burden of the last precatory professor who condescendingly favoured us with his
company during an evening walk. What effect it might
have had upon us under ordinary circumstances, there is no
knowing; but the voice seemed not altogether strange to
our ears, and the sudden flash of a gas-lamp upon the
speaker's face revealed to us features known any day these
ten years upon the same beat. We gave him to understand
as much-when he vanished "just like a bullet from a gun"
-doubtless from the sheer force of modesty.
We cannot prolong this humble oration; but we trust
the few remarks and illustrations we have given above will
assist in drawing the attention of the charitable part of
society to these devoted missionaries of benevolence, and
secure for their universal sympathies a more profound and
discriminating appreciation than as yet has been awarded
them.

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.
SOME cynical person has remarked that people are given
to talk most about what they least understand-an observation, by the way, which although it haspassed into a maxim
pretty generally current, is, like most of the dicta of your
sarcastic philosophers, true only in a limited sense. It is
strikingly true, however, with regard to John Bull and his
numerous family whenever their talk is about the weather.
John, from his insular position, is more exposed to the
"skiey influences," as fine writers call the changes of the
weather, than any of his neighbours; and being a personage
whosebusiness, and whose pleasures too, lie very much out
of doors, he would be glad to know, were it possible, how to
manage his movements so as to escape the foul and enjoy the
fair. Hence it is that the weather, and its probable state at
some not very distant or closely impending period, is a
universal topic of conversation with honest John. It is a
question in which he has a personal interest, and one often
of greater moment than any other which a mere casual
acquaintance could discuss with him. A Frenchman or a
German, an Italian or a Spaniard, may, it is true, be equally
interested in the weather--but then he is seldom, if ever, in
the same uncertainty respecting it. With a wind from any
point but the west or south-west, your continental friend
does not fear getting drenched to the skin; but John knows
from awkward experience, that he has no cause for solid reliance upon any wind that blows; and that rain may come
to him, and does come to him at times, from all points of the

82

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

compass. So he is ever on his guard against it, and prophesies concerning its advent and departure-not very often,
it must be confessed, with the happiest result-thus showing
that though he talks so much about it, he understands it
very little indeed. But he is not content with talking only
-if he were, he wouldn't be John Bull. He arms himself
against foul weather, as he would against any other enemy;
and has contrived no end of munitions and fortifications
against thp assaults which the clouds are for ever preparing
or discharging upon his devoted head. If, on the one hand,
he is annoyed by water, he.is, on the other, defiant in
"waterproof." Run your eye down the columns of his
morning paper, and see what a prodigious store of bulwarks
he-has prepared against the storm. Read the list of gallant
defenders, with the immortal Macintosh at their head, who
have levied contributions from the resources of universal
nature for the purpose-of keeping the hostile moisture on the
safe side of John's waistcoat-from coats of four ounces,
' warrantedto keep out twelve hours' rain," to coats of twice
as many capes, which would laugh at a monsoon-and from
idrotobolic hats, which keep his bald pate dry, and ventilate
it at the same time, to gutta-percha soles that don't know,
and won't be prevailed upon, under any circumstances, to
know, what it is to be damp. Think of voluminous folds of
vulcanised caoutchouc and gutta-perchified cloth-of rugs
and railway wrappers-of palet ts, bequemes, bear-skins,
pea-coats, Chesterfields, Codringtons, Witney Overs, Derby
coats, Melton-Mowbrays, Wellington sacs and wrap-rascals
-to say nothing of the millions of umbrellas, of which
everybody has one to use and two to lend: think of all
these, and a thousand more of the same sort, and say if John
Bull be not tolerably well provided against yonder black
cloud.
Come, we are not going to be afraid of a rainy day, at
any rate, though we do prefer the sunshine; and it is well

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

83

we are not, for it is coming down in torrents just now, and
we must be off to the office to our daily task, let it come as
it may. Jones,. our volatile neighbour in the "two-pair
back," has just declared, in our hearing, to his wife, that
this is a "delectable swizzle," and no mistake. We know
what that means, well enough. But Jones's wife has tied a
comforter round his chin, and he is off, and we must follow
close at his heels, "swizzle" as it will, or else lose a character
for punctuality, which will never do. The street-door slams
us out. Whew! but it is:a soaker! What a clatter the
big drops make upon the strained silk !-we could spare
such hydraulic music. The sky is one dull sheet of lead;
the nearest houses appear as if veiled in a gauze dress, and
the further ones are behind a wet blanket, and won't appear
at all. All London is just now under the douche, and
undergoing a course of hydropathic treatment. Much good
may it do thee, thou dear old wilderness of brick: thy alimentary canal has long. been out of order. Drink, old
Babylon ! Drink, and forget thy filthiness, and show thy
countless offspring a clean face when the morrow's sun lights
up thy forest of tall towers. In the meantime, though, this
is but a sorry joke. Slippety, sloppety, squash! Concern
that loose paving-stone 1-and an ovation to the man of genius
who invented gaiters, by which we are spared an involuntary "futz." What is that ? "Clickety, clackety, skrsh !"
Pattens, by all that is poetical! "0 the days when we
were young !" as the poet says, when pattens were the
genteel thing-when comfortable dowagers went waddling
abroad exalted on iron rings, and with their heads buried in
calashes shaped like a gentleman's cab, only not quite so
big. Ah, those were the days! What, a rush of tender
recollections comes with the clatter of that single pair of
pattens! It seems an age since we last heard that once
familiar sound; and it seems, too, as though we had entered
a new world since that sound was of everyday occurrence.
- 2

84

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

But we must not indulge in these pensive recollections.
Swizh !-p-r-r-r-r-r-r-p! whirr !-no indeed!-if this isn't
enough to swill all sentiment out of a fellow. "Halloo!
Conductor, stop that bus!"
" Full inside, sir:: plenty of room outside, sir !"
" Not a doubt of it; but I'm outside already."
No admission for gentlemen in distress. Never mindwe shall be sure to find an omnibus in the City Road that
will take us in. Really, this is the very sort of a day to
turn into a night; and were it not for the despotism of
Business, that genius of modern activities, who rules us, as
he rules all his subjects, with an iron sceptre, we should be
tempted to follow the example of an eccentric artist of the
last century, and by turning back to our home once more,
and by simply closing the window-shutters, lighting candles,
and poking up the fire, transform this drenching morning
into a cheerful evening., But that won't do either, lest we
fall into a practice that will entail upon us rainy days of a
still less endurable complexion. Sweeper Jack, yonder, is of
the same way of thinking; he has scraped his crossing as
clean as he can ' with his worn-out broom-stump; but his
function is no sinecure this morning, as new puddles are
forming every minute in the track which his daily sweepings
have hollowed out. He cannot afford to lose his morning
coppers; and though he is wet through to the skin, and has
been for this hour past, he will not quit his post till his last
regular patron has gone by on his way to the City. He
holds out a hand, sodden like a washerwoman's, for his customary half-penny, and.depositsit in one of his Bluchers,lying
high and dry under the shelter of a doorway-a piece of practical economy that, because he finds it cheaper to subject the
soles of his bare feet to the mud and slush of the season,
than it would be to submit the soles of leather to the same
destructive ordeal. Sweeper Jack is not much worse
off on such a day as this than the whole tribe of peripatetic

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

85

traders whom the sky serves for a roof every day in the
year, and who prefer the risk of drowning abroad to the
certainty of starving at home. "Eels! live eels !' cries one;
and we can fancy them swimming at their ease in the broad
basket in which they are borne aloft. The soles, haddocks,
and cod are travelling once more in their own element, and
the salesmen are particularly lively, knowing, by experience,
that a drenching day, when economical housewives don't
care to plunge over the way or round the corner to the
butcher's, is not unfa-urable to their trade. Ten to one
that we find a cod's head and shoulders on the table when
we return to dinner at five. Charley Coster's cart looks
remarkably fresh and green this morning; but that poor
"moke" of his is evidently depressed in spirits, and, after
the manner of his kind, lowers his head and bends back his
ears in silent deprecation of the extra weight of moisture he
has to drag through the miry streets. Yonder is a potatosteamer, which the prudent proprietor has moored snugly
under a covered archway: his little tin funnel is fizzing
away amongst a group of boys and lads driven there for
shelter from the storm. He has got his steam up early today-foul weather acting invariably as an impetus to his
peculiar commerce: a hot buttered potato for a halfpenny,
with salt d discretion, as the French say, is too good a
bargain to go far a-begging on such a morning as this.
Another wandering son of commerce, who profits especially
when the clouds are dropping fatness, is that umbrella
hawker, who stands there at the corner, roofed in under a
monster-dome of gingham, from which he utters ever and
anon in a cavernous voice: "A good um'rella for sixpence!
Sixpence for a good um'rella ! A silk un for a shilling !"
You will not see him driving business in that fashion when
the sky is without a cloud; you might as well look for a
rainbow. He gets his living by rainy days; and if he could
regulate the calendar in his own way, 'twere but little hay

86

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

that would be made while the sun shone, and Vauxhall and
Cremorne Gardens might shut up shop. But of all the
gainers by the liberality of Jupiter Pluvius, the cabmen are
the most active and the most exemplary. Now is the very
carnival of cabs; and every driver assumes an air of increased importance, and sways his whip with authority, as
though he. were chief monarch of a wet world, which in
some sort he is. But there is not a single cab on the stand.
The stand itself is washed away-all the disjecta from the
nose-bags, every wisp of hay and straw of fodder, is floated
off the stones; the very waterman has disappeared, and
taken for the nonce to burnishing pewter-pots in the backslums of the Pig and Whistle-his tubs alone are the only
vestiges which are left to proclaim the fact, that four-andtwenty vehicles, all of a row, have their home and restingplace on that deserted spot. Cabby is abroad stirring up
the mud in every highway and byway of universal London;
and Cabby's horse, under the impetus of unlimited whipcord,
is straining every nerve to compensate for the idleness of
yesterday, and to devour as many miles, measured by sixpences, as will satisfy, if that be possible, the expectations
of his owner.
But now we emerge upon the City Road, and hear the
welcome syllables, "''Roomfor one," from the conductor of a
Favorite omnibus. With. a foot on the step, we look inA
upon a not very inviting spectacle: ten stout gentlemen,
each with a dripping umbrella, and one stouter dame,
two single Niobes rolled into one, with a weeping umbrella
and a plethoric bundle to boot-all packed together almost
as tight as Turkey figs in a drum, in a locomotive vapourbath reeking and steaming at every pore. It is impossible
to pass up the centre, and so we are jammed into the corner
next to the conductor, who, enveloped in oil-skin, considerately bars the pelting drops from our face-by exposing to
them his own broad back. We commence a conversation by

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

87

observing, as a sort of leading remark, that such a drencher
as this is a capital day for omnibuses. "Why, you must be
making quite a fortune to-day."
"Hexcuse me, sir," says he, "but that ere's a wery wulgar
herror. People thinks, because they finds the buses full when
they wants to go to town of a wet day, that the wet weather
is best for the trade. 'Tain't no sich thing. We goes to
town this mornin', for instance, full; but we shall come back
empty well-nigh, and shan't do nothing to speak of afore
gentlemen has done their business and comes back in the
evening. Buses that runs along the business-lines does
tolerable well perhaps; but I'm bound to say, that them
as goes north and south don't do half a average trade sich a
day as this. No, sir-fine weather is best for buses, if I
know anything about it. People walks out in fine weather
to enjoy theirselves, and gits tired, and rides home; or they
rides out for pleasure, and to call upon their friends, or they
rides a-shopping, and brings home their bargains; but when
sich weather as this shuts people within doors, of course they
can't ride in buses."
There was no denying the force of the conductor's logic,
backed as it was by a long experience--and we sat corrected.
Here our vis-d-vis, the stout dame with the bundle, stops
the omnibus, and stumbling hastily into the muddy road
drops some halfpence into the conductor's hand.
"What's this, marm ?
"Why, the fare-threepence to be sure."
"Threepence ain't the fare, and this ain't threepence.
D' ye call that a penny? 'tis only a half-penny as ha' been
run over."
"0 dear me! are you sure it's not a penny? it's big
enough. I thought your fare was threepence."
Conductor opens the door and shows the printed table of
fares. "You see, marm, it's fourpence. I want three-halfpence more."

88

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

"0 dear, I wonder if I've got any more."
Niobe lays her bundle on the step, and dives into her
pocket. First dive, fishes up an enormous pincushion, red
on one side and green on the other; dive the second, a
pocket handkerchief and a ball of worsted; dive the third, a
nutmeg-grater, a nutmeg half consumed, a piece of ginger,
and an end of wax-candle, which shows signs of having been
on terms of the closest intimacy with a skein of thread
dive the fourth, half of a crumpled newspaper and a lump of
gingerbread.
"Come, be alive, rmarm," says the conductor; "we can't
be waiting here all day."
"0 dear me, how it does rain! Don't be in a hurry, my
good man-I feel the money now;" and, sure enough, dive
the fifth produces, together with a handful of ends of string,
reels of coloured cotton, and a tin snuff-box, a couple of
penny-pieces. The fare is paid-bang goes the door, and
on we roll towards the Bank.
The City wears rather a blank appearance. It is busy, as
it always is, with the working-bees of commerce, but the
drones are absent, and of pleasure-takers there are none to be
seen. Greatcoated figures flit hurriedly backwards and forwards beneath their hoisted umbrellas; and the indispensable
business of the day is done in spite of the unceasing tempest
that pours from morn to night. But retail trade is almost at
a stand-still. That immense standing-army whose lives'are
passed in the service of the ladies, experience, it may well
be, a welcome intermission of their labours. The shop-walker
may rest his weary shanks, and the shop-talker may give his
tongue a holiday. Drapers' assistants have no goods to drape,
and may assist one another in the laborious occupation of
doing nothing. Now and then the shopkeeper walks to his
front door, and, with one hand in his pocket, while he rubs
his smooth-shaven chin with the other, casts an appealing
look upwards to the leaden sky. He sees no symptoms of a

A RAINY DAY IN

TOWN.

89

pause in the pattering storm; so he retires, and buries himself in his back-parlour, where, with his nose every now and
then between the leaves of his bad-debt book, he falls to
making out fresh bills for stale and long-forgotten accounts.
We mournt for our old frieads the book-stalls, which lie all
day long under a pall-a pall of dilapidated floor-cloth,
which no man stops to lift and look beneath. The search
after knowledge may be carried on under some difficulties,
but not under such a sousing shower-bath as this. It has
actually washed away the apple-women from the kerbstones, who are known to be as waterproof as Macintosh
himself; and it has driven the orange-girls off the pavement
to the shelter of covered courts and theatrical piazzas.
But if the rain has dispersed a whole host of professipnals,
it has at least brought some new ones upon the scene. Here
comes a characteristic establishment, vamped up for special
use on a rainy day. It is nothing more nor less than an
ostensible father of a family, with six impromptu children, all
born to him this identical morning-children whose father
was humbug, and whose mother was a promising ten hours'
rain. He, unfortunate man, informs you as plainly as the
cleverest pantomime can tell the tale, that he is an unsuccessful tradesman who has seen better days, and that these
six forlorn infants, all clad in neat white pinafores, but
paddling with naked feet on the cold wet stones, are the
motherless children of his dear departed wife, who has left
him in sickness and poverty to be the sole guardian of their
tender years. As an evidence that he has brought them up
in the right way, they are singing, as lustily as they can
bawl, a pious hymn to a sacred tune, to which he himself
groans a deplorable bass in a deplorable voice-holding out
his hand the while as a modest appeal in behalf of his innocent orphans. If you are prudent, you will not be in a
hurry to tax your sympathies. You may feel quite at your
ease, and rest assured that this unhappy family, which shows

90

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

so pathetically amidst the driving storm, owes its very existence to this dismal day, and to nothing else. Had the sun
shone brightly this morning, each of these motherless infants
had remained in charge: of its own maternal parent, or passed
the day in raking the mud of Westminster; and the demure,
sorrow-stricken father himself, had been off chalking the
pavement, shamming the cripple, doing the deplorable
"fake," or cadging in some ingenious way on his own
private account, among the gullible population of some other
district. We know the rascal well enough; but he contrives
to sneak on the safe side of the law, and laughs at exposure.
If you want to help him to a debauch of gin, bestow your
charity, but not otherwise.
Such a day as this is a dead loss to a multitude of outof-door. professionals, not a :few'of whom will have to put up
with short-commons, as a result of such an inhospitablesky.
It is not very pleasant to think what becomes of a host which
numbers so, many thousands of needy individuals at such an
untoward time, when they cannot be abroad, and when it
would be of no use if they could, because their friends and
patrons the public are snug at home. Where are all the poor
music-grinders? Where that solid phalanx of Italian pianoplayers ? Where those gangs of supple acrobats and streetjugglers ? Where that battalion of "needy knife-grinders ?"
Where the travelling-tinkers, swinging their sooty incense
beneath our noses ? Where the hawkers of fruits, and nuts,
and. sweet-stuff? Where the bands of children with their
bunches of lavender ? Where those- merry little tender
German tinder-merchants? Where the street-stationer, with
his creamy note-paper ? Where the violet-girls, with their
sweet-smelling posies? And where that vast and indiscriminate crowd that hangs perpetually upon the-skirts of business or of pleasure, and, like Lazarus from the rich man's
table, supply their daily necessities from the abundance and
the superfluities of their more fortunate brethren ? In what

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

91

cheerless homes, what wretched slums and corners, what
dark and unwholesome dens, do they lurk in hunger, cold,
and bodily discomfort, while the relentless rain shuts them
out from the chance of earning an honest penny ? Truly, a
rainy day in London has its dismal aspect within doors as
well as without.
The animal creation, which always sympathises in the
pains and pleasures of us humans, show their aversion from
rainy weather, when it is excessive, in a manner not to be
mistaken. We cannot pretend to decide whether the horse
pulls a long face at a rain-storm, his face being never of the
shortest; but his eye is sadder than usual when he is soaked
with a shower. Donkey shows his dislike to heavy rain by
invariably getting out of it when he can, and by his unwillingness to face the drivin'g blast when upon duty. Dog
is, in wet London streets, invariably draggle-tailed and
downcast, and out of heart. His post is too often, on these
occasions, outside his master's door, upon the step of which
he may be seen sitting, his muddy tail between his legs, and
his woebegone face confronting the public, upon whom he
turns an appealing, lack-lustre eye, telling how much he
would prefer sleeping curled up by the kitchen-fire to standing sentry in company with the scraper. Puss shows her
sense of cleanliness and comfort by keeping within doors;
though our old " Stalker " is an exception to the general
rule, preferring to sit on the outside of the window-sill,
where, erecting every hair in his black coat till they bristle
up "like quills upon the fretful porcupine," he gathers a
vast amount of electricity and considerable moisture besides,
and is always the cleaner and the livelier for the process,
which he doubtless knows to be good for his constitution.
Time was (when we were not so thoughtful as we are
now) when we entertained a notion that it would have been
an agreeable and convenient arrangement of such moist
phenomnena, if all the rain, hail, and snow, of which Mother

92

A RAINY DAY IN TOWN.

Earth stands in continual need, had been predestinated to fall
after sunset, and the hours of daylight had been left to the
uninterrupted pursuits and enjoyments of mankind. We are
grown wiser now, and see that it is better ordered. In that
case, we should have lost for ever the moral effect of a rainy
day; and the stock of undeniable blessings to our mental and
spiritual nature which spring out of little crosses and disappointments, would have been diminished so much in amount
through the lack of a little gentle moral discipline, that, bad
as the world is now, it would have been infinitely worse, and
perhaps hardly bearable for living in. Therefore, with your
leave, good reader, we will be reconciled to the wet weather;
and when it rains, let it rain, without grumbling, merely
donning our gaiters, induing our waterproof soles, buttoning
up our coats, hoisting our umbrellas, and setting about our
business cheerfully and industriously, which, as everybody
knows who knows anything, is the best way of providing
against a rainy day.

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION,
IF some respectable mandarin of Pekin, Whang Whampoo

Fong, who has spent forty years in learning to read his Confucius, and who takes forty hours, and a trifle over, to travel
(when he does travel, which is not very often-not more
than once in a year at the most,) a distance of a hundred
miles-if he could be suddenly caught up out of that opiumsmelling snuggery of his, lighted by a single paper lantern,
and dropped down in a London railway station at ten at
night, say, during the arrival of one of the long trains-I
wonder where he would think he was got to. How he
would stare at the flaming gas-lights-at the glittering roof
with its light cross-work of iron bamboo! How the sudden
apparition of the monster engine, with its goggle eyes of fire,
would bewilder the brains of the Chinaman! How he
would shrink from the approach of the sinuous leviathan
with thirty or forty stomachs, all disgorging at once their
quota of men, women and children, amidst the bawling of
countless voices, the lumbering of luggage, the din of whips
and wheels, and the hissing of that big tea-kettle with a fire
in its belly, and its straight spout aloft in the air! Poor
Whampoo Fong might think the whole affair a dream conjured up by the fumes of opium, and would certainly wish
himself back again, away from the incomprehensible uproar,
to the calm of the sober city of the celestial empire.
Yes, disciple of Confucius, it was a dream once, and that
not very long ago; but it is now the realisation of a dream,
and, like a thousand other things of less importance, which

94

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

were all of them, at one period or othe, dreams too, is as
much a matter-of-fact affair as a cup of tea, a button, or a
mandarin's tail.
A London railway station presents an aspect which constantly varies. At one hour you shall find it a cool promenade, where the footfall of the porter or the policeman
reverberates from the lofty walls and the glazed roof in a
silence broken now and then by the thundering echoes of a
heavy hammer-stroke, or the crash of a ponderously-loaded
truck shunted suddenly into its place. The pleasant sunlight shimmers softly through the arching roof, and at the
open end towards the country, you see the glistening rails
winding onwards for miles, and converging to a point in the
far perspective. As you stand gazing, a bell rings sonorously at your elbow, and, if your eyes are as sharp as those
of the ringer, you will discern in the distance a dim speck, or
a fitful wreath of silvery steam, which grows rapidly bigger
and bigger as you look upon it, and soon, bursting upon the
ear with its sharp iterations of the piston-stroke, gives
audible indication of its near approach. Another minute,
and the huge iron fabric, with its brazen pyramid, pauses
majestically at your side-a hundred doors fly open, and a
motley crowd of travellers, the majority of whom appear to
be gentlemen in easy circumstances, unincumbered with
luggage, alight on the broad flooring, and in a very few
miLutes are scattering themselves towards, the City by
various routes. It is the morning train, which runs for the
special convenience of commerce, and brings from their
country residences to the mart of London, perhaps a hundred or more of her merchants, whose dulce domUM may lie
at the distance of twenty, forty, sixty, or more miles from
their places of business on 'Change. It is but a ride of an
hour or so in a first-class carriage, soft with elastic cushions,
purchased with the price of an annual ticket, which costs
less than the difference in housekeeping between a domestic

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

95

establishment in London and one in the country, or by the
sea-side. So it happens, that with all her abnormal increase
-and London increases at the rate of more than a thousand
souls a month-a good portion of her inhabitants live out of
town, and places are now rising into note, as the country
residences of London merchants and tradesmen, which,
before the invention' of railways, were no less than a day's
journey from the metropolis.
In two minutes from the entry of the train not a single
one of the passengers is to be seen. But now, on the other
side of the platform another is preparing to go out-there is
a series of indescribable snorting, grinding, and clanking
sounds, mingled with loud bangs and explosive concussions,
-carriages and trucks are punching one another in the ribs;
and while these are boisterously getting into line, the crowd
are squeezing and jamming for precedence at the little trapdoors where the tickets are procured, and then they file off
I"
to the platform to secure places. "First-class to B!" "That's
"Here you are, sir !" "Second-class to Tyour carriage-Where do you want to go, sir ?" "To
A-- ." "Into that carriage, and then you won't have to
change, sir." Such questions and directions are sounding
and resounding on all sides; and now comes the news-boy,
and mingles his shrill treble with the "manly voice" of the
officiating police-" Who's for the Times ?-this morning's
Times !-Want the Advertiser, sir ?-Who's for the Illustrated News? supplement and all for sixpence! Times!
here! Times! Times! Times ! Pa-a-par! ainy of the
morning papers !" The boy doesn't stop shouting while he
serves a customer, but bawls, and sells, and gives change,
and bites the sixpences to taste if they are of the real mint
flavour, "all under one" as,he would say. But the train
doesn't start yet, and old travellers know that well enough,
and are in no hurry to take their seats after they have
secured them by depositing their wrappers in a corner.

96

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

There stand a group of them at the book-stall, if it is allowable to call a shop with five thousand volumes, all new, a
book-stall ;-they are picking out something to amuse them
by the way. A hundred miles or two will keep them five or
six hours in the carriage, and they must have something to
pass away the time. When travellers were few it would
have paid nobody to keep a book-shop to supply them with
literature; but since travellers have multiplied by thousands,
owing to the conveniences which railways have afforded
them, multitudes have taken to reading who never read
before. The result of this is visible and prominent in every
department of literature, but chiefly, we fear, in that of
fiction and what is termed light reading. Looking at it in
a commercial point of view, there can be but little doubt that
the railroad has been the means of at least doubling the
number of books printed and published; not that by any
means half the books sold are sold at railway stations, though
there are few railway stations without their book-stall; but
the habit of reading in railways has created new classes of
readers, and spread the taste for reading, and awakened so
general a desire for the accumulation of books, that myriads
of volumes are now sold elsewhere, which, but for railwar
reading, would not have been sold at all. Looking at this
new fact in a moral light, its aspect is not so pleasant as it
might be, inasmuch as no small amount of literary rubbish
travels by the rail, and a considerable quantity besides which
might be designated as something much worse. But we
are mending in this respect of late; works of the very best
class are now to be found on the railway stalls; and there
are hopes that the grand means of intercommunication may
one day become the channel also of an uncorrupted literature.
But now jangles the bell for starting, and already the long
train makes a few fitful and sluggish movements; the laggards leap through the open doors, each of which the porter

A 'EONDON RAILWAY STATION.

97

shuts with a bang as they defile past him. Before the whole
of the train has left the shelter of the roof, it has quickened
almost to a running pace-the guard jumps into his seat-and whiz! it is off-diminishes gradually to a speck, and is
seen no more.
But yonder comes another in sight, and clang goes the
bell again; and now we see, as the train wheels round a
swelling curve in the line, that it is one of unusual length,
consisting of something like fifty carriages, and drawn by two
engines. It is the excursion train from a town nearly a
hundred miles off, and it brings above a thousand holiday
makers on a visit to London, and will take them all back
again the day after to-morrow, or this day week, at the cost
of five shillings a head for both journeys. They come on
but slowly, for, owing to the momentum of their mass, which
is not much less than a quarter of a mile in length, the engineers are compelled to be cautious, and to shut off their
steam at a long distance from the stopping-place. What a
prodigious clamour they make, to be sure! Every carriage
is choke-full of heads, and bundles or carpet-bags, which is
all the luggage allowed. Now the doors are open, and the
merry Babel breaks loose. Tom is bellowingfor Jack, who
is at the other end of the train; and Betty is staring about
for Mary, who ought to have come in the same carriage with
her, but somehow strayed into another. Yonder is a redfaced mother, with four young lasses, palpable peas of the
same pod, clutching on to her gown, while she looks about
wildly for the fifth. There is a knot of hobbledehoys broke
away from home for the first time, with money in their
pockets, and all their own masters. Here comes Tim Goble
the carrier, stooping as he walks, as though afraid of striking his head against the awning of his cart. "What, Tim,"
says a superannuated crone, "be you comed too ?" "Ees a
be," says Tim, "had'n a thort to zee yow tho', Missis
Grimes." "0, t' missis gied I a ticket-her zed I zhoud
I

98

A LONDON

RAILWAY

STATION.

zee Lunnun avore I died, an' zo I be comed-but a han't
zeed much on't benow !" Tim escorts the old dame off,
letting the more active crowd bustle past him. On they go
by hundreds, and in five minutes the population of the distant borough is swallowed up by omnivorous London, like
the dripping contents of a summer cloud by the ocean.
They are scarcely gone, when a luggage train is sighted,
and soon heard thundering in the distance. If you look out
a-head you will see a sort of pantomime performing by a
couple of men with green and red flags, while another pulls
away at an irpn bar rising at an angle from the ground.
The goods train as it advances turns its long trail off into a
siding, and disappears beneath a huge barrack-like shed.
Now the express train is getting ready to start: a few
carriages only of the first and second-class, and a proportionately smaller number of passengers, are in the habit of
flying across the country at the rate of fifty miles an hour.
There is a savour of the gentleman in the negligent garb as
well as in the demeanour of the engineer, who pulls out a
duplex watch to note the exact time, as he gives the necessary directions to the stoker. A party of ladies and gentlemen are shut into the first-class carriages-a few commercial
travellers climb into the second-the inspector gives a shrill
whistle, the doors are shut, and off glides the express,
coughing slowly at first, but soon accelerating to the swiftness of an arrow-and vanishes out of sight.
We need not stay to see more trains go out or come in;
it would only be a repetition of what we have already
seen. Nor need we linger in the handsome refreshment
room, where parties waiting may solace themselves with
delicate viands-nor in the lost-property room, where those
who have left their chattel behind them in the carriage may
chance to recover it again on payment of a trifling fee-nor
among the crowd of cabs and omnibuses in the yard, where
some of the excursionists are scrambling for places almost

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

99

before they have made up their minds where to go. But
before quitting the subject, we may as well contrast the
railway station in London with a certain railway station on
the skirts of an inland village where we have been in the
habit of occasionally rusticating in the summer months.
This country station is a small red brick house of four
rooms, with a little patch of garden-ground inclosed from the
bank of the iron-way; and its platform is formed of a few
planks only, in front of the ticket-room, which serves for
luggage and waiting-room as well. A single rail only runs
past it, and the line is worked on what is called" the redstick system;" that is, no engineer is allowed, under penalty
of instant dismissal, to pass on to the single line unless he
has possession of a certain baton painted a bright red; and
as there is. but one of these batons in existence, collisions are
thus rendered impossible. The whole staff at the station
consists of one man, who prints the tickets, takes and
accounts for the money, distributes parcels and goods arriving, and, in short, does everything. "Sir," said he to us,
one day, "it ain't a easy place altogether. You see, as the
line crosses the turnpike-road on a level, I've got to get up
in the night to let everybody through as comes a horse-back,
or with gigs and carts and that. Last Saturday night I
come down nine times in my night-dress to let the farmers
through coming from
market; they stays after the
market is over, and drinks, and comes home. late. Now,
when you got to do that in the winter, you see, it's apt to
give a feller the roomatiz, an' I gets it very bad sometimes."
"Did you ever have any accident?" we asked.
,Never, nothing fatal, sir. Once I lost my gate--that
was a curious thing-that was."
I don't understand you."
"You see, sir, I used to bar the railway, according 'to my
instructions, after the last train went past-about half-past
H2

100

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

one in.the morning-leaving the road open for the farmers,
who generally gets up betimes. Well, one morning when I
come down at seven o'clock, I found the gate wasn't thereneither open nor shut, but clean gone-nothing but the post
left. I couldn't make out what was gone wi' it-'twas too
big to steal, and too heavy, I couldn't make it out no-how.
However, when the train came in from B, I heered all
about it-they'd got the gate there, miles off. It seems a
train was sent express about something: they never thought
of letting me know anything of it-besides we had no telegraph there. On comes the express at fifty miles an hourrips the gate off the hinges without the engineer knowing
anything about it, and carries it away, hanging on to the
buffers, to B, where they first found out what was
done. 'Twas lucky the engine wasn't throwed off the
rails:"
" What wages do -you get for your attendance, night and
day ?"
"Twelve shillings a week. Not much, you may think,
sir, for a man with a wife and children to maintain; but then
I live in a good house, rent-free, and there's a bit o' garden.
I should like a little more, but there's a pretty many as
would be glad to take what I got, if I were foolish enough
to throw it up."
So much by way of contrast.
It is at a London station, perhaps, that we are likeliest to
form an adequate idea of the marvellous amount of travelling
which takes place in our day. The increased facilities of
locomotion have already effected an immense change in all
orders of society. No doubt the change is mainly for the
better; but the same total of good originating from the uIse
of the iron road is not unaccompanied by corresponding
evils. The wondrous despatch of which railway travelling
is the great example, is recklessly imitated in all our concerns. The go-ahead principle has, in too many cases,

A LONDON RAILWAY STATION.

101

knocked down and pushed aside principles of more value.
We are forgetting the old axiom, "Fair and softly goes far,"
in our anxiety to go fast; and we pay the penalty by
smashes and collisions, commercial and financial, which
would have alarmed as much the moral sense of .our forefathers, as the deplorable slaughters which have occasionally
disgraced the management of railways, would have outraged
their good old-fashioned estimation of the value of life and
limb.

PINCHER INVALIDED.
MY good dog Pincher had, some time ago, to my no small
grief, been in a declining way. An unwonted sobriety and
seriousness was the first symptom of his approaching declension. Instead of tearing and scampering about the house and
garden like a mad creature at first sight of me in the morning, and wagging his tail in regular thumps on the carpet as
he was wont to do, he took to welcoming me with an endearing sort of whine, more human than canine, a moist
supplicating eye, and a tremulous motion of his caudal
terminus more like the vibration of a magnetic needle than
anything else with which I can compare it. Then, instead
of making his bed at night with exactly three revolutions on
the hall mat, and lying down in it, with his nose in the
centre, to sleep in quiet-a ceremony which he invariably
performed as soon as the bed-room candles made their
appearance-he took to attempts at making his bed in all
sorts of holes and corners, twenty times a day, turning round
a dozen times instead of three, and not lying down in it after
all. Then his appetite, which only moderated at first, failed
him altogether; the moisture on his cold nose dried up;
shivering fits crept over him; his" sleek furry coat grew
rough and tangled; and leanness came on, "till his skin, like
a lady's loose gown, hung about him," and his poor bones
squared unsightly protuberances to the view.
What was to be done? A domestic consultation elicited
a variety of opinions. My better-half suggested that poor
Pincher might be breaking up with old age; but six years

PINCHER INVALIDED.

103

is hardly more than maturity for a water-spaniel, and I
know that Pincher is not older than that. Betty gave it as
her decided opinion that he had swallowed a bung cork, or a
buttered sponge, or something of the kind, which had hermetically sealed up his alimentary canal, and therefore there
could be no hopes of him. Tom would have it that the
butcher's dog round the corner had given him a sly gripe,
and that Pincher, poor fellow, was dying of it; but there
was no visible wound on Pincher's body to substantiate
Tom's assertion. Our consultation failed to produce any
remedial measures; but the butcher's man happening to
come to the door at the moment, I referred Pincher's unfortunate case to him.
" Sure-ly," said he, "that there dog is out o' condition,
and don't look respectable no-ways. Our boy shall drown
him for you, sir, if you like."
"Thank you," said I, "time enough for that; I will have
him cured, if possible."
" Well, sir, if you like to lay out money on him-and to
be sure he's wuth it-I know a man that can cure him, if
anybody can."
Thereupon I took down the address of the canine physician, and finding that his abode lay scarcely a furlong out
of my daily route citywards, I put poor Pincher in a cab,
and drove off to the address indicated.
It was in a small house, in a narrow back street in the
very heart of the city, that the professor of canine therapeutics resided. On a sign-board, exalted over the window
of his little shop, was a capital portrait of a water-spaniel,
the very model of Pincher himself, and surrounded by
legends of considerable length, setting forth the medical
qualifications of the professor. On entering, I found the
worthy man-a personage considerably advanced in life, and
of almost Johnsonian figure and feature-seated behind a
small counter, in the act of preparing medicines for his

104

PINCHER INVALIDED.

four-footed patients. He was surrounded with bottles, jars;
gallipots, and pill-boxes, ranged on shelves on all sides, and
was well provided with the usual pharmaceutical implements
which we are accustomed to meet with in an apothecary's shop.
From the walls and ceiling hung several cages, some of them
of singular construction, containing singing'and talking birds.
These, he informed me, were not his property, but had been
confided to his care by their owners, some of whom were
officers in the army and navy, appointed to serve on foreign
stations during the present war, who preferred paying him
for their safe custody and proper treatment to the risk of
leaving them in the charge of servants or strangers; a rather
curious instance, I thought, of the characteristic regard of
brave men for feeble, fragile, and helpless creatures.
On introducing poor Pincher to the good man's notice, he
took him in his arms, and tenderly turning back his eye1lids, and looking at the bared orb for a few moments, assured
me that he could effect a perfect cure in the course of a few
weeks, though it might take some months for the animal to
recover flesh and condition. Having settled the necessary
preliminaries with regard to Pincher, and finding the medicus
no way unwilling to be communicative, I gathered, in the
course of the conversation that followed, a few facts relative
to the contingencies of the canine race in London, which, in
connection with some particulars derived from other sources,
it may be worth recording.
The London dog-trade, ever since the passing of Mr.
Hawes's bill, which enfranchised the draught dogs of the
metropolis, and filled the surrounding rivers, canals, drains,
and ditches with their abandoned carcases, has been confined
almost exclusively to the breeding, the importation, and the
sale of pets and fancy dogs: the exceptions are, the transac. tions in the fighting-dog line-a class of animals who do not
come very much under the hand of the professional man,
being mostly doctored, when they want doctoring, by their

PINCHER- INVALIDED.

105

owners. The trade in fancy dogs. is not one at which any
man can honestly make a fortune, the loss by death being
very great, and the successful rearing of an animal which
will command a high price being a comparatively rare
occurrence inthe experience of any one man. Few men
devote themselves entirely to the' business, which is carried
on for the most part by amateurs, who engage in it as much
from a natural love for animals as from the gain they derive
from it, The notion that such persons are cruel to the
animals they rear is a gross absurdity; on the contrary, they
would generally submit to any deprivation themselves, rather
than inflict it on their favourites. It is the unfortunate rat
who is the object of cruelty. The rat and the dog are
equally the companions of man; but, with the former, man
has no sympathy, and no pleasure connected with him, but
in his death, and he educates the dog to kill him. Millions
of rats are caught alive, and hunted to death in the training
of dogs; rat-killing being the chief accomplishment of the
pet terrier, and the test of the purity of his descent.
Great as is the number of dogs bred in London, the homeproduce is not enough to meet the demand, and many are
constantly imported from all parts of the world. Poodles
have been known to travel twelve- thousand miles from
China; and perhaps we ought to congratulate them upon
their escape from a land.where they are ranked as butcher's
meat, to one where they are received as guests in the drawing-room-saved from revolving on the spit or swimming in
the tureen, to be fondled on satin in a lady's lap. Terriers
are brought from the Isle of Skye, and small spaniels from
Holland. Italy sends a miniature grey-hound; and various
different breeds, rarely weighing more than five pounds per
individual, come from different parts of the Continent. The
traders in dogs may be seen in fine weather standing at the
corners of streets, with half a dozen specimens of their
merchandise seated on arm and shoulder, or yelping round

106

PINCHER INVALIDED.

their feet, and perhaps as many little shaggy heads peeping
forth from their capacious pockets. These may be honest
men, for aught we know; but we are bound to state that the
legitimate dog-traders are at least equalled in number by the
dog-pirates who constantly infest the streets of London,
seeking whose dog they may purloin. Evidence of their exploits is continually visible in the shop-windows, in the shape
of hand-bills offering rewards for the recovery of lost dogs.
There are several dog-hospitals in London, whither diseased dogs are sent by their owners for medical treatment.
The practice in these hospitals has diminished since the
passing of the act above alluded to, though doubtless many
interesting cases are still to be found in the various wards.
Our good friend once had a hospital himself, but the pirates
broke into it at night, and marched off with a valuable prize;
and since then he has housed his patients in his own domicile, where, as he takes but a few at a time, they do not
incommode him, and are all the better attended to.
Many of the dogs of the first class, belonging to thearistocracy, are, when sick, attended by the "regular faculty"
and this, according to our informant, is perfectly as it should
be. "For," says he, "the anatomy of the dog resembles much
more than you might suppose that of the human being;
and whether it be that, associating with mankind so much,
and leading a sort of artificial life, he has picked up a kind
of human constitution, I don't pretend to say; but it is very
certain that he is liable to a good many of the disorders to
which we are ourselves subject. It is a fact, that there is
hardly a dog that lives out of doors in the mud and wet but
what gets the rheumatism very bad, just as we should do if
we led the same sort of life. Then they get the asthma from
being tied up in damp places. Lots of them die in their
youth from a disease very like consumption. When overgorged and indulged, they will die of. apoplexy. They perish
by epidemics and fevers at times; and they get nervous and

PINCHER INVALIDED.

107

hippish, just like lazy gentlefolks, when they get no exercise.
Now, I've studied dogs, and very little else, for forty years,
and I s'pose I know what a dog is. I never want to look
further than a dog's eye to know what's the matter with
him. You can tell something by the tongue, but the tongue's
deceitful; the eye tells you the truth, if you know how to
judge of it. I'll show you a dog (and he fetched one hardly
bigger than its own tail from an inner room)-What should
you think was the matter with that dog ?"
"Have not the slightest idea."
"Fits, sir-come from China eighteen months ago-and
they've allowed his wool to grow till he was smothered in it.
I've cut off more than his own weight, docked all but his
tail, you see; and he's a coming round, though he's a little
bit fittified still. He'll be all right in another month, except
his coat. Here's another, one of the handsomest terriers
ever you see-two years old, and weighs less than three
pounds; there's nothing the matter with him; he's here
upon diet-I shan't give him medicine."
"What medicines do you generally use ?
"I prepare all my medicines myself, in order that I may
be sure of their effects; but I use pretty nearly the same
drugs that I should give to the best friend I had in the
world, if he was ill and I had to doctor him. There are
some exceptions, but not many: thus, if you or I take a
powerful dose of aloes, it gripes us fearful; but a dog will
swallow a lump of it and feel nothing: on the other hand,
you may take calomel, four or five grains, and do you good,
while half a grain might kill a dog. But generally speaking,
the same medicine produces pretty nigh the same effects both
in dogs and men."
" Do you ever administer bark?" I asked; but the good
man was superior to a joke, and replied seriously, that he did
not, because minute doses of quinine were better and more
easy to manage.

108

PINCHER INVALIDED.

The tenderness with which he handled his patients, and
the grateful fondness of the creatures themselves for their
benefactor were amusing to witness; and I left Pincher in
his care with the assurance that all that science and kindness
could do would be done for his restoration.
Sure enough, three weeks after, that saucy young dog
came home again, and brought such an appetite with him as
was quite terrific to witness. The first thing the rascal did
was to jump upon my writing-table, whisking off my papers
right and left with his furious long tail, and commence licking my face. Then his impudence dashed out of the open
window into the garden, and set to work digging up a lot of
bones which he had buried against a hungry day, and, planting himself in the centre of the grass plat, employed the
whole of the morning in settling the arrears of that account.
He has recovered now nearly all his flesh and more than all
his vivacity; in fact, there is no teaching him decorum.
Down Pincher! Ha! would you? Down, sir !

BEATING TiE BOUNDS.
A STRANGER to the civic customs prevailing among the
English, is sometimes startled with curious out-of-door exhibitions, which defy all his attempts to fathom them; and it
sometimes happens, too, that on seeking an explanation from
those who are supposed to know all about it, he is put off
with a conjecture, more or less fortunate, instead of a veracious solution of the problem. The wisdom of our forefathers
is often a riddle to their descendants; and though she lift up
her voice in the streets, as in affairs municipal she is very
much given to do, she cries in an unknown tongue to the
majority of those who hear. In thestreets of London, numberless demonstrations are made, from time to time, before
the eye of the public, of the signification of which the larger
portion of spectators know but little, and care less ; yet they
all have a signification, if we choose to look for it; and primitive and even puerile as some of them may appear, they
might hardly be, abolished without the risk of losing with
them some positive advantage which it would be better to
retain. Among these out-of-door observances, one of the
most frequent occurrence in the summer months, is, that procession of juveniles which once a year, in every parish in
London, starts from the vestry-door of the parochial church
to traverse the limits of the parish, or, in colloquial phrase,
to "beat the bounds." The practice is a very old one-how
old, we have no means of ascertaining. Every parish is of
course in possession of maps of its own domain; but something more than this is supposed to be necessary in order to

110

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THE

BOUNDS.

prevent its limits from being encroached upon. In London,
a single yard of land may chance to be worth a large sum of
money; and every possible precaution is taken to prevent
any doubt as to the proprietorship of every square inch 'of the
soil. Cast-iron plates bearing inscriptions in raised letters,
indicative of the claim of the parish to the land upon which
they stand, are inserted in the walls of houses and warerooms, or affixed to beams of timber or upright posts along
the whole route of the parish boundaries; and these are formally visited and identified once a year, to ascertain that
they stand where they did; and the boys of the charityschool are always chosen as visitors, in order that the rising
generation may be duly impressed with their parochial
rights and privileges, and made intimate with the extent of
the territory which at some future day may chance to be
confided to their guardianship. In ancient times, as we are
informed upon very good authority, the custom of beating
the bounds, which is now one of unmingled pleasure and festivity, was celebrated in a manner not exclusively joyous.
The boys did not then regard it altogether as a holiday,
seeing that certain of their number, who, it is to be hoped,
had earned a right to that distinction, were regularly horsed
and soundly whipped in presence of the several inscriptionplates defining the boundaries.
The castigation, it was
shrewdly judged, was an efficient means of impressing the
localities upon their memories.. There is no doubt that our
forefathers were right in that respect: a fact thus effectually
brought home to an individual's consciousness, at that
tender age when the mind (and the epidermis) is susceptible
of the slightest impressions, was not likely to be forgotten;
and there is no record to show that it ever was. It is long
ago, however, since innovations crept into this part of the
ceremony; and within the memory of man a different practice has prevailed. At the present day, the boys carry in
their hands willow-wands peeled white; and with these they

BEATING THE BOUNDS.

111

commence a combined assault upon the cast-iron inscriptionplates wherever they find them-a process which, in the
opinion of our modern humanitarians, is thought to answer
quite as well, though dissentients from that opinion are not
wanting among the admirers of hoar antiquity.
In ancient times, too, unless my authority is himself misinformed, the boundaries of the London parishes were all
beaten in one day, which must have been a memorable day
for the boys of the city, considering the cakes and ale, which
were always abundant upon the occasion, to say nothing of
the flagellations above alluded to. This practice, however,
was found to have its inconveniences. It may happen in the
case of a destructive conflagration, that in spite of all precautions, the boundary-mark of a parish, if not obliterated,
is overthrown and buried in a mass of ruins-and when recovered, there may be a doubt or a dispute as to the precise
position it previously occupied. This actually took place
some years ago: a large warehouse, which stood partly in
the parish of St. Botolph Aldersgate, and partly in St. Bartholomew's, was destroyed by fire, The premises were in
ruins when the day for beating the bounds arrived. It
chanced, unfortunately, that two armies of charity-boys met
upon the spot, and, as a matter of course, disagreed as to the
position of the boundary-mark, which, in this case, it was
their business to replace. They quarrelled, and fought a
bloody battle. The inscription-plate, raised upon a pole,
was the object of a furious contention; now it was in possession of one party, who endeavoured to plant it too far
west-and anon it was in the hands of another, who bore it
a full half yard to the east. It was a new battle for the
standard. The fight raged round the pole amidst a volcano
of dust that rendered the combatants invisible: now and
then, a disabled champion with black eye or bloody nose
emerged from the cloud, and sought the refreshment of the
pump- They made a good many broken heads among

112

BEATING THE

BOUNDS.

them; but they never settled the dispute after all. The
combat was only put an end to by the police securing the
bone -of contention and carrying it off. Since then, it has
not been deemed advisable that two adjoining parishes
should beat their bounds on the same day; and care is taken
that two irascible factions shall not have the opportunity of
breaking the peace of the City. The parishes now choose
different days for the ceremony-saints' days generally having the preference.
My own experience in this way is but small, having
officiated but on one occasion. What took place then, I
shall relate for the satisfaction of the curious. I have been
a shopkeeper in the City for more than twenty years, and am
considered to do a good stroke of business. When I was
chosen select vestry-man last year, I cannot say I was very
much surprised. I was not sorry either; perhaps I felt a
little flattered. At any rate, I did not refuse the office,
which in our parish is, to say the worst of it, at least as
convivial as it is burdensome. We dispense a good deal of
charity one way and another; and if we make merry after it
now and then, nobody is the worse for that-not ourselves,
I'm sure, whatever cross-grained folks may think about it.
A few weeks ago, I received an intimation that my attendance at the parish church, where I was to join the procession
to traverse the bounds, would be expected on a certain day,
at an hour specified. On the morning of the day named,
there came to my shop by way of reminder, and perhaps,
too, as one of my neighbours hinted, by way of placebo to my
wife, a paper packet, which, on being opened, was found to
contain five or six yards of elegant white ribbon-a sort of
thing which the ladies, bless their hearts! always know
what to do with-and a couple of pair of silk stay-laces of a
rather antique breadth-such, I fancy, as used to be worn at
the time when the plump citizenesses followed the fashion of
lacing their bodices on the outside. We had a hearty

BEATING THE BOUNDS.

113

laugh, my good dame and I, over the contents of the packet,
which were soon whipped out of sight; and then I brushed
up a bit, and set off to the church. I met my colleagues at
the vestry at the hour appointed. Here, while the boys
were getting into marching-order, we took a friendly glass
of wine together; and when all were prepared to set forth,
I found myself at the head of the column, armed with a
bunch of flowers as big almost as the head of an ox, and
with a companion furnished in a similar manner on each
side of me. It wanted an hour of noon when we sallied
forth down the street. Our way lay through various streets,
lanes, courts, and alleys, and along the bank of the river. I
cannot say that I traversed the whole limits of theparish
myself, but I can certify the boys did. At all the recognised boundaries, they set up a jovial shout, and battered
away at the iron landmarks with their willow-wands. In
some places, they had to climb ladders; in others, to dive
into cellars: now their yellow breeches and blue stockings
were seen cascading through an open window; now the
whole school marched bodily into a tailor's shop, and began
jumping aid poking with their sticks at the ceiling; then
they would knock at the door of a private dwelling, and the
moment it was opened, rush down to the cellar in search of
the rusty plate, emerging again with three cheers, in token
that all was as it should be. In this way, we spent, I should
say, something like four hours, without exciting much
attention from the public, who, in London city, have a
rather characteristic habit of attending to their own busi
ness, and leaving other people to follow theirs. Here and
there we attracted some observation, and our yellow-legged
regiment picked up a few recruits of their own age and
standing, who seemed to desire nothing better than to share
in the frolic of the, procession. When we had completed
the survey of the boundaries, and ascertained that the
parish stood in the same place it did on that day twelveI

114

BEATING THE BOUNDS.

month-none of the cast-iron tablets having disappeared
from their positions-our business was concluded. What
followed, I do not consider myself bound to state categorically. If we gave the boys a substantial dinner, which is
quite as agreeable a thing to remember as a sound whipping; if they got a glass of wine after it, as well as a slice
of cake; if young Bob Grimes carried home a couple of
tapped bottles of port, to help his mother over her convalescence after a rheumatic fever; and if, after the boys had
gone home, we also sat down to a comfortable dinner, a snug
party of twelve, and enjoyed ourselves in our turn, after a
walk that had given us all an appetite-nobody has a right
to complain; because I defy any man to come forward and
prove that he or his ever contributed a single penny towards
the expense.
This old custom of beating the bounds of parishes is by no
means confined to London, as most of my readers know,
although it differs there in some important respects, as I
have shown, from the practice prevailing in country towns.
In rural districts it is not always so harmless as it is within
the sound of Bow bells. I have seen the ceremony performed many years ago, in my young days, by an awkward
squad of clodhoppers, headed by the beadle in, his magisterial robes, in a way not at all indicative of the march of
intellect in that quarter. I have known a troop of heavyheeled rustics tramp over the boundary-line, clean through
a farmer's rising crop, or over a gentleman's, or even a lady's
flower-beds, in spite of any remonstrance the owner could
make to deter them; and I have seen walls overthrown, and
fences pulled up, when there was no necessity for touching
them, solely because the spoilers had a prescriptive right to
make their way through them on one day of the year. Those
who remember how these "possession days," as they were
then called, used to terminate in the old times before corporation reform--with what quarrelling and drunkenness the

BEATING THE BOUNDS.

115

nights closed in-how the parishes were literally in possession of the mob till past midnight-will not be disposed to
find fault with the citizens of London for the way in which
they manage the matter.
Talking of that, reminds me of a "possessioning" in which
I once bore a part when I was a boy. I served my apprenticeship in the gay and brilliant city of Bath, and, as near as
I can calculate, it must have been somewhere about the
year 1819 the event which I am. going to narrate took place.
At that time, the beating of the bounds of the city came off
in June, and was a grand summer-day's holiday for all concerned in it. A great deal of fun was mixed up with the
ceremony; bushels of buns, baked for the purpose, were
scrambled for by the mob, among whom they were thrown.
A part of the route lay through the city and suburbs, and a
part along the course of the river Avon. A canal-boat,
decked out for the occasion, served for the corporation barge,
from which a shower of buns flew continually to the banks,
from whence half of them rolled into the water, whither they
were followed by eager urchins, who made no account of a
ducking in such a cause. A band of music accompanied the
cortige, which consisted of members of the corporation,
townsmen with their sons and apprentices, and a hundred or
so of school-boys. The procession was in movement nearly
the whole day, stopping occasionally at various places, and
partaking of libations more copious than prudent. The
latter part of the route along the boundary lay across the
river, at a ferry near South Parade, the once fashionable
promenade of Beau. Nash and his followers. Here the whole
party of us, numbering some hundreds, had to cross in a flatbottomed boat, which was pulled over the river by means of
a rope strained across... The boat would carry safely,, perhaps, a dozen persons;. but thirty rushed into it, and, for a
wonder, reached the other side, and disembarked without
accident.

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BEATING THE BOUNDS.

At thesecond trip, above forty, half of them men fullgrown, and three-parts intoxicated, jumped into it, lowering
it in the water to within an inch of the gunwale. The
ferryman expostulated in vain, and was compelled to attempt
the passage. When about half-way over, the boys began
rocking the boat-in an instant, it toppled over, turned
bottom upwards, and immersed the whole living mass, in
one dense cluster of struggling beings, in twenty feet of
water. A fearful shriek rose on the banks, and then a few
moments of terrible silence, as we viewed the evidences of the
struggle going on beneath the surface of the river. The
water surged and bubbled, and seethed and twisted in a
hundred whirlpools, as we held our breath and strained our
eyeballs for .a sight of our lost companions. There were at
least a dozen strong swimmers among them, but they bad all
gone down in one entangled mass, and no sign of a swimmer
appeared above the foam. No boats were near, and although
messengers had started off to fetch them, it seemed an age
before any arrived on the spot. The ferryman clung to the
rope, and, in spite of the drowning men pulling at his legs,
The ferryboat floated
managed to warp himself :ashore.
slowly down the sluggish stream, and three or four boys who
had clung desperately to it, were taken up by an advancing
wherry. After an interval which I cannot attempt to
measure, a number of hats and garments belonging to the
drowning crew floated into view, and a few minutes later,
several inanimate bodies rose, one or two at a time, to the
surface. These were pulled out with all haste, and laid on
the shelving bank, where, under the care of a few medical
men hurriedly called to the spot, means were :adopted to
restore animation. There was a cry for bedding and blankets,
I remember, and the inhabitants of the South Parade threw
the desiderated articles plentifully from their windows. The
green bank of the river was soon converted into a sort of
hospital, and a hundred hands were engaged in stripping,

BEATING THE BOUNDS.

117

chafing, and rolling the insensible bodies. By this time a
number of boats, in which men armed with long hooked poles,
and groping with them in the deep waters, kept up a continual search, were upon the spot, and paddling about in all
directions, every now and then lifting another body from the
depth, and sometimes two or three clutched together in the
death-grasp. News of the calamity had spread like wild-fire
throughout the whole of the town, and now crowds of distracted friends came rushing bareheaded through the streets
to the scene of the disaster-mothers and sisters to find their
sons and brothers dead or dying on the banks, and wives
whose husbands were yet at the bottom of the flood. The
dragging of the river continued all the evening till long after
dark. Most of the bodies were recovered that night-a few,
having been carried down the stream, were not found for
some days. Of the number of the victims, I have no distinct
remembrance at this distance of time. I lost two of my
most intimate companions, both of them excellent swimmers.
No one sat down that day to the plentiful dinner to which
all had been hastening so jovially. The event cast a gloom
over the fashionable city which was not soon dissipated.
That day twelvemonth the city bounds were not beaten, and
I have no recollection that the holiday connected with such
a fatal remembrance was ever renewed upon its former
footing.
There is no parallel to be found to the above miserable
tragedy in the whole annals of the London corporationalthough we have our aquatic processions, as all the world
knows. The grandest of these is of course that which takes place
on Lord Mayor's-day, the particulars of which are too well
known to be repeated here. But there are other excursions
upon the river on a smaller scale, which also take place
periodically, of which those who do not participate in them
know but little or nothing. One of these has received from
the populace the sarcastic designation of swanhopping, from

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BEATING THE BOUNDS.

the ignorant notion which prevails, that the members of the
corporation embark on board their barges in a body to count
the swans on the river, which are supposed to be, and for
aught I know may be, their property. Perhaps the term
may have originated in the fact, that this kind of excursion
being one in which business and pleasure are united, the
common-councilmen sometimes take their wives and daughters
with them, when a dance may happen to take place upon the
sward of some shady meadow. The real object of the excursion is, however, the survey of certain estates which belong
to the City, and -which lie on the banks of the river, and are
leased to tenants bound over to the observance of specified conditions, and therefore requiring occasional surveillance. MThen it comes to pass that a "griffin" joins one of
these parties he becomes conventionally liable to certain
practical jokes, which have for their object the making him
intimately acquainted with an old landmark, in the shape of
a big stone on the bank of the river at Staines, which is said
to have been set up originally as a memorial of the disafforesting of the Warren of Staines, by virtue of a charter of
Henry III., which granted to the citizens of London, and all
free tenants of the county of Middlesex, liberty of warren
and forest in that district.
Another excursion, and one which, I believe, is a source of
much enjoyment to the voyagers, is the annual trip of the
Navigation Committee, to whom the conservancy of the
banks of the Thames is entrusted.- The Lord Mayor of
London has been, time out of mind, bailiff or conservator of
the river Thames. James I., by a charter, confirmed him in
the office, the functions of which devolve upon the Navigation Committee, composed of common-councilmen. The
lord mayor appoints a water-bailiff, who is called the subconservator, and who, taking his instructions from the Navigation Committee, executes their commands. He controls
and licenses the fisheries, superintends the repair of the

. BEATING THE BOUNDS.

119

banks, and keeps-the bed of the river in a fit state for navigation. Some time in one of the leafy months of summer,
the committee make their annual voyage, to inspect his
domain, and see that Father Thames suffers no neglect at
his hands, or wrong from evildoers. This important business,
I am credibly informed, is never hastily slurred over
or thoughtlessly undertaken. The barge which is to be
freighted with the commonalty being first duly provisioned
with all the requisites for an al-fresco collation, and with an
assortment of wines, in bottles of all shapes, and suited to
civic palates, is despatched in charge of the water-bailiff up
the river as far as Reading, or perhaps up the Isis to Oxford. The members of the Navigation Committee run to the
latter place, say, in the evening by rail, and, after a sunset
ramble among the universities, and a becoming supper at the
Mitre, pass the night in the arms of Alma Mater. Next
morning, they embark on board the barge, and, drawn by a
horse at a walking-pace, commence the voyage back to London, commenting, it may be, by the way, on the state of the
river, and suggesting the adoption of any fresh measures
necessary for the conservation of the banks, the dredging of
the bottom, or the regulation of the fisheries. The chief
characteristic of this return-journey is the deliberation with
which it is conducted. The voyagers are seldom known to
proceed further than Henley -on the first day. There are a
good many things to be looked into, andmore to be got to the
bottom of; and there are fortunately many pleasant shady
nooks on the banks, where, in clear moss-bordered springs,
claret is known to cool, in the course of an hour or so, to a
state of delicious' perfection. A table-cloth, spread upon the
ground by the side of a rustic fountain, and garnished with a
cold venison-pasty, a brace or two of plump capons, and a
Westphalia ham, with here and there a Strasburg pat6 standing upright among tall crystal goblets, into which the red
juice of the Rhine-grape gurgles forth from sombre-coloured

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BEATING THE BOUNDS.

bottles responsively to the ripple of the fountain: such is the
delightful mixture of nature and art which completes the
summer landscape in the eye of the civic connoisseur. A
lunch thus luxuriously partaken of is a thing to be enjoyed
and remembered, and a worthy prelude to the dinner which
comes off at Henley, whither a turbot or a fine salmon, or
perhaps white-bait or turtle, have been thoughtfully forwarded from sympathising friends at the Mansion House, to
enrich the larder of the landlord, and enable him to do
honour to his guests. The party sleep at Henley; the next
morning they embark again, and proceed with the same
deliberation, and the same agreeable intervals devoted to
the contemplation of nature under the most favourable circumstances, until they arrive at Windsor, or perhaps at
Hampton. The third day wafts them pleasantly into the
heart of the great city, and lands them at London Bridge,
whence they return in peace to their families, grateful, it may
be presumed, for having been preserved from the perils of
the deep.
I could say something more on the subject of these
aquatic excursions, and their excellent effect upon the river
population and the river property; but too much writing
somehow makes my head feel as though it did not belong to
me; besides which, there is waiting in the shop a particularly good customer of mine, who will never be served by
anybody but myself. So perhaps I am justified in leaving
off here, and deferring the rest to another opportunity, if
that should ever occur.
DANIEL DIBBS, Chandler.

A NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW.
I -AD been to look for a friend a long way off-a very
long way off; but not being a man of fashion, only a footpassenger in the journey of life, I don't mind how far I go
in search of a friend-east or west, north or south-so that I
find him at last. As adverse fate would have it, however,
I did not find my friend, and had to return disappointed
and vexed.
Of course it began to rain-it always does when you are
a.long way off. Rain, did I say? it began to spout, as
though Jupiter Pluvius had just hit upon a new system of
hydraulics, and was making experiments with it upon a
Before meeting with a cab or omnibus, or
grand scale.
coming to any rational place of shelter, I had got dripping
wet, and determined doggedly, since matters could not be worse,
to go right through it all the way. I was brought up, however, by an advertisement in the window of a public-house
of a nature curious enough to attract a hunter of curiosities
like me. It announced a convocation of dogs, just about to
come off, under the patronage of a celebrated character: in
other words, a dog-show-a kind of canicultural f6te, at
which the best-bred specimens of the bow-wow fraternity
would reap the honour of a prize.
This was too much for my resolution: I darted at once
into the "Thingumbob," and made my way to the exhibitionroom-a public-house parlour of the usual dimensions. In
the centre, a couple of tables placed together were surmounted with a roomy cage of wood and wire in several

122

A NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW.

compartments. A solitary poodle lay curled up in the bottom
of the cage, and his owner, who looked a cross between a
bailiff and a stable-keeper, and in whose mouth stuck a short
pipe very considerably blacker than his rusty hat, sat contemplating him with perfect satisfaction. In a minute or
two, he was joined by another exhibitor, who produced from
his pocket a spaniel of King Charles's breed, no bigger than
a kitten, and passed it into an upper compartment of the
cage. The owner of the poodle had a bull-dog sitting
gravely between his knees, and the proprietor of the spaniel
had another at his heels. Tokens of recognition, consisting
of a species of electric nods, almost too rapid for observation,
passed between the candidates, but no speech. Twonewcomers anticipated any conversation that might have ensued
they were handicraftsmen-shoemakers I think-and each
produced a miniature terrier from his pouch, full grown,
but not much bigger than a good-sized rat. They then
pulled the bell, and ordered stout from the waiter. Other
exhibitors now poured in fast, and nearly every man produced his dog, most of them from the pocket. In the course
of half an hour, the room was unpleasantly full, and the
cage, too, was thoroughly stocked. Every man drank beer
or grog, and smoked, and all talked-save those who roared
The odour of the strong rank weed they chose
-together.
to smoke was almost enough to choke a crocodile-the walls
of the room vanished behind the reeking mist that arose on
all sides, and the vision of ill-favoured faces that loomed
through the grey cloud, reminded me of the grim colossal
phantasmagoria which used to haunt my boarding-school
couch on a hungry and sleepless night. The floor was
literally covered with ugly curs, which had come as spectators-all of the fighting school, and most of them maimed:
or mutilated by battle. One prodigious Gorgon of a brutewith a chest as broad as a boy's, and whose feet, as he sat
motionless beneath a table, met on the ground like the two

A NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW.

123

lines of a capital V-had lost one eye and the whole of his
lower lip; he had a face and forehead of chamois leather, and
was covered with half-healed wounds from some recent
and desperate encounter.
There were as yet no signs of business. The celebrated
character had not made his appearance, or he had delayed
his introduction, perhaps, to give the accommodating landlord of the " Thingumbob" the benefit of those interesting
moments which precede any important event, during which
the absorbents are generally in a state of activity. Pending
his arrival with the umpires, some of the party got up an
exhibition of a different kind, which I had not expected.
Several members of the fraternity had brought little square
bundles wrapped up in handkerchiefs; these proved to be
small bird-cages, each containing a pet bird. One man,
opening his cage, put in his forefinger, upon which he
brought out a lively goldfinch, which he offered "to whistle
agin any bird in the room for a crown." It seemed that
the little songster was a celebrated prima-donna in its way,
and had earned the name which it bore, of the Jenny Lind.
" Don't you wish you may get it?" was the jeering inquiry
from several voices. "Give the long odds, and I'll match
Piper agin him," bawled one; but the proposition was not
accepted. The little bird plumed itself proudly, and uttered'
a note of defiance.
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!!" screamed its proprietor; "all afeard
on yer, Jenny-that's what it is, my beauty-champion of
all England, my little pinch o' feathers. WAho bids ten
guine6s for the champion ?"
"Not champion yet, if I know it," said a voice from the
abyss of sickening vapour; and a man stepped out of the
gloom, bearing a bird perched on his knuckle, as closely
resembling the redoubtable champion as it is possible to
imagine. He accepted the challenge on behalf of his protge', and producing his money, seated himself in a chair,

124

A NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW.

rested his elbow on the table, and held forth his forefinger
as a perch for the bird; the other did the same, while a
third person lighted an inch of candle, and stuck it on an
upturned pewter pot between the competitors. The lists
thus prepared, the challenger gave the signal by a peculiar
sound produced by drawing the air between his lips; and
Jenny, after a few low and preparatory flourishes, burst into
song. The rival bird responded in a strain equally loud,
and both sang in evident emulation of each other, and by
degrees stilled all other sounds in the room, save the snorting
puffs that arose from some half-hundred pipes. The little
creatures grew wondrously excited; their throats swelled,
their tiny feathers ruffled up, their eyeballs rolled, their beaks
yawned and quivered, while without an instant's pause or
let, amidst that horrid reek of filthy tobacco, through which
their forms were but just visible, still rushed the stream of
song. One would have.thought such an atmosphere would
have poisoned them, but both were plainly proof against it
and when at length the rival bird ceased and fluttered down
upon the table, it was from sheer exhaustion of physical
strength, and lack of further power of endurance. Jenny,
as usual, had won the day; and its owner, as he complimented the bird caressingly, averred, with a tremendous
expletive, that he.would have wrung its neck upon the spot
had it been defeated.
Another similar match followed between birds of less note
and less exalted pretensions; but, owing to a defect, or
perhaps to an excellence, in my pectoral apparatus, I was so
unpleasantly affected by the amount of tobacco-reek which
had found its way into my lungs, as to be compelled to make
a hasty exit. Consequently, I had not the privilege of seeing
the celebrated character, or of witnessing the bestowal of
honours upon the dogs of merit. Whether Pompey bore off
the prize-which of the terriers got a medal-and which
came off with only honourable mention, I am in no condition

A NOVEL COMPETITION SHOW.

125

to satisfy the public. There was no illustrated catalogue of
the exhibition, although it would have stood illustration
remarkably well from the hands of some combined Hogarth
and Landseer. Bets were rife upon the chances of the prize,
and the "favourite" was a black and tan spaniel, about the
size of a rabbit, with long broad ears, long silken hair, and
no nose to speak of. This was a dog of fortune-had been
pupped, to speak figuratively, with a golden spoon in its
mouth, having been bred to order for a certain beautiful
duchess, to whom, after having competed for, and probably
won, the first prize, it would be forwarded on the morrow,
to be pillowed henceforth on silk plush, or fondled in the
folds, of lace or satin; to be dieted on fricassees and cream;
to be attended, in case of an attack of the spleen, by a physician who keeps his carriage; and to be led forth in park
or shrubbery every day for an airing, by a liveried page
impressed to melancholy by the awful responsibility of the
charge.
Companions of man, dogs are subject, like him, to every
imaginable variety of social position, and to all possible
mutations of fortune. The difference between the Queen
upon the throne, and the veriest houseless outcast that
cowers shiveringly beneath the blast of winter in the streets
of London, is not greater than that Which exists between the
kicked, starved, mangled, worried, and skeleton mongrel that
wears and whines out its miserable life in the oozy kennels
of the city slums, and the Queen's favourite poodle, caressed
by royalty, immortalised by Landseer, and housed in a
palace. The parallel is capable of a much more extensive
application; but I must not pursue it too far, lest I be
betrayed into comparisons which might not be deemed
complimentary to the reader, for whom, and for whose dog,
I entertain the tenderest regard.

TtlE SIGNS OF TIE TIMES.
NOT being gifted with the spirit of prophecy, and possessing no skill in sciences abstruse and occult, we are not
going upon the present occasion to attempt any explanation
of the mysteries of the past, or to project forward from the
dark lantern of imagination an enlightening gleam upon those
of the future. We know nothing whatever about the Coming
Struggle-have not even the honour of a bowing acquaintance with the Coming Man---have no pretensions to decide
upon the completion of the chiliadic periods, nor have looked
over the proof-sheets of the next year's almanac by Raphael.
The great uproar among the nations that is to be, or is not
to be-the long-looked for debdcle which is to hoist Turkey
in Europe out of Europe-and all the threatened and promised marvels and prodigies and horrors, which certain
hungry and thirsty seers find it so profitable just now to
send drifting down the current of public opinion-these
must take their course for us, and crown their own especial
prophets and promulgators with honour or disgrace, as it
may happen: they are not wares for our marlket. The
signs of the times with which we at present have to do,
though they do some of them hang out aloft very high, and
blaze like meteors-while others glimmer feebly and fitfully
in fuliginous and cavernous resorts, have nothing either
celestial or infernal, supernatural or prophetical about them.
They are substantial realities, the work of men's hands; they
appeal in silent but unmistakable language to a very numerous class of Her Majesty's liege subjects, and, unlike the

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

127

symbols of ancient or modern soothsayers, are never misunderstood by the dullest pate in Christendom. For instance
"The Cat and Bagpipes."
When certain unpropitious planets are in apogee, or when
Mars and Venus are in opposition, thre may be a shindy
brewing somewhere, we don't deny it-very probably there
is-we cannot undertake to determine; but when we See the
\sign of the Cat and Bagpipes in the ascendant, and swaying
gracefully in the evening breeze at the corner of a street, we
don't want the aid of astrological lore or the spirit of divination to inform us what it symbolises. We know as well as if
we were Spigot himself, and had doctored the beer and spirits
with our own hands for these twenty years past, what it
means. It means stout in draught, and bottled beer, and
treble X at threepence-halfpenny "in your own jugs ;" it
means "Max," and "mountain-dew," and "yards of clay,"
and a brown japanned tobacco-box, inscribed with the
venerable legendA good half-penny pay before you fi1,

Or forfeit sixpence, which you will;
and a saw-dusted floor crowded with kitchen chairs and
iron-spittoons, and mahogany-tables baptised in beer and
loaded with foaming pots, each the temporary property of a
volcanic proprietor in a state of eruption, to be followed by a
state of harmony, and to end in a state of beastliness. And
besides all this, it means skittles in the mouldy patch of
garden-ground in the rear, and "goes" of gin, and "noggins" and "three -outers," and plenty more of that sort of
thing, as everybody knows, and no mistake at all about it.
If any one doubts the universal knowledge which bibulous
man has obtained with respect to the language of these
signs,, he or she must be a person of most happy experience,
who has dwelt apart in some delectable Arcadia where milk
and honey have not been banished by malt and hops-and
not in dusty, miry, smoky, beery, brewery London, where

1
.28

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES,

Sir John Barleycorn surveys the whole capital from unnumbered elevations, and is monarch of all he surveys.
Yonder fustian-jacketed labourer is in no such a state of
heathen, or, if you like it better, classical ignorance. Ask
him the way to Aldgate, and he will direct you along the
whole route, though it should extend for a couple of miles,
by those to him hospitable and infallible guides. He knows
the charms of each separate paradise, and, never dreaming
but that you are equally well informed directs you to go
straight on till you come to the Three Turks, then to turn
to the right and cross over at the Dog and Duck, and go on
again till you come to the Bear and Bottle, then to turn the
corner at the Jolly Old Cocks, and after passing the Veteran,
the Guy Fawkes, and the Iron Duke, to take the first turn
to the right which will bring you into it. By this civil communication you are taught, as we have been taught a hundred
times, that the publicans' signs are, to no small section of the
public, a substitute for the map of London. We propose to
take a brief glance at them as they hang over our heads or
flourish on side-posts or ground-glass windows. We have
no intention of entering their sacred precincts, but shall confine ourselves to some selections from the catalogue which
the bare enumeration of them would present, in order to see
who and what are supposed to be the presiding deities in
these veritable homes of half the working population of the
capital of Great Britain.
The public-houses in London amount in number to something not much short of 5,000, and if we suppose that the
average number of customers to each is 100 a day-and
some of the gin-spinning fraternity may count their daily
customers by thousands-the sum-total will be more than
equivalent to half the adult population-which does not say
much for the spread of the total-abstinence principles. The
half-million men and women who daily subscribe to the great
alcoholic fund for promoting the demoralisation of the human

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES'.

129

race, and throw their personal example into the bargain, are
the supporters of about 30,000 persons employed in the sole
occupation :of administering the popular libations, and of half
as many more engaged in their manufacture, for the consumption of London alone. They congregate together for
one uniform purpose, but under banners including every
variety which the imagination can suggest. Somebody has
said that upon a question capable of popular solution nearly
everybody will arrive at a just verdict, though perhaps no
two men will be found who do so upon the same premises:
your thirsty subject has always a problem to solve, and, so
that he comes to the desired conclusion, is not at all particular
as to the premises. If in a loyal mood, he may get drunk
on the premises of the Victoria or Prince Albert; if in a
patriotic one, at the Nelson or the Duke of Wellington; if in
a benevolent one, at the Open Hand; if in an angry one, at
the Hand and Dagger; and so on, suiting the action to the
sign, with true drunken philosophy, the action being always
the same whatever the sign.
The first class of signs demanding notice are those bearing
'the names, and frequently the portraits, of celebrated individuals. The first on the list, for we like to begin at the
beginning, is of course Adam; but Adam, before he had his
Eve, had his arms, for which we must refer the reader to
the College of Heraldry, putting no faith in the legend of a
pewter pot, and a couple of crossed tobacco-pipes, attributed
to him by the learned members of the Licensed Victuallers'
Company. There is but one Adam's Arms in London. Then
come Adam and Eve together, and the blissful pair dominate
over exactly twelve reeking tap-rooms within the sound of
Bow Bells. Our first parents are the only antediluvians on
the list, but of Noah's Arks, which form the connecting-link
between the world before and the world after the deluge,
there are eight. David with his harp begins the catalogue'
of royal personages, of whom there is literally no end. There

130

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

is a King Alfred, only one King George, two Henry the
Eighths, three Kings of Denmark, fourteen Kings of Prussia,
five King William the Fourths, one King on Horseback, ten
King and Queens, ninety King's Arms, and seventy King's
Heads. Of Queens Adelaide and Charlotte, there are two
each; of Queen Victoria, twenty-one; of Queen's Arms, a
dozen; and of Queen's Heads, fifty; and for ihe use and
behoof of all these royal personages, there are threescoreand-ten Crowns; and about as many more in connection
with Anchors, Anvils, Apple-trees, Barley-mows, Tin cans,
Dolphins, Horse-shoes, Leeks, Sceptres, Shears, Shuttles,
Sugar-loaves, Thistles, and Wool-packs; to say nothing of
fifty Roses, the rose always taking precedence of the crown
on the sign-board. There are a dozen Prince Alberts;
twice as many Princes of Wales; as many Prince-Regents.
Each Prince-Regent might be matched with a Princess
of some designation or other; and foreign princes and
princes' heads complete the catalogue of sovereignty.
Then there is everything Royal, from the Royal Albert,
down through the whole alphabet to the Royal Yacht,
including, five-and-twenty Royal Oaks and fifteen Royal
Standards.
Of Dukes, there are ninety-eight, including fourteenDukes
of Clarence, six Dukes of Sussex, twenty-five Dukes of
Wellington, and thirty Dukes of York. There are ten
Earls, and forty-five Lords, including thirty Lord Nelsons;
thirty-six Marquises, of whom one-half are Marquises of
Granby. Of Shakspeares, there is but one, and six Shakspeare's Heads. There are two Sir Isaac Newtons, two Sir
Sydney Smiths, and one Sir Walter Scott; one Van Tromp,
three Whittington and Cats, two Sir John Barleycorns, four
Sir John Falstaffs, and ten Robin Hoods.
Among the signs especially appealing to working-mep,
there are the arms of every profession, from the Bricklayers'
Arms, of which London boasts thirty, through the whole

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

131

alphabet again, down to 'the Watermen's Arms, of which
there are fifteen.
In the animal kingdom, there are three Antelopes; fourteen Brown Bears, besides a whole bear-garden of various
other lively colours ; Birds in the Hand, five; Black Bulls,
sixteen; Bulls' Heads, twenty-five; Black Dogs, four; Black
Horses, twenty-five; Black Lions, ten; Black Swans, six;
Blue Boars, seven; one Blue Pig; one Blue Lion; one
Camel; four Cart-horses; three Cats; one Civet Cat; twenty
Cocks; four Cocks with Bottles; two Cocks with Hoops,
and one Cock and Neptune; two Dogs and Ducks; fourteen
Dolphins; six Eagles; seven Elephants with or without
Castles; ten Falcons;. one Fish; thirty Foxes, with Grapes,
Geese, or Hounds; three Hampshire Hogs; five Hares and
Hounds; ten Goats, some in Boots, and some furnished with
a pair of Compasses; thirty Green Men; nine Greyhounds
two Hen and Chickens; one Hog in the Pound; twentyseven Horses and Grooms; ten Lions in a state of nature, some
tete-d-tte with Lambs, some with French Horns; ninety
Lions in red skins, and twenty-eight in white ones; seven
Magpies, one with a Maiden, three with a Stump, one with
a Pewter Platter, and one with a Punch-bowl; twenty
Nags' Heads; one Old Cook; one Old Fox; 9ix Old Red
Lions; and four Old Swans. There are twelve Peacocks;
one Pheasant; four Pied Bulls; two Rams; two Ravens;
nine Red Cows; one Red Horse; ten Roebucks; seven
Running Horses; one Running Footman; three Spotted
Dogs; eleven Spread Eagles; thirty Swans, some with
Horse-shoes, some with Sugar-loaves, and one with two
Necks; five Tigers; twelve Turks' Heads; five Unicorns;
eighteen White Bears; seventy White Harts, and only one
White Hind;. fifty-four White Horses; one White Raven;
thirty-one White Swans; four Stags; one Leopard; three
British Lions, and one Porcupine.
Some publicans betray a partiality for a particular number,
K2

132

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

and double or treble their signs, or choose some device
which shall express their favourite figure. Thus we have
the One Tun, the One Swan; the Two Bells, the Two
Black Boys, the Two Sawyers, the Two Ships, the Two
Mariners, the Two Brewers (of which there are thirty), the
Two Eagles, &c. Then we have the Three Colts, the
Three Compasses (twenty-seven in number), the Three
Cranes, ,the Three Crowns, the Three Cups, the Three
Goats' Heads, the Three Hats, the Three Herrings, the
Three Jolly Butchers, the Three Kingdoms, the Three
Kings' Heads, the Three Loggerheads, the Three Lords, the
Three Mackerel, the Three Neats' Tongues, the Three
Pigeons, the Three Stags, the Three Suns, and the Three
Tuns, which last number over a score. Four is not a
favourite number with Publicans, and the Four Swans in
Bishopsgate Street is the only quadruple alliance upon the
sign-boards of London. Fives there are in plenty; among
which we may particularise the Five Bells and Blade-bone,
the Five Ink-horns, and the Five Pipes. Of sixes, there are but
two---the Six Bells, and the Six Cans and Punch-bowl. Of
the sevens, there are just seven-of which six are the Seven
Stars, and .one the Seven Sisters. Then the Eight Bells, of
which there are four; and the Nine Elms, of which there is
but one. There is also but one ten-the Ten Bells; and one
twelve, which is also a peal of Bells.
There are sixteen saints-St. John, St. Luke, and St.
Paul being the favourites; and though there is but one
bishop, Bishop Blaize, there are eleven Mitres. Of Georges,
there are fifty; and twenty more of that gentleman settling
his account with the Dragon. There are twenty-one Angels,
and fifteen more Angels in partnership with Crowns, Suns,
and Trumpets; seven Flying Horses; about thirty Golden
prodigies of various kinds-Anchors, Fleeces, and Lions; of
Green Dragons, there are sixteen; and five. Griffins, three
Men in the Moon, one Monster, three Neptunes, eleven
Phcenixes, and one Silver Lion.

THE SIGNS OF THE TIMES.

133

Among the Jolly fellows are the Jolly Anglers, the Jolly
Farmers, the Jolly Millers, the Jolly Sailors, and the Jolly
Waterman, with a Tippling Philosopher at their head.
Of fruits, fruit-trees, and vegetables, we have--Artichokes,
.seven; Apple-trees, three; Cherry-trees, five; Grapes,
sixty-six; Mulberry-trees,, four; Orange-trees two; Pineapples, five; and Vines, three.
The most.absorbent colours are found to be black, blue,
green, red, and white. Of these the Blacks amount to
nearly a hundred, the greater part of them being Black Bulls
and Black Horses; the Blues are sixty, being mainly
Anchors, Boars, and Posts; the Greens are fifty, mostly
Green Dragons or Green Men; the Reds are a hundred and
ten, of which three-fourths are Lions; and the Whites are
above two hundred, in which the White Hart and the White
Horse principally predominate.
Among the mysterious signs which are apt to puzzle us
as we walk the streets, are the Hole-in-the-Wall, of which
there are seven; the Bag of Nails-thought to be a corruption of The Bacchanalians-the 'Two Black Boys; the Cat
and Salutation; the Fish and Bell; the Globe and Pigeons;
the Goose and Gridiron; Grave Maurice (who was he ?);
the Half-moon and Punch-bowl; the Ham and Windmill;
the Hat and Tun; the Hop and Toy; the Horns and
Chequers; the Horse-shoe and Magpie; the King's Head
and Lamb; the Naked Boy and Woolpack; the Queen's
Head and French Horn; the Rose and Three Tuns; the
Salmon and Compasses; the Sash and Cocoa-tree; the Sun
and Sword; the Ship and Blade-bone, &c., the significations
of which, if they have any, lie too deep beneath the surface
for our comprehension.
Of the implements of agriculture there are-Ploughs,
eighteen; larrows, five; one Shovel, three Carts and
Horses, and two Waggons. We may add that there are
fourscore Ships in all conditions, from a Ship on the Launch,

134

4T1E
SIGNS

OF THE TIMES.

to a Sheer Hulk; and of Anchors there are twenty, most of
them allied with Hope, and twenty more. allied only with
blue paint.
The above selections from the list of wooden banners,
beneath which assemble nightly the thirsty population of the
metropolis, must suffice for the present. They are the multifaced symbols of the most frequented, most popular, and
best patronised of all our national institutions; whether they
reflect much credit upon us as the inhabitants of the most
enlightened city in the world, is a question we have not
leisure to enter upon., The hospitality they practise is regarded by humanitarians as a very doubtful virtue-and
some of them do not scruple to declare, that though by no
means ministers of charity themselves, they are the originating causes of half the munificent and splendid charitable
endowments which adorn our land, and, moreover, of not a
few of those palatial-looking prison-fortresses which the
genius of architecture has latterly condescended to render
ornamental too, on the principle, we suppose, that if the body
politic cannot get rid of an unsightly wen, the next best
thing is to hide it beneath an agreeable covering.

LAGSMANBURY.
LIKE a rotten core beneath the bloom of ripe fruit-like a
treacherous and villanous heart under a hypocritical aspect
-like anything and everything that is evil and bad, yet
clings to the semblance of decency and goodness-is Lagsmanbury. Neither Westminster, nor, indeed, all London,
contains a more remarkable instance of the isolation of that
supplementary order of society that sinks below classification,
yet is in the very arms and close embrace of orders whose
ambition and pretension it is to soar above it. You shall
pass a hundired times within a few paces of the boundaries of
the Lagsman's domain without discovering it or suspecting its
existence-for it lies between two well-frequented thoroughfares of respectable and official. character, and can be entered
through either only by the narrow approach of a coveredway. The world to be found within, however, is worth the
notice of the observant, and we shall take the liberty of
making such investigations as may suffice to satisfy our
curiosity.
Three or four acres are probably the utmost extent of the
whole area, and this is traversed from north to south by a
narrow winding lane, at least twice the length of the distance, as the crow flies, between its termini: like a long
snake in a short bottle, it has to double upon itself to keep
within its bounds. The sinuous course of the lane saves it
from being used as a short cut by pedestrians, and thus
helps to keep the company within select; another cause conducing to the same result, is the fact that Lags Lane is rarely

136

LAGSMANBURY.

passable to people of the outer world, unless at an early hour.
From twenty to thirty small courts and impasses disembogue
into it, and of whatever is ejected and rejected from them
all it is necessarily the receptacle, gathering its deposits the
whole day long. The lane itself is lined with shops of a
characteristic kind, that tell plainly enough to the discriminating onlooker what is the position, and to some extent also,
what are the pursuits of the surrounding inhabitants. Shop
windows do not much abound; with the exception of the
baker, the grocer, and the barber, there is hardly a trader
who is troubled with the ceremony of cleaning glass or the
prospect of a glazier's bill. Provisions are the chief staple of
merchandise, and these are of a sort which respectability
rarely sets eyes on. Vegetables, both crude and cooked,
and venerable in either condition, are piled in pyramids or
heaped on dishes, along with gallipots of pickled eels, saucers
of pickled cabbage, little hills of boiled whelks, stacks of fried
soles, sections of cocoa-nuts-and a heterogeneous collection
of yesterday's unsold fish. The stock of the butcher comes
to him from the market, and consists of the otherwise unsale
able refuse, For those who are not family members, there
are the eating-houses-we were going to say the cook-shops,
but in reality very few of them are cook-shops. Their carte,
however, is not wanting in variety, and everything cooked
elsewhere comes here in its last practicable, not presentable
stage, to be finally finished off. Here are terribly attenuated
shoulders of mutton, hams, and sirloins, the remnants of
geese and turkeys, cod-fish reduced to the gills, fins, and
tail-and all the disjecta, in a thousand shapes, of the cookshop, coffee-shop, confectioner's shop, tavern and eatinghouse of more dainty districts; among which the martellotower-looking pork-pies, which have stood guard for a month
in the window, cut the most imposing figure.
On Saturday night, and early on Sunday morning, the
lane is alive from end to end, being crowded with the popu-

LAGSMANB UlRY.

137

lation of the adjoining courts, for whom it is the only available market. At other times the crowd is not excessive,
save at the three gin-shops, one in the middle, and one at
either entrance, unless, as too frequently happens, when some
disagreement grows into a brawl, and every court sends
forth its quota of sympathisers to take part in the settlement
of the dispute. The population of the courts may be divided
into two distinct genera-the residents and the transitory
guests, and each of these is divisible again into more species
than we care to particularise. We can, for many reasons,
notice but a few of them; and of these, the residents, as they
have the strongest claim, shall come first.
There was a time, and that not very long ago, when
Lagsmanbury was to modern London what Whitefriars was
to the London of three centuries back-that is, a kind of
thieves' refuge and sanctuary, where, if offenders against the
law did not defy the police openly, they could at least reckon
upon eluding their search, and lying concealed among their
friends till means of escape were ready. That state of
things ceased with the last generation; and there is no
longer within the whole round of the capital any privileged
Alsatia in which the hunted criminal may hope to find sanctuary. When such dens were scoured out, and their most
secret recesses exposed to the fiery bull's-eye of the detective,
they lost their reputation for safety-the criminal desperado
now shunned them as the fox shuns the trap, and left them
to more fortunate rogues, to whom imperious justice had not
yet issued cards of invitation. The dearth of accommodations
for the toiling masses in London drove a rough class of
labourers to domicile where they could, and it happened in
numerous instances, and must happen again, that the abandoned lair of the thief became the home of the poor labourer's
family. So long as the maintenance of the sanctuary was
possible, the rogues, for obvious reasons, allowed no intrusion of honest people; but, the sanctuary at an end, it was

188.

LAGSMANBURY.

their policy to adopt an opposite course, and they did adopt
it. Thus it happens that the resident population of Lagsmanbury, at the present moment, consists of a low class of
labourers, chiefly Irish, who get an honest living by the
work of their hands, and a predatory class, still lower, who
never work, but live by the exercise of their wits in the prosecution of any artifice or imposture-or, their wits failing
them, by any species of depredation they can find or make
an opportunity to commit. The contact of these two classes
is, of course, the last thing that is desirable; but how it is
to be avoided is not plain. Among the Lagsmen, what is
noticeable is the determination of those who live by their
honest labour, and against whom no suspicion rests, to keep
themselves and their families distinct and separate from
their contaminated or suspected neighbours. To do this as
effectually as may be, they have taken possession of certain
of the entire courts, into which they admit only those who
can give a satisfactory account of themselves-and have surrendered other quarters as entirely to those who have no
such account to give. All such precautions can prove but
partially operative against the effects of that evil communication which corrupts good manners: yet it is pleasant to
witness the existence of the principle.
Among the less permanent residents are a various and
vagabond multitude of foreigners. Some are poor exiles,
spoiled for all useful purposes by the reception of our national
bounty-starving on a trumpery pittance which they ought
long ago to have learned to do without, and too proud and
lazy to work to increase it. Some are independent grinders
of organs or pianos, or dancers and exhibiters of dogs, monkeys, wooden dolls, or white mice. Some are makers and
hawkers of plaster images, roaming the street by day, and
modelling their wares by night. Some are teachers of languages reduced by sickness, extravagance, or ill-fortune, to
the lowest stage of poverty, and condemned to start again

LAGSMANBURY.

139

from the bottom round of the ladder. Some are gamblers in
ill-luck, savage with fortune; and not a few are defeated and
disappointed projectors, who have failed in impressing John
Bull with the value of their services.
The migratory class of vagabonds who honour Lagsmanbury with their presence at irregular and uncertain intervals,
embraces the whole catalogue of poverty-stricken professional
nomads that are seen in London streets. A good proportion
of these 'are men who travel with " properties" of some kind
or other, and for whom the accommodation of the common
cheap lodging-houses and "kens" would not suffice. There
are the acrobats and conjurors, with their gymnastic apparatus and juggling paraphernalia, their big drums, long swords,
golden balls, daggers, tinsel robes, the lamplighter's ladder,
and the little donkey bound to climb to the top of it whenever the public liberality mounts to the climbing point-which
it never does. There are the dog-leaders and dancers with their
melancholy troops. There are the wandering bands of boyGermans, with their burden of battered brass. There is the
player on the bells, whose apparatus runs upon wheels, and
has to be stabled like a beast. There are the grinders of
monster organs as big as caravans. There are the Punch
and Judy men with their travelling stages, and the rival proprietors of all those variations and modifications of Punch
and Judy which one encounters from time to time in the
public ways. There is the travelling rat-catcher and ratfighter,. with his traps and ferrets, and dogs and whiskered
menageries. There is the poor pedlar with his pack; the
poor Jew picture-dealer, with his collection of moonlights
and Dutch metal; the belated hawker of plants, shrubs, and
flowers, "all a-growing and a-blowing;" the omnium stallkeeper, with his stationarystage or rambling hand-cart; and
the travelling razor-grinder, with his rickety equipage. All
these-and we have not set down a tithe of their titles-are
debarred by their accompaniments from taking refuge at

140

LAGSMANBURY.

night in the travellers' rests with which the slums of Londoi
abound, and in which Lagsmanbury itself is by no means
wanting. Such places are too crowded for the propertymen, who therefore make for " Shinders's," where properties
of any and every kind are taken in charge for the night, and
placed safe under lock and key, for a percentage proportionate to their bulk upon the price of their owner's lodging.
" Shinders's " is a pretty extensive caravanserai, occupying
the whole area and buildings of Allsaints Court. It is said,
with what truth we know not, that Shinders himself is a retired
bear-leader, who formerly piped a bruin through every
county in England, but who retired, when bears went out of
fashion, into Lagsmanbury, and set about gaining a living
by providing for others that accommodation he had often
stood in need of himself. Be this as it may, he has long enjoyed the reputation of being the father of this peculiar class,
and under the endearing cognomen of Daddy Shinders, is
known far and wide. He is the sole householder of Allsaints,
of which he has purchased the lease, converting the premises
into that species of hotel of which his clients stand most in
need. All a parent can do for them he does: he lodges
them all at a low rent; he boards as many as choose to sit
at his table for a like consideration; he guards their property
during their repose or absence; he washes and mends for as
many as need or choose to submit to that sort of service;
and the report goes, that he even doses them when they
are ill.
A peep into Shinders's on a summer's day, when his
clients are, or ought to be, reaping the harvest of their
year, and making the most of their opportunity, reveals a
characteristic and suggestive spectacle. The sun may be
shining and scorching aloft ever so hot, but the air of Allsaints is cool and moist, and fragrant with the odour of damp
linen, combining unmistakably with the reek of tobacco and
the flavour of " entire." The flagstones of the court exude

LAGSMANBURY.

141

a soapy ooze, which glistens in a deep umbrageous gloom,
through which the fiery sun casts not a single ray. The
reason is, that at this season of the year it is always washingday at Shinders's, and the trophies of the tub are hanging
out aloft upon innumerable lines stretched across from house
to house, from poles thrust forth from the windows, and from
stays and tight-ropes rigged from the roofs and chimneys
on both sides of the way. 'The miscellaneous and dripping
collection of rags and ragged costume tells its own tale.
Together with a regiment of striped shirts, there hang
coloured sashes and spangled vests, tight-fitting "fleshes,"
and gaudy mantles of the Spanish cut. There is Judy's
gown and headgear, and there are the cutty kirtles of the
dancing-dogs. The principal mass of the pendent napery
is, however, an indescribable collection of tattered trumpery,
which all the washing in the world would never cleanse.
Beneath this cool and odorous shade you may watch, if you
are so inclined, the progress of a species of operations
ingenious and industrial, rarely offered to your inspection.
Here the proprietor of a dilapidated organ has disembowelled
the instrument for the hundredth time, and, with the pipes
scattered in confusion around him, is painfully cobbling at
the disabled bellows. There, the owner of a cornopean,
doomed never to utter any sort of poean more, is endeavouring to east out the dumb spirit by the charms of tinkering, plugging, oiling, and soldering. Yonder is a man
fitting the blade of a property-sword to his own swallow,
by carefully rounding its point with a file and emery-cloth,
and smoothing its back and edge with a fine polish. Another
fellow in the corner is training a little mongrel dog to sit on
a narrow plank, and bark and bite, without change of posture,
at the proboscis of Mr. Punch. Within doors there are
sounds of hammer and saw, and the tinkle of small tools,
and the babble of voices-and half-clad figures walk in and
out, or lounge about the court in attitudes half swaggering,

142

LAGSMANBURY.

half graceful, indicative of their professional habits. You
have more than a suspicion, as you glance at the defalcations
of their outer covering, that they are very much in the
predicament of Beau Tibbs, when his "twa shirts" were
gone to the wash, and that they are loitering here at home
for lack of the indispensable habiliments in which to present
themselves to the public.
In the rear of Shinders's is Coster's Mews. The idea of
establishing a mews and stabling a stud of horses, in such a
locality as Lagsmanbury, probably never entered the brain
of the original founder of the settlement, whoever he was:
at any rate he made no provision for anything of the kind.
What now constitutes the Mews is nothing but a row of
wretched cottages flanking a piece of unpaved ground.
What were once the sitting-rooms of the tenants are now
the stalls of the beasts-the flooring having been ripped up
and used for barriers and fittings. The bedrooms have been
converted into lofts for hay and straw, a transformation,
however, which does not hinder them from being still used
as sleeping-rooms when Lagsmanbury is crowded, and beds
are at a premium. Where the horses, and the asses which
fully equal them in number, that domicile in Coster's Mews
come from, and to what class of the community they belong,
is more than we can determine; but the Mews is crowded
all the year round; and such is the demand for the accommodation it affords, that twice within the last three years it
has been rendered capable of stalling an increased number
of animals, and that without adding an inch to its original
area-simply by narrowing the stalls. The mews are under
the management of Mr. Thady Brill, whose name figures
on a sign-board at the entrance; but there are reasons
for supposing that Thady is a man of straw in more senses
than one, and that old Daddy Shinders is their veritable
proprietor.
Opposite the entrance to the Mews is the inlet to the

LAGSMANBURY.

143

Creek-a court which is also a cul-de-sac, so narrow, that it
is possible for the opposite neighbours to shake hands across
the space that separates them. The lower floors of the
houses are so dark, that the use of them by daylight is
impossible; and in the Creek the order of things is inverted
-the householders living in the upper floors, and letting
the lower rooms for lodgings. It is in the Creek that typhus
and cholera always make their first appearance, when these
scourges come round., It is here that the most reckless and
debased of the Lagsmen are to be found-the psalm-chanter,
the "ruined tradesman," the starved weaver with five children in clean white pinafores, the dolorous dodger, and the
smasher. Here infants are to be hired, trained to put on
melancholy faces to excite compassion; and hence children
hardly above the age of infancy are sent forth to prey upon
the public by imposture or theft, and starved or tortured into
accomplished pickpockets and cadgers. We said the Creek
was an impasse; and so to the uninitiated public it is; but a
clansman can find a way through it into Crack Alley, and
take refuge for a time, if pursued, in Scamp's Castle, where he
can be captured only by a police force. The castle is nothing
more than a number of dingy tenements, standing back to
back, perforated and pierced into one vast labyrinth, and its
only defences are its own evil character. It is comparatively
empty during summer, by which we mean that it lodges at
that time not many more inmates than it can decently
accommodate; but towards November, when the cracksmen
and lags crowd into town from their provincial tours, and
resume their winter-quarters, it begins to swarm like a hive.
It is hither the detective comes in search of a practitioner
who is "wanted," routing him out with bull's-eye and truncheon, in the dead of the night, from a score of comrades
all huddled together on the same floor, not a man of whom
dreams of resistance. It is here rogues in feather hold their
nocturnal orgies, until drinking, feasting, and gambling have

144

LAGSMANBURY.

plucked them bare again to their last coin, and driven them
forth to new adventures. It is hither the belated votary of
Bacchus, who has lost his wits and his way, is sometimes
beguiled by an accidental friend, 'and submitted to that
searching and refrigerating process which ends by his
waking up sad, solitary, sober, shivering, and stripped to
his waistcoat and pantaloons, on a dung-heap in Coster's
Mews, or in the moist kennel of Lags Lane. Whoever
looks for Scamps' Castle, in the expectation of any outward
and visible sign of its inner and various capabilities, will be
disappointed. He will see but a block of grimy brick buildings, with ever-open doors, gaping, jagged windows, and a
few half-illegible sign-boards, promising "good accommodation for travellers."
*Wehave not surveyed a third of the area of Lagsmanbury; but there is no necessity for continuing the survey.
What should we discover by prosecuting the investigation?
Nothing more than idem, eadem, idemn-more courts, more
impasses, more creekls, more travellers' lodges-and all with
the same dirty face, the same mixed population, the same
uindelightful fragrance. We have had enough of it by this
time, and we quit without reluctance this delicious nurseryground of freeborn patriots and members of the society which
prides itself on its growing enlightenment and Christian
philanthropy.

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.
INDEPENDENTLY of the vast mass of literature which floats
or seeks to float upon the stream of popularity in this capital
of the world, and very distinct from anything the publishers
and their agents are employed in putting before the public,
there exists a class, or more classes than one, of printed
documents, more or less privately circulated, and to which
the denomination of lurking literature may be fairly applied.
We speak not now of those flying and ephemeral sheets
passed from hand to hand among the members of the different commercial professions, with which the general public
have nothing to do, and which are for the most part incomprehensible to all but the parties immediately interested.
Nor do we care to include in the category such periodicals
as the Hite and Cry, interesting to rogues and vagabondsto policemen, detectives, and the victims and avengers of
crime of every sort-though these are never to be met with
in the usual marts for the productions of the press, and may
be said in a sense to lurk, rather than to circulate. Again,
there are various trades which have periodicals of their own,
intended to advocate their own interests-to vindicate their
cause, if that should ever stand in need of vindication, but
chiefly to serve as a medium for the facilitation of business,
and as a check to the victimisation of the subscribers by frauds
to which they stand peculiarly exposed. Such a publication
is the pawnbrokers' weekly journal; we forget by what
name it goes-a paper which has done real service in its
time, by causing the recovery of much valuable property,

146

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

and the detection of delinquents in the act of committing
offences against the law. With such publications as the
above, however, we have on the present occasion nothing to
do; they are all set on foot for legitimate ends, with which
we have no right and no wish to interfere: those, to which
we design briefly to call the reader's attention, are, all but
one, of a description considerably different.
First among the literature that lurks unseen, except by
the eyes for whose especial delectation it is prepared, we
may mention the prospectuses of numberless bubble-companies. These things, which are generally printed on flysheets of super-royal folio, lie snug in the desks or in the
pocket-books and breast-pockets of their concoctors-a race
of needy men-so long as money is tight in the market; but
let the Bank cut down its rate of discount to two or three
per cent.-let speculation set in like an epidemic-and out
they come numerous as swallows in summer-time; and
terrible swallows they prove, in engulfing the floating
cash, and flying away with it. The shares of the Great
Gridiron Company, and the Barbers' Block Association,
which were both a month ago considered defunct, are now
not only alive, but found to possess astonishing buoyancy,
and really promise to become the most profitable investments
going. They rush like race-horses up to par, and beyond it
-make a tremendous sensation in the market-are bought
by hundreds who know perfectly well that the intrinsic value
of a waggon-load of them would, not amount to a farthing,
but who also know that they can sell them at a profit before
they begin to tumble down again; and then, after the fussing
and shuffling of a few months, weeks, or days, as it may
happen, the rage for gridirons and blocks subsides, and
shares and speculators in them vanish together. If, after all
is over, you inquire what has been done, the result is neither
more nor less than the simple fact, that some tens or hundreds
of thousands have been lied out of the pockets of greedy

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

147'

simpletons into the pockets of greedy swindlers. The literature by means of which this transfer of cash is periodically
inaugurated abounds in pompous names, which you cannot
always find in the Directory, and in paragraphs remarkably
technical and official, promising a golden harvest, compared
to which twenty per cent. is as nothing, to all and sundry
who shall have the discrimination to dabble in the gridirons
or the blocks.
Mr. Bawker is the editor, proprietor, advertising agent,
and collector, as well as the entire literary staff, of a monthly
magazine. He is a man of considerable substance, with a
large balance at his banker's, and a comfortable leasehold
property in one of the suburbs. He startedin the literary
line many years ago; and his first appearance before the
public that way was in the character of a "walking sandwich" between two deal-boards placarded with puffs of that
now defunct periodical The Tomahawk, whose proprietor
kept him in pay. The editor of The Tomahawk threw the
hatchet with such success, that he was prosecuted for libel.
The Tomahawk, in consequence, sunk out of sight, leaving
Bawker high and dry on the strand. But by this time, being
a man of observation, and having participated in various
functions connected with the printing-office, the editor's
closet, and the advertising agents, he had solved a good part
of the mystery of the book-producing trade, and resolved, if
he could compass it, to have a magazine of his own. How
he succeeded, without money, in setting his speculation
afloat, it might be difficult to discover; but the magazine
came out, nominally under high sanction, and from the first
assumed to have a position second to none of its numerous
rivals. Bawker did not go in for a large sale; be did not
care for the sale at all. What he wanted was a good advertising medium-good, that is, for Mr. Bawker. To make
sure of this, he stereotyped a paragraph upon the front-page
of his wrapper, announcing to all whom it might concern

L2

148

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

that Bawker's Magazine is perused every month by 120,000
readers, and is therefore the best vehicle for advertisements
open to the commercial world. A pushing tradesman, who
had puffed largely in Bawker's advertising sheets, happened
to discover that the impression which promised 120,000
readers, was actually short of 200 copies; and he accordingly
resisted payment of his account.
The ingenious publisher's defence of the announced circulation was worth all the money in dispute. "Bless you, this
here magazine is lent, and lent, and lent about among the
ladies, like anything. It have never done cirldlatin! My
calkilation of readers is one hundred and twenty thousand.
Of course, I may be mistook." This little trouble did not
cause any abatement of Bawker's pretensions. He still kept
up the game with unflagging success. For the literary substance of his magazine, he is indebted chiefly to American
writers, :the fashionable columns of the morning papers, and
the obsolete fiction of old periodicals, cut from their columns
with the shears, and flung to the printer to arrange according to convenience. Bawker does his own criticisms, and,
taking warning from the Tomahawk, to use his own expression, " soaps everybody and everything." It is marvellous
to think of the odd catalogue of commodities which come for
criticism to Bawker. Among them would be found every
new perfume in elegant crystals and vases-all the washes
for the complexion that were ever devised-numberless new
inventions for the toilet, and imaginary bulwarks against the
inroads of time, preventatives against baldness and greyness,
hair-dyes, charming ringleted fronts and bewitching little
wigs, paddings and plumpers,; and rouge-pots and powder.
Add to these a long list of everything captivating to mothers
-darling
babies' caps and lace-wrappers, tiny crocheted
socks, corals, jumpers, toys without limit, and perambulators
to carry single or double. Then there is infinite music, in
the shape of songs, fantasias, polkas, and quadrilles, amount-

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

149

ing to reams in the course of a month or two; and, over and
above all this, a complete library of ladies' literature, and a
complete museum of the materials, and finished performances
of those various species of domestic industry in which ladies
delight. All these voluntary contributions, as fast as they
flow in, are noticed each by a brief laudatory phrase, and,
the instant they are "soaped off," are transferred new to the
shops of the retailers, with whom the careful Bawker does
business on liberal terms, and at once transformed into cash;
and, it need not be said, they contribute handsomely to the
profits of the concern.
Another literary work, of a somewhat analogous kind, is
the Aristocrat, which for some years has figured as a weekly
newspaper, purporting to have an extensive and exclusive
circulation among the nobility and landed gentry of the
country. Its real sale in any class is a mere trifle, except
on some extraordinary occasions. Some obsolete institution,
for instance, is dying a natural death because it is no longer
wanted, and lacks the sinews of war. The governor or
secretary, trembling for his salary, gets up a flaming puff in
praise of its benevolence, and an eloquent appeal to the rich
and charitable on its behalf. The document is sent to the
Aristocrat office, together with an order for a thousand
copies of the number in which it shall be printed. The bribe
amounts to something considerable, and of course in goes
the puff in a front column. The same thing will happen
when young Briefless gets his firstsuit. He reports it himself, and dresses up his speech to the best advantage; and
at the cost of a few hundred copies has the pleasure of a brief
celebrity, at least among his personal friends. But these
things happen rarely-not once in six months, on the average.
Of the copies printed on ordinary weeks, not more than onethird are sold, the rest being given away; and the proceeds
of the sale are a trifle. But the Aristocrat swarms with
advertisements, chiefly oft books, and these of the tmost

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LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

expensive kind, copies of which are sent for review, and
before the week is out are turned into cash. If a book of
any value is not sent, it is written for, with a request that it
may be sent per bearer-a request generally complied with.
The entire literary work, including scissor-w6rk and reviewing, and extracting by the yard, is done by contract for some
35s. a week, with the periodicals and stitched stiff-covered
books as perquisites.
Let us turn now to some lurking literature of a different
description. Reader, unless you happen to be a stranger to
the book-stalls, you must have encountered, among the heterogeneous boxes and ragged, mud-flecked rows of volumes
exposed to the weather, a tolerable list of treatises upon
medical subjects, or on the medical treatment of real or imaginary disorders of the human frame. There is Stickleback
on the Spinal Cord-there is Pumper on Pleurisy-there is
Noggins on the Nervous Energy-there is Glauber's Physiology of the Alimentary Canal--there is Renal Records, by
Ramsbottom-there are fifty others whose names we might
write down from memory; and there are at least a hundred and fifty more whose names we have forgotten.
Did it ever strike you, good friends, that until these
volumes found their way to the book-stall they were
never before offered for sale--though some few of them may
have been nominally published by men who are unknown as
publishers-and never had a name, much less a value, in the
market ? No bookseller ever had them in his catalogueno critic ever commented on their contents; and the reason
is, that they were not intended by their soi-disant authors
to run the career of ordinary books. It was the fashion
some years ago, and the fashion has not yet died out, for
every practitioner in high life to write his volume declaratory of his own views, after the well-known Abernethy plan,
and to lay it on the tables of his patients. Men who could
not write at all, and who would hAve betrayed sad ignorance

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

151

in the attempt, were driven to get others to do the business
for them. Scores of those volumes were thus written by
scribblers who knew nothing of the curative science, under
the direction of their medical employers; and this system of
vicarious authorship still goes on.
Calling the other day on our friend Spiller, who knows
everything, for a little information on an abstruse subject, we
found him up to the eyes in heavy volumes handsomely
bound, and scribbling away, early in the morning, as if for
dear life.
" Cut it short, my dear fellow," he said; " I am over the
ears in business: the Greeks did eat mustard with ham, if
that's all you want to know; you'll find an allusion to
it in Aristophanes, I think-but I can't stop to look now."
" Why, what's the matter ? You seem quite excited."
" The matter! Why, M'Stickit has been here-you know
I did his Kidneys for him. I'm now going in for the, Mucous Membrane, if you know what that is.
See what a
cart-load of books the fellow has seiit, and more are coming.
He thinks I'm going to read through the lot, I supposeknow a better trick than that. He wants the book out by
the end of the month-300 pages at least-he stumped up
like a Trojan (here Spiller showed a handful of notes); and
I shall walk into it."
And Spiller was "walking into it" at the rate of forty
pages a day. We don't happen to be in his secret, and cannot therefore testify as to the mode in which he got through
with the business; but the Mucous Membrane is already
out, though seven weeks have hardly elapsed since he commeneed the attack; and M'Stickit, amazingly proud of it, is
pushing it right and left among his patients.
It is not necessary to say that volumes of this peculiar
4eass add little or nothing to the general store of knowledge on medical subjects: but, at the same time, it would
not be altogether just to infer that their reputed authors are

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LURKING

LITERATURE OF LONDON.

There is many a clevet
mere professional pretenders.
well versed in the treatment of disease, whose
practitioner
skill may snatch a patient from the jaws of death, who yet
would be exceedingly puzzled to write a book; and a melan,choly experience sometimes shows us, on the other hand,
that medical professors of high literary standing will blunder
fatally in the practical details of their art. The printing
and circulation of these books is one of the expensive
vanities for which fashion has to answer.
The last specimen of lurking literature to which we shall
allude is a periodical work, to which we shall give the name
of the Black Book. This is a work of portentous importance
and signification, of which ninety-nine out of a hundred of
our readers have never had a sight, and of which, moreover,
let them labour to that end as they may, they will-never
succeed in getting a glimpse. Who are its editor, printer,
and publisher, we cannot say: the whole business is got
through with a secrecy as marvellous as the appearance and
clandestine distribution of the work itself are regular. What
is the extent of its circulation no man knows, but it must be
considerable, for the expense of its production is great; yet
so far are the proprietors from making any attempt to push
it with the public, that its very existence is guarded as a
secret from all but the subscribers, and if inquiry is made
for it by a stranger, it is universally ignored. The reason
is, that every line of the book is a libel-all the more
offensive and hateful, in that every line is also a truth. The
Black Book is, in a word, a comprehensive register, inexorably posted up day by day, of every man and woman in
the metropolis who has ever been known to break faith,
through either vice, imprudence, or misfortune, in a monetary
matter. The register dates, to our own lKnowledge, to ten
years back, and very probably to twice that period. To the
merchant, the man of business, and the speculator, it is an
invaluable record of commercial character, because it is a

LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON.

I53

general directory of defaulters under all the phases in which
default is possible. Every bankrupt's commercial history,
with all the particulars interesting to a creditor, is down at
full length : the amount for which he failed-the amount of
his assets-the cause of failure, whether extravagance, speculation, decline of business, or the failure of others-the
amount of the dividend he paid-whether he got a certificate, if so, whether or not his certificate was opposed, and
what class certificate he did get. Then there is a compendious catalogue of names in close columns, with their
addresses, of all sham and shuffling and failing securities,
whether to loan societies-these alone amounting to many
thousands-or to credit transactions in any shape. There
is the endless list of all those who have ever dishonoured a
bill, with its amount, the date of its notification, and
whether it was eventually discharged or not; and of
all, those who have given a bill of sale or a power of
attorney upon their property. There is analogous information of every kind respecting the constitution of
companies, the cash character of their promoters, agents,
and responsible parties,-in short, there is every item and
atom of intelligence that can possibly be derived from
public documents and the most rigid private investigation,
which may prove serviceable to business-houses by enabling
them to distinguish, so far as that can be done by the teachings of experience, between men of substance and character
and men of straw and no character. The Black Book is
thus a book of doom to multitudes who know nothing of its
existence, and who would be horror-struck if they were to
see, after the lapse of years, the figure they cut in its
columns. The uses of the book are obvious, and, managed
as it is, with a circulation strictly guarded and private-for
not a leaf of it is ever exposed to view, even to the most
prying eye-it is, in our opinion, a perfectly justifiable document. The knowledge that such a compilation exists need not,

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LURKING LITERATURE OF LONDON$

however, be kept a secret. The trading and speculating
world will manage their affairs none the worse for knowing
that a watchful eye marks their operations, and will assuredly
chronicle their breaches of faith. The consciousness of this
fact will be a timely providence to more than a few, and it
may explain to some the mystery of that uniform repulse
they meet with' in their attempts to raise the wind by the
most promising schemes. As a commercial people, we have
latterly become shamefully insensible to the moral delinquency that too frequently marks commercial failure. The
most infamous frauds are practised and, at least legally,
countenanced in the way of business-frauds which in other
European countries would be punished by exile or condemnation to the galleys. Whole families are reduced to
beggary through putting faith in the plausiblelies of unprincipled traders-who "smash" suddenly through some
desperate attempt to get rich-pay a shilling in the pound
-are whitewashed a month or two after in the Bankruptcy
Court, and set free to commence the experiment over again.
Trade has grown into a gambling game-the chief difference being that the debts are not debts of honour. Why
should not the trading gambler know, that if he fails to pay
the stakes he will be posted in perpetuity?

"MOVINGI HOUSE.")
WE, write upon the eve of quarter.-day, and as it happens
to be the Midsummer quarter that is impending, we are
reminded by demonstrations at this season, always very
numerous, and which meet us 'as we walk the streets, that, a
pretty large section of the London, population are about
changing their abodes, or are even now in the very act of so
doing. First, there is the sudden apparition of " This house
to let-enquire within," or somewhere else, stuck into parlour
and drawing -room windows, or mounted on a board. in the
front garden. Then there is the spectacle of respectable
fathers of families, or agitated young wives, flitting backwards and forwards like unquiet phantoms, and turning their
heads constantly on this side and that, in search of a ne w
Again, there are those long ominous -looking
domicile.
vans, upon whose fronts are inscribed the words "Goods
removed," either standing open-mouthed at the greengrocers' doors, with their shafts reared perpendicularly like
rampant skeleton arms, or their cavernous throats filled with'
the household goods of a migrating family, creaking slowly
along the highway on the route to a new domestic retreat.
These outward signs, which we cannot escape if we would,
forcibly recall to our recollection the events of that last flitting, when, leaving the southern banks of the Thames, we
took our flight northwards, to the suburban precints of merry
Islington.
First came the preparations for the event, which preparations consisted of no end of packing and bundling, sorting,
arranging, and rejecting, all accompanied with so many

156

"MOVING

HOUSE."

appeals to old memories and sympathies, so many mementoes of vanished pleasures, and, no less touching, of vanished
pains too-so many dumb and dusty witnesses of the fateful
and remorseless passage of that "time which is our life,"
that it required no little stock of moral courage to look them
all in the face with an unmoved countenance. Think of unearthing thirteen gratuitous blue-papered hat-boxes, consigned one by one at forgotten dates to the gloom of an
upstairs cupboard, but unscrupulously unkennelled at once
by Betty to scare our astonished senses! Worse than that
-think of her marshalling a battalion of physic-bottles a
hundred strong, each with a label like a clerical band at its
neck, and each one recalling the undelightful sensatiois" ventral, subventral, internal and central," of which, in the
course of that long illness, it had been the bitter occasion.
Think of the awful dilemma into which we were cast, as a
host of forgotten and unmentionable articles were dragged
forth from their hidden recesses, and the question was asked,
" Will master take this to the new house ?" and the impossibility of a sagacious decision upon numberless calls so suddenly made. Think of the dismay, the spasmodic squall,
the resulting ill-humour and consequent ill-management, of
Betty herself, who, having rushed heedlessly to work with
the bed-key to take down her own four-poster, had smashed
in the roof of her purple-splashed bonnet-box, and jammed
her best puce silk bonnet into a colossal facsimile of a
Norfolk biffin! Think of dining for the last time upon the
deal dresser in the kitchen, without chairs, only the brewer's
unclaimed barrels to sit upon-with borrowed knives and forks
to carve and eat with, and nothing but a battered pewter pot
to drink out of! Think of the dust and the dirt, and the
torn letters and papers, the rushing of porters and the hammering of packers, the cracking of crockery, the jingling of
broken glass, and the splitting of furniture-and you will have
some idea of the preparations which inaugurate a removal.

"MOVING HOUSE."

157

But the vans are all loaded, and, putting your family with
Betty, who carries Pussy in a basket,into a hackney coach,
you drive off to the new residence, and await the arrival of
your indispensable appliances, without which a home for a
civilised Englishman cannot exist. Fortunate may you consider yourself if your goods and chattels follow in reasonable
time, without being backed into a shed until somebody else's
turn has been first served, and horses are obtainable foryour
convenience. But Betty, whom you have restored to good
humour by the promise of a new bonnet, is on the look-out,
and, in the course of the evening, descries the waggons
while there is yet light enough to superintend their unloading. The goods, as a matter of necessity, are pitched out
as they come to hand, and all heaped together for the night
in the parlours. Beds are pulled out from the mass and
made up upon the floor: happily, the children, pleased with
the confusion and the novelty, think it excellent fun, as good
as gipsying, or picniclking in Epping Forest or Bushey Park,
and lie down to sleep with the expectation of a pleasant
morrow. But your better-half declares she is almost worn
out, and you are well-nigh exhausted yourself. Betty gets
you some tea, and while you are discussing it, lets Pussy out
of the basket, and butters her paws in order that she may
Then you
not run back in the night to the old dwelling.
retire to rest, surrounded with your goods all in a state of
apparently inextricable confusion, or, as Betty terms it, "all
As you lie among them on the boards,
higgledy-piggledy."
too weary to sleep, the gas-light which flickers in from the
street-lamp over the window-shutters, converts them into
shapes rugged and romantic; and when at last you arrive at
dreamland, it is a land of wild, unearthly forms, and grim
and indefinable terrors.
In the morning you awake ini a new world. You have
immediately to resolve yourself and your better-half into
a hanging, arranging, and regulating committee. Now come
a series of discoveries, each of which entails a demand upon

158

"MOVING HOUSE."

your patience or your purse, or both. It may be there is
no water in the cistern, because the last tenant wouldn't
pay the water-rates, and was cut off from the main, and you
have to go a-begging for a breakfast, and then to hunt up
the turncock. It may be that it has rained in the night,
and the attics are swimming in water, not because the
roof is out of repair, but because the plasterer has left a score
of spare slates and a small mountain of mortar in the drain,
and thereby occasioned an overflow, and of course you
have to hunt him up. Then Betty brings the news that
Pussy has killed a big rat in the night, and, holding the
corpus delicti by the tail in proof of her own assertion
and Pussy's prowess, declares her conviction that the place
is overrun with them; but having other things to think
of, you are willing to leave that affair to the cat, as belonging to her department, and sending for a carpenter's
man, begin to put things in order. You find out before the
day is over that one-half of the fancied rubbish which you
yesterday consigned to the rag-and-bottle merchant for the
merest trifle, consisted of indispensable necessaries and
etceteras for which you have now to disburse afresh, and that
it would have been wiser to have brought them with you.
It takes you a full week, and perhaps more, to get things,
as sailors term it, "ship-shape," and to build up your new
house to the customary comfortable status of the old one;
and you find, by the time it is over, that your purse has
collapsed considerably under the operation. It is still longer
before you are naturalised to the necessity of turning your
face northward, after leaving your office in the city, instead
of southward, and you often catch yourself walking involuntarily toward one of the bridges, which for the last ten years,
it may be, it has been your lot to cross twice a-day at least.
"Three removes," says the proverb, are "as bad as a fire ;"
and like most proverbs, it is fraught with considerable truth.
There are, however, a class of persons in London, who, being
not much encumbered with families, and in circumstances to

I

"MOVING

HOUSE."

1059

shift the turmoil and annoyance of removing upon the shoulders of others, make a point of moving regularly at short
intervals. They have a fancy for new houses, built and
decorated after the newest fashion, and make a practice of
gratifying this propensity with as little consideration as they
would any other whichmoney will satisfy. It may be partly
from this cause that all the new houses of any pretensions
are let almost as soon as they are finished and fairly habitable, andnot a few of them long before. The removing of
goods, though a calling which is never, for obvious reasons,
carried on alone, is yet one in which, in London, a large capital is invested. Thousands of covered vans, built for the
express purpose, are hireable at any moment, at an established charge, payable according to the number of hours
they are employed; and these, as quarter-day approachesand, though in far less profusion, at or about the termination of the half-quarter-may be encountered in numbers
traversing the streets of the metropolis towards all points of
the compass. The manwho "moves you," as the phrase is,
is generally a tradesman well-to-do in the world, and who
has plenty of work for-his horses besides the haulage of
household goods: his coadjutors are a set of handy lads,
well skilled in the practice of packing and porterage, and
who rarely do a serious mischief, if left to the management
of their own business in their own way.
For some years past London has been migrating from the
centre towards and beyond the suburbs. The city proper
originally set the example: the omnibus and short railways
have combined to extend the movement. The more it prevails, the better for all ranks; the tendency outwards relieves
the stifling pressure which prevails so fatally in the heart
of the Great Babylon, and gives a better chance of health
and comfort to those whom poverty and circumstance confine to the crowded arena of commerce.

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.
I AM going to make a clean breast of it, for the repose of
my conscience, if I may be supposed to have any, and as
some sort of laggard justice to that very numerous class
towards whom a stern necessity has compelled me to play
the impostor.' I was once a student of nature, and enthusiastic in my studies--nourishing dreams of reputation and
celebrity, with all the pleasant and agreeable accompaniments attendant upon them. Long years of painful experience
have at length brought home to my consciousness the slow
and unwillingly-acknowledged conviction, that I have wasted
the thread of life in the pursuit of a vocation never intended
for me; that, though once profoundly imbued with the sentiment of art, I never really possessed the "faculty divine,"
without which success in the profession is hopeless.
I
say I once possessed the sentiment of art-because I don't
pretend to it now; even that is gone, clean gone-frittered
and fooled away by the conventional and technical din of the
studio and the cant of connoisseurship. It is a wretched
fact, that to me the whole world of art, so far as its oesthetic
influence is concerned, is nothing but a blank, unless perhaps
something worse. The once magic creations of Raphael,
Correggio, Titian, and Rembrandt, are resolved, through the
detestable process my mind has undergone, into mere
masses of oil and varnish, canvas and colour. Where others
behold with awe the expression of a god-like idea, the embodiments of intellect and passion, or the incarnations of
physical or mental loveliness, I see nothing but paint-reds,

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

161

browns, and yellows, madders and ultramarines, with the
scumblings, and draggings, and glazings, and scrapings, and
pumice-stonings, and the thousand artifices employed in
getting up an effect. It were well if this were all. I could
be well content never to look on picture more, if the face of
nature would return to me again under the aspect it wore in
the days of my boyhood. But alas! it cannot be. To me the
-

Meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight,"

are but suggestive of paint in its myriad mixtures and combinations. .The gleam of sunshine upon a field is but a dash
of Naples yellow; the dark gloom of evening closing o'er
the distant mountains, speaking of infinite space and distance
to the unsophisticated eye, is nothing to me but a graduated
tint of indigo, red and white: the impenetrable depth of a
yawning cavern, dimly discernible amid the sombre shades
of a mountain gorge, though it may tell a tale of romance
and mystery to others, is nothing upon earth to me but a dab
of Vandyke brown. Nay, the boundless sky, the overarching canopy that wraps us up in brightness or in gloom,
is in my view, according to circumstances, but a tube of
diluted cobalt, or a varied combination of greys and reds, and
yellows and whites: while the glorious sun himself figures
in my imagination, precisely as he does in the pictures of
Claude Lorraine, as a one-shilling impression of a flamecoloured tint.
How this came about perhaps my history will shoW. I
shall make it as brief as I honestly can: may it prove a
warning to the youthful aspirant for artistic fame, and incite
him to a candid and timely investigation into the reality dnd
extent of his creative faculty! One thiig I know-it will
prove a revelation of some value to collectors and connoisseurs of all ages and grades, provided only that they have
yet modesty enough remaining to doubt the infallibility of
their judgment.
M

162

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S RACK.

I was born in one of the suburbs of the metropolib, and
my earliest recollections are associated with the palette and
the studio. My father, whose sole child I was, was an artist
of very considerable talent, who, with a real love of nature,
combined a ready hand and a facility of practice which enabled him to produce a multitude of pictures, though he
My mother, who worshipped him with a
died young.
devotion that knew no bounds, relieved him of every care
unconnected with his pursuit. It was her business to dispose of his productions, which, being all of small size, rarely
exceeding twenty inches in length, she carried to town, and
sold to the dealers for as much as they would bring. In
these perambulations, when I was big enough to take the
long walks, I sometimes accompanied her, and when the sale
was successful, generally got a cake or a toy for my share.
Besides my mother, my only playmate was a small lay-figure,
which it was the quiet delight of my childhood to cherish
and fondle with an affection which I cannot now comprehend.
My father's pictures never realised much during his life.
They were chiefly landscapes of a verysimple style of composition, and scores of them had no other figures than a
woman and a child, of which my mother and I were the
models; and I remember distinctly that when a pair of them
realised five pounds, it was the occasion of a rejoicing and a
hot supper, which I was allowed to sit up and partake of.
My poor father died before I was eleven years of age; and
then his performances rose into sudden repute, selling rapidly
for ten times the sum he had ever received for them. By
degrees they all disappeared from public view, being bought
up, by the best judges, who during his life never condescended to notice the artist. My mother followed, my father
to the grave before her year of mourning had expired; and I,
for the time heartbroken, was transferred to the care of my
father's only brother, also an artist, though of a very different stamp. He sent me for two years to school, where, in

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S hACK.

163

the society of children of my own age, I soon forgot my
griefs. Before I was fourteen my uncle bound me apprentice to himself, to make sure, as he said, of some sort of
recompense for the trouble he would have in teaching me.
Hie was a portrait-painter, at least so said the brass-plate on
the door of the house in Charlotte Street; but very few and
far between were the sitters who came to be limned. His
principal occupation was that of cleaning and restoring old
and damaged pictures, and in this he was employed mainly
by the dealers, who allowed him but a sorry remuneration.
He had, too, a small connection of his own, to whom he occasionally sold pictures, bought at the sales in a woful condition for a few shillings, and carefully got up by himself.
With him I worked hard from morning to sunset for seven
years, in the course of which period I copied an immense
number of pieces, nearly all the copies being sold to country
dealers, who came periodically to town and cleared them off.
I-learned thoroughly the difficult art and mystery of picturecleaning; acquired of necessity some skill in portraiture; and
prosecuted, whenever opportunity offered, the pursuit of
landscape, in which I was resolutely determined upon gaining a reputation.
With this view, when the term of my indentures had run
out, I bade adieu to my uncle, who made no attempt to alter
my purpose, and commenced the world on my own account,
devoting my whole time and energies to my favourite pursuit. I first painted a couple of pieces of a small size, and
Street Exhibition, paying the then
sent them to the
customary fee, which a wiser policy has since abolished. I
felt overjoyed to hear that-my pictures were hung, and
hastened t6 look at them as soon as the doors were opened to
the public. My hopes were dashed away by the sight of my
two little productions, hardly covering more than a square
foot of canvas each, suspended as telescopic objects high aloft
beneath the gloom of the ceiling; while whole fathoms of the
m2

164

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE DEALER'S HACK.

sight line"were choked up with the "unmitigated abominations," as the reviewers justly styled them, of one of the members of the committee, whom nature had cut out for a scavenger. I had gone in debt for my frames, which were returned
to me at the close of the exhibition smashed to fragments. I
could never afterwards afford to repeat the experiment.
I now began to paint for the dealers, thinking, as I had
but myself to maintain, that I might get on with frugality, and in time tread in the steps of my father.
The
dealers shook their heads at my performances; and one,
with more candour than the rest, produced one of my
father's pieces, bought of my mother for thirty shillings,
which he pronounced "a little gem"-showed me how crisp
was the touch, how pure and sparkling the colour; how
vigorous, and yet how playful, was the handling; and how
simple and graceful was the composition. I endeavoured to
profit by the lesson; but necessity drove me to the market
with my work unfinished, and for three years I maintained
a hapless struggle with privations of all sorts, buoyed up
only by the fervid ambition of excellence in my art. When
the dealers would not bunymy productions, I often left them
in their hands to be sold on commission. When they did
sell, I rarely discovered what they sold for; but from information accidentally obtained with regard to some few, I found
that the average commission was about seventy-five per
cent., leaving the other twenty-five for the artist.
I grew tired of starving in pursuit of improvement, and
in the hopes of mending my fortune started a portrait club.
The members were the frequenters of a Free-and-easy, who
subscribed a shilling a week each, and drew lots for precedence; but they believed in beer, and had no faith in
honesty. As each one received his portrait, he discontinued
his subscription towards the rest, and I received next to
nothing for painting the last half-dozen. The landlord, too,
wished me at Jericho, as his customers took to bemusing
'

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

165

themselves elsewhere, to avoid my eloquent appeals for the
arrears. I bade a final adieu to their ugly faces, with a
feeling of profound contempt as well for the department of
art they encouraged as for the patrons of it, and returned
to my garret, to cogitate some new mode of renewing my
exhausted funds. I made a couple of sketches which occupied me a week, and took them to a pawnbroker, who lent
me. fifteen shillings upon them. I thought, as I threw the
duplicates into the Thames, that though this would hardly
do-taking the cost of canvas and colours into account-I
might manage it by a little contrivance; so I procured halfa-dozen canvases of the same size, traced one subject-comprising a windmill, an old boat, and a white horse-upon
them all, and making one palette do for all, got up the
whole six in ten days. These I pawned for an average of
eight shillings a piece. It was long since my pockets had
been: tightened with such a weight of silver; but with the
new feeling of independence arose one of shame and degradation, which, however, I soon stifled. I repeated the same
subject again and again; and grew so expert at length with
my one picture, that a few hours sufficed to finish it. I kept
a register of my numerous "uncles," taking care never to appear twice at the same place with the same picture. But this
trick could not last. At the annual sale of unredeemed
pledges the walls of the auction-room were covered with a
whole regiment of repetitions, amidst the jeers and hootings
of the assembled bidders. My plan was blown, and I dared
not show my face to a pawnbroker. It was vain to send
pictures to be pledged by another hand, the fellows knew
my touch too well to be deceived. I tried again with original sketches, but it was of no use: everybody believed that
I had a score of reduplcations in store; and I was forced at
length to abandon the pawnbrokers to their discrimination.
I returned again to the dealers, but each and all had a copy
of my windmill, old boat, and white horse hanging upon

166

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S IACK.

hand; and, pronouncing my productions unsaleable, declined
to purchase. In this dilemma I:was driven to the "slaughterhouses," or nightly auctions which are opened weekly at the
West End, and constitute the last wretched refuge and
resource of destitute daubers. Here I figuredfor some time,
wasting my days in unprofitable attempts to meet the demands of a miserable market.:: I grew shabby and dispirited,
and sank into the depths of poverty. Often I could not meet
the expense of canvas, and painted on paper or millboard, or
even on an old shirt stretched upon a worm-eaten strainer,
begged or bought for a few halfpence from the liners'
journeymen. Sometimes, aroused to:exertion by a rekindling
love of art, I would walk up to Hampstead or out to Norwood, and bringing back a subject, paint it up with all my
old enthusiasm; but it availed me nothing': he picture was
generally sacrificed for a few shillings; and even though it
were afterwards sold for a fair price, the profit had been
shared in the knock-out, and I was none the better.
In this exigency I gladly complied with an offer made
me by Mr. Grabb, a carver and gilder, with whom it had
been my wont at times to exchange pictures for frames. In
addition to his regular business, he dealt in pictures to a
great, extent, had a large country connection, and, livihg
himself in Soho, kept an extra shop in the city, where he
always made an extraordinary show of colour and gilding on
dividend days, with the especial design of catching the
"country gabies," as he called them, cash in hand. With
him I boarded and lodged, and received a small weeldy
salary, in return for which I was to occupy myself ten hours
a day in making new pictures or restoring old ones, according to the demand. He had picked me up just in time for
his purpose. A day or two after I entered upon my duties,
he encountered a country baronet at a sale which had lasted
for nearly a week. The man of title had bought between
200 and 300 lots, with the view of decorating a mansion

CONFESS[ONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

167

which he was then building in Sussex; and having no place
at hand to contain his numerous purchases, had accepted
the ready offer of my patron to warehouse them for him for
a season. The purchases arrived on the day of clearance,
and .with them the delighted owner, who had bought a
whole gallery-full for about £500. They were all stacked
in the silvering-room, and my employer was commissioned
to select such of the number as he judged would do credit
to the taste of the possessor, to restore them to a good condition, to regild the frames of such as required it, and to
dispose of the rejected pieces for what they would fetch,
carrying the proceeds as a set-off against his bill. Mr.
Grabb knew perfectly well what to do with such a commission. The next day I was summoned to a consultation, and
having locked the doors, the whole batch was gone over, and
carefully scrutinised with the aid of a bowl of water and a
sponge. All the large pictures (some were as big as the
side of a room), many of which I felt bound to condemn as
worthless, were set aside for repair and framing; while a
select collection, amounting to about thirty of the smallest,
best, and most saleable cabinet sizes, were thrown into a
corner as unworthy of attention. For these, which were
nearly worth all the rest of the collection put together, he
ultimately made an allowance of £15 off his bill, amounting
to several hundreds, the cost of gorgeous frames and gilding
for trumpery of no value. It took me four months to prepare such of the pictures as wanted cleaning for their gilded
jackets, and it would have taken as many years had proper
care and leisure been allowed for the operation; but I was
admonished to follow a very summary process-to get off the
dirt and old varnish from the lights, and to leave the shadows
to shift for themselves, trusting to a good coat of varnish to
blend the whole. One immense sea-fight, which defied all
our solvents to disturb its crust, Grabb undertook himself.
Stripping it from the stretcher, he laid it flat on the silvering-

168

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

slab, and splashing water on its surface, seized a mass of
pumice-stone twice as big as his fist, and scrubbed away with
bare arms, like a housemaid at a kitchen-floor, until admonished by the tinge of the water that he had done enough.
The canvas was then re-strained, and turned over to me to
paint again what he had scoured away. As the whole rigging of a seventy-four was cleai gone, I began the slow
process of renewing it; but he would not hear of that, but
bade me bury everything in a cloud of smoke as the shorter
way of getting over the business. When the whole were
ultimately carted home and hung up in his new residence,
the baronet was delighted with his gallery, and with this
picture in particular, which certainly differed more than any
of the others from its original appearance.
The baronet's commission being now settled and done
with, the rejected pictures were withdrawn from their
hiding-place and confided with many precautions to my
most careful treatment. I laboured con amore in their
restoration, and G rabb reaped a little fortune by their disposal. He kept me well employed. Every picture which
came in to be framed or repaired, if he judged the subject
saleable, was transferred to me for copying, and sorry indeed
should I be to swear that the original invariably found its
way back to the owner.
Soon after my domiciliation at Grabb's my uncle left
Charlotte Street, and with a large cargo of English pictures
emigrated to New York, where he sold his venture to good
advantage. In one of the southern cities he found patronage
and a wife, and grew into consideration ere he died.
I remained seven years with Grabb, and during that
period attained a wonderful facility in the production of
copies, and so close an acquaintance with the method and
handling of some of the living London artists, as occasionally
perplexed even themselves. This talent my employer turned
to good account by selling forgeries of mine as the original

CONFESSIONS

OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S

HACK.

169

sketches of painters of note and reputation; and at the
decease of any one of them he supplied me with canvas and
panels procured from the colourmen they had dealt with,
and set me about the manufacture of sketches and unfinished
pictures, which were readily bought up as relics of celebrated
geniuses.
At the close of my seventh year business fell short. True,
there was plenty for me to do, but owing to distress in the
manufacturing districts, the sale of pictures, as is invariably
the case at such seasons, very much declined. Still my
principal managed to get rid of his stock, though not in the
regular way of business: he packed off a portion of his best
goods to country agents, and to old customers on approval,
and crammed the shop in the city to overflowing, where also
he took to sleeping at night, leaving me and the shop-boy
sole guardians of the house in Soho. One morning about
two o'clock, while soundly sleeping in my garret, I was
aroused from my rest by a thundering noise at my room
door, and the affrighted cries of the boy, calling upon me to
arise and save myself, for the house was on fire. I dashed
out of bed, contrived to huddle on a portion of my clothes,
and opened the door. The room was instantly filled with
smoke; the boy had already escaped through the trap-door
in the roof, which, being left open, acted as a flue to the fire,
the flames of which were rapidly ascending the stairs. I
had no time for reflection, nor sufficient presence of mind to
snatch, as I might have done, the few pounds I had hoarded
from my drawer; but scrambling after him as I best might,
found myself in a few minutes shivering on the roof of a
neighbour's house, in my shirt and trousers, now my sole
worldly possessions. A servant-girl let us in at the garret
window, and I immediately despatched the boy for his
master, whom, however, I did not see till the morning, when
he coolly informed me that he was a ruined man, and that I
must look out for some other employer. He paid me a small

170

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

arrear of wages due, and gave me a faded suit of his own to
begin the world afresh. I may add that-Grabb subsequently
received two thousand pounds insurance money;that in two
years after he was so unfortunate as to be burned out again,
and received fifteen hundred; that he was overtaken by the
same calamity twice afterwards in New York; and returning
again to London, was again burned out: whereupon the
office in which he had insured politely informed him that he
might recover the money if he could in a court of justicethey should not else pay it.. He never instituted any proceedings, but carried on business for ten years without
insurance and without accident.
I could not afford to remain long idle; and being now
pretty well known to a certain portion of the trade, I was
not long of obtaining employment. My next engagement
was with Sapper, who kept a shop for the sale of-pictures,
together with large warehouses, in the neighbourhood of
Covent Garden. I thought myself pretty well versed in the
art and mystery of picture-malking, and conceived that after
my long experience under Grabb I bad little if anything left
to learn. This worthy undeceived me effectually, In my
former place I had been the only hand; here I found three
companions, each far more experienced and more clever than
myself. One, a gentleman-like old fellow, painted nothing
but Morlands from one year's end to the other. He had
been a contemporary of that eccentric genius, and had
mastered his style so effectually that he would have deceived
even me had I met with his forgeries elsewhere. He was
provided with a complete portfolio of every piece of Morland's which had ever been engraved, besides a considerable
number of his original chalk drawings ;he had, moreover,
pentagraphed outlines of the known size of the original
paintings, which outlines were transferred to the canvas in a
few minutes by means of tracing-paper, and painted in from
the prints, which were all slightly tinted after the originals

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

171

for his guidance. A man of about five-and-forty, a Manchester artist, of thorough training and admirable skill in
his department, did duty every morning from eight till
twelve o'clock as the celebrated Greuze; after that hour he
disappeared, to attend to his own practice as a portraitpainter. I recognised at once in his work the source of the
numerous admirable transcripts of that master which I had
been for years in the habit of occasionally encountering both
The third was a
in sale-rooms and private collections.
Sapper had picked up on a picture-tour
Dutchman, whom
in Holland, and engaged from admiration of his marvellous
imitations of Teniers, whose works, with other of a similar
school, he was constantly employed in imitating with
astonishing fidelity and success.
Among these companions I was directed to set up my
easel and commence operations; and a small picture of
Patrick Nasmyth was put into my hand to be copied in
duplicate. I was directed to mix a certain substance with
every tint that was laid on with any thickness to insure its
drying speedily "as hard as a brick," lest the finger-nail of
a wide-awake customer should detect the softness of new
colour. The panels put into my hands, though snow-white
with the prepared ground on the one side, were black with
age on the other, and spotted over here and there with the
cracked sealing-wax impressions of well-known connoisseurs, to intimate that the picture I was about to commence
had already passed through the hands of several collectors
of repute. When I had finished them, both being done
within a week, they were, after a few days' drying, slightly
glazed with a weak solution of liquorice to give them tone:
one was varnished, framed, and readily sold from the
window; the other laid by in a garret, to await, with a
hundred more, its turn for exportation. My next job was
a magnificent Cuyp which had, not many weeks before, been
knocked down by auction for eight hundred guineas, and

172

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

which was confided to Sapper for the purpose of removing
the old varnish and substituting new, and for framing. As
nothing else was required to be done, the picture might
have been returned to the proprietor within a week or ten
days; but Sapper determined from the moment he saw it
to possess a facsimile, and I was set about the manufacture
of one forthwith. A panel was prepared of the precise age,
from three oak planks selected from the stores of a dealer in
old houses, and dyed to the required tint by a strong infusion
of tobacco. By means of new bread kneaded in the hand,
the two broad burgomaster's seals on the back were counterfeited beyond the possibility of detection; and I commenced
upon the surface with all the industry and skill I was master
of, stimulated to the task by the prospect of an extra guinea.
The picture had been promised to the owner in a week,
my employer knowing well enough that it would take me
four or five weeks at least to make the copy, It was in
vain that one message after another -came to urge the return
of the picture, and that the owner himself drove up in his
carriage, and remonstrated in no measured terms with
Sapper, and threatened him with the interference of the
law. The knave had a reply ever ready upon his lips:
"He was determined to do justice to so exquisite a work
of art, and he would not, he could not, be induced to hurry
it; his reputation would suffer should any mischief happen
to the painting, which he would prevent, in this case at
least, even at the risk of disobliging his patron." At length,
after nearly six weeks' delay, I had, completed the copy;
and then Sapper himself, in less than an hour, licked off all
the old varnish with a wisp of wadding steeped in " the
doctor," gave it a new coat of mastic, clapped it into an
elegant and appropriate frame, and despatched a note to
the proprietor requesting his attendance and approval. He
came, and was delighted with the aspect of his picture;
while the dealer, with a thousand modest apologies for the

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE DEALERIS HACK.

173

delay, assured him that the task had been one of great
labour and anxiety, both to him and me, and that he could
not, consistently with justice to the master, have accomplished it sooner. The wealthy connoisseur swallowed his
lies with evident relish and satisfaction, reiterated his thanks
again and again for the marvellous manner in which the picture had been got up, and paid at the same time a bouncing
bill for a process which a crown would have amply recompensed. There remained now nothing to be done to the
copy in order to render it a tolerable facsimile of the original,
but to imitate the close reticulation of cracks-the ineffaceable work of time-which covered every square inch of the
surface. This was accomplished in the following manner:
-After the copy had stood to dry for a fortnight, by which
time, thanks to certain nostrums ground up with the colours,
the whole had grown as hard as a pantile, it was taken
down, slightly toned with a warm brown to give it age, and
when again dry, carefully coated with size; the composition
of which, as it is already too well known among the knaves
of the profession, and can be of no manner of utility to any
honest man, I may be excused from explaining. This was
no sooner tolerably dry, than it was followed by a liberal
coating of varnish floated over the surface, and left to harden
in a room free from dust. The inevitable result from such
a process is, that the varnish is no sooner set than it begins
to crack, owing to the expansion of the understratum of
size; and this cracking may be regulated by an experienced
hand, in varying the proportions of the ingredients used in
compounding the size, and in other ways, so as to give rise
to fissures, of all widths, from the thickness of a hair, as
exhibited on the panels of the Dutchmen, to that of a
crown-piece, as they are beheld in the present condition of
most of the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds. With the width
of the cracks the size of the reticulations also varies, ranging
from the diameter of a small shot to that of the palm of the

174

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

hand. When very fine, the cracks are not visible until
made so by rubbing impurities into them, for which purpose
the dust which settles upon a polished table, wiped up with
an old, silk handkerchief slightly oiled, is usually preferred.
The difference between a picture thus cracked by artifice
and one cracked by the operation of years or centuries
cannot, other things being equal, be possibly discerned by
the closest inspection. The only way to get at the imposture would be to remove the varnish, either by friction or
solvents, when the fissures would be found in the true picture to extend through the paint, while from the manufactured copy they would disappear with the varnish-a rule
however, which would not be without exceptions.
One morning our old Morland found himself standing
still, not from any want of subjects or demand for them, but
because the young fellow whose business it was to line
canvases and prepare panels for us all to work upon, had
been out on one of his periodical drunken bouts, and had
nothing ready for him. Sapper, coming up and seeing him
idle, requested him to go to a broker's in Red Lion Street
and " crab" 'a picture for him, as he wanted to buy it.
When the old fellow had gone off on his errand, I asked
the Greuze what he was gone after. "Oh," said he, "the
broker wants £10 for a bit of Gainsborough, and the
governor wants it for fifty shillings-that's all." I soon
found that " crabbing" is the art of putting a man wanting
judgment in the article he deals in out of conceit with his
goods. Two or three accidental inquiries, with demonstrations of amazement at the " enormous"'price asked, are found
materially to lower the demands of the seller. In this
instance Sapper eventually succeeded in getting the picture
he wanted at his own price, and after disposing of several
copies in various quarters, ultimately sold it again for its
full value.
He sold pictures on commission; and these he managed,

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S

HACK.

175

when it was worth his while, with a complex kind of adroitness which is worth recording. I shall chronicle one instance: a gentleman who had given £800 for a famous
production of one of our first living artists, grew discontented with its too great size, and sent it to Sapper to be
disposed of, professing himself willing to lose £100 by the
sale, but not more. Sapper offered it for £1000, and at
length obtained a bidding of £700, which, as be observed,
would have left nothing for himself. He immediately wrote
to the owner, informing him that he had an offer of £200,
and a fine Claude, which he requested him to come and
inspect, as he did not like to refuse the offer without the
owner's sanction. Meanwhile, one of Hofiand's beautiful
transcripts of Claude, procured in exchange at the nominal
price of sixty guineas, was mounted on the easel, and, covered
with a curtain, awaited the inspection of the victim. He
came, and deceived by the really fine execution of the picture, the counterfeited cracks of age, the palpably Italian
style of lining, in which Sapper was skilled to a miracle,
and the Roman frame and gilding, concluded the transaction,
giving the rogue a small commission for his trouble, who, in
addition to that, pocketed the difference between £500 and
the value of the pretended Claude, which would have been
well sold at £50.
Though Sapper's house was filled with works of art of
every imaginable description, overflowing with pictures
from the cellar to the garret, including every species of
rubbish gathered from the holes and corners of half Europe,
yet the contents of his dwelling afforded but an inadequate
idea of the extent of his stock. He had "plants" in the
hands of numerous petty agents, the owners of small shops
in suburban highways, who sold for a trifling percentage.
He had here a Madonna and there a Holy Family, in the
keeping of a lone widow or decayed spinster, whispered
about as pieces of great value which the holders were corn-

176

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

pelled to part with from the pressure of domestic misfortune
or embarrassment; he had traps and baits lying in wait for
the inevitable though long-deferred rencontre of customers
whom bitter experience had rendered wary, and who had
long ceased buying in the regular market; and he had
collections snugly warehoused in half the large towns of the
empire, waiting but the wished-for crisis of commercial
prosperity to be catalogued and sold as the unique collection
of some lately defunct connoisseur, removed to
for
convenience of sale.
Among the acres of what he called his gallery pictures
was one with an area of some hundred square feet, upon
which he had bestowed the names of Rubens and Snyders.
It had hung for years upon hand, and was at length disposed of by the following ingenious ruse:-A gentleman
who had appeared at different times desirous of treating for
it-now negotiating an exchange, now chaffering for a cash
price-hovering on the edge of a resolution, like Prior's
malefactor on the gallows-cart-at length absented himself,
and withdrawing on a visit to B, appeared to have relinquished the idea of dealing. Sapper, knowing that a
picture-sale was shortly coming off in the town to which his
dallying customer had flown, and knowing, too, that he
could do as he chose with the auctioneer, who was an old
chum, followed close upon the heels of the tardy bidder,
taking the enormous picture with him. As the cunning
rogue had calculated, the instincts of the would-be-buyer
led him to the sale-room, where his astonishment was unbounded at beholding the picture he had so long coveted
at length condemned to the hammer. On the following day,
when the sale came on, Sapper, who had not shown his face
in the town, lay ensconced in a snug box behind the fence
over which the lots were consecutively hoisted, and here,
concealed from view, he ran up the picture against the
eager bidder to the full sum he had offered for it in London,

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

177

and bought it in against him in the name Of an Irish nobleman. So soon as the doors were shut, thepicture was again
off to London, and the next day appeared inits usual place
on the wall of the staircase. In a fortnight after the gentleman walks into the shop, exclaiming: "Ha, Sapper, so you
have parted with the picture-you might as well have
closed with my offer." "I don't understand you," said the
other-" I have parted with no picture that I know of which
you had. any inclination for."
"I mean the Rubens and Snyders," replied the gentleman; "it was sold at B-. about a fortnight ago, and
fetched about what I offered for it. I must know, for I was
there myself, and bid for it."
"I don't pretend to contradict you, sir," retorted Sapper;
"all I know is, that the picture you speak of has never been
out of my house, and, what is more, is not likely to go, unless I get my price for it. Now I think of it, there was a
young fellow from B - up here last summer, who gave
me ten pounds for permission to copy it; and a capital copy
he made: had I known he was so good a hand I should not
have let him do it for the money. You will find the picture
in its place if you like to step and look at it."
Up walks the bewildered gentleman, and can scarcely believe his eyes at beholding the old favourite in its old place.
Sapper follows with a sponge and water, and cleaning down
the face of the painting, expresses his astonishment that any
one should mistake a copy, however cleverly done, for such
a fine work as that; adding, that if the copy brought so
good a sum under the hammer, what must be the actual
value of the original ? The inference was inevitable, and
the speedy result was the consummation of the purchase,
not without some show of unwillingness on the part of
Sapper, who appeared impressed with the notion that he
w as submitting to a tremendous sacrifice.
I cannot, nor need I, continue these details. I have said

178

CONFESSIONS OF A PICTURE-DEALER'S HACK.

enough to warn the unwary, and to arouse the watchfulness
of the wise. Is it wonderful that the moral atmosphere in
which I have lived, and moved, and had my being, should
have had the effect upon my mind which I have described at
the commencement of this paper? When connoisseurs and
critics stand gasping with breathless raptures in contemplation of slimy mixtures of megilp and burned bones; when
they solemnly invoke the shades of the mighty dead, and
ejaculate their maudlin rhapsodies in reverential whispers, as
though hushed to silence by the spirit of departed genius, in
the presence of a rascally forgery perpetrated for a wage of
thirty shillings-what marvel if one whom hunger and
necessity have driven to deceit should lose all capacity for
the proper appreciation of art or nature either, and should
at last be able to look at both only through the prostituted
means and materials which during a whole lifetime have been
the daily instruments of deceit ?
What I would inculcate is not far to seek: he who buys
a picture should never speculate beyond his judgment; and
if he would encourage living art, should do so in the studio
of the artist.

FLOWERS IN LONDON.
THE love of nature is not to be trodden out of the human

heart by the conventional forms and usages of the world.
Amid the most matter-of-fact and even repulsive aspect of
business, with all its turmoils and anxieties, its annoyances
and discomforts, the idea of her simple grace and loveliness
The
will intrude and claim a place and find a welcome.
contemplation of beauty is to the millions, who perhaps are
but very partially conscious of the fact, a necessity of their
lives; and a very benevolent necessity it is, for more reasons than we have space to mention-and for the reason
especially that it prompts every right-minded man to harmonise his own conduct with the ideal which nature exhibits, and silently admonishes him that his actions, to be
beautiful, must be good, and honest, and true. It is impossible to say to what extent the exquisite flowers that
summer sheds in profusion around our path are our friends
and benefactors. They speak a language that all understand, and love to listen to---coming, like angels of mercy,
to deliver a message of peace; and dying, as we gaze upon
them, to teach us how feeble and fragile are the loveliest
and the brightest of all created things.
The universal love for flowers in this great metropolis is
a passion that admits of no question, but the proof of which
greets us daily in our walks. Even in the smoky resorts of
the city, the choicest productions of the conservatory and
the garden are visible, during the season, in every street,
and almost every house. The very back-slums and abodes'
N

2

180

FLOWERS IN LONDON.

of the poor are green with dusty mignonette or lanky geraniums without a blossom, lifting their tops towards the light
of the sky; and if we walk into the suburbs, we find the
residences of the comfortable classes brilliant with hues that
are never spread on a painter's palette, or on the arch of
the rainbow. In this respect the aspect of modern London
differs immensely from what it was a generation back.
Then, the myrtle (now almost an exploded plant), a few
old-fashioned geraniums, and hyacinths in coloured glasses,
with here and there a ranunculus, constituted nearly the
whole of the portable garden which adorned the windowsills and balconies of our sires or rather of their betterhalves-for at that time of day flowers were held to be beneath the notice of gentlemen. Now, so widely has an improved taste extended, that almost every new house of any
pretensions to comfort has its conservatory appended to it,
and a new class, or rather many new classes, of traders and
dealers in flowers have risen up to meet the growing demand
for them. Walking some time ago in a fashionable district
at the West End of the town, we came suddenly in front of
a spectacle transcending in beauty and brilliancy all that we
had ever seen or imagined in floral luxuriance. It was a
familyresidence about sixty feet in height, and not less than
thirty in width, the entire street-front of which, from the
roof to the pavement, was one enormous and magnificent
bouquet. From the battlements to the kitchen-window,
level with the road, the whole was a monster flower-stand,
crammed in every part with the finest specimens which the
horticultural art could produce of the productions of all
climes, all growing in pots and arranged in shelves one above
another, concealing the whole of the brickwork and nearly
the whole of the windows of the mansion: their delicate
odour filled the street.
The passion for flowers, of which the above remarkable
demonstration is the greatest existing proof we happen to

FLOWERS IN LONDON.

181
1

know of, betrays itself in London in a two-fold manner-by
the purchase of flowers full-blown and by their home-culture.
The morning markets, and Covent Garden market especially,
daily supply the flowers which, sold in shops or hawked
through the city and suburbs, are disposed of for personal
or domestic decoration to the two million inhabitants. Some
idea may be formed of the quantities used for this latter
purpose, from the fact that, at:
asingle entertainment given
by an aristocratic family to their friends, twenty-five or
thirty pounds is no extraordinary charge for the flowers that
fill the bouquet-vases scattered through the rooms or adorning the banqueting-table. We may remark, too, that London
markets supply the whole kingdom with the choicest flowers,
when wanted for festive occasions. We have seen bouquets
for wedding parties adroitly packed in tins, and sent by express trains into the heart of Scotland, at the charge of a
guinea each; their stems being embedded in moist wadding,
they arrive perfectly fresh after their journey, and often travel
hundreds of miles after the feast is over, borne off as presents
by the guests. In the immediate neighbourhood of London
are grown the finest flowers of all kinds that our climate can
be made to produce ; and so active is speculation in this
branch of commerce, that the growers will give almost any
price for a new specimen-and few indeed are the rarities in
the Royal Botanical Garden, which have any claims to floral
beauty, which may not be bought for a price in the nurseries
surrounding the capital.
It is owing to this commercial
value of flowers that the gardens throughout the country,
both public and private, present such a different appearance
to what they did thirty years ago, and are so wonderfully
enriched by new treasures.
When the fuchsia, now a
favourite with every cottager, first came to this countryhardly more than twenty-five years back-fortunes were
made by its cultivation, five guineas each being demanded
and received for thriving roots, which may now be bought

182

FLOWERS IN LONDON.

for sixpence. Though the rose will not flourish well very
near the city, yet roses are grown by the acre at no great
distance, and their leaves are sold to the chemists by the
hundredweight for the extraction of the attar, the most exquisite of all odours, and the most expensive. Moss-roses
are retailed in the streets in immense numbers, by women,
who, in the precincts of the Inns of Court or of the Exchange,
and in the more gentlemanly resorts of business, find a conThe violet, naturally a spring
tinual demand for them.
transformed by the spirit of commerce into
flower, has been
a perennial one; and the violet-girl accosts you at all seasons
of the year, even in the depth of winter, with her dark-blue
posies buried in scraps of letter-paper. Wall-flowers, cabbage-roses, pinks, and carnations, &c., &c., mingled with
sweet-smelling herbs, come to town in waggon-loads, and find
a place in the street-markets along with the roots and vegetables of the humbler classes, and are as readily and as certainly purchased by them as the greens and turnips for the
Sunday's dinner. A dealer, standing on the kerb-stone of a
frequented thoroughfare, will sometimes, on a favourable
Saturday, sell from three to four hundred bunches of mixed
flowers at a penny a bunch.
It is no marvel that the attempt to cultivate flowers
should grow out of this general partiality in their favour. In
consequence of this attempt, London plays very much the
part of a general cemetery for the floral race. Millions upon
millions are brought here from year to year to die. So soon
as winter shows signs of retreating, come the cheap spring
roots-primroses, polyanthuses, London-pride, and all that
cottage-garden tribe so dear to the lovers of the countryside. These are cried about the town in hand-carts, and are
followed soon after by flowering roots-early geraniums and
rising seedlings. The travelling gardener pursues his trade
throughout the summer, and is always welcome, notwithstanding the awkward fact, that-from one cause or other,

FLOWERS IN LONDON.1

183

partly no doubt from doctoring, to get his flowers earlier to
market-his merchandise is astonishingly short-lived. Lookings to our own dealings with this worthy-for we cannot
do without flowers-the residuum of ten years' commercial
transactions with him resolves itself into ten plants, two dead
and three dying of this year's purchase, and a hundred or so
of empty pots buttressing the dust-box in the garden.
Having the disadvantage of smoke and soot to contend
with, it seems strange that a dweller within the sound of
Bow Bells should enter the lists against the floriculturist of
the country, and compete with him for the prize at the
flower-show, which occasionally comes off in the neighbourhood. Yet he does it, and, as we can testify, is often successful, as we have seen him carry off the prize more than
once against all competitors. We had no idea, however,
until properly instructed on the subject, of the labour and
watchfulness entailed upon one who undertakes such a competition in a suburban garden of some forty feet by twenty.
Our informant, who carried off a dahlia prize, did not allow
himself, for the last three weeks preceding the show, to sleep
more than an hour and a half at a time. Twice every three
hours during the night did he descend to the garden iii his
night-gown, and, lantern in hand, examined every leaf and
spray of the flower in training, in search of slugs or earwigs,
a single nibble from either of which would have ruined his
hopes. He told us, with breathless interest, that he only
saved his credit at last by catching a piratical earwig in the
very act of assaulting his flower as the quarters chimed halfpast two that very morning.
The poor fellow wrought
sixteen hours a day at shoe-making, but he declared he
should hardly have forgiven himself if he had allowed the
earwigs to defeat him.
We look upon the growing love for flowers as an evidence
that we are getting on in a morally right direction. In the
good old times," when bull-baiting was a popular sport,

184

FLOWERS IN LONDON.

and badger-drawing a gentlemanly pastime, there were no
popular flower-shows; and the recreations of the artisan
classes were more marked by the love of cruelty than the
love of nature, which flower-shows are calculated to impart.
The increase of public extramural cemeteries, where flowers
are always planted in profusion, and droop their beautiful
petals over the dead, may be one cause why we have learned
to prize them more than we did. May we prize them more
and more; and may our words and deeds be flowers, and
smell sweet and blossom when we are dust.

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN.
"GIVE us a brown, sir-O do, sir-do, sir, give us a
brown, sir-had no wittles since isterday arternoon, sir!"
Such was the appeal of a ragged urchin of some nine
years of age, as he skipped before me with shoeless feet in
the mud, which he had made an ineffectual attempt to
scrape out of my path with the worn stump of a birch-broom.
The boy look6d pale and hungry, though sharp, eager, and
vivacious as a ferret; and it seemed probable that he spoke
the truth.
" No victuals !-how comes that? Have you no father?"
" Yes I have, sir, and mother, too; but father broke his
leg off the scaffold, and mother can't get no work."
"And what does your mother work at ?"
"Her chores."
"Her chores !"-That's a text, I am inclined to think,
from which a pretty lengthy sermon might be preached by
any man given to long-winded orations. The boymeant to
say, that his mother sought, by acting as char-woman to any
one that would employ her, to supply the place .of her
crippled husband. What are the special duties of a charwoman, I do not pretend to be able to define with perfect
accuracy; but I do know, that just as the profession of a
schoolmistress is the refuge for destitute females of a certain
class, so is that of char-woman a like refuge for another
class. It is a profession which involves the performance of
duties of a remarkably practical kind, to which no degree of
eclat, no prestige of notoriety is attached: nobody ever

186

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN,

heard of an honorary char-woman. Its emoluments have
never, to my knowledge, been the subject of statistical inquiry, or its functions of regulation by authorities official or
magisterial. It has been insinuated, that while other professionals have to study and struggle in order to rise into a
position and sphere of practice, the candidates for the office
of char-woman qualify themselves for the proper performance of its duties by a species of inverse progression, which,
in the course of time, and by the lapse of opportunity, leads
down to it--that, in fact, it cannot be approached by any
upward movement at all. Does a woman fail in the vocation
of cook, then, assuming that of housemaid, fail in that toothen, transforming herself into a maid-of-all-work, fail again?
-she is qualified as a char-woman from that time forth.
Does a sempstress, weary of the everlasting "stitch, stitch,
stitch," and perhaps half-blinded by the perpetual strain
upon her eyes, abandon the needle and thread, and hopelessly resign herself to fate ?-fate deposits her at once in the
rank of char-woman. Is the wife of an artisan or a labouring-man overtaken by adversity ?-is her husband laid up by
,sickness ?-has he abandoned her to go a gold-digging at
the antipodes ?-is he dead ? or, worse still, is he alive, and
daily drunk ?-in either of these cases, the poor woman, as a
matter of course, enlists as a char-woman. Besides these,
there may be, for aught I know, a hundred different tracks
marked out on the chart of woman's eventful life, which land
the poor tempest-tossed voyager at this undesirable haven.
At any rate, the profession is one which, though lacking in
any very inviting attractions, is undergoing continual augmentation, and, consequently, suffers in its emoluments from
continual competition.
Owing to the very various sources from which the ranks
of this numerous sisterhood are recruited, it is difficult to
define, with anything like exactness, the, physiology of the
individual. You may regard her, if you choose, as a devout

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN.

187

worshipper at the domestic altar: she is often upon her
knees before it; but she prefers a very noisy, clamorous kind
of adoration; and her piety is of the abstract species, not
paid to any particular penates, but to the household gods of
universal man or woman who may be standing in need of
her ceremonial rites. Candour compels the declaration, that
the char-woman prefers the service of man, young or old,
unmarried or widowed, to that of her own sex. Not that
she is to be accused of any design upon his personal liberty;
but she counts more upon his amiable ignorance of household
mysteries, and the permanence of household stores-especially of such small matters as fall unavoidably under her
control in the course of the cleansing, soaping, rubbing,
scrubbing, polishing, and brightening of the sanctuary of home
-concerning all which particulars, she generously supposes
him too much of a gentleman to demand a fractional account.
Where there is a mistress, the credit and the privilege
of these little responsibilities do not devolve on the charwoman.
The costume of this sisterhood is as various as their character and antecedents, and may be regarded, perhaps, inr
some degree as an indication of both. In general, however,
it may be remarked, that their outer integuments have a tendency to coagulate in tumours and amorphous bundles about
the loins, and at the same time to trail sweepingly at the
heels. I have heard it affirmed, that the celebrated Dorothy
Draggletail, of harmonious notoriety, was a char-woman; and
a friend suggests that she might be taken as a type of the
class. I am not so sure upon that matter; the class being
so very numerous, and the good woman who at this
moment is clattering about the kitchen below, being a
type of a, very different order-not only an example
of neatness in her own person, but in the persons of two
young fatherless children, whom she maintains by her
arduous labour. She happens to be the only teetotal char-

188

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN.

woman that ever came beneath my notice, however; and as
I am a bachelor of fifty, and, in a small way, a man of
observation to boot, I suspect this fact may be regarded as
evidence that total abstinence is not extensively practised
among them. But Mrs. Pottler, like a woman who has seen
the world, makes a market of her temperance-and who shall
blame her for that, seeing that so many foul wares are
brought to market, and fetch a high price ? In demanding
an extra sixpence a day, in lieu of beer and gin, she practically asserts the value of the virtues which all praise, whether
they exercise them or not; and her employers, in acceding
to her demand, I am persuaded, lose nothing by the compact.
The rarity of total abstinence among these untiring vestals, may be due to the very lowliness of their lot, which
drives them to seek consolation in such brief joys as they can
snatch from the present, for the loss of those vanished hopes
which have long ceased to gild their prospects of the future.
I have had opportunity of noting, during some of those
great domestic revolutions which take place occasionally in
the best regulated households, that when two or more charwomen get together, whether it be around the tea-pot or the
black bottle, their conversation is invariably of a melancholy
and retrospective kind; and if the sitting be continued long,
and the libation be alcoholic, the melancholy deepens, and
the retrospection becomes dramatic and tragic. Like their
ancient friend and brother, honest Dogberry, they have had
their losses-far be it from us to say that they have deserved
them. They are always unaliimous in deploring the departure of the "better days" which they once knew, and of
which they cherish a remembrance all the dearer to them
that they know they are gone for ever-thus exercising,
without knowing it, a species of philosophy which the
serious and didactic poets have long been striving to inculcate. It is owing to these sentimental remembrances, it may

THE LONDON CHAR-WOMAN.

189

be, that the modest stimulants which excite and exalt
others, depress them; and that the most pardonable excess
makes them often maudlin, but never merry. So I have
come to the conclusion, that though the mass of the profession differ physiologically more, perhaps, than do the members of any other profession that could be named, they are
united by one remarkable characteristic-namely, that of resignation; a virtue, if it be a virtue, which, in these fast and
stirring days, they almost exclusively monopolise.
Scandal is often busy with the subject of our sketch. Deficits in househould stores, if they cannot be otherwise
accounted for, are unscrupulously set down to their agency.
They are accused of surreptitiously meddling where they
have no concern-of wandering unconsciously into beer-cel:
lars, and groping mesmerically in wine-bins-of exercising a
comprehensive philanthropy among a numerous circle of
relatives at the expense of their employers-of coming to
work in the morning thin, spare, and cylindrical, and of
departing at night in an unsightly bulbous, tuberculous condition-and of fifty other things, which I hold it invidious
to set down. To all such charges, I turn, on principle, a
deaf ear. The man or woman either who cannot submit to
be cheated a little, is not fit to live in this world, and need not
reckon upon my sympathy. 'Tis true, I should like to see
that pair of slippers again which cost me ten-and-sixpence,
and which disappeared unaccountably after I had worn them
twice; and if the good woman who preceded Mrs. Pottler in
the Saturday sovereignty of the basement-floor of the
respectable house in which I lodge, did remove them by
mistake in one of those fits of abstraction to which I know
she was unhappily subject, and will return them to me "per
Parcels Delivery," I shall be happy to pay the carriage, and
will retain a grateful remembrance of the act of restitution.

WHAT'S O'CLOCK IN CHEAPSIDE
THERE is no scarcity of clocks in Cheapside, with St.
Paul's at one end, and Bow Church not far from the othercertainly not; but we mean to show that independent of these
and all horological contrivances,, that famous arena of traffic
can boast of certain social phenomena indicative of the time
of day. We shall glance at a few of them very briefly.
No matter whether it be a day of hail, rain, snow, sleet, or
fog-of star-lighted winter or sun-lighted summer-here we
are in Cheapside, which is submitting to its daily scrape;
having been lathered with-mud all day yesterday, it is
undergoing a clean shave in order to a presentable appearance
to-day. Scavengers are brushing and scraping up the filth
and refuse of twenty-four hours, and loading their heavy
carts with the gold of London streets-gold at least it will be
to the farmer in the shape of manure to his exhausted land.
In the midst of their labour comes the regular tramp of the
police, in Indian file, to relieve guard, by which everybody
who knows anything about it knows that it is six o'clock in
the morning in Cheapside, even though St. Paul's should
cease to wag his metallic tongue, and Bow bells be be-witched
into dumb-bells.
But the day has grown older, and Cheapside has put on a
new face; commerce has thrown aside her mask of wooden
shutters, and the wealth of both worlds is peeping out at
windows; shops are sweeping and garnishing; genteel
young men and comely damsels exhibit themselves at fulllength, framed in burnished brass and plate glass-they are

WHAT'S O'CLOCK IN CHEAPSIDE?

191

busy liming twigs for fluttering vanity. Here on the pavement comes a procession of standard-bearers, an army with
timber banners, levied in the east to invade the west-a
battalion of slop-shop militia, commissioned to fight the
battle of cheap pantaloons under the very nose of fashion.
Ragged recruits they are, very much in want of the garniture
which they are doomed to puff: they defile slowly round St.
Paul's Churchyard, and vanish to their work.-Now sets in
a current of omnibuses towards the Bank, all crammed
within, and covered without, with business faces. At every
turn they stop and discharge a part of their cargo of clerks,
managers, time-keepers, book-keepers, and cash-keepers,
and then, with a convulsive bang of the door, roll on again.
Others having set down their passengers, exemplify the
truth of the old adage, " Empty vessels make the greatest
sound," and come sauntering westward, emitting lusty cries
of "Charing Cross !" "Sloane Street !" "Westminster !"
"Angel!" "Highbury !" &c., &c., to which places very few
people just now want to go. Of course the London reader
knows well enough what's o'clock now, and does not require
to be informed that it is nearer TEN than nine in the morning.
But the old edacx'rerum has bitten another mouthful out of
the day, and we come again for a third look at Cheapside.
And what a spectacle it is! the whole broad thoroughfare is
one mass of life, as full of activity as Thomas Carlyle's Egyptian pot of tame vipers, who had nothing else to do all their
lives long, but each one to struggle to get his head above his
fellows-which after all is very much what this city pot of
human beings are about, if the truth were told. One wonders
whence came all this marvellous concourse of eager energies.
Carts, waggons, carriages, gigs, dog-carts, phaetons, drays,
with a score or two of omnibuses, choke up the roadway,
while the foot pavement is hidden almost every inch from
view by the swarming pedestrians. Here and there a heavy
team stands patiently waiting at one of the narrow turnings

192

WHAT'S O'CLOCK IN CHEAPSIDE ?

from the main channel, for an opportunity to dash forward
into the living stream. The rattle and rumble of wheels,
which has been increasing momentarily since the dawn, has
swollen into a deafening crash, continuous and unbroken as
the roar of a cataract. Every face you meet is alive with
interest; hand, heart, and head are worldng while day
From some of the side streets and from narrow
lasts.
entrances of warehouses you see working-men and porters
with paper caps and aprons rolled round the waist, making
the best of their way to the cook-shop or the coffee-house,
by which you learn that the big bell of St. Paul's, whose note
could not pierce to your ear through the roar of traffic, has
just struck ONE.
Another interval.-The din of commerce continues without
an instant's pause, but the symptoms of ebb-tide begin to be
visible to the experienced eye. - The 'busses which have been
crawling at the picking-up pace for the last five or six hours
as they passed towards the west, now drive smartly off,
crammed, it is said with bulls and bears, whose feeding time
is at hand. Here and there the smart "turn-out" of the
merchant or capitalist-phaeton, brougham, or close chaise,
drawn by a spanking grey, darts off rapidly from the scene of
action-a token to everybody that business is over for the
day on the Stock Exchange, and that it is FouR o'clock.
Two hours later, and the stroke of six is heralded by signs
which, standing at the junction of Cheapside with St.
Martin's-le-Grand, it is amusing to witness. Then the steps
of the Post Office are besieged by a motley class of the
population. Enormous bags of damp paper and printer's ink
run on very little feet, and plunge themselves head-foremost
into yawning receptacles; grave gentlemen forget their
gravity, and hasten with long strides to deposit their epistolary contributions; lanky runners dart forth from dark
places and narrow short-cuts, and while the hour is yet
striking save by a second the inevitable post. Mail carts

WHAT'S 0'CLOCK IN CHEAPSIDE

193
1

drive up from all quarters, and postmen with corpulent bags
from the district offices flock rapidly and silently to the grand
centre of a nation's correspondence.
Again-and Cheapside is illumined with a thousand jets
of gas; the throng of foot-passengers is reduced one half or
more, and is visibly diminishing in numbers every minute.
Those that yet remain are mostly of a different class from
the eager crowds of the morning. The gorgeous display of
the shop-windows under the vivid artificial glare, collects a
nightly assemblage of admiring spectators and purchasers.
Offices and counting-houses are closed, and the labourers of
the desk and labourers of all ranks find relaxation and refreshment in the enjoyment of an out-door stroll. The noise
of the wheels, though unceasing, is no longer deafening; yet
to our thinking, is much more suggestive and impressive than
at its greatest uproar, because the ear, no longer overwhelmed
by the surrounding crash, is at liberty to catch the fardistant and portentous hum of sound which, from every
quarter of the metropolis, surges heavily in the upper air.
Now a sudden wall of darkness bars the breadth of the way;
the print-shop has dropped its porteullis of patent shutters;
and now you may see on either side long wooden ones rise
out of the ground, and men come forth with iron bars not at
all fit for toothpicks, so please, friend porter, to keep them
out of our mouths-and now you know it is NINE o'clock in
the evening.
When we take our last glance, the moon is high in the sky,
and the shops are all shut up save one or two, from the
narrow doors of which-for even they have closed their
shutters-a stream of red light flashes across the road. The
last omnibus rattles noisily along, and the shouts of the con ductor are audible at a distance of fifty yards. Heavy wains,
loaded with goods for luggage-trains, grind their slow way
Groups of individuals still pass
to the several stations.
hastily along, and the sound of their footsteps, heard at no

194

WHAT'S o0'CLOCK IN CHIEAPSIDE?

other time, gives token of the comparative solitude. Lights
now gleam aloft in bedroom windows, disappearing one by
one, and lulled by the continual rumble of wheels, the inhabitants retire to rest as a thousand iron tongues proclaim
the midnight hour of TWELVE.

If you ask a dweller in this locality how he knows when
it is past two in the morning, he may tell you, as he has told
us, that the silence of the City sometimes wakes him at that
hour, and that then he does not sleep again until the melody
of cart-wheels, which begins once more an hour or two after,
soothes him to slumber.
The dweller in Cheapside of a hundred and thirty years
ago, when the place looked very different from what it does
now, might have known what o'clock it was at a certain time
by the coming of a small, plain carriage, drawn by one horse,
and driven by a steady serving-man, and which stopped for
half-an-hour or thereabouts, at the north-west corner of the
street. A person of observation would have remarked, that
though that small vehicle came regularly every day, yet the
driver never descended from his seat, and no one ever alighted
from the carriage, which, after standing on the spot for the
allotted time, wheeled round and returned by the way it
came. If, urged by curiosity, he had looked through the
little glass window, he would have seen an old, old man of
nearly fourscore years and ten, enveloped in the folds of a
warm cloak, and gazing with moistened eyes upon the dome
of St. Paul's church, so grandly defined against the clear
morning sky. That was worthy old Sir Christopher Wren,
who, now too feeble for action, came daily to snatch another,
and yet another last look at the greatest and most glorious
fact of his manly life. Ah, my friend! there was a man who
always knew what it was o'clock.

THE EXPECTANT.
WHEN a boy I was sent to school in a country' village in
one of the midland counties. Midvale lay on a gentle slope
at the foot of a lofty hill, round which the turnpike-road
wound scientifically to diminish the steepness of the declivity; and the London coach, as it smoked along the
white road regularly at half-past four o'clock, with one
wheel dragged, might be tracked for two good miles before
it crossed the bridge over the brook below and disappeared
from sight. We generally rushed out of the afternoonschool as the twanging horn of the guard woke up our
quiet one street; and a fortunate fellow I always thought
was Griffith Maclean, our only day-boarder, who on such
occasions would often chase the flying mail, and seizing the
hand of the guard, an old servant of his uncle's, mount on
the roof, and ride as far as he chose, for the mere trouble
of walking back again. Our school consisted of between
twenty and thirty boys, under the care of a master who
knew little and taught still less: for having three sermons
to preach every Sunday, besides two on week-days, he had
but little leisure to spare for the duties of the school; and
the only usher he could afford to keep was a needy hardworking lad, whose poverty and time-worn habiliments
deprived him of any moral control over the boys. This
state of things, coupled with the nervous and irascible
temper of the pedagogue, naturally produced a good deal of
delinquency, which was duly scored off on the backs of the
offenders every morning before breakfast. Thus, what we
o2

196

THE EXPECTANT.

wanted in tuition was made up in flogging; and if the
master was rarely in the school, he made amends for his
absence by a vigorous use of his prerogative while he was
there. Griffith Maclean, who was never present on these
occasions, coming only at nine o'clock, was yet our common
benefactor. One by one he had taken all our jackets to a
cobbling tailor in the village, and got them for a trifling
cost so well lined with old remnants of a kind of felt or serge,
for the manufacture of which the place was famous, that we
could afford -to stand up without wincing, and even to laugh
through our wry faces under the matutinal ceremony of
caning. Further, Griffith was the sole means of communication with the shopkeepers, and bought our cakes, fruit, and
playthings, when we had money to spend, and would generally contrive to convey a hunch of bread and cheese
from home to any starving victim who was condemned
to fasting for his transgressions. In return for all this
sympathy, we could do no less than relieve Griffith, as
far as possible, from the trouble and "bother," as he
called it, of study. We worked his sums regularly for
days beforehand, translated his Latin, and read over his
lessons with our fingers as he stood up to repeat them before
the master.
Griffith's mother was the daughter of a gentleman residing
in the neighbourhood of Midvale. Fifteen years ago she
had eloped with a young Irish officer-an unprincipled
fortune-hunter-who, finding himself mistaken in his yenture, the offended father having refused any portion-had
at first neglected and finally deserted his wife, who had
returned home with Griffith, her only child, to seek a reconciliation with her parents. This had never been cordially
granted. The old man. had other children who had not
disobeyed him, and to them, at his death, he bequeathed the
bulk of his property, allotting to Griffith's mother only a lifeinterest in a small estate which brought her something less

THE EXPECTANT.

197

than a hundlred pounds a year. But the familywere wealthy,
and the fond mother hoped, indeed fully expected, that they
would make a gentlemanly provision for her only child. In
this expectation Griffith was nurtured and bred; and being
reminded every day that he was born a gentleman, grew
up with the notion that application and labour of any sort
were unbecoming the character he would have to sustain.
He was a boy of average natural, abilities and with industry
might have cultivated them to advantage: but industry was
a plebeian virtue, which his silly mother altogether discountenanced, and withstood the attempts, not very vigorous,
of the schoolmaster to enforce. Thus he was never punished,
seldom reproved: and the fact that he was the sole individual so privileged in a school where both reproof and
punishment were so plentiful, could not fail of impressing
him with a great idea of his own importance. Schoolboys
are fond of speculating on their future prospects, and of
dilating on the fancied pleasures 6f manhood and indeperldence, and the delights of some particular trade or profession upon which they have set their hearts-the-farm,
the forge, the loom, the counter, the press, the desk-have
as eager partisans among the knucklers at taw as among
older children; and while cro'uching round the dim spark
of fire on a wet winter day, we were wont to chalk out for
ourselves a future course of life when released from the
drudgery, as we thought it, of school. Some declared for
building, carpentering, farming, milling, or cattle-breeding ;
some were panting for life in the great city; some longed
for the sea and travel to foreign countries ; and some for a
quiet life at home, amid rural sports and the old family faces.
Above all Griffith Maclean towered in unapproachable
greatness. "I shall be a gentleman," said he, "if I don't
have a commission in the army-which I am not sure I
should like, because it's a bore to be ordered off where you
don't want to go--I shall have an official situation under

198

THE EXPECTANT:

198
THE nothing to
government, with next to EXPECTANT do but to see life and
to enjoy myself." Poor Griffith1
Time wore on. One fine morning I was packed, along
with a couple of boxes, on the top of the London coach;
and before forty-eight hours had elapsed, found myself
bound apprentice to a hard-working master and a laborious
profession in the heart of London. Seven years I served
and wrought in acquiring the art and mystery, as my
indentures termed it, of my trade. Seven times in the
course of this period it was my pleasant privilege to visit
Midvale, where some of my relations-dwelt, and at each
visit I renewed the intimacy with my old schoolfellow
Griffith. He was qualifying himself for the life of a gentleman by leading one of idleness; and I envied him not a
little his proficiency in the use of the angle and the gun, and
the' opportunity he occasionally enjoyed of following the
hounds upon a borrowed horse. At my last visit, at the
end of my term of apprenticeship, I felt rather hurt at the
cold reception his mother gave me, and at the very haughty,
off-hand bearing of Griffith himself; and I resolved to be as
independent as he, by giving him an opportunity of dropping
the acquaintance if he chose. I understood, however, that
both he and his mother were still feeding upon expectation,
, to whom
and that they hoped everything from General
application had been made on Griffith's behalf, as the son of
an officer, and that they confidently expected a cadetship
that would open up theroad to promotion and fortune.
The wished-for appointment did not arrive. Poor Griffith's
father had died without leaving that reputation behind him
which might have paved the way for his son's advancement,
and the application was not complied with. This was a
mortifying blow to the mother, whose pride it painfully
crushed. Griffith, now of age, proposed that they should
remove to London, where, living in the very source and
centre of official appointments, they might bring their

THE EXPECTANT.

199

influence to bear upon any suitable berth that might be
vacant. They accordingly left Midvale and came to town,
where they lived in complete retirement upon a very limited
income. I met Griffith accidentally, after he had been in
London about a year. He shook me heartily by the hand,
was in high spirits, and informed me that he had at length
secured the promise of an appointment to a situation in S
House, in case T -- , the sitting member, should be again
returned for the county. His mother had three tenants,
each with a vote, at her command; and he was going down
to Midvale, as the election was shortly coming off, and
would bag a hundred votes at least, he felt sure, before
polling-day. I could not help thinking, as he rattled away,
that this was just the one thing he was fit for. With
much of the air, gait, and manners of a gentleman, he combined a perfection in the details of fiddle-faddle and smalltalk rarely to be met with; and from having no independent
opinion of his own upon any subject whatever, was so much
the better qualified to secure the voices of those who had.
He went down to Midvale, canvassed the whole district
with astonishing success, and had the honour of dining with
his patron, the triumphant candidate, at the conclusion of
the poll. On his return to town, in the overflowings of his
joy, he wrote a note to me expressive of his improved
prospects, and glorying in the certainty of at length obtaining an official appointment. I was very glad to hear
the good news, but still more surprised at the terms in
which it was conveyed: the little that Griffith had learned
at school he had almost contrived to lose altogether in the
eight or nine years that had elapsed since he had left it.
He seemed to ignore the very existence of such contrivances
as syntax and orthography; and I really had grave doubts
as to whether he was competent to undertake even an official
situation in S
House.
These doubts were not immediately resolved. Members

200

THE EXPECTANT.

of parliament, secure in their seats, are not precisely so
anxious to perform as they sometimes are ready to promise
when their seats seem sliding from under them. It was
very nearly two years before Griffith received any fruit
from his electioneering labours, during which time he had
been leading a life of lounging, do-nothing, dreamy, semiconsciousness, occasionally varied by a suddenly conceived
and indignant remonstrance, hurled in foolscap at the head
of the defalcating member for the county. During all this
time fortune used him but scurvily: his mother's tenants at
Midvale clamoured for a reduction of rent; one decamped
without payment of arrears; repairs were necessary, and
had to be done and paid for. These drawbacks reduced the
small income upon which they lived, and sensibly affected
the outward man of the gentlemanly Griffith: he began to
look seedy, and occasionally borrowed a few shillings of me
when we casually met, which he forgot to pay. I must do
him the credit to say that he never avoided me on account
of these trifling debts, but with an innate frankness, characteristic of his boyhood, continued his friendship and his
confidences. At length the happy day arrived. He received
his appointment, bearing the remuneration of £200 a year,
which he devoutly believed was to lead to something infinitely greater, and called on me on his way to the office
where he was to be installed and indoctrinated into his
function.
The grand object of her life-the settlement of her son
-thus accomplished, the mother returned to Midvale, where
she shortly after died, in the full conviction that Griffith was
on the road to preferment and fortune. The little estate,
upon the proceeds of which she had frugally maintained
herself and son, passed at her death into the hands of one of
her brothers, none of whom took any further notice of Griffith, who had mortally offended them by his instrumentality
in returning the old member for the county, whom it was

THE EXPECTANT.

201

their endeavour to unseat. There is a mystery connected
with Griffith's tenure of office which I could never succeed
in fathoming. He held it but for six months, when, probably
not being competent to keep it, he sold it to an advertising
applicant, who offered a douceur of £300 for such a berth.
How the transfer was arranged I cannot tell, not knowing
the recondite formula in use upon these occasions. Suffice
it to say that Griffith had his £300, paid his little debts,
renewed his wardrobe and his expectations, and began to
cast about for a new patron. He was now a gentleman about
town, and exceedingly well he both looked and acted the
character; he had prudence enough to do it upon an
economical scale, and, though living upon his capital, doled
it out with a sparing hand. As long as his money lasted
he did very well; but before the end of the third year the
bloom of his gentility had worn off, and it was plain that he
was painfully economising the remnant of his funds.
About this time I happened to remove to a different
quarter of the metropolis, and lost sight of him for more
than a year.
One morning, expecting a letter of some
importance, I waited for the postman before walking to
business. What was my astonishment on responding personally to his convulsive " b'bang," to recognise under the
gold-banded hat and red-collared coat of that peripatetic
official the gentlemanly figure and features of my old schoolfellow Griffith Maclean!
"What, Griff !" I exclaimed, "is it possible-can this
be you ?"
"Well, said he, "I am inclined to think it is. You see,
old fellow, a man must do something or starve. This is all
I could get out of that shabby fellow T , and I should
not have got this had I not well worried him. He knows I
have no longer a vote for the county. However, I shan't
wear this livery long: there are good berths enough in the
post-office. If they don't pretty soon give me something

202

THE EXPECTANT.

fit for a gentleman to do, I shall take myself off as soon as
anything better offers. But, by George! there is not much
time allowed for talking: I must be off-farewell! "
Soon after this meeting the fourpenny deliveries commenced; and these were before long followed by the establishment of the universal Penny-post. This was too much
for Griffith.. He swore he was walked off his legs; that
people did nothing upon earth but write letters; that he
was jaded to death by lugging them about; that he had no
intention of walking into his coffin for the charge of one
penny; and, finally, that he would have no more of it.
Accordingly he made application for promotion on the
strength of his recommendation, was refused as a matter of
course, and vacated his post for the pleasure of a week's
rest, which he declared was more than it was honestly worth.
By this time destiny had made me a housekeeper in
"merry Islington;" and poor Griff, now reduced to his
shifts, waited on me one morning with a document to which
he wanted my signature, the object of which was to get him
into the police force. Though doubting his perseverance in
anything, I could not but comply with his desire, especially
as many of my neighbours had done the same. The paper
testified only as to character; and as Griff was sobriety
itself, and as it would have required considerable ingenuity
to fasten any vice upon him, I might have been hardly justified inrefusing. I represented to him as I wrote my name,
that should he be successful he would really have an opportunity of rising by perseverance in good conduct to an
upper grade. "Of course," said he, "that is my object: it
would never do for a gentleman to sit down contented as a
policeman. I intend to rise from the ranks, and I trust you
will live to see me one day at the head of the force."
He succeeded in his application; and not long after signing his paper I saw him indued with the long coat, oil-cape,
and glazed hat of the brotherhood, marching off in Indian

THE EXPECTANT.

203

file for night-duty to his beat in the HRoad. Whether
the night air disagreed with his stomach, or whether his
previous duty as a postman had made him doubly drowsy, I
cannot say, but he was found by the inspector on going his
rounds in a position too near the horizontal for the regulations of the force, and suspended, after repeated transgression, for sleeping upon a bench under a covered doorway while
a robbery was going on in the neighbourhood. He soon
found that the profession was not at all adapted to his
habits, and had not power enough over them to subdue them
to his vocation. He lingered on for a few weeks under the
suspicious eye of authority, and at length took the advice of
the inspector, and withdrew from the force.
He did not make his appearance before me as I expected,
and I lost sight of him for a long while. What new shifts
and contrivances he had recourse to-what various phases of
poverty and !deprivation he became acquainted with during
the two years that he was absent from my sight, are secrets
which no man can fathom. I was standing at the foot of
Blackfriar's Bridge one morning, waiting for a clear passage
to cross the road, and began mechanically reading a printed
board, offering to all the sons of Adam-whom, for the
especial profit of the slopsellers, Heaven sends naked into
the world-garments of the choicest broadcloth for next to
nothing, and had just mastered the whole of the large-printed
lie, when my eye fell full upon the bearer of the board, whose
haggard but still gentlemanly face revealed to me the lineaments of my old friend Griff. He laughed in spite of his
rags as our eyes met, and seized my proffered hand.
"And what," said I, not daring to be silent," do they pay
you for this?"
"Six shillings a week," said Griff "and that's better than
nothing."
"Six shillings and your board, of course ?"
"Yes, this board," (tapping the placarded timber); "and

2D4

THE EXPECTANT.

a confounded heavy board it is. Sometimes when the wind
iakes it' though, I'm thinking it will fly away with me into
the river, heavy as it is."
"And do you stand here all day?"
"No, not when it rains: the wet spoils the print, and we
have orders to run under cover. After one o'clock I walk
about with it wherever I like, and stretch my legs a bit.
There's no great hardship in it if the pay was better."
I left my old playmate better resigned to his lowly lot
than I thought to have found him. It was clear that he had
at length found a-function for which he was at least qualified; that he knew the fact; and that the knowledge imparted some small spice of satisfaction to his mind. I am
happy to have to state that this was he deepest depth to
which he has fallen. He has never been a sandwich-I am
sure indeed he would never have borne it. With his heavy
board mounted on a stout staff, he could imagine himself, as
no doubt he often did, a standard-bearer on the battle-field,
determined to defend his colours with his last breath; and
his tall, gentlemanly, and somewhat officer-like figure, might
well suggest the comparison to a casual spectator. But to
encase his genteel proportions in a surtout of papered planks,
or hang over his shoulders a huge wooden extinguisher
labelled with coloured stripes--it would never have done:
-it would have blotted out the gentleman, and therefore
have worn away the heart of one whose shapely gentility
was all that was left to him.
One might have thought, after all the vicissitudes he had
passed through, that the soul of Griffith Maclean was dead
to the Voice of ambition. Not so, however. On the first
establishment of the street orderlies, that chord in his nature
spontaneously vibrated once again. If he could only get an
appointment it would be a rise in the social scale-leading
by degrees-who can tell ?-to the resumption of his original status, or even something beyond ...... I hear a gentle

THE EXPECTANT.

205

knock, a modest, low-toned single dab, at the street-door as
I am sitting down to supper on my return home after the
fatigues of business. Betty is in no hurry to go to the door,
as she is poaching a couple of eggs, and prides herself upon
performing that delicate operation in irreproachable style.
"Squilsh !" they go one after another into the saucepan-I
hear it as plainly as though I were in the kitchen. Now
the plates clatter; the tray is loading; and now the eggs
are walking up stairs, steaming under Betty's face, when
"dab " again-a thought, only a thought louder than before
-at the street-door. The spirit of patience is outside; and
now Betty runs with an apology for keeping him waiting.
"Here's a man wants to speak to master; says he'll wait if
you are engaged, sir.;' he aint in no hurry." "Show him
in;" and in walks Griff, again armed with a document-a
petition for employment as a street-orderly, with testimonials
of good character, honesty, and all that. Of course I again
append my signature, without any allusion to the police
force. I wish him all success, and have a long talk over
past fun and follies, and present hopes and future prospects,
and the philosophy of poverty and the deceitfulness of
wealth. We part at midnight, and Griff next day gets the
desiderated appointment.
It is raining hard while I write, and by the same token
I know that at this precise moment Griff in his glazed hat,
and short blouse, and ponderous mud-shoes, is clearing a
Street, City, and
channel for the diluted muck of C
directing the black, oozy current by the shortest cut to the
open grating connected with the common sewer. I am as
sure as though I were superintending the operation that he
handles his peculiar instrument-a sort of hybrid between a
hoe and a rake-with the grace and air of a gentleman-a
grace and an air proclaiming to the world that though in
the profession, whatever it may be called, which he has
assumed, he is not of it, and vindicating the workmanship of

206

THE EXPECTANT.

nature, who, whatever circumstances may have compelled
him to become, east him in the mould of a gentleman. It is
said that in London every man finds his level. Whether
Griffith Maclean, after all his vicissitudes. has found his, I
do not pretend to say. Happily for him, he thinks that
fortnne has done her worst, and that he is. bonnd to rise on
her revolving wheel as high at least as he has fallen low.
May the hope stick by him, and give birth to energies
productive of its realisation',

LETTING LODGINGS.
A WIDOWIS

TALE.

THERE are a number of stock subjects, which writers of
fiction, concocters of articles for journals and magazines, and
delineators of society as it is, or as they imagine it to be,
have in a manner seized for their peculiar property, and
erected. into a sort of literary capital, upon which they
consider themselves at liberty to draw upon emergencies.
Among these not the least remarkable, or to the gentlemen
of the quill the least useful, is the Lodging-house Keeperthe lone woman whom misfortune has condemned to open
her doors to all the world, and to postpone her own ideas of
convenience or comfort to those of whomsoever fate may
quarter upon her hospitality. It is a noble quarry, doubtless; and the grey goose shaft when it is winged against the
"Landlady," must not be deemed ill-directed.
There is
something very chivalrous and laudable in denouncing her
as a thief and a drunkard, under a little ingenious periphrasis-and it is so much more pleasant and profitable to
make her the laughing-stock of the public, and to hold her
up to the scorn and detestation of good and sober people,
than it is punctually to pay her weekly bills, that authors
who write for the amusement of their readers, are perfectly
justified in the course they'have unanimously adopted. It
may be thought a piece of gross impertinence, in one of this
highly criminal class, whom every writer of the age, from
the loftiest genius to the lowest would-be litterateur, has
used for the butt of his wit, if he chanced to have any, or of

208

LETTING LODGINGS.

his ill-nature, when he had nothing better to display-it
may be held unpardonable that such an one should venture
to demur to the general verdict, and prefer a claim to be
heard on the other side of the question. But I shall venture
it notwithstanding---lnot indeed taking example from the
writers aforesaid, or retorting in the same complimentary
I am a
strain which characterises their productions.
Lodging-house Keeper, and the necessities of my position
have compelled me to the practice of civility: thosewho set
themselves up for teachers of public morals, through the
press, appear to be under no such compulsion, and can do as
they list. My arguments will consist of my own experience,
or some selected portion of it-and if they serve no other
purpose will, I am sure, tend to show that the "'Landlady,"
so far from being a sort of animal of prey, ready to seize
upon whom she may devour, rather resembles the poor
quadruped, tied to a stake, against whom, in the good old
times, any houseless vagabond cur might try his mettle.
I was the only child of respectable parents, who, after a
life of business, retired upon their savings, to a modest
AWith the death of my
cottage in the outskirts of town.
father, which took place in my twenty-first year, the major
part of our revenue ceased, but he left me a small portion,
payable upon his policy of insurance. A year after his
death, I married a gentleman in the employment of a wellknown mercantile firm, and with my mother, who had a
small annuity of her own, and in the society of my husband,
an excellent and accomplished man, passed eight years of
my life in the enjoyment of as much happiness as any
woman has reason to expect. At the end of this period my
mother died. The same disease that carried her off confined
my husband to his room for five months, and so undermined
a constitution, which was never strong, as to inspire me
with the greatest fears on his account. They proved to be
but too well founded. In little more than a year after I had

LETTING LODGINGS.

909

buried my mother, my husband was stretched upon a bed of
sickness, from which he never rose again. While he lay ill,
my youngest child sickened and died, and I was obliged to
send away the two eldest, in order to devote myself to the
care of my sick partner. He was respected by his employers,
and they generously continued his salary, which, though not
large, was sufficient for our wants, up to the day of his death.
He languished for upwards of twenty months, during which
the greater part of my little fortune was expended unavailingly in feeing physicians, none of whom would come to any
decision as to the precise nature of his disease. After his
departure, I found myself completely alone in the world
with my two boys-I had no other relations, that I knew
of, living-in possession of about two hundred pounds in
cash, and a. house full of excellent furniture.
I was anxious to get my little boys educated, and to put
them in a way, as soon as old enough, to earn a living for
themselves-and I deliberated long on the best means of
investing my little capital in a way that should ultimately
ensure this object. It was not from choice that I became a
Lodging-house Keeper; but because nothing else appeared
applicable in the circumstances in which I was then placed.
I hired a new house, in a pleasant and healthy part of the
London suburbs, and situated in the route of the omnibuses
to and from the City. The annual rent, together with the
rates and taxes, amounted to sixty pounds; but, anything
respectable and fit for the purpose could not be got for less,
and I hoped, by superior accommodation and attention, to
succeed in creating a connexion, and to be enabled ultimately
to pay my way. When all my goods were arranged in a
state of order and cleanliness, I put up a legible announce ment in the parlour window, and anxiously waited for occupants-never leaving home, save after dark, for fear of
missing an offer-and employing myself in teaching my
boys to read, to distract my mind from the fears and
P

210

LETTING LODGINGS.

responsibilities which began to weigh upon it. Nearly a
fortnight passed without an applicant, and then came a commercial gentleman, on the Sunday afternoon, which, he said,
was the only time he had to spare for the purpose, to inquire
my terms. He was pleased with everything, but objected to
the price, and offered me a rent for two rooms, with attendance, which would have barely covered their cost to me if
empty. He was huffed at my refusal-said he could get
them elsewhere-that people who had rooms to let must let
them for what they could get--he would look further.
When he was gone away I began to reflect on his offer, and
to suspect whether I had not done wrong. I saw the truth
of what he said, and that I must let my house at whatever
people would give, or do worse. He came back in the
evening, and in a very brusque way, said:"What do you pay for this house?"
" Sixty pounds, including everything."
"Too much-but say sixty--there are ten tooms-bating
the kitchens, as common to the whole house, there are eight
left for hire-eights in sixty-that's seven pound ten a
room, empty-come, I don't mind doubling it for furniture
and attendance, if you give me my choice of the roomssay twelve shillings a week."
Though internally resenting this mode of calculation, I
was-too.anxious to make a beginning to venture to offend
him. As a matter of course, he chose the front parlour and
the best bed-room-and, leaving a deposit, agreed to send
his luggage on the morrow. He came, and remained with
me two years, at the end of which time he was seduced
away by a promising advertisement, in one of the daily
papers, offering the same accommodation, with "partial
board" into the bargain, at the same price. He was a
north-countryman, attached to the London department of a
Manchester house, at a salary of £400 a year, every farthing
of: which it was his boast that he banked regularly as he

LETTING LODGINGS.

211

received it, paying the whole of his personal expenses from
the proceeds of his perquisites, which need not have been
very considerable for that purpose. Though he stood fair
before the world, his moral character was indescribably loathsome and abhorrent, and I felt relieved when he went away.
A few days after he had arrived, a stout, ecclesiasticallooking personage, of about fifty, having a languishing lady
on his arm, and followed by a Moorish-looking man, in
rather doubtful garb, knocked boldly at the door, and demanded to see the drawing-rooms. The girl showed them
up. The lady then threw herself upon the sofa and declared
she would not search any further, as the house was tolerable,
and she was exhausted with the labour they had gone
through. The gentleman, who handed me a card, inscribed
the " Rev. Mr. Something," agreed to the terms I proposed
for the drawing-room floor and an additional bed-room for
" Queero," so they called the blackamoor, whom, the gentleman accommodatingly observed, I might put where I chose,
as he could sleep anywhere, and was not given to complain
of his quarters. They took possession of the rooms at once,
the lady remaining on the sofa, while the gentleman and
Queero set off in a cab to fetch their luggage from the hotel
where they had been staying for a few days, having recently
arrived in England. On their return, Queero, having stowed
away their trunks and packages, was ordered into the
kitchen, an arrangement for which I had not bargained, but
against which, finding the man could speak no English, and
that he was not, from his attractions, likely to entangle the
affections of my maid of all work, I did not think proper to
object. Here he was proud to make himself useful, and after
cleaning his master's boots and clothes, would draw water,
scour knives or pots, or do anything-grinning and chattering
the while in the most laughable and incomprehensible way,
vastly to the amusement of my two little boys, whom after a
few days it was impossible to keep away from him. He ate

212

LETTING LODGINGS.

his meals in the kitchen, after his master and mistress had
sent down the dishes; -and had an appetite that was never
satisfied so long as anything remained to be consumed.
I do not pretend to be void of the curiosity which is said
to be characteristic of the sex, and I will confess to puzzling
myself a good deal to no purpose on the score of Queero. It
was so strange a position which the man, who was a mere
savage, occupied, that I could not make it out. The
reverend gentleman, his master, never spoke to him but
with an assumption of the greatest dignity, while his
mistress loathed the very sight of him, and would not have
passed him on the stairs, or approached him closely, for any
earthly consideration; though she tolerated his presence in
the drawing-room, upon occasions, like one submitting to
unavoidable tortures. These occasions were invariably when
visitors arrived, when Queero always formed one of the
party, and jabbered long and loudly in his native dialect,
in reply to questions from his reverend patron in the same
tongue. When the guests were gone he descended again to
the kitchen-but two or three times in the week he dressed
himself in a gentlemanly suit and rode out with his master
early in the evening, not returning till late at night.
The mystery came out at last My commercial lodger
happening one evening to follow the crowd into a great
public meeting, was startled by the spectacle of Queero on
the platform in the character of an Africat Prince, addressing the assembly with an enthusiasm which, combined with
most rapid gesticulations, threw him into.a violent perspiration, and the audience into a rapture of delight. The
reverend Something stood by his side, and interpreted his
address to the assembly. My informant was very jocose on
the subject-wondered where the missionary had bagged
the prince-and set himself earnestly to calculate the profits
of the speculation, which he estimated at an enormous sum,
and marvelled where it all went to. I wish to make no

LETTING LODGINGS.

213

remarks on this serious matter, as I am incapable of judging
of such things; but if the man was a prince in his own
country, as the parson, in my hearing (for I was curious
enough to go and witness Queero's performance) said he
was, I think it is'rather hard that he should have been compelled to turn shoe-black in ours. This remarkable triad
remained with me three months; and though the lady could
do nothing for herself but talk and ring the bell, which
latter she would do twenty times a day to summon the
servant to poke the fire, I was sorry when they went away,
as they paid me well and punctually.
Before they had left, I had let my remaining bed-room,
with the use of my own sitting-room, to a teacher of languages, who came in and went out at all hours of the day
and night too, having stipulated for a latch-key. For
months before I got used to it, I lay awake whenever he
was out, till I heard him let himself in and go to bed; but
this feeling passed away in time; and I learned to sleep
whenever leisure could be found for so unprofitable employment of time. A few weeks after the missionary had left,
the drawing-rooms were taken by a new-married couplethe husband a clerk in a mercantile house. Their rounds
of visiting and receiving visits led to a succession of late
hours and vigils on my part which laid me up at length with
fatigue. When, after a fortnight's illness, I rose from my
bed, I found that my teacher of languages-he was a German-had departed without paying his bill, leaving me his
creditor to the extent of nearly seven pounds. I had never
seen any of his money, as he had proposed paying quarterly
when his pupils paid him. Shortly after this, the young
couple, anticipating parental duties, hired a small cottage
and removed to it. They were succeeded in less than a
month by two friends, clerks in a banking-house, who
passed their evenings generally in smoking and fiddling
together, varied with card-parties in winter time. These

214

LETTING LODGINGS.

two young gentlemen understood economy, if one may
judge of their practice within doors, to perfection. They
never breakfasted on Sunday, because they dined with me at
one o'clock, at the cost of eighteen pence a head. At
Michaelmas, one of them had .a goose sent him, and made me
a present of it, mentioning, at the time, that he should take
the liberty of inviting his partner and the gentleman in the
front parlour to dinner on Sunday when it would be dressed.
The accompaniments to the goose, together with the pastry,
cost me nine shillings: the three gentlemen cleared the
whole, with the exception of the little which I ate myself,
and thus my dinner cost me six times the amount they were
accustomed to pay for theirs, while the liberal donor plumed
himself on his generosity. I dared not hazard a hint of the
different notions I entertained, for fear of offending and
losing my lodgers.
In the room of the teacher of languages came the secretary to a benevolent society, a man of a very religious turn.
He agreed to board wvith me (taking his dinner on week-days
in the City), at the lowest charge which with safety I could
name. His acquaintance among religious people in the
neighbourhood was pretty large, and he was often absent at
meals; but lest I should gain by this, he kept an accurate
register of every meal he missed, and balan'ed them off by
inviting a party of ten or a dozen to tea or supper, when he
had sufficient arrears outstanding to enable him to exhibit
such hospitality without a demand on his purse. Being, in
his way, a conscientious man, he felt some qualms that his
guests should sweeten their grog with my sugar; but recollecting that when he was absent I sat without a fire, he told
me that I should consider the coals thus saved a fair set-off
against the lumps of sugar consumed by his friends, who he
had not the sense to -see were really entertained at my
expense. He married, after three months' courtship, a lady
of property ; and, I have no doubt, takes excellent care of it.

LETTING LODGINGS.

215

At parting, this careful Christian recommended a traveller
to a firm in the City to take his place-at the same time
cautioning me to make the necessary inquiries, as he made it
a point to be responsible for nobody. This traveller, who
was but a sorry sort of fellow, stayed three months, often
lying in bed the whole of the day, having been discharged
by the firm, and waiting for a new engagement. He never
paid me a farthing, and when at last he got an appointment
in.
Manchester, walked off without even saying that he was
going, leaving nothing behind him but an empty trunk, value
three- and -sixpence.
At the end of my first year I began to review my speculation, and drew out as well as I could a debtor and creditor
account of my affairs for the past twelvemonth. The.landlord of my house had assured me that the rent and taxes
together would be under £60, and I found them accordingly
to be £59 18s. 6d. My whole receipts from lodgers had
been £129 12s. Od., out of which I had paid £10 for wages
to servant, £12 12s. Od. for wood and coal, leaving £47 is.
6d. to pay for the maintenance of four persons, the partial
board of the lodgers, and incidental expenses. The reader
will not be surprised to hear that I had drawn considerably
upon my little stock of money, and that I looked forward to
the final close of the speculation in no very hopeful spirit.
The second year brought experience with it, and the
dearly-bought knowledge of a multitude of shifts and contrivances to save a penny by the avoidance of expenditure.
I knew by this time that the proper education of my boys
was not to be thought of, and sent them to a cheap dayschool, where, fdr five shillings a quarter each, they were
roughly taught the elements of commercial knowledge. I
have never been able to do more for them in that way; and
up to the last twelve months, that is for more than seven
years, I have made all'their clothing with my own hands.
I need not go on with the catalogue of the different cha-

216

LETTING LODGINGS.

racters who have done me the honour of making my house
their home. I have had, during the period of my servitude,
men of all professions under my roof. Far be it from me to
deny that I have met with kindness and generosity where I
had no reason to expect, much less right to demand it. But
my experience upon the whole is not very creditable to that
section of human nature which lives in lodgings. I derive
that impression not so much from any outraged feelings of
my own-the world I move in having long since taught me
that such things as feelings are not recognised in one of my
condition-as from the information of my ledger, which
shows an average of bad debts amounting to something over
fourteen per cent. upon my entire receipts; and, from the
state of my savings' -bank book, which shows that less than
ten pounds remains to be drawn out, the last relic of the two
hundred which comforted me and gave me courage at the
commencement of my career of "landlady." Candour compels me to say that a most disproportionate share of defaulters in my case are literary men, or, perhaps, I should
call them "booksellers' hacks," who live or starve, as it may
happen, by the labour of their brains.
The end of my landladyship is drawing nigh. Without a
fund in store, it is impossible that I can continue to furnish
bed and board, for less than they cost, to the houseless
public. I have spent the best days of my life, and the
whole of my little substance, in providing for their accommodation-and now, after nine years of such toil and anxiety
as no Carolinian negro ever endured, the widow's house is
devoured. My two boys are not educated, but they are
grown big enough to labour, and, for a small premium each,
will be taken out of my hands and taught to work hard at
an honest trade. The premiums I must pay by the sale of
my furniture, which is well nigh worn out in the service of
those who, having none of their own, have abused it on the
most disinterested principle. It is good for little else now

LETTING LODGINGS.

217

than the hammer of the auctioneer, who will consign it a
prey to the broker. When it is gone, and transformed into
an outfit for my dear boys, I shall consult the columns of the
Times for a situation that will suit me. I feel already
exhilarated by the bare thought of emancipation from the
lot and the load which has weighed me down so long, and
x*hich, while compelling me to act as the ever grateful recipient of obligations without -number, has broken my spirit
aid beggared my resources. As housekeeper-as: maid of
all work-as, cook in a* respectable family, I may retain my
self-respect,. and indulge the consciousness that the philoso phers who in our day instruct mankind in the truths of life,
regard me as something better than that canting, lying,
thieving, drunken specimen of filthy and degraded humanity
which, according to their unanimous verdict, lets lodgings.

CROCODILE COURT.
CROCODILE COURT is a second-rate court, debouching at
one end in a third-rate street, which, on Saturday nights is
a fourth-rate market, and at the other in a lane. The lane
leads to nowhere particular, unless it be to the gin-shop at
the end, one side of which sends its flashing illumination at
night-time far down the darksome labyrinth, where squalor
and misery crouch from public view, while the other turns a
magnificent and hilarious face upon a splendid street, as if
utterly unconscious that there are such thing§ as squalor
and misery in the world. The court itself may be about a
furlong in length, and averages some nine or ten feet in
width, and its area, until it comes to the entrance of the lane,
where you suddenly turn a corner, is supposed to be paved
over the entire surface, with the exceptions, of course, of the
little gratings which give light to the cellars below. We
say "supposed," because a good number of the flags have
mysteriously disappeared, leaving little square patches of
moist earth, which agreeably chequer the ground, chess-board
fashion, and are moreover exceedingly convenient in affording
material for the development of the fictile genius of a limited
band of urchins, playfully denominated the young crocodiles,
the aborigines of the locality. The readiness with which,
after a shower of rain, these little Pre-Raphaelites will get
up a batch of mud-pies-transform the whole into a Malakoff
-make a redoubt out of a broken dish, and bombard the
"Rooshins" with pellets of clay, is striking to behold; and
the spectacle of their patriotism might warm the heart of the

CROCODILE COURT.

219

war minister, if the sight of their hapless filth and friendliness did not send a chill through the official cartilage.
The aspect of the court is not fascinating to a casual
visitor. Like many other valuable subjects of study, it only
surrenders its treasures to the man of patient observation,
who will take the pains to penetrate beneath its unpromising
surface. On entering it from the street, you have to pass
through a covered way, which is flanked on one side by a
gin-shop and on the other by a pawnbroker's window, and a
pawnbroker's side-door which admits the hypothecative philosopher into a box, which is emphatically not a witness-box,
where, with the aid of another philosopher skilled in the
logic of a peculiar school, he may solve the .problem his
poverty propounds.. We cannot pause to investigate what
connexion there may be between the "bottle-department"
on our right and the three golden balls on our left, especially
as we have to elbow our way through a dozen or so of the
inhabitants of the court, to whom the shelter of the covered
entrance, fragrant as it is with the alcoholic odours of the
gin-shop, seems a favourite rendezvous, where they meet to
gossip and look out upon the world at large.
The architecture of Crocodile Court, when you get into it,
strikes you as decidedly of the mixed order. It is plain that
a number of builders combined a variety of talents in its construction-that each built as high as he could, and stopped
when he had no money to carry him higher. The brick
walls would be brown if they were not black; the windows
would be of glass if they were not half of them of brown
paper varied with rags of no colour at all; and the woodwork would yet wear a coat of white paint, had not the rain
without and the worm within-the wet-rot and the dry-rot
-crumbled it and sluiced it and stripped it of every vestige
of its original hue. Yet here and there, amidst the general
mass of decay and disrepair, you may discern the individual
evidences of ileatness and attempts at comfort and even

220

CROCODILE COURT.

Herea
decency, not to say respectability of appearance.
tenant of 'a first-floor has painted his sash, and, in spite of
surrounding example, luxuriates in whole squares of glass;
and a dweller in a front parlour actually cleans her windows,
and parades a bit of muslin blind as a fence against popular
curiosity. Such indications of gentility are, however, but
few, and it is possible they are looked upon with a jealous
eye by the aggregate crocodiles, and only tolerated in consideration of ancient privilege and long standing on the part
of the owners. Let us look around now, and make acquaintance with some of the component parts of this characteristic
microcosm, and see what is to be got out of them.
"The first and foremost man of all the world"-the world
of Crocodile Court-and the most formidable crocodile of the
whole brood, is undoubtedly, Mr. Brassy, the marine-storeman. Brassy is a man who has seen nearly three-score
summers, during the whole of which time he and his unhappy parent (who in '41 went to Australia, and there died)
have kept the rubbishy shop in which he is content to sit
from morning to night, waiting the arrival of customers who
come to buy and to sell. Brassy's shop is a museum of
everything that is worth little or nothing-of old iron, old
copper, old brass, old tools, old panels of oak and mahogany,
old cranks and cogwheels and fragments of incomprehensible
machines, to which you may add the rusty keys of forty
thousand perished locks, and coils of rope and shreds of
broadcloth strung together in huge mops upon wires.
Nobody would imagine, from the contemplation of Brassy's
stock, or from his face, which is just as hard and impene trable and rusty, ,or from his garb, for which Monmouth
Street would hardly make room-that he could possibly do
anything better than live from dirty hand to dirtier mouth,
without being able to afford the luxury of soap. And yet
the fact is, that Brassy is a man of substance, the owner of
half the houses in the court which are worth having and in

CROCODILE COURT.

221

decent repair. It is whispered by those who dare not speak
out, that he has an extensive connexion among that class of
society who excel in secret appropriation, among whom he
bears the soubriquet of captain of the fencibles-and that the
police always have their eye upon him. If so, we can only
say that the police do not enjoy a very pleasant prospect, for
Brassy is an ill-1ooking fellow, and, as if conscious of the
fact, loves to lurk unseen in the darkest recess of his den.
There is no Mrs. Brassy, which perhaps is not to be regretted,
and there are no young Brassys, a thing also not to be regretted; but there is a ferocious wall-eyed bull-terrier, who
sometimes keeps shop-and we should say keeps it effectually-while his master is absent or engaged with blow-pipe
and crucible below stairs.
Next door to the marine-store is the rag and bone shop
-the moist and mouldy, and a trifle marrowy, abode of
Bridget McFinn, a sister of the sister isle, who addresses all
whom it may concern with the polite appeal, "Plees to
rekleck! at this shop you gets 2d., for seven poun of bones,
and 3d. a poun for best linning rags;" to which she appends
a delicate allusion to dripping and kitchen-stuff, which we
shall not quote literatim. Bridget's shop-window is stuffed
up, to the utter exclusion of such daylight as the narrow
court would afford, with a conglomerate of clouts and rags,
and the concave bottoms of phials and bottles, among which
are distinguishable, here and there, odd remnants of decayed
finery, such as scraps of ragged lace and trimming, crushed
and crumbled ends of ribbon, a cracked cameo torn from
its setting, or an old hair bracelet wanting the snap. Her
patrons are the abigails and cooks and scullions of a pretty
extensive district, among whom she is a bit of a favourite,
being an accomplished gossip and not given to haggle for
trifles. In addition to her shopkeeping, Bridget drives another trade as a landlady-the upper part of her house being
the refuge of her wandering countrymen, whom she will

222

CROCODILE COURT.

receive in any numbers and for any consideration they can
afford to pay, or, for the matter of that, for no consideration
at all, rather than turn them, as she has been heardto phrase
it, "to the windy side o' the door bekase there was no money
to the fore." Whether Mrs. McFinn unites her two professions in one speculation-whether the rags and bones and
dripping of the London kitchens go to solace the stomachs
and backs of the Irish immigrants, is a question which we
are in no condition to solve, not thinking ourselves bound to
push inquiry in that direction. But she is a thrifty dame,
and has thriven to the extent of seventeen stone at least.
If you were to peep over the bit of white muslin curtain
mentioned above, it is more than probable that you would
get a glimpse of Betsy Spiller, sitting at a table covered with
scarlet, violet, or almond-coloured silk, just fresh from the
loom, the gorgeous hues of which are quite out of keeping
with everything around. Miss Spiller is a character in her
way: she is a determined and active little body, bound up in
a dress so tight that you might almost imagine she kept herself
packed ready for carriage by the Parcels Delivery, and so
defiant of present fashions that you would have to go back
thirty or forty years to find anything like it in the neverending mutations of female costume. There is a mystery
about her which the curiosity of the court has given up the
attempt to fathom: all they know of her is, that she has
seen better days-a fact of which they are certain because
she "talks dictionary," and resents in a dignified way any
grossness or familiar impertinence. Miss Spiller, as the neat
card in her window informs you, gets her living by straining
silk fronts for cabinet and cottage piano-fortes. In this
ingenious branch of industry, which is not usually performed
entirely by females, she is known to excel, and in consequence
she is rarely idle. If she be not gathering up the silk in
fanciful folds or starry rays with her needle, you are pretty
sure to hear the tap-tap of her little hammer driving the

CROCODILE COURT.

223

tacks into the wooden frame; and if she is doing neither, it
is because she has locked up her room and is off to the
piano-forte makers to carry home her work and fetch more.
Her neat hand is so well known in the trade, that a dealer
will tell her work at a glance. Poor Betsy lives all alone.
She has no personal charms to boast: they have vanished
behind the veil of fifty years, and she knows that perfectly
well. What is that life-history which has vanished with
them ? whose were the familiar faces that smiled upon her
infancy and childhood? what were the buoyant hopes and
loves of her "youth's age," and in what grave do they lie
buried ? and from whence came the shafts of calamity which
cast her from her proud position, and landed her, lone and
friendless, in Crocodile Court ? Betsy Spiller will work her
fingers to the bone-will ply needle and thread and hammer
and tacks to the last-but she would not respond to these
inquiries.
A little farther on, past the potato and coal shed, well
known to the Irish labourer, who for twopence can get three
pounds of "murphies," and for a penny more buys seven
pounds of coals to cook them with-past the broker's, whose
goods have been broken fifty times and as often mendedpast the " MANGLING DONE HERE " of Mrs. Grinder, whose
vast machine, "its bowels filled with stones," is constantly
groaning and thumping and creaking under her vigorous
hands-and we come upon the establishment of dapper little
Dennison, who keeps the "halfpenny shavirig shop." A halfpenny is the standard price for a shave in Crocodile Court,
and no one wearing a beard would think of paying more;
and, what is worse for Denny, there is not a single beard
among his customers that submits to the operation more than
once a week-on Saturday night, that is, or on early Sunday
morning. The population of the court includes, it is probable, above two hundred beards, and with very few exceptions, Denny has the handling df the lot; and, moreover,

224

CROCODILE COURT.

there are the dwellers in the lane, who patronise him to a
certain extent, so that between five o'clock on the Saturday
and noon on the Sunday (for in Crocodile Court no day of
rest dawns), upon a moderate estimate he lathers and reaps
three hundred chins. He is an active little man, and so he
had need be to get through his grand field-day in creditable
style. Of course, he does them in bulk, lathering four or five
in succession, and leaving the first lathered to soften in the
saponaceous cream while he proceeds with the rest. He is
rich in a peculiar kind of experience-talks learnedly of the
Irish epidermis, and of the deadly effect upon razors of the
grit that gets into bricklayers' chins. He chooses his blades,
he will tell you, for their substance, preferring at least a third
of an inch in the back-" you can't shave a dustmanwith a
thin blade-for why? the edge will be sure to turn up wiry."
Denny's shop, at any time between six and twelve on the
Saturday night, presents a characteristic spectacle. Denny
himself is a voluble talker, and, being in addition a practical
politician and a radical of the extreme school, and maling it
a point of duty to be up in all the news of the day, his hebdomadal synods are never dumbfoundered for want of a subject
of discussion. There you may see grave beards, lathered and
unlathered, wagging on grave matters with an orderly decorum that might be imitated with advantage in "another
place ;" and if Denny should stop the peroration of an
orator by suddenly seizing him by the nose, 'tis all in the
way of business3 and no one dreams of offence. We can
assure our readers that the war question is well understood
at the halfpenny shaving shop, where it is discussed with
becoming temper, and with most unanimous concurrence in
the policy of paying its cost with an income-tax. What the
halfpenny shaver does with himself all the rest of the week
does not appear. He can't keep birds, as many barbers do,
for the birds have taken a prejudice against living in Crocodile Court, and if you bring them there they die. There is

CROCODILE COURT.

225

but little hair-cutting in his domain, and not much to be got
by the dressing of ladies' fronts where the ladies are in the
habit of carrying fruit, fish, and vegetables on their headsand he is not skilful in the manufacture of wigs. We have
a notion that he spends the bulk of his time in spelling over
every newspaper he can lay hold of, and in honing and
strapping his stock of razors for the weekly harvest of
beards.
Right opposite to little Dennison's is Brimmer's lodginghouse, where "good accommodation for travellers," if Mr.
Brimmer is to be believed, is to be had for threepence a
night-and no trust. The character of the accommodation
is not so good, we fear, as to challenge criticism. The
travellers who take up their abode there, are of a very
various kind--chiefly travellers by day through London
streets, and of that multitudinous class who rise in the
morning without knowing, or much caring, where they shall
lay their heads at night. Brimmer lives, and drinks from a
black bottle, in the front parlour, and sits there at night with
the door open to levy the oboli from all who pass in. He
professes clean sheets once a month, and an annual entomological battue; but, in a candid mood, he will advise an
unseasoned visitor that his rest will be best secured by
burning a candle all night.
Close to Brimmer's there sits a spectral cobbler, in a little
open shed, pounding away at the heel of a patched blucher,
to which he is fitting an iron shield. In front of him, on a
narrow board, are a selection of shoes for both sexes, glimnering with black-lead, and gaping with cracks. The
whole look as though they had been rescued from the dustbox and vamped up for sale, and such is probably their
history. It is plain that the cobbler is half ashamed of
them, and it is but charity to suppose that he exhibits them
rather as emblems of his craft than as saleable merchandise.
Next to the cobbler is a cobbling bookbinder, whom we

226

CROCODILE COURT.

chance to catch in the very act of sawing a score of notches
in the back of a great folio bible, and letting in shreds of
twine with glue to hold the leaves together, to save himself
an hour's labour in honestly sewing the book. We could
reprove the knave for his irreverent chicanery, and feel half
inclined to do it; but his bloated face and rubicund nose
turn up fiercely at the remonstrance we throw him, and we
quicken our pace to escape from a torrent of vehement abuse
that comes thundering from his mouth.
Towards the end of the court we hear the whirring of a
lathe, and come upon a turner and his boy up to their chins
in shavings, and engaged in the operation of transforming
a bundle of old mopsticks, silk-rollers, and what not, into so
many gross of pill-boxes, to which the boy is fitting the
lids, working the treddle the while, as fast as they are
whirled off.
Then we are suddenly charmed with a delicate group of
wax flowers, cunningly modelled by a poor cripple, who
exhibits them beneath a bell-glass in a little window that
looks towards the lane. His productions are sold by his
mother to the shop-keepers for what they will fetch, and
sometimes to the ladies in whose dwellings she periodically
officiates as char-woman,
Besides the professionals above mentioned, the court has
its tinker, who departs on his rounds regularly in the morning and comes back in the gloaming, when he is too often
seen staggering homewards under a burden heavier than his
pots and soldering-iron and extinguished fire; and is apt,
once in the court, to pitch himself down at anybody's door
to sleep off his potations. Then there is the blind fiddler
and his amazonian wife, well fitted to'fight her sightless
This pair are absent sometimes in
husband's battles.
summer for weeks and months together, patrolling the
country far and wide; and the return from these excursions
is usually celebrated in the court by a gratuitous concert.

CROCODILE COURT.

227.

Then there is lone Widow Green, the glove-cleaner and
bonnet bleacher, who is half bleached herself by the fumes
of sulphur, and half sick with the smell of turpentine, and
who dwells in a topmost garret, and only emerges like a
pale phantom at night, to communicate with her patrons or
to do her indispensable marketing.
But enough of the professionals: it is possible that we
have not enumerated one half of them; yet, taken all
together, they would not make a tithe of the whole population, who swarm in Crocodile Court as thick as bees in a
hive. In every room there is a family, save in those where
there are two or more: when the weather is fine, the
windows aloft are choked with feminine busts and fat folded
arms, and hundreds of glib tongues keep up a flying conversation, not always over complimentary, from side to side
and from ground-floor to garret. And in addition to all
these there is that migratory host to whom the hospitality of
Brimmer and Mrs. McFinn, and one or two other less pretentious caravanseries, offer a fortuitous shelter on their
wanderings. The most effectual way of obtaining an adequate idea of the whole population would be, perhaps, to
visit the court on a washing-day: then the natural gloom of
the place is deepened by the display aloft of unnumbered
bainers formed of every imaginable species of feminine and
infantine attire, and of tattered domestic napery a whole
forest, among which are beheld struggling in air no inconsiderable number of those bifurcated appendages quce rnaribus tribuuntur. Then it is that Crocodile Court is under a
cloud-that a warm and somnolent reek issues from a thousand
broken panes and open windows-that the covered gallery
of observation is more than usually crowded and the ginshop at the corner more than usually busy. The court itself,
and the door-ways of each house especially, are thronged
with the lords of the creation, driven forth by the steaming
suds, and there they stand or lounge in their shirt-sleeves,
Q2

228

CROCODILE COURT.

smoking their short pipes, and bandying talk with one
another, while the children, barefooted, unkempt, and dirtyfaced, roar and squeal, and squabble and riot, and play and
grovel in the dust at their feet. "Is it possible," you ask
yourself, "that all this throng has its home within these
dingy walls ?"
But who is this meagre starveling of a boy, lean, lanky,
and leaden-eyed, whose yellow skin is stranger to a shirt,
whose swollen ankles emerge from the wrecks of a pair of
cutdown man's boots-whose jacket and trousers are one
mass of tatters, and whose matted black hair trails like the
mythological snakes of the Gorgon on his fleshless neck ?
"Halloa, Shanks !" bawls a voice in greeting.
The juvenile anatomy turns half round, and, without
taking his hands from his pockets, glares with his large grey
eye upon the speaker, an Irish labourer.
" Got anything to eat, Shanks ?"
"No," says the poor ,boy, qualifying the answer with an
ejaculation we shall not repeat-" give us something."
""I'm hard up meself," says the man. "Ax mother
McFinn."
"She give me a dinner isterday," says Shanks, "for cleanin' out the cellar."
"Give Brassy a chance, then."
"No I shan't; Brassy sets the dog on me."
"The thief o' the wurruld! But you had a raal dinner
yesterday, Shanks."
"Ah, I did," replies Shanks-" and I can wait, I 'spose,
till I git a job."
This colloquy takes place in front of the little parlour
window of Betsy Spiller. Anon, the bit of muslin blind is
seen to flutter and shake, and then the sash flies up with a
sudden jerk, and Betsy's thin .white lady's hand is thrust
forth with a penny between the finger and thumb, and her
thready voice is heard calling to Shanks :-

CROCODILE COURT.

" Go and buy bread, poor boy," she says; and as Shanks
snatches the coin, and pulls an acknowledgment at his
thatch of hair, the window falls again, and Betsey is no
more seen.
"Shanks," says the Irishman, "you're in for a buster this
time, anyhow; long life to the lady; sure the gentle bloods
the thing."
Shanks disappears in the direction of the baker's who
lives round the corner; and while he is gone we may wind
up our sketch with a brief recital of his biography.
Poor Shanks is a waif of Crocodile Court. In the court
he was born some twelve years ago. The cholera of 1849,
which made awful work among the crocodiles, carried off
both his parents, and left him to the mercy of strangers.
The poor woman who shared the one room of the dead
father and mother, took charge of the boy, and for two years
maintained him from the proceeds of a fruit-stall. She was
ignorant or criminal enough to barter fruit for stolen goods,
was tried for felony, and transported. The boy was then
taken to the workhouse by the parish authorities, and
entered under the name of Shanks, a soubriquet conferred on
him by the court, in allusion to the length of his legs. Shanks
justified the cognomen by running away, and returning to
his old haunt, where he has lived, or rather starved, ever
since. How he keeps life in him is not easily explained.
All we know is, that he is always ready to do anything for
anybody, for any reward, however small. He will lug the
drunken tinker to his lair-he will turn Mrs. GUinder's
mangle and wheel out her barrow-he will scrub stairs and
swill cellars-he will lead the blind fiddler on his rounds
when the wife is too ill, or too something else, to do it-and
sometimes he will don a clean apron which Betsy Spiller
keeps for the purpose, and carry home her handiwork for
her to the warehouse or shop. He has no enemy in the
court, unless it be Brassy-and the fact of this man's dislike

230

CROCODILE. COURT

to him, we have a suspicion, tells more in the boy's favour
than against him. May circumstances be propitious to poor
Shanks!
"But where," says the curious and compassionate reader
' where is Crocodile Court ? I cannot find it in the map,
and it is not down in the Directory."
No, my worthy and comfortable friend it is not down in
the map, and the authority of the Directory will not guide
you to it. We will give you a plainer direction than either
of these-a direction often proffered but rarely acceptedand which in all likelihood you will not accept from us.
Here it is, however, at a venture. Follow your nose. Now
you know you never do follow your nose when it affords you
any disagreeable premonitions, but you turn off in a contrary direction. So long as you persist in doing that, you
will never see Crocodile Court, and must be content to take
your information of such places at second hand-from the
city missionary, who fearlessly proceeds wherever his duty
leads him-from the sanitary commissioner, who does the
same-and from such humble scribblers as we are, who do
not disdain to imitate their example.
In answer to the
question, Where is Crocodile Court ? we will ask, Where is
it hot? that is, in what quarter of London, inhabited by the
labouring and struggling masses, is it not to be found? To
be serious, it is a reproach to our metropolis, that so many
Crocodile Courts should exist in the vicinity of respectable
streets, without the inhabitants of the latter aiming to bring
to bear upon them the ameliorating agencies of sanitary
improvement and moral and religious instruction.

COMMERCIAL ART.
FROM some cause or other, which we are unwilling to
account for by the alleged and admitted inferiority of the
English people as judges and patrons of the fine arts, it
happens, that when in our walks through London streets, we
are greeted with the spectacle of art officiating as the handmaid of commerce, a demand is less frequently made upon
our admiration, than upon some other and very opposite
sentiment. It is not so among neighbouring nations. Partly
from the fact, that a knowledge of the principles of art is
more general upon the continent than it is with us, and that,
therefore, owing to a larger demand, the productions of art
are much cheaper, we find there the artist seriously allying
himself with the trader, and, free from that assumption of
consequence which shuts him out from such employment in
England, doing his best to promote the interests of trade.
Looking only to the outward and visible evidences of this
sensible and brotherly union, we find in the continental cities
frequent specimens of tradesmen's signs, sometimes painted
on the plastered wall, sometimes in compartments on the
shutters, fully equalling in design and execution many of the
pictures which from year to year are exhibited on the walls
of the Royal Academy. A young London artist would feel
himself disgraced by such an exercise of his talent; a young
Parisian would eagerly accept the commission, and execute
it with the utmost care, prizing the opportunity for a public
appeal for what he stands most in need of-the public approbation. The difference of the professional feeling in this

232

COMMERCIAL

ART.

respect between the artists of England and those of France,
is manifest in the superiority of the French commercial signs
and emblems, through all their grades, from the imposing
compositions of some of the large establishments, down to
the single bottle and glass of the eau-de-vie shops-all are
executed with a degree of fidelity and finish unknown in the
corresponding performances at home. It was not always so.
Commercial art once flourished in London to an extent unknown, perhaps, in any other city in the world. Little more
than a hundred years ago, every tradesman of any note in
the city had his sign painted and emblazoned in a good
style, regardless of expense, and by the best painter who
could be induced to execute the task.. Hogarth himself is
known to have painted signs; and, later, Morland did not
disdain to liquidate his tavern score by the same means.
The signs in Hogarth's day, as is evident from the views of
various parts of the metropolis to be found in his prints,
projected into the road, some of them'clearing the foot-pavements altogether, and threatening the roofs of the passing
carriages. It was this growing obstruction that led to their
abolition, a decree being passed that they should not project
beyond a certain limit. This law, together with the new
practice of numbering the houses of every street, was almost
the death-blow of the sign-painter's art in England: the
demand from publicans and tavern-keepers, who nearly alone
continued to exhibit them, was not sufficient to remunerate
the profession, and it gradually declined, and passed into the
hands of the house-painters-to not a few of whom it has
served as a stepping-stone, by developing a talent which
might othervise have remained latent, and the exercise of
which has raised them to the rank of artists.
Within the last dozen years or so, symptoms have become
manifest in various quarters, not so much of a return to the
old system of sign-boards, as of a renewed appreciation of
art, in another and modified form, as an auxiliary to business.

COMMERCIAL

ART.

233

The age has grown wondrously pictorial during the reign of
her present Majesty-and the shop-windows, which are the
invariable indices of progress, in whatever direction, have
become, to some small extent, galleries for the exhibition of
a new kind of art, serving the same purpose as a sign, but
conceived in a more comprehensive spirit, and intended,
without doubt, to proclaim the liberaltastes of the dealer, as
well as modestly to suggest the merits of his wares. The
most numerous of the works of this kind are those exhibited
in the windows of the humbler sorts of coffee-shops ad
eating-houses. They are not of very various design, and we
have a suspicion that, numerous as they are, they are all, or
nearly all, the works of one hand. The subject generally
consists of a loaf, sometimes two loaves, of bread; a wedge
of cheese on a plate of the willow pattern; a lump of
"streaky bacon;" a cup, supposed to be full of coffee; a pat
of butter on a cheese-plate; and a knife and fork. These
are plainly tee-total emblems, and they are largely adopted
by the temperance houses. Occasionally, however, a tankard
of porter, with a foaming top like a cauliflower, or a glass of
rich brown ale, is added, and perhaps a red herring, eloquent
of a relish. Sometimes there are a couple of mice delineated
in the act of nibbling the cheese, while a tabby cat, with
formidable spiky whiskers, is inspecting the operation from
a dark corner. Next to the coffee-shops, it would appear
that the second and third-rate grocers are the greatest patrons
of this new commercial school of art. They are seen to
launch out with greater liberality, and patronise a higher
style; conversation-pictures, as they are called, being most
to their taste: these are generally representations of teaparties, sometimes of staid British matrons, assembled round
the singing kettle or the simmering urn, and exhaling, in bold
Roman type, as they sip "the fragrant lymph," extravagant
encomiums in its praise, and grateful commendations to
Mr. Spicer, for supplying them with it at the moderate

234

COMMERCIAL ART.

charge of only 4s. a pound. Sometimes it is a party of
foreigners, perhaps of Chinese, engaged in picking, from a
palpable gooseberry-bush in a garden, or drying or packing
the tea in chests, directed to Mr. Spicer himself, Little
Liquorpond Lane, London. A work of extraordinary pretensions, and which seems to be a great favourite, portrays a
party of Bedouins in the Desert, bivouacking round a
damask table-cloth, upon which is displayed a Staffordshire
tea-service; with the aid of a Birmingham kettle and Sheffield knives, they are enabled to enjoy their repast in comfort. The artist has forgotten to give their nose:bags to the
camels, which are allowed to mar the festivity of the scene,
by looking coldly on with forlorn and fasting faces. The
fishmongers deserve to rank next: though not so generally
given to the public patronage of art, yet, when they do have
recourse to it, it is in a respectable and serious way. The
pedestrian in London will come now and then upon a really
well-painted picture upon the wall or panel which flanks the
fishmonger's inclined plane. It may be a group of fish in
the grand style-salmon, cod, turbot, and ling, among which
enormous crabs and lobsters seem dripping with the salt
ooze. It may be a coast-scene, with the bluff fishermen up
to their middles in the brine, dragging their nets upon the
beach, which is covered with their spoils. It may be a stiff
breeze at sea, in which the mackerel-boats, under a single
sail, are bounding upon the billowy surge: but whatever it
is, it is sure to be pretty well done, if done at the order of a
fishmonger-it being a fact that art is cultivated and appreciated among the chapmen of Billingsgate, some of whom
are the proprietors of collections of the modern masters, of
which a nobleman might be proud. The fishing-tacklemakers, again, in addition to the varnished skins of fresh..
water fish, preserved in glass-cases, have latterly taken up
with works of art as illustrations of their craft and its pleasures. Groups comprising every fresh-water fish that swims,

COMMERCIAL ART.

235

ahvays admirably painted so far as the fish themselves are
concerned, and not unfrequently with good landscape backgrounds, are nowto be seeninalmost everyrespectable fishingtackle-maker's window. Besides groups of fish, they exhibit
pictures of angling-stations within a few hours' ride, at the
furthest, from London, of which establishments they are the
agents for the sale of subscription-tickets.
Recourse is also had to the arts by a very miscellaneous
class of traders, from motives and with views much higher
than the obvious ones of advertising their business. Thus a
coal-agent will treat the public to a gratuitous panoramic exhibition, detailing the whole history and processes of the
coal-trade, from the first descent in the mine in Yorkshire,
to the delivery of the fuel in sacks to the cellar of the consumer in London-all capitally painted in a style that would
do credit to Burford himself, and really conveying a course
of instruction, receivable by the eye in a few minutes, which
the reading of half a day would not so effectually have supplied. A shoemaker, with literary tendencies, paints up the
shoes, and the precursors of, or substitutes for, shoes of all
nations and all times, from the calceamentum of the ancient
Romans, to the sabot of the modern Gauls-including all the
strange and odd freaks and modifications of fashion which
from every available resource he has been able to collect. A
hatter will pursue a parallel course with hats and headgear.
A shopkeeper with a biblical and patriarchal turn, surmounts
his window with a representation of Noah's Ark, treated in
the miraculous style-the said Ark being, according to the
irrefragable evidence of perspective, of not more than twelve
tons burden at the utmost, and having already disgorged from
its open doors-from which a couple of elephants are emerging
-a troop of indescribable quadrupeds, walking two and two,
in a procession stretching miles away oyer the distant hills, in
addition to an immense cloud of ornithology, principally the
conventional crow, that nearly blots out the sky from the picture.

236

COMMERCIAL ART.

Now and then, a tradesman shows historical predilections.
Some remarkable event of ancient or modern days-some
battle, siege, earthquake, or terrible volcanic eruption is delineated in his shop-window as a background to his goods;
and the goods and the heroes or sufferers are so ingeniously
mingled together, that whosoever contemplates the picture,
must of necessity take both into his consideration, so that it
may be that the storming of Seringapatam, the earthquake
of Lisbon, the overwhelming of Pompeii, or the forcing of
the North-west Passage, is indissolubly connected, in the
spectator's mind, with the destruction of vermin by Jabez
Dosem's Patent Cockroach Exterminator, or the newly invented heel-tips of Simon Bendleather.
Painting is thus, again, stooping to make progress along with
the arts of buying and selling ; nor is the sister art of sculpture
altogether discountenanced by the sons of trade. Here and
there, the bust of some great man is found presiding over the
stock of some petty shop. We have seen Sir Isaac Newton
among piles of potatoes labelled "three pounds twopence,"
and Shakspeare and Milton imbedded among the thread, wax,
heel-ball, and sparables of the retail leather-seller.
Commercial art takes a still more familiar form in the
hands of the modeller, who, besides the manufacture of
dummies which pass for real stock, has assigned to him the
fabrication of colossal models for exhibition as signs, in which
the small wit of the trader receives as large an embodiment
as he chooses to pay for. Thus the "little boot" hoisted
over the door of an ambitious disciple of St. Crispin, is about
large enough for the Colossus of Rhodes; and the ",little
dust-pan" which shuts out the light from the first-floor
rooms of an aspiring tin-man, is broad enough to accommodate an average family tea-party, equipage and all: the
"little cigar" is big enough for the topsail-yard of a frigate;
and the "little stick of sealing-wax" might do upon an
emergency for the mast of her long-boat.

COMMERCIAL

ART.

237

.We are bound in candour to remark, that the most notable
characteristic in what we have denominated Commercial Art,
is its want of originality. All its professors seem to depend
more upon one another than upon themselves, and continually reproduce each other's designs in preference to
inventing new ones. The same thing is as manifest, and
much more mischievously so, in art as applied to manufactures. It is true that, as respects designs merely ornamental,
intended for repetition in paper-hangings and textile fabrics,
&c., we have been for many years past making respectable
progress, and may be said to possess a rising school of
designers of our own; but of designs entirely pictorial, also
intended to be multiplied ad infinitum, and which are
actually so multiplied, there is not one in a hundred to be
met with which is not stolen, in whole or in part, from the
works of established artists living or dead. These thefts are
mostly committed without the licence or the knowledge of
the proprietors of the copyright. The Potters are the most
wholesale plunderers in this way, as their countless transcripts from the works of Landseer, Cooper, Ansdell, Bateman, &c., attest-numbers of which may be seen in any
business street in London at any hour of the day. The
manufacturers of papier-mache ornaments are just as unscrupulous in the use of what is not their own: thousands
of pictures are painted monthly on these wares from the
prints of Stanfield, Turner, Creswick, &c.-an original
design by the artists employed being the rare exception. It
would be easy for the proprietors of the copyrights in question to put an interdict upon these proceedings, and confine
the manufacturers to their own resources; and it appears to
us that they would further the interests of their own profession at once, and be eventually the means of infusing a
leaven of art among the manufacturers themselves, were they
to do so.
From the brief glance at the phases of art which are most

238

COMMERCIAL ART.

familiar to the view of the populace, we are forced to the
conclusion, that,.in spite of the rage for illustration, and the
influence of that pictorial flood which has inundated our
literature, less progress has been made in informing the
popular taste than some of us are complacently disposed to admit. We are among the number of those who desiderate a universal appreciation of the higher qualities of art, and who
regard the dissemination of true principles in relation to it
among the people as an enterprise perfectly hopeful, because
remunerative as well as practicable. What the press has
done and is doing for literature, by rendering it cheap,
abundant, and good, the press will also do for art, but neither
so rapidly nor effectually, unless, and until its efforts are
supplemented by practical teaching. To educate the eye, is
always a slow process; but it is one that produces an important and valuable result, being, of all branches of education, that which best commends itself to the pupil. Unfortunately for the dwellers in English cities, most of the objects
they gaze upon have a tendency to inure them to ugliness
and ungracefulness; and this we take to be one principal
reason why the perception of what is just and true in art is
so rare among the masses of the population.

CIAP-PICTURES.
THE love of pictures, of representations of familiar or
unfamiliar objects by outlines or colours, or both, if it be
not a universal passion, is something very like it. The
savage indulges it, in his way, as much as the man of education and refinement; in default of other means, he scores
and tattoos designs upon his own skin or that of his fellows,
and bedaubs his flesh with gaudy colours, making of himself
the picture he loves to contemplate. All nations have had
their pictorial representations; of not a few these have
formed the national monuments and records; and of more,
it may be, than we are aware of, they have been the
originators of the alphabet, and thus the pioneers of literature. Perhaps the man was never born who, with the
ordinary powers of vision, had not some taste, or, to say the
least of it, some liking for art under some form or other,
and who was not capable of deriving some instruction, as
well as satisfaction, from gratifying that taste. We intend,
with the reader's permission, to glance for a few moments at some of the popular methods, so far as they are
traceable from present existing remains, which have been
for a number of generations past in operation in our own
country for supplying the humbler orders with the means of
such gratification.
There was a time when comparatively few of our industrial classes could read, or cared to read; but there never
was a time when they would not have looked with pleasure
upon a picture. What were the household pictures, or

240

CHIAP-PICTURE S.

1240
CHAP-PiCTURE.
whether there were any at all to be found in the humbler

dwellings of our land, even so late as the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, we cannot undertake to say, but are inclined to
think there was nothing of the kind; and that rude images
and quaint casts or carvings constituted the only sort of
domestic art familiar to the people. Though engraving on
wood and copper has been practised for almost four hundred
years, it would appear that, with the exception of such small
specimens as were used for the illustration of a few books
and ballads, but little of the engraver's work made its way
to the mass of the populace. At anyrate we can meet with
little or nothing now of a kind adapted for the walls of a
cottage or humble residence, which dates further back than
the close of the seventeenth century. We have-a notion
that the first commercial experiment in engraving pictures
to meet a popular demand was made about that time. The
works of the best continental engravers, and of the old
etchers, were too expensive for general circulation; and,
what is more, theywere too learned for the general taste.
To create a demand for pictures, it was necessary to descend
to the comprehension of the multitude, and at the same time
to give them enough for their money. The first popular
engravings, judging from their style of execution, must have
been exceedingly cheap. Probably they were not engraved
upon copper, but upon some softer metal or admixture of
metals; they were intended to be hung on the wall, portfolios
being known only to artists and collectors ; they were for the
most part coloured, and were framed in a narrow black
moulding. Among the oldest subjects now to be met with
-and these must be looked for in the butler's parlour, or
housekeeper's or servants' room of some old mansion in the
country-are views of the palace and gardens of Versailles
and of Fontainebleau, in which the old-fashioned trim
gardens, as they existed once but exist no longer, are shown
in a birds'-eye species of perspective not- very correct.

CHAP-PICTURES.

241

The walks are mathematically squared or circled, the trees
are cut into formal spires or pyramids, and the fountains
spout in arches geometrically true. The figures are longlegged gentlemen with pigtails and powdered hair, collarless
coats, waistcoats which repose on the hips, ruffles, and tremendously lanky swords; with these are ladies-in exalted
head-dresses, with wasp-like waists, and enormous swelling
hoops below, andsupporting themselves on heels of perilous
height; in addition to the gentlemen, the ladies are attended
by poodles with head and shoulders shaggy as a lion, and
hind-quarters bare as a frog. Conteniporaneous with these
were garden-scenes something in the Watteau style, in
which nature was allowed a little latitude, and Damon and
Phyllis, -in wig and hoop, danced together on the greensward, or posed themselves in picturesque attitudes beneath
a shady tree by the running stream, or sent one another
aloft in a swing, while the rest of the party picnicked
together in the foreground.
Pictures of this sort-and most persons must have met
with them in the course of their experience-did their
work in paving the way for something better. Before
Hogarth's time, conversation-pieces, and rude engravings
of good pictures, had got into the market. They were
mostly, however, too dear for the agricultural-districts,
where the people chose to buy, at a cheaper-rate, a new
class of subjects brought to them by the pedlers and
hawkers, and which were nearly all illustrations of Old-or
New Testament history, or scenes from the martyrology.
The trade in engravings of a popular: descriptionhad as sumed a degree of importance by the time that Hogarth
came upon the scene; the advantage he derived from:it, and
the benefit he conferred upon art in this country in so doing,
are well known. His unrivalled productions did not, however, save in exceptional cases, penetrate beyond the .cities
and larger towns; and it is a rare occurrence,*even-at the

242

CHAP-PICTURES.

f242
CHAP-PICTURES.
present moment, to meet with one of his original plates in

the country districts. They were not, in fact, cheap enough
for the hawkers' and pedlers' market, and, in consequence,
they remained unknown in the cottages and villages of the
country.
But the country trade was not allowed to languish. It
must have been somewhere about the time of Hogarth's
death that some ingenious fellow, with an excellent eye to
business, hit upon the mode of manufacturing those paintings on glass which for more than threescore years have
deluged the country, and which even now are sold in considerable quantities, though the traffic in them has declined,
according to the testimony of a rather extensive manufacturer, to less than one-twentieth of what it was within his
recollection. These paintings, which the reader will immediately call to remembrance, are nearly all of two uniform
sizes-14 inches by 11, or 14 inches by 22. They are what
they profess to be-oil paintings on glass; and having an
undeniable title to this description, they took amazingly
with the common people, and sold in immense numbers.
We may form some notion of the traffic from the fact that
it is hardly possible even now to walk through a village or
market-town without seeing them exposed for sale, or to
enter the cottage of a poor man, or the farmer's kitchen,
without finding a pair of them, and it will be oftener half-adozen, hanging on the walls. The smaller size predominates,
the larger ones being comparatively rare-a circumstance
which may be accounted for.by their liability to fracture,
the cheapest and .thinnest glass being invariably used.
Viewed at a little distance, they have a striking resemblance
to old oil-paintings; they have all dark rich backgroundsare mostly on sacred subjects-show strong contrasts of
light and shade, and but a small variety of tints, for a reason
which will be obvious presently. A slight blow cracks the
thin glass, and then they are ruined until the pedler comes

CHAP-PICTURES.

243

round with a duplicate of the same subject, and for a couple
of shillings or so makes all right again. We must not omit
to notice one peculiarity in these glass-paintings. Though
their number is legion, and their designs almost endless in
variety, yet these are all, or nearly all, the property of the
manufacturers; it is rare indeed that one meets with an
instance of piracy from the works of living artists, or even
of copies from standard and classical works-the only exceptions being in the case of single heads, such as Madonnas
and Ecce Homos. It is but fair to state, however,, that this
recommendatory fact is not attributable to the honourable
independence of the manufacturer-we shall not call him
artist-so much as to the necessities of his trade, which drive
him to the use of the simplest design and the fewest possible
tints, in order to make the more profit. Most of these pictures are made in London, and the manufacturer generally
has recourse to some struggling artist for his design, who,
for a couple of guineas or so, will supply him with what
he wants, and he can get the engraving done for even
less.
The manner in which these paintings are produced is a
mystery to all but the initiated; it is a riddle even to the
practical artist; and it is possible that the reader who has
tried to penetrate the secret, after puzzling his brain to no
purpose, has given it up in despair. We shall take the
liberty to make some revelations on the subject, which will
clear up the enigma; and in order to do it effectually, we
shall introduce our friends to the atelier of Mr. David Daubham, who at present holds a large share of the country trade
in his hands.
Mr. Daubham's place of business is in Leather Lane,
where, however, he is under no necessity of making any
demonstration, and does not make any. His atelier is a
roomy brick-chamber in the back yard, lighted from one
whole side. Upon entering, we find Mr. Daubham engaged
P,2

244

CHAP-PICTURES.

in a warm discussion with a glass-dealer, upon a question of
sixpence in the gross of " eleven-fourteens." Pending the
settlement of the debate we look:round, amid an odour of
oil and strong varnish almost too much for our olfactories. A
couple of girls and four or five lads are busy in the prosecution of their work. Before we have watched the several
processes for five minutes, the whole art and mystery is as
patent to us as it can be to Mr. Daubham himself. The
glass being first cleaned, an operation inwhich extra carefulness does not appear to be necessary, the surface which is
to receive the picture is rubbed completely over with a
preparation of turpentine varnish. Upon this, as it dries
rapidly, an impression from the engraved plate is laid, and
rubbed firmly upon.the glass with the palm. It is then left
to dry till a batch of a hundred or so is done. The paper
upon which the impression is taken is the flimsiest material
that can be used, and :is rubbed off by a momentary application of the sponge, leaving every line and touch of the print
adhering to the. varnish. But the varnish has not only
fastened the ink of the print to the glass, it has also primed
the glass for the reception of the colours. In this state, the
squares of glass are stuck up on a kind of scaffolding which
may be called the easel, with their faces to the light. The
easel will hold a score of them at a time. Then each of the
lads seizes a pot of colour and a brush, and sets to work at
their rear. One covers all the faces and hands With flesh
colour; another dabs on the greens; a third does brownsand so on, till all the tints are dabbed on and the glass is
covered. The whole twenty do not take twenty minutes in
the colouring, unless the tints are more numerous than they
usually are. It seems unaccountable that any pleasing effect
should be produced by such a process; but in fact, as the
engraving supplies all the shading, the effect is not bad,
considering all things; and there is no reason why really
excellent pictures should not be produced by a similar

CHAP-PICTURES

245

process, if it were thought worth while to improve it by
cautious experiment-though it would be impossible to paint
even a decent sky in such a way. Hasty and careless as
the work appears, it will be easily conceived that a certain
amount of dexterity is necessary in laying on the colours
within the prescribed outline;. and it must be done quickly,
lest the varnish be disturbed,: in which case the colours would
not adhere.
The pictures thus finished have only to be framed in
order to be ready for the market. Mr. Daubham contracts
for his frames with a firm in the neighbourhood, and finds
that he has as much as he can do himself in putting the
pictures into them-a job he does not choose to trust to his
" hands," who would break too many. The frames are of
two kinds-wood, and shining lackered metal pressed into a
sort of flowery pattern by a die. The far greater proportion
of his goods are, however, sold to the trade unframed. The
market-price was 9s. a dozen previous to the war, but has
fallen a trifle since, though not' so much as the demand.
The wooden frames cost not quite the same-and seeing
that these precious works of art are hawked at the present
moment at from 6s. to 7s. the pair, it is clear that profit has
not been lost sight of. The number of manufactories similar
to Mr. Daubham's, he tells us, is eight or ten, exclusive of
the small shops of amateur dabblers in the trade who get
up pictures of exceptional sizes at a low rate by working
from exhausted plates purchased as old metal. Looking to
the vast numbers which are and may be produced, amounting
to several gross a week from a single vorkshop, we are
puzzled to know what becomes of them, considering that
the country demand has so greatly declined. "But," says
Mr. Daubham, "you don't take into account the exportation.
They goes abroad, sir. A hundred gross, at least, of my
pictures goes to Catholic countries every year. Most of my
plates is Catholic subjects-Madonnas and Martyrs, and the

246

CHAP-PICTURES.

blessed saints St. Francis, St. Januarius, St. Nicholas, St.
Theresa, and so on. Then I've got twelve different Holy
Virgins, and lots of subjects that is Catholic or Protestant,
and will do for the home or export market either. I pack
'em without frames in racks made on purpose, and they
travel safe enough. The poor people abroad likes to have
their patron saint; and then they vows a picture to the
Virgin perhaps, and so they get stuck up in churches.
I've heard tell that you can see 'em in most of the churches
in Italy, as well as in Spain and Portugal. I used to send
twenty to thirty gross to Oporto every year, but the vinedisease has very much injured that trade, and I don't send
half as many now. However, I've had a new plate engraved,
and got out a new picture, called 'La Vi'rge 0 Grap;' that
means 'the Holy Mother with the Grapes,' and I'm going
to send a hundred gross of them out to Portugal to cure the
vines-of course I warrant 'em to do the business. He! he!"
We commend Mr. Daubham's candid summary to the notice
of book-making travellers and tourists, some of whom, if we
are not very much mistaken, have dwelt with curious yet
blundering minuteness upon these identical pictures, without
conjecturing that in so doing they were describing the
But we must leave the
products of English industry.
obliging Mr. Daubham to the prosecution of his trade, and
take a look at another and more pretentious branch of
equivocal art.
We have said that the home-trade in the productions of
Mr. Daubham and his congeners, has of late greatly declined.
This is not because the love of art has declined, but because
it has become more ambitious-we can hardly say more discriminating. The glass-painting has at length been pretty
generally discovered not to be the genuine thing; and oilpaintings on canvas are now extensively superseding the
oil-paintings on glass. In the new trade, the Jews mingle
very largely, and take the lead. They get up new frames

CHAP-PICTURES.

247

from old worn-out moulds, gild them with Dutch metal, clap
a landscape of a good thumping size into them, and sell a
pair of them for five-and-twenty shillings. They have a
gorgeous appearance, and impart an air of luxury and grandeur to a poor man's cottage or a farmer's parlour, which
pleases him none the less that it is barbarously out of keeping with all the rest of his domestic havings. The middle
classes accept the same bait; and even in London, several
thousands of such cheap wares are annually retailed. Nothing
is more common in the streets of the suburbs than the spectacle of a wandering Jew, with a couple of pair of these
tawdry pictures slung round his shoulders, back to back, and
stopping to display them at positions favourable for effecting
a sale. Both in London and in the country towns and
villages, they are sold by the furniture-brokers in large
numbers, and, like the paintings on glass, they too are
exported-not to Catholic countries, where they would be a
drug, but to the colonies, and especially to the emancipated
negroes of the West Indies, who have a prodigious appetite
for violent colours and gilding. The Jew-school of art is a
peculiar one, and none can excel in it who have any conscientious scruples on the score of finish. About half-acrown the square yard is the usual tariff paid to the artistthe employer finding the canvas. It is by no means indispensable that the canvas be covered by the painter, as, for
the majority of subjects, the work is half done to his
hands when he receives it. The artists' colourman has to
look to this. For moonlights, which are great favourites,
he primes the cloth with a blueish lead-colour tint, which
answers for the sky-for sunsets, he primes with a vivid
orange-colour-for rocky scenes, with a dark umber-for
snow-pieces, with pure white; and so on, to spare the
painter unnecessary labour and expense of paint. It is
found that an adept in this wholesale style of art, notwithstanding the immense area he has to get over before he has

248

CHAP-PICTURES.

earned a guinea, will make. a comfortable thing of it, and
win more money than many a studious artist whose works
have gained the applause of the critics. These pictures are
not painted one at a time-that would never pay. One
pallet is made to suffice for half-a-dozen or so of the same
pattern, the whole of which will be generally finished in the
day's work. We have known the trade so brisk in speculating times, that two batches per diem were exacted by a
well-known Jew exporter from an expert practitioner, whose
earnings, while the pressure lasted, could scarcely have been
less than ten guineas a' week.
We have remarked in the preceding paper," that to
educate the eye is a slow process. Nothing, in fact, seems
to make less satisfactory progress among the common people,
than the power of distinguishing what is true and good in
art, from what is false and vicious. In spite of Art-unions,
of cheap illustrated books, and myriads of pictorial periodicals and newspapers, the very feeblest designs in which
have more truth and value than whole cargoes of the chappicture& above described, we see the people running after
this palpable rubbish because it has the appearance of a
bargain. The worst of it is, that the classes we generally
term the uneducated, are by no means alone in this kind of
preference: the vile daubs above described are found not
only in the dwellings of the poor and uncultivated, but, with
broader frames and more luxurious gilding, in the houses of
persons with some pretentions to fashion and taste. People
who would not be seen abroad in an ill-cut coat, or a bonnet
a month behind the mode, are yet content to gibbet their
gross ignorance of the simplest principles of art on their own
walls, for the information of all comers. We do not like to
recommend the establishment of a censorship to take cognizance of pictures, or anything which would interfere with an
Englishman's privilege of spending his money as he likea;
* See " Commercial Art," p. 231.

CHAP-PICTURES.

249

CllAPPTURE~4
4
but we may express our conviction, that the public would
profit astonishingly by a despotism which should abolish at
once the unprincipled manufacture of that which is not
"goods," and the sale of which is a swindle, and compel
the busy hands employed in it to work at some useful
occupation.
It is to be feared that, notwithstanding all the remedies in
the shape of Schools of Design, popular works on art, the
flood of engravings and the deluge of illustrations weekly
issuing from the press, we are really making but little progress in helping the great body of the community to the
faculty of discriminating between a good and a bad imitation
of nature or natural objects. A celebrated German critic,
who wrote some years back on the state of the arts in this
country, attributed what otherwise Would have appeared to
him the unaccountable insensibility of our populace to the
msthetic qualities of art, to some general defect either in the
organs of vision or of the brain. We shall not accept any
such theory. In our cities and towns, we have improved
wonderfully since this dictum was promulgated; and if there
has not been the same improvement among those living
away from the centres of civilisation, it may be that it is
because the same opportunities of comparison between what
is really excellent and what is not so have not been afforded
them. The establishment of provincial galleries and museums
of art, and the throwing open of the numerous collections in
-private mansions, would place the villager in some respect
upon a level with the citizen. To a limited extent, this is
already being done. Education, by the press and by the
schoolmaster, must imbue our rising youth with a right
appreciation of these advantages, so that all shall be eager
to make the right use of them. When that is the state of
things with us, the right feeling will spring spontaneously
out of the right soil; and what is 'an instinct with the
southern nations of Europe-the ready perception of the

250

CHAP-PICTURES.

beautiful-will be an instinct also with us. We shall hope,
in the face of the verdict above quoted, that the day will
come, and that some of us will live to see it, when the
queer schools of art described in this paper will be numbered with the fossilised facts of a vanished era, and their
relics be regarded only as the monuments of a barbarous
age.

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.
region of the Seven Dials, to which we must introour friends, is unique in the topography of London. In
duce
a central area on what was once Cock and Pye Fields, in
the parish of St. Giles, seven narrow streets have their
termini. A column formerly stood there, surmounted with
sun-dials turning a face towards each street, and hence the
name of the place. It was built in the reign of Charles I.,
and was for some time a place of fashionable repute; but it
fell into ill odour more than a century ago: the column with
the dials was then removed; and when the Irish, who had
long held possession of a part of St. Giles's, extended their
Rookery to its immediate neighbourhood, Seven Dials
lapsed into the possession of everybody and anybody who
chose to tolerate their proximity. From the time of Gay,
who describes it in his Trivia, down to the present hour, it
does not appear to have much changed in character, though
it has become immensely more populous with the increasing
population of the capital, and its worst features have intensified in repulsiveness. At the present moment, order is
maintained by an extra force of policemen, and the first
symptoms of riot are summarily suppressed. The whole
region of the seven streets, with the innumerable courts and
channels of intercommunication, wears the aspect of a
market crammed with merchandise not worth possessing.
Monmouth Street, the rag-fair of the metropolis, stretches
towards and overflows into it; and the odour of the filthy
tatters, the mouldy leather and greasy disjecta, and the
THE

252

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

Cockney slang and explosive eloquence of the Jew-dealers,
go to make up its smells and sounds. Every third shop is a
marine-store or a dep6t for rags and grease-each and all of
them rivalling the rest in placarded announcements of what
they will give for old lead, old brass, old copper, old pewter,'
old iron, old glass, or old bones. Here a profusion of
cracked, smashed, and rickety furniture bursts out upon the
pathway, and shuts out half the light from the next door,
where two women are grinding away at a crippled mangle,
and brawling and squabbling the while, heedless of the roar
of a squalling urchin writhing on the floor with a broken
head. Here a group of undeniable London thieves, lounging
at the entrance of a court, are seen romping lazilywith their
dusty inamoratas, or more seriously employed in gambling
for cbppers at pitch-and-toss. Here the brazen-fronted ginshop grins at its fellow over the way; and the votaries of
both are swarming at the bar, where, as you peep in, the
operations appear to be all conducted in dumb show, so
deafening are the clack and the din. Here the trash-shop,
with its myriad of ballads, long songs, song-books, and
pictured tragedies, attracts a group of idlers, three-fourths of
them of the light-fingered juvenile gentry whose professional avocations commence with the gloaming. And here
is the half-penny shaving-shop, that luxuriates, besides, in
penny-cigars, modicums of pigtail, and screws of tobacco.
In this delectable locality, all unfavourable as it is to the
Muses, are the head-quarters not only of the Seven Dials
Press, whose productions surpass in number and popularity
those of any other press in the kingdom, but, for the most
part, also of the aspiring geniuses who furnish it with
novelties at the demand of the moment, and distil their
brains for the delectation of the mob. The Press, we are
bound to say, is in good keeping with its surroundings the
rag-shops, the fencing-kens, the crippled mangles, and the
gin-shops-seeing that its literature is decidedly tattered

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

253

that three-fourths of its productions are stolen property,
that both its verse and prose are crippled and mangled
beyond cure, and that its philosophy is principally of the
tipsy and staggering sort.
Foremost on the list of its productions stand the songs
and ballads. Of these, the Seven Dials printer, who is his
own publisher, professes to have, and perhaps really has,
above five thousand different samples constantly on hand.
On turning over a massive bundle, we find them to embrace
lyrical selections from the works of Shakspeare, Herrick,
Suckling, Rochester, Burns, Byron, Moore, Dibdin, Russell,
Eliza Cook, and a number of other names well known in
literature. Such selections, however, form but an exceedingly small proportion of the general stock, and have but a
limited sale. They are mostly above the comprehension or
the sympathies of the class which- buys half-penny ballads;
and even when they are not open to this objection, they are
too tame and general for the relish of the multitude. The
people must have piquancy and novelty; and it would seem
to signify very little what is the subject of a song, provided
it have these elements in its composition, and be sung or
singable to a popular tune. In general, it is no recommendation to the unlettered singer that the grammar
of his strain is good and the versification correct-these
are excellences which he is not always qualified to apwhat he can appreciate are strong language
preciate
and dramatic incident, the more striking and startling
the better. The popular ballad, Seven Dials born, treats of
all popular subjects-it is political, warlike, amatory-its incidents are now horrible murders and assassinations, now
the funniest practical jokes, now ghostly apparitions, and now
a stand-up fight: it plunges into questions of morals and
religion, of teetotalism, of sabbatarianism, of patriotism and
legislation, and is diffuse and humanely indignant on the
matter of wife-beating. Songs of this class, of which every

254

TIlE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

week produces its quota of novelties, are written by men in
the pay of the publishers, and not unfrequently by the
publishers themselves. Very often the author of a new
ballad is the man who first chants it about the streets; but
oftener still he is a man whose chanting and pattering days
are over, who has lost his voice and worn out his legs in the
trade, and is reduced to his last shifts for a living. The
established honorarium for a new song is a shilling, though
eighteen-pence is sometimes given for something "particular
spicy." This miserable payment is defended by the publisher on the ground that, whatever he pays for a song, he
cannot make it his own. "If I -print a new song," says he,
"on Wednesday, my neighbour is selling it on Thursday.
How can I afford to pay for property which is at another
man's use as much as it is at mine ?"
The new song, when fir'st published, appears on a quartersheet of crown-paper, and always in company with another
older ditty, which is given into the bargain. In this shape
it is sold by the street-chanters, who find out its value by an
experiment of a few days on the London public. Hundreds
of them in the course of a season are all but still-born, notwithstanding the noise they make in coming into the world,
and fall into oblivion either from their own demerit, or from
the rise of new subjects of greater interest. If a song stands
the public ordeal, and finds favour with purchasers, it is
immediately pirated; and the next shape in which it figures
is as an item in those streaming fathoms of verse technically
known as "long songs," in which as many as a hundred
favourite ditties are sold for a penny, by the patterer posted
on the kerb, who never troubles himself to sing them, but
spends his breath the livelong day in recapitulating their
titles. From such long strips the most successful songs are
transferred, finally, to the song-books published in the Dials
as serials, under no end of titles, and adorned with a supposititious portrait of some popular singer, or perhaps of the

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

255

Queen or Prince Albert. Regarding these serials, we may
remark that they have one curious characteristic, and that is
that the song most in vogue is inserted in every number.
The song-trade is always most flourishing in periods of
public excitement, and there is nothing more conducive to
its prosperity than a stirring and popular war. The palmy
era for the muse of the Seven Dials was the time when
Nelson was triumphant at sea-the years that followed, when
the Duke overran the Peninsula-and especially the year of
the crowning conquest at Waterloo. After the peace, songchanting declined, and thousands of wandering minstrels had
to seek another occupation. True, the people had their
songs and ballads; but three-fourths of the demand vanished
with the war; and the songs upon home-subjects went but
tamely off after the excitement of battle and heroic deeds.
With the loss of public countenance, the chanter lost his
confidence, and the rugged spirit and wit of the song-writer
declined. Both were fast falling into contempt-the vagabond minstrel sank into a half-starved tatterdemallion, and
became at once an object of commiseration and of comical
travestie on the stage, and those supplementary institutions
of low comedy, the shades, the coal-holes, and cider-cellars
of the metropolis. This saved him from extinction, or from
a fate as bad. It would not do to sing upon the stage or
the platform of the cider-cellar the rubbish concocted by the
Dials publisher, or the superannuated chanter he held in pay.
So the dramatic authors of the day had to apply themselves
to the task; and if popularity be a proof of success, they
certainly succeeded to an extraordinary extent. They
imitated the diction, the coarseness, the unsophisticated outspeaking of the Diallians, but they informed their productions with such a vein of wit and humour and ridiculous
comicality, as set all the world laughing and applauding.
What is not so much to their credit is the fact, that they
also blended the most ghastly terrors with flippant jocularity,

256

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

and knew how to arrest the hilarious laugh with the shuddering chill of horror. These imitations of the Diallian
songs are now very numerous, and of themselves form one
of the oddest curiosities of literature. We have said that
they rescued the chanter from comparative extinction; and
they did so because the Seven Dials press, true to its principles, stole them all as fast as they came out, printed them in
countless numbers on its crown quarter sheets, sowed them
broadcast in its long streamers, and stitched them up in its
serials. The chanter finds them infinitely more popular than
the works of his own poets, and the mob is never weary of
laughing at them. We need only mention Willikins and
his Dinah, Billy Barlow, The Rat-catcher's Daughter, and
that dramatic, pathetic, and mysterious ballad which is so
great a favourite on board the fleet, Molly the Betrayed, or
the Fog-bound Vessel, the incidents of which are a murder,
an appalling apparition, and a spell-bound ship, sung to the
chorus of "Doddle, doddle, doddle, chip, chum, chow,
chooral li la."
Besides the chanters, who sing the songs through the
streets of every city, town, village, and hamlet in the
kingdom-the long-song seller, who shouts their titles on
the kerb-stone-and the countless small shopkeepers, who in
trash-shops, toy-shops, sweet-stuff-shops, tobacco-shops, and
general-shops, keep them as part of their stock, for the
supply of the street-boys and the servant-girls-there is
another important functionary engaged in their distribution,
and who is well known to the inhabitants of large towns:
this is the Pinner-up, who takes his stand against a dead
wall or a long range of iron-railing, and, first festooning it
liberally with twine, pins up one or two thousand ballads for
public perusal and selection. Time was when this was a
thriving trade; and we are old enough to remember the day
when a good half-mile of wall fluttered with the minstrelsy
of war and love, under the guardianship of a scattered file of

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257

pinners-up, along the south side of Oxford Street alone.
Twenty years ago, the dead-walls gave place to shop-fronts,
and the pinners-up departed to their long homes. As they
died out, no one succeeded to their honours and emoluments;
and in place of the four or five score of them who flourished
in London at the commencement of this century, it is
probable that the most rigid search would hardly reveal a
dozen in the present day. In the provincial towns, the
diminution is not so marked; and there, from causes not
difficult to explain, the pinner-up has been better able to
hold his ground. This functionary, wherever he is found, is
generally a superannuated artisan or discarded servant; and
as he is necessarily exposed to all weathers, his costume
usually consists of everything he can contrive to hang about
him.
If the first care of the Seven Dials publisher is to cater for
the chanter, the second is certainly to subserve the interests
of the patterer. This genius, who has not at all a musical
voice, yet boasts inexhaustible lungs, and can bawl in a
crowd or patter at an area gate with perfect ease from one
week's end to another. If he sings, it is with a companion,
in a humdrum way ; and the cream of his song is found in
the spoken dialogue with which the two interlard the
stanzas. For these the Seven Dials press deals forth numerous romances of real life, cut from the columns of the newspaper, and appropriately garnished with gratuitous details
calculated to make a sensation. Then it prints myriads of
riddles and charades, contrived as vehicles of satire against
statesmen and the government, which the patterer propounds
with a stolid face to the gaping crowd, and sets them in a
roar by the comical solution after they have given it up.
But it is under the scaffold and the gibbet the patterer reaps
his largest gains. Time out of mind, the sale of last-dying
speeches and " sorrowful lamentations" has followed upon
the capital punishment of the British criminal; and so strong
8

258

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

is the morbid craving of the multitude for details connected
with the gallows, that the sale of these gloomy sheets far
exceeds that of any other production of the press throughout
the world. If the legislature should put an end to capital
punishment, they will at the same time destroy a species of
traffic which yields an occasional harvest to thousands of
vagabonds scattered through every part of the kingdom from
John o'Groats to the Land's End. The annals of literature
can boast no publication whose circulation equals that of the
gallows-sheet. There never is a murder avenged by the law
that does not call for its hundreds of thousands of impressions
from the Seven Dials Press. When the murder is a "good
'un "-that is, when it is marked by extra barbarity in the
perpetration, or extra insensibility in the perpetrator-the
impression approaches a million, or even exceeds that. The
gallows-sheet of the wretched Rush, containing his "sorrowful lamentation," actually approximated to two millions and
a half in number. Enough were sold to supply nearly one
in ten of the entire population of the realm with a copy-a
circumstance not very flattering to our ideas of the schoolmaster's progress.
The matter of these sheets is generally collected from the
newspapers, the only addition being the "sorrowful lamentation"-a copy of verses made to order for a shilling.
Jemmy Catnach, for a long time the great Mmcenas and
Elzevir of the Dials, when his bards happened to be tipsy,
which was too often the case, was driven to write them
himself. When hanging was a weekly ceremony, and the
victims much more numerous than they have been latterly,
the same copy of verses was made to do duty for a dozen
different criminals-there was, in fact, no help for it, because
the execution followed so quickly on the sentence. But when
the law was passed which allowed a longer day, there was
no excuse for second-hand verses, and each unfortunate had
a ditty to himself. As executions have become less frequent,

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

259

the impressions of the gallows-sheet have increased in number
'-which would seem to show that the demand for this exceptional article is subject to the usual law.
But the gallows is not always a fruit-bearing tree, and a
"good murder" does not happen every day. Nevertheless,
the patterer must live; and, lest the increase of public
virtue should condemn him to starvation, the Seven Dials
press steps forward to his aid, and considerately supplies
him with-" cocks." Perhaps the reader does not know
what a "cock" is. A cock, then, is a pleasing fiction-a
romance of a startling and exciting character-a tale of
scandal concerning some celebrated personage or aristocratic
family-an olio of sorrowful loves, heart-rending horrors,
and desperate revenges-anything, in short, that is violently
interesting and touching, and has not an atom of foundation
in fact. In the vulgar tongue, it is simply a lie; but the
Diallians are polite, and disguise the exceptionable term under
the cognomen of the bird of dawn. With a good cock-crow,
the patterer can do tolerably well; and with an assortment of
them, to suit the several districts on his beat, he can do still
better. Are you startled from your meditations, while making
your toilet some morning, by a stentorian voice roaring along
the terrace the "halarming news, just arrived by he-lectric
telegraph, of the hassassination of the Hemperor Napoleon
by a hinfernal machine-of the happrehension of the hassassin with his heyes blowed out of his ed-of the consternation of the city of Pairis;"' and fifty other things besides ?
Don't be agitated: it is only Scuffler. By the time you
have done dressing, he will have mulcted your Betty and
half the servant-maids of the terrace of a halfpenny apiece
-will have realised enough by the " cock-a-doodle-doo " to
buy him a substantial breakfast, which he will enjoy at his
leisure, and afterwards sally forth to crow another cock for
dinner. In the evening, just after sundown, when the stars
begin to blink through the fog, his tremendous voice will be
s2

260

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

heard reverberating along the quiet streets of the West End,
witha "full, true, and circumstantial account of the elopement of John Simkins, the ansome footman of Belgravyer,
vith the markis's youngest daughter, and the narrer escape of
the appy pair from the markis's eldest son, Colonel G,
vot started arter 'em vith sword and pistols-and shewin'
how the colonel vas done at the Rugby station by the false
intelligence prepared for him by the ansome John, and
started on to Scotland by express; while the appy couple
perseeded to Liverpool, and then sailed for Ameriker, vere
they finally landed on the shores of love and liberty-the
young 'ooman havin' a splendid fortin in her own right."
This is found to be a capital crow for the servants-hall and
kitchen, and needs but a little vigour on the part of Scuffler
to secure him a supper and a bed at any time. The crows
for the working classes must be of a little stronger flavour,
and, to tell well, should be illustrated by a huge picture in
flaming colours, and mounted on a pole, in which blood, fire,
or phantom is the conspicuous feature. Now it is an earthquake, now a conflagration, now a horrible thunder-storm
and shipwreck. In London, this species of illustrated cock
is everlastingly on the alert-and crows, and crows, and
crows, early and late, and all day long, in quarters judiciously selected-except when the falling rain declares war
against the painted cartoon. .The cock, like the ballad and
the sorrowful lamentation, sells for a half-penny, but, in spite
of all its crowing, not so readily; partly because it is objectionable to the police, who will not allow it to remain long
on its perch, and partly for want of faith on the side of the
mob, whom, in these days of cheap newspapers, it is not so
easy to delude in the article of news.
We come now to notice the more solid staple of the Seven
Dials press-what may be termed its classics, the production
of which yields it steady employment during those reactionary periods and pauses of quiet which intervene be-

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

261

tween the recurring seasons of excitement. These classics
comprise a numerous list of works which the generality of
the reading public have long lost sight of;. because among
persons of intelligence they have been long supplanted by
others which either are, or are supposed to be, infinitely
better. We confess to a lurking partiality for some of them
which the memories of childhood have rendered dear; while
at the same time the great mass might be advantageously
surrendered to oblivion. Among them will be found all
those wonderful little books which formed almost the exclusive library of childhood in the days when we were children
-Jack Spratt, Cock Robin, Mother Goose, Simple Simon,
Goody Twoshoes, Mother Hubbard, et hoc genus onmetogether with Books of Fate, Universal Dreamers, Universal
Fortune-tellers, Jack Sheppard, Dick Turpin, Moll Flaiders,
and others of that type. They are all published at the
lowest price-in large quarto for a penny; a smaller edition
for a half-penny, and still smaller editions for a farthing;
and they about equal in bulk the song-books at the same
cost. To these must be added a selection of the old-fashioned
school-books whose copyrights have run out, as the works
of Vyse, Mavor, Walker, Carpenter; an immense issue of
Christmas-pieces flamingly coloured, of Twelfth-night characters, of Christmas carols, and Scripture sheets or coloured
pictures of sacred subjects; and last, not least, of valentines
by the ton annually, varying in price from a half-penny to
five shillings each. If to these we add almanacs, marinestore and rag-shop placards, which are always on sale,
window-bills, poetry-cards, panoramic cuts and theatrical
characters, we shall not be far from completing the catalogue
of works issuing from the Diallian Press.
We must be allowed here one word on the subject of
Seven Dials art. Songs, ballads, books, lamentations, cockcrows-all are illustrated; and of a large proportion of the
productions named above, the illustrations form: the chief

262

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

part, while some of them are entirely pictorial. Sir Joshua
Reynolds once said that he was indebted for the chiaro-oscuro
of his well-known picture of Lord Ligonier to a wood-cut
at the head of a ballad which he found on a dead-wall, and
bought for a half-penny. It may have been that the engraving in question strayed into the Seven Dials after it
had been worn out in the regular service : at any rate, the
engravings on the sheet-ballads of the present day are a full
century behind the march of improvement in that direction,
and, in addition to being worn and ground to death by
myriads of impressions, have generally the merit of being
quite independent of the subject they are supposed to illustrate. Where they are new, they are plainly the attempts
of tyros in the art, and are probably purchased at the prime
cost of the wood on which they are engraved. There are a,
few exceptions, however. Now and then we meet with a
spirited scene by Seymour, rivalling Cruikshank in his
wildest humour; and there lies before us at this moment a
portrait of the Rat-catcher's donkey, apparently dashed off
with pen and ink in a furious hurry, and containing lines of
which the most accomplished artist might be proud. The
larger cuts which adorn the dying speeches and lamentations, the calamities and the crows, may be described in one
word-they are all simply abominable. Those which figure
as frontispieces to books.and on the Christmas-pieces are not
much better; but when covered with flashy water-colours,
they are gorgeous to the uneducated eye, and, being retailed
at a low price, sell by thousands. Then there are the cheap
valentines, which are monstrous caricatures, only comical
when they are not disgusting, and which, fierce in red, blue,
and green, are to be met with at the proper season in all the
slums and trash-shops of the kingdom. The staff of artists
must be pretty numerous, and the consumption of watercolours must be enormous in the Dials, taking all these proAuctions into acjeount, and reckoning also the huge cartoons

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

263

exhibited by the cock-crower, and calamities, such as explosions, wrecks, earthquakes, floods, conflagration's, &c.,
without number, which are executed for shipwrecked and
mutilated sailors, for car-borne cripples, for blasted miners,
and machine-crushed factory-workers-all of which are
painted in the Seven Dials or its immediate purlieus.
We have but small space left for some few particulars and
details .of the literary trade of the Dials. From what has
been shown above, it would appear inexplicable, on the face
of it, that in these days, when good and serviceable literature
is so cheap and abundant, there, should be found a paying
market for what not only is unquestionable rubbish, but
looks what it is, and scorns 'to assume the appearance of
anything better. In point of real value, there is no comparison to be instituted between the pennyworth that issues
from the Seven Dials and that sent forth at the same price
by respectable publishers. The paper used by the Seven
Dials press averages some four or five pounds' weight to the
ream, instead of sixteen or seventeen pounds, which it should
weigh to be of any permanent service, and in quality is so
vile that no decent shopkeeper would condescend to.use it
to wrap up copper change. The print is indescribably villanous-rarely legible for three lines together, and teeming
with blunders and omissions where it is legible; and the
matter is such as we have described above. What, then, is
the secret of the large and continuous sale, and how does
this refuse compete, and compete successfully, with matter
infinitely better-double, treble, fivefold in .quantity, and
printed on good paper, with perfect correctness, and in an
elegant form? " Oh," says the philosopher, "the reason is
plain enough-it is the corrupt taste of the masses, who will
feed on garbage, and prefer it to wholesome mental food."
With all deference to the philosopher, and allowing his
dogmas their due weight, we are of opinion that this
oracular utterance leads but a little way towards the solu-

264

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS

tion of the question. As practical inquirers, we look at
facts, and we find this single one to be worth more than a
bushel of theories:-The distributing-agent of the Seven
Dials literaturepockets as profit four-fifths of his receipts.
The chanter, the patterer, the pinner-up, the cock-crower,
the small shopkeeper--all buy their sheet-ballads, lamentations, crows, &c., at 2d. to 2d. the long dozen. The trade
thus yields the agent from 200 to 300 per cent. on his
outlay; and this enormous profit he often doubles by charging a penny instead of a half-penny for his gallows-sheet,
when this, as in the case of a "good-murder," is in great
lrequest." Moreover, in the case of the ballads, a provision
is made for this doubling process-two being printed on the
quarter-sheet, which is oftener than not split up by the
chanter at country wakes and fairs. Now, it is a truth
pretty well established by experience, that rubbish and
quackery of all kinds may be forced upon the public by
persistent vehemence and vociferation. Were the literature
we speak of subjected to the usual distributive agency, it
would be all but still-born-would be rejected by booksellers, or, where received, would rot upon their shelves,
and would speedily, from ceasing to be remunerative,
become extinct. But, trumpeted as it is by hundreds of
bawling vagabonds and audacious wags in the ears of the
ignorant populace, it creates its own market wherever it
goes; and the Seven Dials press flourishes, thanks to its
paternal care of its agents. Perhaps we ought in candour
to add, that this judicious exercise of liberality is not confined to the Dials, and that it has been the foundation of
greater fortunes than have ever been made within the precincts of that classical spot. We might refer to a well-known
Family Bible, which was pushed by voluble touters into the
cottage of the poor man and the simpleton, in sixpenny
numbers, to, the number of 40,000 copies-which cost the
subscriber £6 6s. by the time it was completed, of which

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN

DIALS.

265"a

sum the proprietor received 40s., leaving more than double
that amount to the distributors! And we might point to
fifty works besides, circulated by the same machinery at the
present moment, which cost the purchasers from two to
three times their value in the market.
Another peculiarity in the Dials trade, and which must be
a chief cause of its success, is, that all its transactions are for
ready cash. Credit, and the fact is suggestive, is a word
unknown in the Dials. From the ragged chanter to the
bookselling country-agent, all must down with the cash
before they receive the goods. Thus the Dials publisher has
no bad debts; and, looking to the complexion of his wares,
must make a brilliant profit in spite of the abnormal allowance to agents.
Of the amount of the Seven Dials trade in literature, but
little is positively known, and statistics on this subject are
hard to be got at. It has been estimated that about £12,000
is thrown away annually by the people upon the sheets, halfsheets, and quarter-sheets emanating from this district; but
what proportion this bears to the produce of its myriads of
cheap books is a question to which we can obtain no reliable
response. The average gains of the chanter and his confreres are from 7s. to 9s. a week, in ordinary seasons ; but
in seasons distinguished by the exploits of a Rush or a
Manning, they will run up to five, or even ten times that
amount while the excitement lasts. The pinner-up takes
about £60 a year, disbursing for his stock perhaps £18.
The shopkeeper is content with far less profit, as in places
remote from the Dials he acts as middleman between the
chanter and the publisher.
The known prosperity of the Dials press naturally provoked rivalry in other quarters; and Holywell Street, the
Borough, Clerkenwell, even "the Row" itself, have started in
the race, with a similar species of literature at the same price.
But the means they adopted to insure success have only

266

THE PRESS OF THE SEVEN DIALS.

insured their defeat-they printed too well-on paper too
good, and could not in consequence leave so liberal a margin
to the agent. So the chanter, who must look to his profits,
leaves them in the lurch, and turns his face to the Dials
when he is out of stock.
From the above sketch, it will be gathered that, with all
our success in the diffusion of cheap literature, the Seven
Dials press has never yet felt to any extent the effects of
rivalry in its own peculiar field. Nor is it easy to see how,
by anybody incommoded by a conscience, effectual rivalry
can be established. One only consolation seems derivable
from an investigation of the subject-and it is, that some
advance is perceivable in the morality of the Dials productions-though the improvement is only negative. They aie
neither so rancorously seditious, nor so grossly indecent as
we can recollect them to have been in times past.

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.
STRAWBERRY STREET presents nothing very remarkable
to the view, and in its present condition would be considered
the reverse of captivating by the lovers of the picturesque.
But the street has a history, with which it has been our
fortune to become intimately acquainted-a history so like
that of many a human lot, with its ups and downs in the
world, and so interwoven with the destinies of men, that we
have made up our minds to record it. Strawberry Street
stands, and has stood for nearly thirty years, in a district
once known as Strawberry Fields, and still spoken of under
that appellation by a small section of our older citizens, who
can recollect when the grass grew on its site, and the cows
of a small dairy-farm famous for its custards, cheese-cakes,
and curds and whey, chewed the cud in peace, unconscious
of Smithfield.
When Strawberry Street first rose into being, which it
did very gradually-taking between two and three years to
complete its double row of two-storied dwellings-it was,
to all intents and purposes, a suburb of London, and like
other suburbs, shrank from being swallowed up in Babylon's
bosom, and clung with considerable tenacity to rural associations and characteristics. It retained for some years a strip
of grass between the footpath and roadway, and boasted a
tree or two, almost amounting to a row, on the eastern side.
In lieu of pavement, the footpath was laid down with gravel,
and the roadway was neatly macadamised; and, as all the
front-parlours were fenced off from curious eyes by iron

268

HISTORY

OF STRAWBERRY

STREET.

railings four feet at least from the windows, the street wore
an undeniably neat and respectable appearance.
There being nowhere any indication of a shop, the street
naturally bore the reputation of being what is called a
genteel street. And genteel it undoubtedly was-for a
time. It became very early the abodd of professional ladies
and gentlemen, whose neat brass-plates informed you that
they taught drawing and painting, and japanning, and
French, Italian, and German, and the pianoforte and singing,
and the practice of all kinds of musical instruments. Then
there were clerks, managers, and responsible persons employed in the city, who came home to their families in
Strawberry Street, as regular as the clock, about seven
in the evening; and, besides these, a number of persons of
independent property, of the staid and sober sort-mostly
annuitants we fancy, who had ensconced themselves in this
comfortable quarter to spite the assurance-offices by living
to the age of Old Parr if they could.
The most remarkable man among the early settlers was
Mr. Pottinger, whom we knew well, and whom, to look at,
you would have accounted the model of a gentleman of
threescore. He wore his hair powdered, and on Sundays
went to church in tights and Hessians; and you might look
in vain, Sundays or week-days, for a spot on his broadcloth
or a flaw in his linen. He was a man famous for his conversation, and was the oracle of the parlour at the Fox and
Salutation round the corner, where he regularly took his
night-cap in the evening. He was great in politics; and in
'29, when we had the privilege of a first-floor in Strawberry
Street, predicted the triumph of the opposition and the
certainty of Reform, which both came to pass in due time;
but he was greater still in aristocratic genealogy, and if he
had learned the peerage by heart, could not have been
better informed than he was ; and, more than that, he knew
the length of every nobleman's purse, and would dilate on

IIISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

269

the pecuniary difficulties of lords and landholders in a way
that astonished his hearers. In his most communicative
moments, Pottinger never said a word about himself; and
there was a mystery about him which the whole street had
tried its skill in fathoming, but to no purpose.
Pottinger, who seemed never to have any business on his
hands, was a favourite with most of his neighbours, and with
the children especially, to whom he was gentle and patronising, and liberal in the small toys and dainties children
love. Miss Montgomery, who lived at No. 10,- was the only
person in Strawberry Street who did not concur in the
general reverence for Mr. Pottinger. She was a maiden
lady on the further side of fifty, who kept, in addition to a
maid-of-all-work, a page, and a poodle, and no other society,
save at periodical intervals, few and far between, when a
carriage would drive up to her door, and a posse of young
ladies, with their mamma, wearing the Montgomery face,
only twice as large, would alight and thunder at the knocker,
and be let in by the page, all spick and span for the occasion, and half an hour afterwards would be let out again,
and drive off amid demonstrations equally noisy. Mr. Pottinger departed this life, as his tombstone informs us, at the
age of sixty-three; and all Strawberry Street was thrown
into a state of perfect amazement by the grandeur of his
funeral, which was performed by a west-end undertaker on
the most imposing and expensive scale. Besides the hearse
and mourning-coaches, there were three private carriages,
empty to be sure, but yet bearing heraldic insignia on their
panels, sent to follow the good man to his grave. Pottinger
dead was even more mysterious than he had been when
living; but when all was over the mystery was cleared up.
Miss Montgomery, who was too much of a gentlewoman to
give a handle to gossip during the life of Mr. Pottinger,
now felt herself at liberty to justify the pertinacity with
which she had in a manner ignored his existence; and she

270

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

suffered it to ooze out through Jemima, her maid-servant,
that Isaac Pottinger had passed much of his life as gentleman's gentleman to Sir Bullfig Browning, at whose townhouse she had often seen him in days gone by, when she
visited at the baronet's. Of course, it was out of the ques,
tion that she could acknowledge his civilities in Strawberry
Street.
The year after Pottinger's death, Miss Montgomery left
the street; the carriage came one day, bringing the periodical visitors clad in deep mourning, and when it went
away, bore Miss Montgomery off. Her page, poodle, and
hand-maid followed a few days later with her goods, and
No. 10 was to let. With her departed the exclusively
genteel era of Strawberry Street. Her house was taken by
the two Misses Filkins, who turned it into a young ladies'
seminary, and clapped a brass-plate nearly a yard wide on
the little front-gate.
The "young ladies" who flocked
hither for instruction comprised all that could be got together by the most diligent canvassing, and included-we
hope the classification is not very unnatural-a dozen at
least of small petticoated masculines.
This gave a new
aspect to the street, which now lost' its accustomed qdietness; and regularly, at the hours of nine and twelve, of
two and four, reverberated with the prattle and squalling of
infant voices, or their joyous outburst when released from
school. The Misses Filkins may have been very useful in
their vocation, but they were not what is termed "select" in
their choice of pupils, and they pursued an active kind of
treatment, the result of which was frequently too audible
out of doors. They were a pair of loud-voiced spinsters,
given to white dimity dresses of astonishing amplitude, to
taking in green-groceries at the school-room window, and
to borrowing a neighbour's washing-tub on Saturday afternoons. We do not assert that they were not genteel, but
their gentility differed exceedingly from Miss Montgomery's.

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET,

271

The palmy days of Strawberry Street were now passing
away, and its pretensions were evidently on the decline.
The professional ladies and gentlemen moved by degrees
further north, and their places were supplied by a new class
-by tradesmen's clerks, by foremen and overseers of workshops, men of a hundred a year and no leisure, who came
home at all hours of the night, and let themselves out in
the dark mornings of winter long before sunrising, and who
let lodgings to help to pay the rent. Here and there the
muslin-blind disappeared from the front-parlour window,
and revealed such things as a Wellington boot beautifully
"treed" and polished; a last covered with a little Switzerland of bunions; a set of milkwhite ivory piano-keys; a case
of brilliant razors; or a few small panels exquisitely painted
in imitation of oak, mahogany, or sandal-wood: all-so many
indications that the dwellers within lived by the labour of
their hands, and would be happy to take your orders.
These were but the signs of a further change that was
coming. Already a tall brick chimney, only a few score
yards from the southern end of the street, had risen so high
in the air as to overlook its whole area, and was daily
mounting higher; and already men in splashed aprons and
shirt-sleeves would be occasionally met strolling in bands
through Strawberry Street on their way home from work.
And now long ranks of cottages, not twenty feet apart,
sprung up like mushrooms in the waste ground on the
eastern side. These were inhabited almost as soon as built,
by a class who did not trouble their beads about gentility
at all, but who speedily found out the Fox and Salutation,
whose landlord turned the large parlour into a taproom for
their accommodation, to the hearty indignation and disgust
of his old customers.
S* ddenly, one Winter's morning, the tall chimney, from
which the scaffolding had disappeared a few days before,
began sending forth a volume of black smoke, which dark-

272

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

ened the whole neighbourhood, and set all the world, and
Strawberry Street in particular, complaining of the nuisance,
and talking of .lawsuits and indictments against the proprietor. This disagreeable surprise was followed by another
hardly less welcome to the remnant of exclusives who were
still dwellers in the street. For some days, alterations had
been going on in the house that once was Mr. Pottinger's,
under cover of a tall hoarding, which being at length taken
down, displayed the broad front of what is called a "generalshop," surmounted by the name, painted under the cornice
in letters a foot long, of Mrs. Murgatroyd. This lady,
whose touching habit it was to describe herself as " a lone
woman," was a strapping creature of five feet nine, and of
corresponding circumference, but active and pushing withal,
and experienced in the ways of the world. Her shop, which
contained every thing that a man who wore a leathern
apron, or the wife and family of such a man, could possibly
want, immediately became the resort of the whole of the
"hand to mouth" class of the neighbourhood, and the focus
of more gossip than had ever emanated from that part of
the world before. Mrs. Murgatr6yd gave credit, on a
principle of her own, to those who, from temporary loss of
employment, or misfortune, stood in need of it; and thus
secured in prosperous times the gratitude and patronage of
those whom she assisted in adversity. It may be that she
had her losses; but we have a notion that they were few,
and compensated on her peculiar principle, and, on the whole,
she throve. At her outset in business she was dragged
into a terrible dispute with the Misses Filkins, who at first
dealt with her, and then basely slandered her souchong.
The quarrel was deadly and fierce-nothing less than war
to the knife-and in the end the Filkinses lost the day, and
what was worse, lost their pupils, and had to take flight and
settle somewhere else.
Mrs. Murgatroyd's example was by and -by followed by

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

273

other enterprising spirits who are sure to spring up wherever
there is a chance of doing business. A greengrocer was
the next to make his appearance, and he combined a coalshed with his potatoes and cabbages, dispensing at once the
viands and the materials for cooking them. Then came a
carpenter. and joiner; then a vender of sweet-stuffs, who,
defiant of Mrs. Murgatroyd, dared to sell peg-tops, marbles,
paper-kites, and hoops for the boys; then a cooper, and then a
slopseller. In short, in less than a couple of years from the
erection of the tall chimney, the whole street on both sides
of the way, with the exception of a very few houses, was
transformed into a third-rate business street, and had lost
all trace of its original neatness. As every man had constructed his shop on his own plan, and the last-comeis had
vied with each other in encroaching as far as possible on
the footpath, the ranks of shops showed a beautiful irregularity in their fronts, and imparted to the straight street
a tortuous aspect which it retains to the present hour.
The tall chimney above referred to belongs to a saw-mill,
which has prospered from the hour when it first took up its
position in the neighbourhood, and which has not only
increased its own establishment to three times its original
extent, but has gathered round it a host of industrial professors, all more or less dependent upon the services of a
saw-mill for the prosecution of their labour. These hosts
have invaded Strawberry Street, and have taken possession
of its every floor, to the final dispersion of the votaries of
gentility, who have abandoned it in despair.
If you go into Strawberry Street now and look for No. 10,
where once, beneath an arch of red damask curtains, Miss
Montgomery's famous campanula drew admiring glances
from the passers-by, you will find that rigid maiden's parlour,
once an impenetrable sanctum to everything masculine, save
the pale-faced page and his breast of golden buttons, transformed into a barber's shop. The pole, with its bunchy top,

274

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

sticks diagonally at the side of the doorway, like a monster
rocket ready to be fired over the opposite houses; and
within, where once not so much as a thought of a beard
was suffered to intrude, beards are now seen to wag with
equivocal jokes, and are dealt with by the gross whenever
Saturday-night comes round. No. 9, to the right of barber
Suddles, has long since been turned into a beer-shop, and is
celebrated far and wide for the flavour of its treble X, at
" 3-d. a pot in your own jugs," and which may be drunk on
the premises at 4d. It mounts, as a sign, the Circular Saw,
and is already a powerful rival to the Fox and Salutation;
and when the landlord has obtained his spirit-licence, for
which he has applied three times already, and makes sure
of getting it when the magistrates meet again, Strawberry
Street will be blessed with a gin-shop-that modern climax
of civilisation. A little lower down, on the other side of the
way, stands Punter's coffee-shop, known as the early breakfast-house. Punter's is open at five o'clock in the morning
all the year through, and hot coffee and thick slices are to
be had at any time between that hour and twelve at midnight. Punter never gets above four hours' sleep in his
bed; but he makes up for that deficiency, in good part, by
a two hours' stretch on the bench in the afternoon, and such
other occasional winks as he can catch, with the connivance
of Mrs. Punter, during the day. The purlieus of Strawberry
Street are now alive with work-shops and work-yards, from
which, whenever there is an interval from labour, there is
an influx of labourers and apprentices into Punter's. The
attractions of the place are not very great, consisting, besides
the coffee and slices, of a couple of weekly papers, an occasional second-hand copy of the Tines cut up into single
leaves for distribution, a few cheap illustrated serials, and
When the evenings are wet and
unlimited dominoes.
muddy, Punter's place is crammed, not so much from the
force of its attractions, as from the necessity his customers

IIISTORY OF STRAWBERRY

STREET.

275

are under of going somewhere, and the fact that they have
nowhere else to go save to the public-house or to bed.
Thirty years, which are nothing in the life of some streets,
have changed Strawberry Street from the abode of quiet
and ease-loving competence to that of the toiling and
struggling mass, and within the period of an average lifetime hurried it through all those changes which generally
require centuries for their operation. In its present condition-its grass and trees all gone, for the former has been
trodden out, and the latter cut down for firewood by the
inhabitants-with its footways choked with shavings, stale
cabbage-leaves, empty pewter-pots, coal-sacks, barrels of
sodden cranberries, and tubs of red herrings-with its roadway half blocked up with trucks, barrows, and hand-carts,
and worn into ruts by waggon-wheels-with its upper windows bristling with drying-poles adorned with the dangling
shapes of female costume-with its wide open doors left
eternally gaping for the convenience of unnumbered lodgers,
and revealing the stained and tattered walls of the interiors,
and flights of dusty stairs; in its present condition, we say,
we fail to recognise a single feature of the Strawberry Street
of old; and it is a fact that on searching for it lately, after
the lapse of many years, we walked twice through its whole
length without recognising our quondam suburban retreat.
If, however, the subject of our remarks has lost in the article
of respectability-a word, by the way, which is much misapplied-it has gained immensely in usefulness and populousness. For every head it sheltered in its genteel infancy,
when it glittered in all the glory of paint and polish, it now
accommodates ten at the least; and if in its youthful days
it could boast of spending a deal of money, it may now
solace itself with the reflection that it earns a still greater
amount. Its dense population are all doers and workers,
with hardly a" single exception; and it stands noted in the
registrar's report that they add to the aggregate of the
T 2

276

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

births of London in a ratio considerably greater than the
general proportion; while, on the other hand, although
funerals are performed by the Messrs. Earthworm in the
next street, "on a scale unprecedentedly low," the inhabitants still refuse to die in anything like encouraging
numbers to reward the speculation of those enterprising
tradesmen. The fact would appear to be that Strawberry
Street is a healthy locality, in spite of its indifferent drainage, which is perhaps balanced by its standing on a gentle
declivity; and in spite of its want of paving, for it has never
been paved, unless a single line of flag-stones down the
centre of the footways is to be called paving. Perhaps the
mud of the rainy season is somewhat mitigated by the
flocks of pet ducks which pick a living out of it somehow,
along with a battalion of scrubby cockney fowls, much
abbreviated in the articles of wing and tail, whose clucking
and crowing, mingled with the barking of a band of ragged
terriers, the clink and thump of tools, and the bawling,
shouting, and laughter of innumerable weather-proof children, make up the music of the place. Perhaps the street
is healthy because labour is healthy; and hard work for ten
hours a day is the lot of most of its inhabitants, who, for the
most part, do not look for any other.
We said at the outset that the history of Strawberry
Street was like that of many a human subject. Have we
not shown it to be so? Does not many a pretentious spark,
who comes to London purposing to gratify all manner of
ambitions, get shifted by fortune down, and down, and down
the ladder of loftiness, step by step, until he feels a firm
footing at last, it may be very near the lowest round, and
finds his vocation where nature designed it for him, in doing
what he is best fitted for? Yea, verily, for we have witnessed
this descent a hundred times, and generations unborn shall
witness it after us. Another point of resemblance: ask for
Strawberry Street noN, ;And you shall be told you mean

HISTORY OF STRAWBERRY STREET.

277

Familiarity has knocked off a syllable
Strawby Street.
from the designation. If Miss Montgomery had remained
at No. 10 till this time, it is our opinion she had been lopped
down to Gumry. So it is that, if you inquire for Mr. Robert
Fitzwilliams, who came to town in '34, intending to be one
day developed into a city alderman, you may chance to find
him doing duty as " Bob Wills," on a policeman's beat, and
shining only in a glazed hat.

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.
As a bachelor of fifty, given to solitary speculations upon
men and things from the altitude of my two-pair back, and
with leisure enough upon my hands to allow me to look at
all things considerately and dispassionately, I possess more
advantages for observation and reflection than every philosopher can boast of. I am not compelled to come to a conclusion upon every popular topic that turns up, before I have
looked at both sides of it. VVWhen I find the morning paper,
after Betty has aired it and hung it over the back of my
chair, hammering away with the vigour of a Cyclops in
favour of one particular course of proceeding, or set of men,
and browbeating or bullying the other side, I am not under
the necessity of letting myself be crammed with wind from
the editor's force-pump, and exciting my nervous system in
a disagreeable way. I can afford to let the matter rest
awhile, and wait till that unprincipled faction has had its
say in its turn, in the evening paper, or in to-morrow's;
and then, if I choose, I can compare notes, and weigh one
side against the other, and draw a conclusion, if it be worth
while, which it generally is not.
It is wonderful what advantages I derive by the practice
of this compensating system, and what a knowing old person
I have the reputation of being, solely from adherence to so
simple a plan. The beauty of it lies in the fact, that it
enables you to clear off matters as you go, and reduces the
amount of important material for judgment to the minimum
point. A most'surprising number of great public questions

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

279

have I either settled outright, or shelved for future settlement in the course of my time. I would name some of
them, but that the catalogue might appear invidious, and
give offence to many worthy people; and I am unwilling to
be the cause of scandal to anybody to whom that designaBut-there are public questions of a
tion is applicable.
kind which do not admit of thus being disposed of, for the
simple reason that they are addressed point-blank to the
reader personally-that there are no two sides about them,
and that they call for a definite answer in a manner unmistakeably plain and candid. These questions have weighed
for a considerable time upon my mind, and I have observed
latterly that they are growing more numerous, more pointed,
more personal. Their notes of interrogation have stared me
in the face at the breakfast-table, in my after-dinner chair,
at the tea-table, any time for this twelvemonth; and yet I
have never set eyes on a syllable in response. Can it be
that they are all addressed to me individually, and that the
propounders are waiting for my answers all this while ? If
it should be so, how discourteous and unsympathising must
I appear in their eyes by this time! Let me hasten to redeem my fault, and let my natural modesty stand in excuse
for the slur which my neglect hitherto may have cast upon
my character. I will answer your questions, 0 my persistently inquiring friends! as it becomes me to answer them,
and to the best of my humble ability,
The first-because, according to the best of my recollection, it has the claim of longest standing-asks me rather
curtly, "Do you want luxuriant hair and whiskers?" I
might object to this inquiry as a little too personal; but,
waiving that, let me say that there was a time when I might
have replied more feelingly to the interesting questionwhen I wanted no luxuriance either of hair or whiskers, but
only the sanction of fashion to wear them. In the days of
my pilous luxuriance, whiskers were remorselessly mown

280

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

down as fast as they appeared; and now that all the world
is cultivating them, my crop is not worth cultivation. The
best I can do is to compromise the matter by a kind of halfshave, and pass muster as well as I may. As to my hair,
Time has thinned it somewhat; but they tell me that,
phrenologically, I look none the worse for that. So, with
many thanks, my good friend, I will decline the luxuriant
hair and whiskers.
Somebody has been asking pertinaciously for a long time
past, " Do you bruise your oats yet ?" There is something
suggestive and consolatory about the yet. At present, I am
bound to say, I do not bruise my oats; and this is a painful
confession, inasmuch as I have no oats to bruise. If I had
been more sparing in the quantity which, with such pleasure,
I sowed broadcast wherever I went thirty years ago, I
might have had some left to bruise at this present moment.
As it is, I have no horses to eat oats-pauper et pedester
sum-I ride on Shank's naggie, or in my "Favorite" 'bus,
when business calls me abroad. As yet, that is. I shall
live in hopes, on the suggestion of my inquiring friend; and
if he can put me in the way of becoming the ,proprietor of
oats, and the etceteras implied when "your oats" are
spoken of, I will undertake to bruise them with all my
heart, and on his peculiar principle.
Somebody else asks seriously, "Do you double up your
perambulators?" NPo, sir; but last Sunday morning, as I
was walking quietly to church, I was doubled up by a
perambulator in a most shameful and scandalous manner.
Whether the fat matron who propelled the abominable
machine was an etymologist, and imagined that her perambulator was to walk clean through me, I don't know;
but she drove the front-wheel right between my legs, and I
woke suddenly out of a reverie to find myself sprawling
over a couple of gigantic babies. It was a providence that
the twins were fat, fleshy, and soft, and that I escaped with

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

281

a slight abrasion of the forehead. There used to be a law
against driving wheel-carriages upon the trottoirs; I should
like to know when it was repealed, or, if it never was
repealed, why it is not put in force ? Not a day of my life
passes now but I am perambulated into the kennel or into
an open shop, to avoid being upset. In other respects, I
have nothing to do with perambulators, being a bachelor,
and having no use for them. Nevertheless, I should have
no objection to see them doubled up, once for all, in a way
that would not at all gratify the inquirer, I fear.
A curious person asks, " TWhere do you purchase fish ?"
Never going to market myself, I am obliged to ring the bell
for my landlady, Mrs. Jones, and propound this query to
her. She tells me that fish of all sorts, from sprats to
salmon, and from dried herring to salt cod, "travels about
the streets of London on men's heads, and calls at everybody's door "-that "a pair of soles is tenpence; big uns
a shilling, or maybe one and two "-that "mackerel is
vareyus;" and that "salt cod goes up always about Eastertime along with the Catholics." "Eels," she says, "is
always alive accordin' to the crier; but they never shows
no signs of life till you've skinned 'em." Her acquaintance
with the fish supply of London extends no further than this;
and for any additional information he may want, I must
refer the inquirer to the fountain of knowledge at Billingsgate.
An inquisitive philanthropist asks," Why wear a coat that
does not fit ?" With a protest that I am not bound to reply
to such a question unless I choose, I beg to submit that
there may be many reasons for so doing. A coat that does
not fit may be a fitter coat for many purposes than one that
does. For lounging, gardening, dozing by the fire, your
non-fitting coat is most suitable. Then, who is to decide
what constitutes a fit ? Is it a coat that cleaves to a man
like an outer skin, in the fashion of George IV.'s time, or

282

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

one that, "like a lady's loose gown," hangs about you, as
one sees them now ? Perhaps a coat may be either of these,
and yet fit, or not fit, according as it is well or ill constructed.
But, be the coat upon a man's back what it may, it seems to
me a breach of manners to ask him why he wears it. What
right have you, my friend, to hint so plainly at the res angustce domi, which often compels many a worthy man to
wear any coat he can get to shield him from the weather ?
Why wear a coat that does not fit! "Why does the miller
wear a white hat ?"
A querist of the same imperious character blurts out the
abrupt question, " Who's your hatter ?" What's that to
you, I should like to know ? I shan't tell you. The man
is an honest tradesman, and makes a decent hat, that I am
not ashamed to put my head in, and sells it at a fair price.
You have no right to be meddling with his business; and I
hold your inquiry to be a piece of impertinence; and I shall
not satisfy your curiosity. My hatter pays his way; I shall
be glad to hear that you do the same.
A captious personage, whom I suspect to have interested
motives, wants to know, " Why ladies and gentlemen will
wear wigs, fronts, or head-dresses which the most cursory
glance detects," when they might wear others that defy detection ? The question, I must say, betrays a radical want
of sincerity on the part of the questioner. He has evidently
no notion that a lady or gentleman wears a wig with any
other intention than that of deceiving their " friends and the
public." The proper use of a wig, he requires to be told, is
to keep the head warm, and to supply in an honest way the
natural covering of which time or affliction has deprived the
head-not to deceive the world. The man, or woman
either, who shaves off a set of grey or carroty locks in favour
of a black Brutus or auburn curls, for which neither has any
need, beyond the gratification of personal vanity-such a
man or woman lives all day over head and ears in falsehood,

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

283

and only dares the truth in the dark, and under a blanket.
Take my word for it, Mr. Holtzkopf, there are people who
wear their wigs with a conscience, and are perfectly well
satisfied that their wigs shall be recognised as wigs by all
and sundry who may think it worth their while to determine
the point. You may think them blockheads for the display
of such needless sincerity-it would become you better to
reverence them for the possession of virtues more valuable
than all the wigs in the world, and to which your question,
I am sorry to say, shows you to be an utter stranger.
A question which has been put with considerable pertinacity of late asks, "Have you tasted our thirty.-shilling
sherry ?" I cannot reply with certainty, but I suspect I
have. One day last week, on landing at the Great Northern
station, after a couple of days' trip in the country, I met
Captain Gollop on the platform, and he lugged me off to
take tiffin-the captain has serve'd in India-with him at his
lodgings in the New Road. A cold capon and a plate of
Norfolk sausages made their appearance in quick time; and
the captain drew from the sideboard a black bottle, from
which he extracted the cork in his usual dexterous manner,
and then decanted the contents, and poured me out a glass.
I drank it without misgiving, and though I felt disposed to
make a wry face immediately, succeeded, by a hard struggle,
in maintaining some degree of composure. Not so the captain. The moment he had tasted the stuff, he grinned as
thoudgh his great toe were in a vice, and exploded a terrible
oath. The offending liquid was immediately ordered out of
the room, and its place supplied by a more genial vintage. I
am inclined to think the abominable stuff was "our thirtyshilling sherry," but cannot be quite certain, and the captain
is too sore on the subject to permit my venturing an
inquiry.
The next question is the most important one in the whole
category, and I can but express my surprise at the deliberate

284

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

coolness with which the inquirer propounds it in the public
prints. He asks me point-blank, and without the slightest
tinge of the circumlocution office, "Do you think of getting
married?" Really, this is coming to close quarters indeed.
What if I do? Am I obliged to make him my confidant?
And if I don't, am I compelled to confess as much? Please
to note, that he does not ask me if I intend to get married.
If he had shaped his question to that effect, I might and
would have answered at once, that I have no intentions
whatever of that sort; that, having led the life of a bachelor
for fifty years, I consider it now too late in the day to
submit myself to matrimonial responsibilities ;and that all
views of that kind I had ever entertained have vanished
long ago in the dim distance. But he is not satisfied with
knowing what my purposes may be in that respect, but must
needs rend the veil from my secret thoughts. Suppose it
should be the case, that "sometimes, in the dim twilight,
when the window-curtains are drawn, and those "faces in
the fire" look out upon my solitude all fresh and glowing,
and full of the memories of days for ever gone-suppose it
should happen then that my thoughts revert to what might
have been, had Julia listened to my suit five..and-twenty
years ago, and that padded and long-legged ensign had not
struck in and carried her off. 'What then? Has Mr.
Blinker any right to participate in these reminiscences ? I
question it; at anyrate, I am not disposed to make him the
partner of my sad speculations, and I won't do it. What if
I sometimes ponder less pensively about the Widow Winkin,
with her four hundred a year in the three per-cents., which
would have made the decline of life so comfortable, and her
interminable tongue and alcoholic temper, which would have
made it so miserable ? Is Mr. Blinker to weigh my conduct
in that matter in his balances of prudence, and sum me up,
and write me down an ass or a Solon, according to his
judgment ? I shan't consent to that, if I know it. What

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285

my thoughts are in this particular, I shall keep to myself,
and therefore decline most energetically to answer this question at all.
To atone for my reticence in regard to the above tender
subject, I will answer the next question without the least
reservation, verbal or mental. The inquiry is plain, perspicuous, and unsophisticated, and deserves a response in the
same spirit. It demands hospitably, "Do you like a dry,
hot, mealy potato ?" Candidly, I do; it is the very description of potato I prefer to all others-dry, hot, mealy! the
epithets are all savoury and appetising-baked in an oven,
and served up in their jackets, with butter, pepper, and
salt, what can be nicer than they are for supper-when you
have nothing better'? When you have something better, of
course they occupy a second rank; but pace it in what rank
you may, a potato that is dry, hot, and mealy asserts its own
respectability, and cannot be despised. Yes; the dry, hot
mealy potato for ever !
The last question which I feel called upon to answer at
the present time inquires, " Do you keep livery-servants ?"
This demand smacks somewhat of the tax-gatherer, and
might be supposed to emanate from him, were it not that the
questioner makes no mention of " dogs," which I have re.&
marked, are uniformly classed with liveiy-servants in the
tax-gatherer's schedule. As a lodger, who pays rent for
furnished apartments with attendance, I might summarily
dismiss this question, so far as I am individually concerned,
with a negative; but looking to the respectability of the
establishment in which I reside, and of Mrs. Jones, who is at
its head, I am bound to record that a livery is not altogether
an unknown luxury at No. 24. The boy "Bung," the everactive Mercury of the house, does wear a livery upon occasions. True, he is generally seen in a state of dishabille, his
back minus a coat, his arms bare to the elbows, and his feet
in a pair (or two odd ones) of cut-down boots. When

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GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

wanted, he has to be excavated from the lower labyrinths of
the basement floor, where, busy as a beewith boots, black.
ing, and brick-dust, he passes the mornings of his days. But
when the parlour gives a dinner, or the first-floor holds a
soire'e, if you should happen to be one of the guests, you will
see Bung brilliant in a clean face, a milkwhite collar, and
"dickey," neat slippers, and a showy suit of rather faded
livery, a little tarnished in the lace and buttons, only a few
sizes too big for him, and not very much the worse for wear
-by candlelight. I have observed that the livery has
changed three times during the five years of my tenancy
with M1rs. Jones. When Bung was what she calls a "brat
of a boy," she liveried him in blue and gold, which Mr. Solomons brought her in his bag, but which soon went to
pieces, and had to be succeeded by a suit of drab and silver.
Bung grew out of these, and now disports himself in a man's
suit of Oxford grey and frogs, which is very becoming, and
sets the seal of gentility upon our establishment. I may
add, that whenever Bung waits at table in livery, his services
are duly put down in the weekly bill; but I have great
doubts, although Mrs. Jones thus levies a tax for livery upon
her lodgers, whether she pays a farthing herself on that
score to the revenue.
I have now answered about a dozen of the most prominent of the great public questions of the day; and here, for
the present, I shall conclude my responses. Whatever importance the reader may choose to attach to these questions
-for myself, I have my own private opinions
concerning
them-he will not, he cannot deny that they are, among all
the subjects of which the press treats from time to time,
those which it keeps with the most perseverance and persistency before the public eye. Other topics it treats of
by fits and starts, and in a more or less abstract manner.
The subject of national education is at a premium one day,
at a discount the next; political reform comes and goes upon

GREAT PUBLIC QUESTIONS.

287

the platform of the broad sheet; the peace agitation is
rampant at one season and dormant at another; and so on.
But the whiskers, the oats, the perambulators, the wigs, the
hot mealy potatoes, &c.-these things keep their ground;
their foundations are deeply rooted beyond the mutabilities
of the changing years, and bid defiance to the storms of fate.
Whether such phenomena be according to the natural course
of things, or whether they be the symbols of some profound
and unexplained mystery, I leave to be decided by the
" coming man" when he shall have made his appearance.

FITDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.
No man who is not a fiddler can be fully aware of the
virtues that reside in a fiddle. To the majority of mankind,
the thing is but a vibratory machine of thin wood, furnished
with tightened strings of catgut for the production of musical
sounds; and the non-fiddling portion of the community
are apt to entertain a derogatory notion both of fiddles and
fiddlers, as though there were something unaccbrdant with
the dignity of human nature in the production of melody by
shaking the elbow and twiddling the fingers. Not that they
by any means object to the result produced, or refuse to
listen to the harmonious combination of sounds which horsehair and resin elicit, or refrain at all times from responding
to the invitation of the music by tripping through the mazes
of the delightful dance: but they wouldn't be seen to operate
themselves; they could not submit to be themselves the
fiddlers. A small section of society-a dismal, dolorous, and
drab-hearted community-go still further. With them, the
terms "to play the fiddJe" and "to play the fool" are
synonymous; the notes of a fiddle-string sound irreligiously
in their ears, and they look upon fiddlers as persons in a
highly equivocal, not to say dangerous position. But the
truth is, these people don't know what a fiddle is. I do, and
I have therefore the advantage of them.
I am the owner of a Straduarius which cost me nearly
£200, and is worth more than double the money. I have
insured it in the "Equitable" for the sum it cost-I
couldn't rest in my bed till I had done so. How it came

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

289

into my possession-what risks I ran-what sacrifices I
made to get it-what danger I was in of losing it for ever:
these are particulars which I may record at some future
time. At present, I am about to say something of fiddles
and the fiddle-trade in general, for the benefit of the world
at large and my brother-amateurs (I am not a professional
musician) in particular.
All the world-at least all the musical world-knows that
the finest fiddles which the art of man has ever achieved,
were made by the Cremonese masters 200 and odd years
ago. What all the world does not know so well is the fact,
that though these masters, Amati, Straduarius, and the rest,
made but comparatively few instruments, these have been
somehow so miraculously multiplied since their death, that
at the present moment, when, according to the ordinary
course of things, they ought almost to have vanished from
the earth, they abound in such prodigious numbers, that
there is not a dealer in one of the great cities of Europe who
has not always one or two specimens at least upon hand to
dispose of. I am of opinion that this is owing, not so much
to the merit of the Cremona fiddles, transcendently excellent
as most of them are, as it is to the existence of a class of men
of whom the reader knows but little or nothing. It is with
the great fiddle-makers as with the Raphaels, Titians, Correggios, and Rembrandts, in another art; their works are so
tremendously in request among the connoisseurs, that they
have to be manufactured anew to meet the demand. It is
the credulity and ignorance of the collectors which have
instigated the forgeries in both cases.
As your connoisseur in art is never a painter, though he
knows the constituents of megilp, and can daub a bolsterlooking cloud; so your connoisseur in fiddles is never a
performer, unless the ability to rasp a quadrille or a polka is
to entitle him to that designation. But the collector of
fiddles, it is probable, derives as much pleasure from his

290

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

accumulations as his brother of the studios. He gloats over
the torso of an old instrument, and feels the same raptures
on contemplating the graceful swell of the "belly," as my
lord-connoisseur does in the presence of an antique marble
or a Venus of Titian. And as there are rival connoisseurs
in art who bid and buy franticly against one another, so are
there rivals in the fiddle-mania who do precisely the same
thing. One consequence of this is, that fiddle-dealing is a
snug money-making profession, the more pretentious branch
of which is monopolised in London by a few old stagers, but
which is carried on profitably in all the large towns. There
is, for instance, Old Borax, whom those who want him know
whereabouts to look for-within the shadow of St. Martin's
Church.
Borax makes but little demonstration of his wealth in the
dingy hole that serves him for a shop, where a donble-bass,
a couple of violoncellos, a tenor or two hanging on the walls,
and half-a-dozen fiddles, lying among a random collection of
bows, bridges, coils of catgut, packets of purified resin, and
tangled horsehair in skeins, serve for the insignia of his profession. But Borax never does business in his shop, which
is a dusty desert from one week's end to another. His warehouse is a private sanctum on the first floor, where you will
find him in his easy-chair reading the morning-paper, if he
does not happen to be engaged with a client. Go to him for
a fiddle, or carry him a fiddle for his opinion, and you will
hardly fail to acknowledge that you stand in the presence of
a first-rate judge. The truth is, that fiddles of all nations,
disguised and sophisticated as they may be to deceive
common observers, are naked and self-confessed in his
hands. Dust, dirt, varnish, and bees-wax are thrown away
upon him; he knows the work of every man, of note or of
no note, whether English, French, Dutch, German, Spaniard,
or Italian, who ever sent a fiddle into the market, for the
last 200 years; and he will tell you who is the fabricator of

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

291

your treasure, and the rank he holds in the fiddle-making
world, with the utmost readiness and urbanity-on payment
of his fee of one guinea.
Borax is the pink of politeness, though a bit of a martinet
after an ancient and punctilious model. If you go to select
a fiddle from his stock, you may escape a lecture of a quarter
of an hour by calling it a fiddle, and not a violin, which is a
word he detests, and is apt to excite his wrath. He is never
in a hurry to sell, and will by no means allow you to conclude a bargain until he has put you in complete possession
of the virtues and the failings, if it have any, of the instrument for which you are to pay a round sum. As all his
fiddles lie packed in sarcophagi, like mummies in an Egyptian catacomb, your choice is not perplexed by any embarras
de richesses; you see but one masterpiece at a time, and
Borax will take care that you do see that, and know all
about it, before he shows you another. First unlocking the
case, he draws the instrument tenderly from its bed, grasps
it in the true critical style with the fingers and thumbs of
both hands a little above the bridge, turning the scroll
towards you. Now and then he twangs, with the thumb of
his left hand, the third or fourth string, by way of emphasis
to the observations which he feels bound to make-instinctively avoiding, however, that part of the strings subject to
the action of the bow. Giving you the name of the maker,
he proceeds to enlighten you on the peculiar characteristics
of his work; then he will dilate upon the remarkable
features of the specimen he holds in his hand-its build, its
model, the closeness and regularity of the grain of the wood
of which the belly was fashioned; the neatness, or, wanting
that, the original style of the purfleing-the exquisite
mottling of the back, which is wrought, he tells you, ''by
the cunning hand of nature in the primal growth of the
tree "-twang. Then he will break out into placid exclamations of delight upon the gracefulness of the swell-twangu2

292

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

and the noble rise in the centre-twang-andmake you pass
your hand over it to convince yourself; after which, he carefully wipes it down with a silk handkerchief. This process
superinduces another favourite theme of eulogium-namely,,
the unparalleled hue and tone (of colour) imparted by the
old Italian varnish-a hue, he is sure to inform you, which
it is impossible to imitate by any modern nostrums-twang,
Then he reverts to the subject of a fiddle's indispensables
and fittings; discourses learnedly on the carving of scrolls,
and the absurd substitution, by some of the German makers,
of lions' heads in lieu of -them; hinting, by the way, that
said makers are asses, and that their instruments bray when
they should speak-twang. Then, touching briefly on the
pegs, which he prefers unornamented, he will hang lingeringly upon the neck, pronounce authoritatively upon the
right degree of elevation of the finger-board, and the effects
of its due adjustment upon the vibration of the whole bodyharmonic, and, consequently, upon the tone. Then, jumping
over the bridge, he will animadvert on the tail-piece; after
which, entering at the S-holes--not without a fervent encomium upon their graceful drawing and neatness of cuttwang-he will introduce you to the arcanum mysterii, the
interior of the marvellous fabric-point out to you, as plainly
as though you were gifted with clairvoyance, the position
and adaptation of the various linings, the bearings of the
bass-bar, that essential adjunct to quality of tone-twangand the proper position of the sound-post. Lastly, he will
show you, by means of a small hand-mirror throwing a
gleam of light into its entrails, the identical autograph of the
immortal maker-Albati, Guinarius, or. Amati, as it may
happen-with the date printed in the lean old type, and
now scarcely visible through the dust of a couple of centuries, "Amati, Cremonse Fecit 164,5," followed by a manuscript signature in faded ink, which you must take for
granted.

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

q9.

Borax has but one price; and if you do not choose to pay
it, you must do without the article. The old fellow is a
true believer, and is accounted the first judge in Europe;
fiddles travel to him from all parts of the continent for his
opinion, bringing their fees with them; and for every instrument he sells, it is likely he pronounces judgment upon a
hundred. It is rumoured that the greatest master-pieces in
being are in his possession.
A dealer of a different stamp is Michael Schnapps, well
known in the trade, and the profession too, as a ravenous
fiddle-ogre, who buys and sells everything that bears the
fiddle shape, from a double-double bass to a dancing master's
pocketable kit. His house is one vast warehouse, with
fiddles on the walls, fiddles on the staircases, and fiddles
hanging like stalactites from the ceilings. To him the tyros
resort when they first begin to scrape; he will set them up
for ten shillings, and swop them up afterwards, step by step,
to ten or twenty guineas, and to ten times that amount if
they are rich enough and green enough to continue the experiment. Schnapps imports fiddles in the rough, under the
designation of toys, most of which are the productions of his
peasant-countrymen bordering on the Black Forest; and with
these he supplies the English provinces and the London toy
and stationers' shops. He is, further, a master of the fiddlemaking craft himself, and so consummate an adept in repairing, that nothing short of consuming fire can defeat his art.
When Pinker, of Norwich, had his Cremona smashed all to
atoms in a railway collision, Schnapps rushed down to the
scene of the accident, bought the lot of splintered fragments
for a couple of pounds, and in a fortnight had restored the
magnificent Straduarius to its original integrity, and cleared
150 guineas by its sale. But Schnapps is a humbug at
bottom-an everlasting copyist and manufacturer of dead
masters, Italian, German, and English. He has sold more
Amatis in his time than Amati himself ever made. He

294

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

knows the secret of the old varnish; he has hidden stores of
old wood--planks of cherry-tree and mountain-ash centuries
old, and worm-eaten sounding boards of defunct harpsichords, and reserves of the close-grained pine hoarded for
ages. He has a miniature printing-press, and a fount of the
lean-faced, long-forgotten type, and a stock of the old ribbed
paper, torn from the fly-leaves of antique folios; and, of
course, he has always on hand a collection of the most wonderful instruments at the most wonderful prices, for the professional man or the connoisseur.
"'You vant to py a pfeedel," says Schnapps. "I sall sell
you de pest-dat- ish, de pest for de mowny. Vat you sall
gif for him ?"
"Well, I can go as far as ten guineas," says the customer.
" Ten kinnis is goot for von goot pfeedel; bote besser is
tventy, tirty, feefty kinnis, or von hunder, look you; bote ten
kinnis is goot-you sall see."
Schnapps is all simplicity and candour in his dealings.
The probability is, however, that his ten-guinea fiddle would
be fairly purchased at five, and that you might have been
treated to the same article had you named thirty or forty
guineas instead of ten.
I once asked Schnapps if he knew wherein lay the excellence of the old Italian instruments.
"Mein Gott !" said he, "if I don't, who de teifil does ?"
Then he went on to inform me, that it did not lie in any
peculiarity in the model, though there was something in
that; nor in the wood of the back, though there was something in that; nor in the fine and regular grain of the pine
which formed the belly, though there was something in
that; nor in the position of the grain, running precisely
parallel with the strings, though there was something in
that; nor in the sides, nor in the finger-board, nor in
the linings, nor in the bridge, nor in the strings, nor in
the waist, though there was something in all of them;

FIDDLES AND THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

295

nor yet in the putting together, though there was much
in that.
"Where does it lie, then, Mr. Schnapps ?"
"Ah, der henker ! hang if I know."
"Has age much to do with it, think you ?"
"Not moshe. Dere is pad pfeedels two hunder years ole
as vell as goot vons; and dere is goot pfeedels of pad models,
vitch is made fery pad, and pad pfeedels of de fery pest
models, and peautiful made as you sall vish to see."
This is the sum-total of the information to be got out of
Schnapps on that mysterious subject. On other matters he
can pronounce with greater exactness. He knows every
Cremona in private or professional hands in the whole kingdom; and where the owner bought it, if he did buy it, and
what he gave for it; or from whom he inherited it, if it came
to him as an heir-loom. Of those of them which have passed
through his hands, he has got facsimiles taken in plaster,
which serve as exemplars for his own manufactures. Upon
the death of the owner of one of these rarities, Schnapps
takes care to learn particulars; and if the effects of the
deceased come under the hammer, he starts off to the sale,
however distant, where, unless some of his metropolitan
rivals in trade have likewise caught the scent, he has the
bidding all his own way, and carries off the prize.
Fiddle-making, as a branch of industry, is not a very
remunerative employment, and those who follow it in London are but few, and are growing fewer. The whole number
hardly amounts to half a score; and though there are not
wanting among them men who can manufacture excellent
instruments, yet the staple of their productions is a kind of
regulation article, which does not command a high price,
and serves, for the most part, to supply the demands of the
counties and the c.olonies. The best English instruments,
however, deserve a better character than they bear. Some
of the old provincial makers, needy men, who perform the

2 96A

FIDDLES AND

THE FIDDLE-TRADE.

entire work with their own hands, have produced fiddles
almost rivalling the old Cremionas in tone, and excelling
them in workmanship; and I have seen -some few specimens
of this class realise by anction fifteen times the amount paid
for their manufacture.- The inundation of German fiddles,
which may be bought new for a few shillings, has swamped
the English makers of cheap instruments, of which there are
by this time five times as many in the market as there is any
occasion for. Hence it is that fiddles meet us everywhere;
they cumber the toy-shiop; they house with the. furnituredealer; they swarm by thousands in the pawnbroker's stores,
and block out the light from his windows; they hang on the
tobacconist's 'Walls; they are raffled at public-houses; and
they form an item in -every auctioneer's catalogue.
Meanwhile, the multiplication of rubbish only enhances
the value of the gold; and a fiddle worthy of an applauding
verdict from old Borax is more difficult of acquisition than
ever., So I shall keep my Cremona.

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.
THERn can be but few persons who have not occasionally
remarked in the course of their dealings with the multifaced
world of commerce, that certain trades and professions, and
industrial employments, as well of the lowest as of the highest
grade, have at least an apparent tendency to run, as it were,
in certain channels, and to remain from one generation to
another in the hands of a particular race, or of the inhabitants
of a particular district-as though monopolised exclusively
by them. Old clothes, and the trade in old clothes, is a case
in point. A cast-off coat, a napless hat, a pair of seedy pantaloons, recalls the image of the perambulating Jew with his
corpulent bag on his shoulders, and, it may be, seven several
crowns to his hoary pate, and his familiar cry of " Old Clo,"
by which, from time immemorial, he has asserted his prescriptive right to all such exuviae. But this industrious and
heavy-laden patriarch affords but a single illustration of a
spirit, or a habit, or a destiny, or a something or other that
perhaps Carlyle would call "an inevitable course of things,"'
which does, in a rather singular and not very accountable
manner, characterise the history of many of the various modes
by which man transforms his industrial energies into a mar-'
ketable commodity. No one well acquainted with the streets
of Paris will have failed to observe the operation of a curious
law, by which it would seem to be decreed, that the various
out-door occupations of Parisian life are all severally monopolised by immigrants of the various departments, who come
to the capital young, spend the best years of their lives in the

298

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

toilsome acquisition of just money enough to buy a couple of
roods of ground in their native district, and that grand desideratum accomplished, retire to their homes, where, living
upon the produce of their half-acre, with the reputation of
landed proprietors, they spend the rest of their days. Every
knife-grinder in Paris has the same "story to tell;" they all
come from Auvergne, Savoy, Lorraine, or Piedmont; and
they gratify at once their nomadic taste and their ambition,
by trundling their rickety misshapen machines through the
by-streets of the capital, grinding for bread or broken food,
upon which they live, and rarely spending a coin when they
receive coin for their labours. The hare-skin dealers are all
from Auvergne-the charcoal-porters from the same place; the
water-carriers, once a most numerous race, are either from the
Cantal ofAuvergne, or from Normandy, "that other Auvergne,"
whence come so many of the ragged naiads of the fruit, the
flower, the vegetable, and the fish markets; the street-porters
are invariably from the Puy-de-D6me. There is no mistaking any of these for Parisians-the abominable dialect
they speak, intelligible only to themselves, betraying their
origin, and effectually confining them to their own class. We
have no exact parellel to this in any occupations carried on
in our metropolis; but we shall proceed, with the reader's
permission, to notice some facts bearing on the physiology of
trades and employments in some degree analogous to it, and
which will not perhaps be found useless or uninteresting.
To begin with the bakers : an immensely disproportionate
number of these are Scotchmen, who are said to be attracted
to London by the margin of profit, which is a fraction wider
here than it is in the north. They mostly do well; do not
generally affect low prices, which are the ruin of many
bakers; and the majority of the most respectable household
bakeries are in their hands. Next to the Scotchmen, the
most numerous are the men from Devonshire and the west
of England. There are also a good many Germans, and one

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

299

or two Frenchmen,, in the trade-the latter figuring only at
the West End, and catering principally for the wants of their
own countrymen. Londoners, of course, are not wanting;
but of the -whole batch it may truly be said, they enjoy the
least credit, and are most involved in difficulties with their
factors. It may be worth while to remark, that the inhabitants of London will not eat wholesome bread; if it is not
whiter than the best wheat-flour will make it, a Cockney
disdains it; so alum comes into use, causing about 10,000
indigestions a week; and then comes the doctor, to whom
the baker is the best friend he has. We have a private
opinion of our own, that if London bread were nothing but
bread, the London mortality-bills would decrease a remarkable percentage.
Next door to our baker lives a barber, who tells us that
half the barbers in London are London born, but that a good
many of the fashionable hairdressers are from the wateringplaces and genteel towns. Both classes of workmen, he says,
have a good character in town, and are sure of employment.
People imagine that London sends hairdressers to all parts
of the kingdom; but the fact is that every barber in the
country comes to London, at some time or other, to improve,
worldng for nothing the while, for the sake of learning the
ladies' department. "After their return," says our oracle,
"they announce themselves as' from London,' finding their
account in so doing. Some of the London hairdressers dub
themselves Professors, and make large incomes by grease,
cosmetics, and hair-dye, which latter, if once used, must
always be used, and is generally sold at half-a-guinea the
bottle, and costs a premium of a guinea to be taught how to
use it. Sometimes, from constitutional peculiarity, it turns
the hair green; and then, mayhap, a young lady of sixty
requires to have her head shaved, and to shut herself up
while a fresh crop is growing. Immense sums are made by
hair-dye, some of the professors having a European con-

300

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

nection, and travelling express to foreign capitals, disseminating youthfulness and beauty wherever they go." Our
communicative barber, who is not* perpetually shaving, ekes
out his time by retailing tobacco, snuff, and cigars; by weaving at a wig occasionally, and by breeding, and teaching,
and doctoring canary-birds; upon all of which matters he
has something to say that may be worth hearing. The
tobacco trade, he says, is in the hands of Londoners, but the
best tobacco decidedly comes from. Bristol. The Jews have
a good deal to do with cheap cigars, which are manufactured
both by men and women; and some of them, he avers, may
be made to smell uncommonly lile a dish of cabbage by
simply boiling them for an hour. In fine tobaccos and cigars,
he adds, a most enormous trade is done; good tobacco ought
to be smoked in a seasoned meerschaum. A meerschaum is
seasoned in the following way: it is first swaddled ten or
twelve deep in flannel cases; then it is consigned to the
hands of a responsible life-guardsman, together with maybe
twenty pounds of shag tobacco; the soldier undertakes that,
once lighted, the pipe shall not be suffered to grow cold for
six months; it becomes the pipe of perpetual peace in his
keeping, and passes from comrade to comrade, day and night,
till the whole period has expired, by which time it is burned
to a deep Vandyke-brown, and thoroughly seasoned. It
costs perhaps £30, and takes a whole regiment of soldiers to
do it! As to wig.-making, all he does is in human hair, for
which, using but a small quantity, he does not go to the
hair-merchants, of whom there are but two or three in
London; the hair is nearly all imported, as English girls are
not fond of selling theirs: a good deal comes from Brittany,
where a girl will sell her head of hair to buy a wedding dress. Touching the canaries, he knows all about them.
The canary originally came from the Canary Islands; but
he wouldn't buy birds from those islands now if they were
offered to him, as the most part of them cannot stand our

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

301

climate, and die in the first winter. There is a much
stronger bird, and better in song, too, which comes from
Germany, where millions of them are bred every year by
the workmen and labouring-people, as well as by regular
breeders. They are bred for exportation, and are shipped
in immense numbers to Russia, where it is the fashion to
keep them, and where they die when the winter comes on.
You may see ships freighted with nothing but canary-birds
lying at St. Petersburg-all sent from Germany. He thinks
the climate would not kill them if they were properly looked
after. Canaries live longest in a large cage, where they
have room to run about, which they are fond of doing.
They are subject td a kind of boil on the head, which is
easily cured if attended to in time, but which kills them if
neglected, as it generally is, because people are not aware of
it. Vast numbers of them are bred in England, and excellent birds too. The Spitalfield, weavers breed some of the
best birds, and some of them make a living when work is
slack by teaching them to sing. The canary is a very docile
bird, and may be taught with certainty by any one who will
take the necessary trouble, and should have at least four
lessons a day.
Ting! ting! There goes a tall, round-faced German, with
the still rounder face of a clock under his arm, whose tingling
bell is his advertisement as he walks the streets. Dutch
clocks once formed the staple of a great import business,
which has latterly undergone-a rapid decline, and is now
almost in the last stage of a galloping consumption. That
handsome German just gone by is the first of his craft we
have seen for this month past, and is, we fear, gone on a
vain quest for employment; his comrades have for the last
few years almost totally disappeared from the streets. Their
disappearance is due to the prodigious importation, of American clocks, of Which thousands are sold weekly in London
alone, at a price varying from 8s. for a thirty-hour bracket-

302

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

clock, to from l5s. to 40s. for an eight-day one--even the
lowest priced clock having a neat mahogany case. The
cost of the wheel-work of a Dutch clock used to be 3s. 6d.
to the makers, who had to procure cases, pendulums, bells,
weights, catguts, dials; &c., from different manufacturers, so
that a decent thirty-hour clock, with brass works, could not
well be sold retail for much less than £1. Now the cost of
the works of an American clock is said to be, to the producer, not more than a small fraction above the value of the
metal, the whole being struck from a sheet of rolled brass
by a single stroke of a die or press, which cuts the works of
a clock at a blow. These clocks go remarkably well-rather
better, upon an average, than a good lever watch-and do
not get readily out of repair.; The consequence is that they
are driving the perambulating German from the streets, and
may be seen by the dozen in the shop-windows even of his
own countrymen-Jonathan having beaten the German out
of his peculiar market.
Watchmakers-by which is to be understood, not people
who make watches, but who put them together-are mostly
Londoners; but a vast number of excellent movements
(works) which receive the names of some of the best London makers, are really manufactured at Coventry. Gold and
silver cases, and dial-plates are made in London, and, in the
district of Clerkenwell, are chased and ornamented by means
of the rose-engine, with which a clever workman can easily
earn from 50s. to 60s. weekly, if he possesses an engine of
his own. The state of our political relations with China
considerably affects the watchmaking trade. Your respectable Chinese does exceedingly desire and covet a good
English lever watch in a silver qase, and will give anything
like a reasonable price for it. We could point to one maker
who, during the war which brought us the Sycee-silver, was
compelled to diminish his production at the rate of above
1000 lever watches per annum. Working jewellers and

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

303

lapidaries also affect a district of Clerkenwell: these are
mostly of London origin;: and the latter, being very few in
number, are particularly independent, working their own
hours, without too much regard for their employers' convenience, and earning high wages.
Five-and-twenty years ago, the looking-glass and pictureframe makers of the metropolis were nearly all Italians, some
of whom carried on a large wholesale trade, having their
working establishments in Leather Lane, and the courts and
back-streets adjoining. Italian names are still visible in
that district, and a few glittering shops, in bad keeping
with the surrounding squalor, yet maintain the pretensions
of Leather Lane as the nursery of this ornamental branch
of industry. But the rapid growth of art within the last
generation, combined with improvements in manufacture,
has raised a demand for more picture-frames and mirrors
than they could supply, and now the works of Englishmen
in this way are at least quite as numerous, and, as far as we
can judge, equally excellent in quality. But a marvellous
difference in the kind of article produced characterises the
trade of a picture-frame maker-one man making the same
frame for 30s. for which another, with more fairness, considering the actual value of the article, will demand £5.
The most: remarkable instance of pertinacious adherence
to a single occupation to be met with in England, and perhaps in the world, is that afforded by the Spitalfield weavers;
who, though nearly all of foreign descent, being the descendants of the French emigrants driven over here by the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes, are more truly Londoners
than any other class to whom we could refer. They are a
patient and suffering race, who have from time to time been
made the victims of foul oppression by their employers. The
regulations to which they are forced to submit in the practice
of their miserable calling are, as we have reason to know,
such as no other class of English workmen would tolerate for

804

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

a day. Their wages have been ground down to the minimum point; they work often, in their miserable dwellings,
from sixteen to twenty hours out of the twenty-four: and,
although leading a life of semi-starvation, yet persist in
training their children to follow the same unremunerative
,calling. As lately as the commencement of the present century, they retained the use of the French language, and their
religious services were conducted in French within the
memory of many yet living; but their native tongue has at
length died out even among the oldest of the race. Their
dwellings are among the most squalid and ruinous to be
found in the metropolis; they may be easily recognised by
the pedestrian from the long and narrow windows, constructed
to admit as much light as possible into their work-rooms.
London, which is never to-day of the same extent as it
was yesterday, demands the services of whole armies of
builders, brickmakers, bricklayers, and their subordinate
fellow-labourers. The builders, who but too rarely condescend to invoke the assistance of a professional architect,
though mostly Londoners, are by no means exclusively so,
but comprise among theii number a host of speculators from
all parts of the kingdom--the facilities for building with
very little capital being perhaps greater in London than in
any country town in England. The brickmakers are' for the
most part Londoners; but they have had latterly to contend
with new rivals from the neighbourhood of Liverpool and
Manchester, as well as with a new kind of pierced brick,
brought hither by rail in large quantities from brickfields
situated at various distances north of the capital. The workmen at this trade invariably work by the piece; and by
labouring during the summer months with an intensity that
would kill the strongest animal in a week, earn extravagant
wages, sometimes amounting to from three to four guineas a
week per man, which they spend as extravagantly, being
often reduced to dismal straits in the winter, when they

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

305

cannot work. From three in the morning till nine at night
is no uncommon day's work for a brickmaker in the height
of summer. As a class, they occasion the police more trouble
than any other that could be named; and they are at once
the support and the disgrace of the suburban public-houses.
The bricklayers are a far more respectable, intelligent, and,
indeed, educated class; simply, perhaps, because their profession requires the exercise of more capacity. It is not
quite true that "by line and rule works many a fool;" a
fool not being exactly the man to manage such simple tools,
and certainly not the man for a bricklayer. These operatives
are known as a provident class, familiar with the regulations
of friendly societies and the value of the savings-bank.
They, too, are mostly Londoners, associated, however, with
many excellent workmen from the provinces. The bricklayers' labourers, hod-men, mortar-men, and so on, are almost
exclusively Irish. Formerly, they were a wild and untamable
set-the tyrants of the streets at night, and the habitants of
the drunken and disorderly cells at the stations; but their
intimacy with the police, and their prison experience, have
wrought in them a considerable reform; and though they
occasionally break out into riot, it is oftener on religious
grounds than from any other cause.
The navvies, or navigators, who now form so large a section of our labouring-class, came originally from the fen
districts, where, from their occupation, which consisted
principally in raising banks to dam out the water, they were
Since the formation of railways, Yorkcalled "bankers."
.shire and Lancashire have supplied the greatest number.
They bear but an evil reputation.
'Among the shoemakers, a great number are provincialists,
and the far greater proportion of these are from Northamptonshire. They manufacture a prodigious quantity of shoes
for exportation and for government contracts. It is a
rather singular circumstance, which we can state on the best

306

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

authority, that the only really expert and accomplished
workmen who ever find their way into a jail, are shoemakers.
A good proportion of the tailors of London are Irish,
Scotch, and German; but the tailoring trade has suffered
wofully within the last few lustres, from the enterprise of the
ready-made clothes-merchants, from whose unlimited stock
a large section of the public find it easier and more convenient to get fitted at once, than to run the risk of failure
from an incompetent professor of the art. Their enormous
increase throughout the kingdom is doubtless due to the
convenience they afford, and the saving of time, now so
important an article, effected by dealing with them. The
largest establishments are those of the Jews; and more of
them, in fact, belong to the Jews than the public are aware
of. An ignorant prejudice, which yet partially prevails,
against dealing with Jews has induced many of them to
disguise or change their names. Thus Moses sometimes
becomes Moss,'Abraham sinks into Braham, or expands into
Tabraham, and Levi is anagramed into Evil, &c. But the
tailvr is by no means the only craftsman with whom the
Jew interferes as a formidable rival. In Covent Garden he
is well known as an importer of oranges and dried-fruits,
nuts, dates, and so on; he is noticed for doing business in
these, the least perishable of vegetable commodities, at the
lowest profit; and he is the chief source from whence the
perambulating dealers obtain their stock. Again, he is a
manufacturing confectioner and preserver of fruits, and purveyor of jelly and jam, candying lemon-peel, and bottling
lemon-juice, and dealing in cocoa-nuts and pine-apples; he
is a compositor in printing-offices, keeping only the Christian
Sabbath, or none at all; he is a furniture-broker and appraiser, and not unfrequently a pawnbroker; he is a picturedealer to any extent you like, but makes no pretensions to
a judgment of high art; and is also picture-cleaner and

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

307

restorer as well. In short, he is extending his energies
rapidly into fresh departments of trade, and at every step
he takes is overcoming old prejudices, and rising higher in
the regard of his Christian brethren.
Germans in London have several departments of trade, if
not entirely in their own hands, nearly so. Sugar-refining
is almost exclusively carried on by Germans, and their
refineries are nearly all congregated together in Whitechapel and the immediate neighbourhood. The workmen
mix but little with the English, but frequent mostly their
own houses-of-call.
The toy-trade is also very much
monopolised by Germans: they import large cargoes of
toys from their own country, and supply the London dealers
with them at a cheap rate. There are, moreover, many German retailers of toys who affect the arcades of the metropolis, which, being sheltered from the weather, are admirably
fitted for their purpose. Myriads of toys are made by German peasants in their long winter evenings, and by shepherds
and herdsmen in their solitud6s, whose remuneration must
be excessively small, looking to the low price at which their
wares are retailed in England. In the article of lucifermatches, the Germans beat the London makers hollow, and
no end of them are imported into this country, where they
meet a ready sale: we have just lighted candles with one
from a German box, containing 1000 matches, each perfectly
cylindrical in shape, and lighting without noise; said box
being sold retail for a penny. Numbers of Germans in
England pursue the occupation of farriery, and some years
ago they were in high repute for the superiority of their
practice; but latterly, an educated class of Englishmen have
by degrees entered that profession, and the Germans are no
longer in the ascendant. Many Germans are importers of
foreign fancy goods, especially baskets, in which an extensive trade is carried on: these come over in packages as big
as an Irishman's cabin, and have to be unpacked in the
x2

308

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

street. Others import musical instruments and musicalboxes, which latter are to be bought in every street in
London, at prices marvellously low. Others, again, import
birds, particularly piping-bullfinches, which fetch prices
sometimes beyond all reason, proportioned to their musical
abilities. Besides the German traders, the whole of which
we cannot pretend to ,enumerate, there is always in. London
a good staff of German professors of languages, and teachers
of every accomplishment that a gentleman could wish to
learn.
With respect to the provision-dealers in the metropolis,
we may remark that London, with that regard for the
genuine article which is a part of her idiosyncrasy, loves to
supply her table from the best market. Thus, the lite of
the dairymen are from Devonshire and Wales, the cheesemongers from Yorkshire and Hampshire, while Wiltshiremen deal in pork and bacon, and her own market.gardeners
sell the finest fruit and vegetables. Of eggs, London devours
them by millions fresh, in the season, at the established cost
of three-halfpence each; and by hundreds of millions, not
too fresh, sent over by French egg-merchants, all the year
round. For butcher-meat she trusts to her own butcbdrs,
who are mostly London-born; and for fish, to the Billingsgate,-men, who, like the oysters, are also natives. Her
grocers, too, are principally her own citizens; and so, for
the most part, are her brewers, though she has a decided
penchant for country ale, and holds out a welcome hand to
the men of Burton, of Alton, and especially of Edinburgh.
When she wants a dose of physic, she runs to the chemist
and druggist, who, in three cases out of four, is not a Londoner at all, but an enterprising fellow from some country
town, come hitherto cure her of her maladies, If, being
really ill, she don't get better, be sure she will call in a
London physician, because there is scarcely another to whom
she can have recourse; and if death comes in spite of him,

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

309

it is at least seven to one that a Londoner will play the part
of undertaker, that being about the proportion that the Londoners of the mortuary profession bear to the provincials
located among them.
Of the linen-drapers in London, both wholesale and retail,
a very large proportion are from Scotland and the north
Among their
of England, particularly from Manchester.
assistants, are a smaller proportion of Londoners than we
should expect to find. A great number of them are Scotch,
many come from Lancashire, not a few are Irish, but in a
larger proportion than any of the above are the young men
from Somerset, Devon, and the west country. Commercial
travellers, as well in connection with this business as with
others, are, the majority of them, north-country men.
Many large millinery establishments in London are in the
hands of men, and employ a large capital in carrying
them on; the young girls who do the work are, however,
mostly from the country, whence they come in the capacity
of "improvers," to learn experience, returning, after one or
two years' practice, to commence business in their native
place.
SAmong the professions which the new arrivals from the
provinces contest most successfully with the Londoners,
would appear to be the pianoforte-makers, of whom the
major part are men from the provinces; the booksellers,
especially those who deal in second-hand books, of which
a good proportion are countrymen; the printers, whose
working ranks would soon-die out were they not continually
supplemented by arrivals from the country, and many of
whom, saving money, set up for themselves; the cabinetmakers, whose profession is extended'much in the same
way; the carpenters, who, if they succeed, invariably become
builders 'ona small scale, in connection with the London
bricklayers: to which might beadded many other trades
not peculiar to London, but which, when fairly mastered by

0910

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

clever country hands, are more completely understood by
them than by the generality of London-trained workmen.
It is a fact, that the London artisan rarely understands
more than one department of the trade to which he serves
his 'apprenticeship; and although this doubtless tends to the
proverbial perfection of London work, it often operates to
prevent the workman from becoming a master. Country
workmen, on the contrary, usually know all the branches of
their profession; and, when well skilled in them, naturally
rise, in such a field as the metropolis affords, to the position
of employers.
We find we are getting beyond our limits, and must proceed to notice a few remaining facts as briefly as possible.
Engineers and millwrights are for the most part from Scotland, and the northern counties of England; but not a few
are to be met with, particularly on board the steamers, from
the iron districts of Wales. Wheelwrights from the provinces are almost as numerous as the London hands. Horsedealers come chiefly from Yorkshire and Hampshire; but
Irish horses are from time to time sold in town in considerable numbers. Cutlers are principally from Sheffield; hardwaremen fromBirmingham: and there are few great firms
originating in country towns, in any department of manufacture, who have not warehouses and show -rooms in London.
Gardeners,: especially those retained at the seats of the
nobility and gentry, are very generally Scotchmen. In the
jewellery trade there is a large admixture of Jews, who
principally affect the manufacture of such articles in gold as
do not imperatively require the sanction of Goldsmiths' Hall
-such as gold chains, and the flashy gold rings now exporting in-large quantities to the "diggings," which cost in the
London markets seven shillings each, and sell readily for
four guineas in the land of gold. Cabmen are principally
Londoners; but a few civil countrymen, who know the town
and candrive, find their account in following the cabman's

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

31,1

occupation. Furriers, and fur-dyers and dressers, are a good
many of them Germans. Among the wine-merchants are
an extra proportion of foreigners; and foreigners almost
monopolise the manufacture of many of the wind-instruments of music. Finishers of fine work, in almost all industrial trades, are in nearly every instance London-bred, and
are sometimes heard to boast of their London blood. Every
morsel of sponge in London passes through the hands of the
Jews, who levy a contribution upon it, in some shape or
other, before it comes into use. Brewers' draymen, though
stalwart fellows to look at, are proverbially short-lived; not
a man of them, it is said, ever attaining the age of fifty:
from the inflamed state of their blood, accidents, however
slight, become fatal to them. Some years back, a case was
recorded of one who died in the apparent vigour of manhood, through slightly grazing his finger against the wheel
Lastly, the omniumgatherum shops, whose
of his dray.
stock exhibits as delightful a confusion as the above paragraph, are invariably the property of thorough-bred Cockneys.
We shall conclude with the notice of two facts, worthy
at least of a passing remark. Something more than a
century ago, there arrived in this country a very little colony
of iron-workers from Sweden. They brought with them the
art of preparing the Swedish iron, and they settled down in
a small village in Northumberland, and began practising it
for their own advantage. They throve well; and repudiating all intimacy with the surrounding inhabitants, remained
a distinct race, speaking their own tongue, and following
their own customs, in a land of strangers. When one had
achieved a competence, he withdrew to his native land, and
sent over another; and thus their number was kept up for
three generations, when their secret having at length exploded or been discovered, they all simultaneously disappeared.-Twenty-five years ago, there were not above

312

GENESIS OF THE WORKERS.

half-a-dozen Greek merchants in London, and these were
mostly of small capital and less note, but of indomitable
energy, and .first-rate business tact., At the present day,
they have not only multiplied in numbers, but have sue.ceeded in monopolising nearly the entire trade of the
Mediterranean and the East.. They have their businesshouses at every port and station upon the coasts and rivers,
and realise a profit annually hardly exceeded by that of any
class of merchants upon the face of the earth.

"CROWNER'S QUEST."
IT was on a bitter cold day in the depth of winter, that I
was compelled to make one of a jury assembled to hold an
inquest on the body of a man recently and suddenly deceased. The place allotted for the purpose was an upper
room in a public-house adjacent to my own residence,
whither, at the appointed hour, I repaired, though I must
confess with considerable reluctance. The wind blew raw
and keen, penetrating to the very bones; a slight, very
slight thaw had commenced, just enough to make the snow
beneath one's feet sloppy and insinuating, and suggestive of
influenza and rheumatism. On entering the room I found
some ten or twelve individuals of the respectable class seated
on the polished wooden chairs of the place; not round the
fire, which, newly lighted for the occasion, andsmoking furiously, as if angry at being called to take a part in such a
serious business, invited no such intimacy, but each " sullenly apart," muffled and buttoned to the chin, and evidently
desirous of dismissal. In the centre of the room stood a
small table and an arm-chair, reserved for the coroner, who
had not yet arrived; a wine-glass full of ink, and a single
pen new from the stationer's, completed the scanty preparation. In the corner, of the room farthest from the fire sat a
pale, melancholy child of ten or twelve years of age, and an
elderly person whom I took to beher mother; both were of
the poorer class.
The coroner not arriving at the time specified, considerable dissatisfaction became apparent upon the silent visages
of my companions, and very likely upon my own as well.

314

c4"ROWNER'S

QUEST."

Here, however, we sat and shivered for a full hour in comfortless speechlessness, strangers, as far as I could judge, to
each other, and having, with one exception, apparently, a
general determination to remain so. The individual furnishing the exception was perhaps of a lower grade than the
rest, and was, besides, constitutionally unfitted altogether
for the business in hand. WVhile the rest sat still and
motionless as sphinxes, he twisted, wriggled, and turned
upon his seat, rubbed his hands and smiled with a cordiality
which ought to have been catching, though it was not. All
his attempts at conversation, and they were many, met with
a freezing and unqualified rebuff; and at length, giving it up
as a bad job, he turned his attention to the fire, and I really
felt grateful when, by a little judicious poking, he succeeded
in eliciting a cheerful aspect from that, the only face in the
room in accord with his own. Encouraged by this success,
he actually produced a snuff-box from his pocket, and giving
it a good-natured tap on the lid, offered it politely to his
neighbour, who, however, would not share in the stimulant,
but left him to enjoy it alone, and to waste the sunshine of
his countenance upon the unresponding company.
How slowly that long hour crawled away, and how I regretted that my pockets were void of books or anything
readable 1 There was one old gentleman behind a pair of
goggle spectacles, deliberately spelling through a greasy,
beer-stained portion of a weekly paper-even him I envied.
At length the rattle of wheels was heard below, and, amidst
a general movement and upstanding, the coroner entered the
room. My friend with the snuff-box sobered his merry face,
took a parting pinch, and addressed himself to the serious
business of the hour.
The coroner proceeded immediately to apologise politely
for the delay he had unwittingly occasioned us, arising, as
he said, from an unexpected mass of evidence to be gone into
in another case in which he had been engaged that morning.
I could not help thinking that he appeared to be well used

"COWNi9'S QUEST."3

315

to makling apologies, and to having them well received.
This done, and the requisite twelve being ascertained to be
present, he proceeded to administer the oath usual on such
occasions. This ceremony was got through summarily, the
elderly gentleman who had monopolised the newspaper being
first sworn as foreman. Six of the others, each placing a
finger on the gospels, were sworn in at a batch; the same as
to the remainder, and the business was concluded in less than
two minutes.
The next step was to inspect the body of the deceased,
previous to hearing what evidence might have to be adduced. For this purpose we followed our foreman over the
melting snow and mingled mud, through a long labyrinth of
narrow and half-paved back-streets, to the house or rather
hut, where lay the object of our inquiry. It was during this
transit that I for the first time heard any of the circumstances
attending the death we were called to investigate. It appeared that the deceased was a labouring man, who had
returned from his employment unexpectedly in the middle of
the day, complaining of indisposition; he had gone to bed,
and died in a few hours, without having recourse to medical
assistance.
We entered the lowly dwelling, and there, in a small front
room on the ground-floor, hardly nine feet square, on a bed
that filled half the space, lay (surrounded by a family of
small children), as if in a quiet sleep, the remains of one of
the sons of toil and privation. He looked old, but not dead;
three-score and ten upon the point of waking-such he
seemed to me. I was deceived, however, somewhat in regard to his age.
When, in separate detachments-for the room was too
small to hold us all at once-we had duly contemplated this
sad sight, we returned shivering to the inn-rooni, where we
found the coroner, who had not been idle during our absence,
engaged in questioning the child I have before referred to.
When we were all seated, he read over the evidence he had

316

" CROWNER'S QUEST."

elicited in the interval; and, first putting a few simple questions to the child as to the nature of an oath, which she
answered satisfactorily, he swore her to the truth of what she
had already said, and was about to say in reply to any questions asked.
The case, as the coroner observed, was the simplest that
could possibly occur. From the replies of the child, we
learned the following facts, exemplifying, I have no doubt,
the history of multitudes of the countless army of workers
for daily bread, except in the extreme suddenness of the
death, which made the circumstance legally amenable to investigation under a coroner's warrant. The deceased had
been employed for many yeafs by a manufacturer in the
City, and was highly respected for his sobriety and industry.
On the Wednesday before the inquest, which was held on a
Monday, he had come home unexpectedly at two in the
afternoon, complaining of great difficulty in breathing, and,
requesting his wife to make him some tea, had gone to bed.
Having drank a little, he said he wished very much for a
quiet sleep, and desired his wife not to let the children make
a noise. The deponent, the eldest but one of the children,
of which there were eight, alone remained with the mother
at his bedside. The mother requested him to "have the
doctor," but he refused to do so, and leaning back on his
pillow, as though very, very weary, fell asleep. He remained silent for about an hour, and then commenced
breathing heavily (the child described it as " snoring in his
breast"). After some time he was again silent; when his
wife, observing that his head lay very low in the bed, rose
to place a pillow beneath it, and was horror-struck at finding him cold and stiffening. Medical aid was immediately
summoned, but all too late; he had been dead nearly an
hour. The stertorous breathing was the sole evidence of
his last agony. He was sixty-three years of age; his
wife, who was five-and-twenty years younger, was on the
point of giving birth to a ninth child, and could not attend

"CROWNERIS

QUEST."

317

the inquest. The elderly female I had taken for the
mother of the child, was a kind and simple-hearted neighbour, whose evidence merely corroborated that of the child,
and gave proof of her own genuine feeling and tender
sympathy.
The witnesses being desired to withdraw, we proceeded
to deliberate upon the verdict. It was not considered necessary to have apost-mortem examination. The coroner, an
approved medical practitioner himself, assured us there was
nothing suspicious or even unusual in the case. The poor
man had: doubtless died of disease of the heart, or of
apoplexy-a dissection might decide which. But of what
use or import was it to know? The immediate causeof his
death might, perhaps, be found in the extreme exposure to
cold to which he had subjected himself on the morning of
his decease.; it having come out in evidence that he had
mistaken the hour, and rose at half-past three o'clock in
the morning, instead of six, in his anxiety to be early at
work during a press of business. Not thinking it worth
while to go to bed again for so short a time, he had sat
without fire for more than a couple of hours before proceeding to his employment.
We could do nothing better than adopt the suggestion of
the coroner, and agree to the verdict of "Death from natural
causes," which.was accordingly done.
It was surprising how suddenly the face of things now
changed. Everybody rose and buttoned up his great-coat,
and donned his gloves, and bared the right hand again to
sign the document, half printed, half written, containing the
verdict, and then departed without ceremony; so hastily,
indeed, that I saw more than one return for walking-sticks
or umbrellas forgotten in their anxiety to be off. It was
curious to see the different modes of handling the pen;
some, delighting in their dashing autograph and flourish,
made signatures audible at twenty yards distance; others,
with careful deliberation, in a manner printed their names,

318

"CROWNER' S QUEST."

legible for centuries. One slim, Adonis-like figure, whom I
took for an artist, wrote the finest Italian hand with a pen
which he produced from a gold " Mordan;" his performance,
however, was immediately buried under the signature of an
old stager, who, having less perfect vision, inscribed with the
gaping quill of the party, his own blotty patronymic immediately upon it. Next came our friend of poker and snuffbox celebrity. He was the last excepting myself, and twice
he signalled me to precede him; but I was inexorable, and
determined to inspect his caligraphy, cost what it would.
Still he dallied, and looked: wofully around him. It was
plain he had not calculated upon this, and it was not till
the coroner lifted his head to remind him of his duty, that,
in desperation he seized the pen-could it possibly be for
the first time in his life ? I am afraid so. There it stood
upright between the fingers of his clenched fist, dripping
with ink (he had thrust it to the bottom of the wine-glass),
and distilling drops more durable than precious. After
many futile attempts to settle upon the right spot, he at
length succeeded in the perpetration of a series of hieroglyphics that might have defied Champollion.
Having appended my own humble signature, I retreated
to the corner I had hitherto occupied in search of hat and
gloves. The little child who gave all the evidence we had
heard was sitting by the window, and now sobbing violently,
as if for the first time aware of the extent of her loss. The
kind-hearted neighbour held one of her hands, and tried in
vain to soothe and comfort her. After an equally vain
attempt on my own part, I turned to withdraw, and found
that the coroner had taken his flight with a precipitancy
which I could only account for on the supposition of another
sudden death-or a dinner. In his chair sat a stalwart
drover, who rang the bell violently, and vociferated, as I
descended the stairs, "Come, Betsy! serve up the steaks,
and bring a pint of stout !"

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.
THE shops of ancient London, by which we must be
understood to mean the London of the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries, are described by a city historian as of "ane
meane appearance "-consisting of an open shop, at the
entrance of which stood the owner or his apprentice, anda
"solar," or upper chamber above, in which solar, it is more
than probable, the proprietor resided with his household.
The mercantile guilds, in our day so wealthy and prosperous,
#were then comparatively in their infancy, and struggling
with debt and difficulties. When they became prosperous,
the shops of London became splendid; but even then their
magnificence was for a long time confined to a single locality.
In the fifteenth century, there was a vast deal of wealth
accumulated in the metropolis, but it was engrossed by
comparatively few individuals. One of the most wealthy
was Geoffrey Boleyn, a mercer in the Old Jewry. He was
great-great-grandfather of Queen Elizabeth by her mother's
side, and was lord mayor of London in 1457. In his time,
the whole of the foreign and wholesale trade was confined
to the hands of a few great capitalists; and some of the most
illustrious families in the kingdom may trace: their origin
from men who were at that period London merchants.
The oldest shops of which we have any particular account
are those of the goldsmiths standing in Cheap, the modern
Cheapside, of which the goldsmiths would seem to have had
possession from time immemorial. Of these, the most remarkable by far is that which was built by Thomas Wood,

320

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

who was one of the sheriffs of London in the year 1491.
Maitland describes it as " the most beautiful frame and front
of fair houses and shops that were within the walls of
London, or elsewhere in England, commonly called Goldsmiths' Row, betwixt Bread Street end and the Cross in
Cheap, but within Bread Street Ward. It contained in
number ten dwelling-houses and fourteen shops, all in one
frame, uniformly built four stories high, beautified towards
the street with the goldsmiths' arms, and the likeness of
woodmen, in memory of his (Thomas Wood's) name, riding
on monstrous beasts; all which were cast in lead, richly
painted over and gilt. These he gave to the goldsmiths,
with stocks of money to be lent to young men having those
shops, &c. This said front was again new painted and gilt
over in the year 1594, Sir Richard Martin being then mayor,
and keeping his mayoralty in one of them."
The example of Thomas Wood did not want imitators.
New shops, worthy to vie with those he had erected, arose
to complete his plan. As the city increased in wealth, it
also increased in splendour. Cheapside, which was then of
more than double the breadth it is now, was the scene of all
processions and of royal or civic display.- It was the centre
of the shopocracy, and continued so to be almost up to the
time of the great fire, which swept away its glory and magnificence for ever. King Charles I., it appears, took a special
interest in the goldsmiths' shops in Cheap, as we learn from
the following record of the year 1629 :-" At this time, the
city greatly abounded in riches and splendour, such as former
ages were unacquainted with. Then it was beautiful to
behold the glorious appearance of goldsmiths' shops in the
south row of Cheapside, which in a continued course reached
from the Old Change to Bucklersbury, exclusive of four
shops only of other trades in all that space." These four
shops were an offence to the royal eye, and gave rise to an
order from the privy-council, which we abbreviate thus:

LONDON SHOPS. OLD AND NEW.

321

"Forasmuch as his majesty hath received information of
the unseemliness and deformity appearing in Cheapside, by
reason that divers mel of mean trades have shops amongst
the goldsmiths, which disorder it is his majesty's express
pleasure to have reformed .....
It was accordingly ordered that the two lord chief-justices, with such other judges
as they shall think meet to call unto them, shall consider
what statutes or laws there are to enforce the goldsmiths to
plant themselves for the use of their trade in Cheapside," &c.
The citizens, who probably imagined that the king, who had
other things to think of, might leave them to manage their
shops, took no notice of the order in council, but went on
letting their premises to whom they chose. After the lapse
of seven years comes another peremptory missive, charging
the lord mayor and aldermen with disobedience in not
bringing the goldsmiths living dispersed in the city to seat
themselves in Cheapside or Lombard Street, and commanding them forthwith to turn out all other tradesmen to
make room for the goldsmiths, and to commit such as shall
prove refractory to prison; until they do conform themselves.
"'And in the meanwhile," concludes this strange document,
"we are, by his majesty's command, to require and charge
you forthwith to cause all such shops as are not goldsmiths,
and have been taken or opened either in Cheapside or Lombard Street since our said letters, to be presently shut up,
and not be permitted to be opened till further order from
this board, &c.-24 May, 1637." Fearing this arbitrary
order might not be of sufficient force to compel the citizens
to obedience, the King followed it up by a thundering decree
from the Star-Chamber, which threatens to imprison the
aldermen of the wards if they shall neglect to execute his
majesty's commands. The magistrates of the city seem to
have cared little either for privy-council or Star-Chamber,
judging at least from the "appearance of a third order
addressed to the lord mayor and aldermen, reciting the

822

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

former two, and complaining of the contempt and disrespect
with which they had been treated. What effect this last
message had upon the corporation does not appear; whether
the "boke-seller, the drugster, the girdler," &c., who had
dared to mingle with the goldsmiths, and open their shops
in spite of his majesty and the Star-Chamber, were compelled
to cry peccavi, 'and beat a retreat, we cannot say, but are
inclined to think they kept their ground. The king was at
this crisis embroiled with his subjects on the question of
ship-money, and the citizens of London were especially sore
and rebellious, having been rated at twenty ships, and
petitioned in vain to have the number reduced one-half.
The affair of the shops vanished before the affair of the
ships-and of that, at present, it is not our business to treat.
By this time London had increased to more than double
the size it was when Thomas Wood built his celebrated
shops, and that in spite of various enactments which had
been passed to prevent the extension of the city beyond
what were deemed its natural boundaries-the walls. The
shops, in spite of acts of parliament to the contrary, had
burgeoned forth of the city towards the Strand in one direction, and towards Holborn in another. As early as the
beginning of the first Charles's reign, we find shops and
stalls in Westminster Hall. These were in the hands of
booksellers, law-stationers, and sempstresses, and the profits
(rents?) of them belonged by right of office to the warden
of the Fleet. There is an entry in Laud's Diary, to the
effect that, on Sunday the 20th of February, 1630-1, "the
Hall was found on fire by the burning of the little shops or
stalls kept therein;" and we know, from other sources, that
this retail traffic was carried on among the lawyers and their
clients up, at least, to the commencement of the eighteenth
century. So far as we know, the Westminster Hall Bazaar
is the first notable example upon record of the system of
projecting the elements of commerce into places of public

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

823

resort, which is the most characteristic feature of London
retail trade in our day.
The bickerings bdtween Charles and the citizens on the
subject of the goldsmiths' shops were hardly ended, when
the king -doubtless
for a consideration- gave them a
charter, in right of which they were to enjoy certain privileges, and to levy certain fees and tolls. One clause of
this charter, which bears date 1638, throws some light upon
the matter of shops. It runs thus;---" And further, we do
give and grant to the said mayor and commonalty and
citizens of the said city and their successors, that it may
and shall be lawful to the citizens of the same city, and any
of them for the time being, to expose and hang in and
over the streets and ways and alleys of the said city, and
suburbs of the same, signs and posts of signs affixed to their
houses and shops, for the better finding out such citizens'
dwellings, shops, arts, and occupations, without impediment,
molestation, or interruption of us, our heirs or successors, or
any officer or minister whatsoever of us, our heirs or successors." In those days the houses of London were but
partially or irregularly numbered, and in many districts
were not numbered at all. Signs were therefore necessary,
as distinguishing marks, and that they were very generally
used long before the date of this charter, we have abundant
evidence in the imprints of old books, and the allusions of
old writers,. dramatic and other. It is very possible that
they might have become a nuisance from projecting too far
into the public way, and that the right of the shopkeepers
to maintain them may have been disputed by persons who
were or fancied themselves aggrieved. This clause of the
charter legalises them, and it is noteworthy that it says
nothing as to their size or the rate of projection over the
causeway.
After the great fire, which destroyed nearly the. whole of
the city north of the Thames, within the walls, the shops

324

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

speedily advanced into the suburbs. We have no record of
any particular splendour or magnificence attached to them,
but they became infinitely more numerous; and when the
city rose from its ashes, though it monopolised the wholesale
trade, it found a formidable rival in general commerce
outside the walls. The shops continued to be distinguished
by their signs down to a very recent period. We learn
from Hogarth's pictures how very plentiful and how bulky
they were. In the plate illustrating Hudibras, entitled
" The Burning of the Rump," the view is of Fleet Street
within Temple Bar, which obstruction appears precisely as
it does at present, with the addition of three traitors' heads
stuck on the top of it; and the ponderous signs are seen
projecting over the roadway in a manner that would not be
tolerated for an hour in modern London. In the opening
part of his career, Hogarth painted signs for the shopkeepers,
and thought it no discredit that his works should be appropriated to a useful purpose.
Notwithstanding that the English have been so long a
nation of shopkeepers, it was reserved for the living generation to make the grandest discoveries in the science of
shopkeeping. If the reader would know in what these discoveries consist, let him contrast the present appearance of
Oxford Street, Holborn, the Strand, or Cheapside, or any
other frequented thoroughfare, with what it was at the termination of the last war, before the invention of gas, or the
improvements in the manufacture of plate-glass which rendered it available for the shopkeeper's purpose. And, to
make the contrast more effective, let the comparison be made
after sunset on a winter-day. The gloomy street in which
a few blinking oil-lamps just sufficed to render the darkness
visible--the.narrow shop-window, with its panes of bulging
glass, twenty inches by twelve, lighted by a couple of tallow
candles or an argand-lamp- the shop'door closed to keep
out the cold air; and the one, or perhaps two, guardians of

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

325

the counter comfortably ensconced in the room beyond,
waitihg the information of the bell which rings a loud peal
when a customer enters-such was the aspect of many a
business thoroughfare in the year when Waterloo was fought.
Now, the departure of the day is the herald of a light such
as the sun never darts into the nooks and crannies of traffic:
broad streams of gas flash like meteors into every corner of
the wealth-crammed mart-from which, it may be but one
invisible wall of solid crystal separates the passenger, who
might easily walk through it but for the burnished metalguard which meets him breast high. If he enters to purchase, he is met at the door by a master of the ceremonies,
who escorts him to the precise spot where what he seeks
awaits him in the charge of a sort of genius of the lamp;
one of a numerous band, whose sole purpose in life it is to
gratify his wishes. He walks over rich carpets, in which
his feet sink as though upon a meadow-sward; and he may
contemplate his portrait at full length in half-a-dozen mirrors, while that pair of gentlemen's kids at 2s. 10d. is being
swaddled in tissue paper, and that remnant of change in the
vulgar metal of which coal-scuttles are made, and the very
existence of which the immortal Brummell felt bound to
ignore, is being decently interred in a sort of vellum sarcophagus ere it is presented to his acceptance.
Fifty years ago, by far the greater portion of the retailshops in London were small establishments easily manageable
by one person. The proprietor in most cases was his own
manager, and attended personally behind the counter to the
wants of his customers. The race of shopmen were hardly
one-fourth as numerous as they are at present-and the
early-closing movement had not been heard of, because lateshopping, except on Saturday nights, was not a prevailing
practice. Great as is the alteration which has taken place
in the size and aspect of our shops, perhaps the metamorphosis which has also taken place, or rather which is now in

326

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

course of development, in the system of doing business, is
greater. The distinction between the wholesale traders and
retailers, formerly so strongly marked, and, by the commercial by-laws of the citizens of London once erected into
an impassable barrier, is in our day fast disappearing. We
have in fact, now, in almost every business street in London,
examples of retail-trades carried on, so to speak, by wholesale. The snug shop under the control of its single proprietor-for whom John Gilpin may serve as a prototypeis transformed into a monster establishment, which has disembowelled a dozen houses to make room for its stockwhich, backed by the combined funds and responsibilities
of several capitalists, does away with middlemen of every
class-buys its raw material in the foreign markets, or its
wrought stuffs from the home manufacture, at a discount for
ready money-gives no credit, and takes none-and doing
business upon a margin of profit calculated to afford a living
remuneration under the old-fashioned process, goes on increasing in wealth, and year by year extending in magnitude.
The small trader suffers wofully by this monopolising system,
and finds himself compelled to retire from the field and sink
to a lower status, or, linking himself with others in the same
predicament, to attempt the same game, the success of which
in other hands has threatened his ruin. The end to which
all this is tending, would appear to be the abolition of that
class who are exclusively wholesale dealers, or, in other
words, the middlemen who stand between the producer and
the shopkeeper. While the process which is to bring about
this change is going forward, those engaged in it, it is easy
to see, must make large gains, because they realise the profit
both of the wholesale and retail seller; but when the transition state is over, and the change accomplished, the same
competition which will have swept the smaller traders from
the stage, will bring the larger ones down to precisely the
same position in which. the smaller ones stand at present.

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

327

Then, and not till then, will the public reap the full benefit
of the commercial revolution now in progress, and, which,
judging from appearances, is destined to end in the substitution of a system under which the purchaser will have to
pay but one profit, instead of the present system which mulcts
him in two.
The rent of shops in London was never so high as it is at
the present time. Within the last few years they have risen
upon the average 10 per cent., and in many districts three
times that amount. Speculation in shop-leases is a favourite
species of excitement with a certain class of jobbers. The
plan is to lend money at a usurious interest upon the lease
of a tradesman in difficulties: if he recovers his position and
pays off the loan, it is not a bad stroke of business; but if
he fails, and goes into the Gazette, it is a hetter one, as the
lease is sure to be bought at a good pr.fit by some one in
the same line of business, who, on the strength of the bankrupt's connection added to his own, hopes to do better. A
tradesman who has a lease can always raise money upon it;
and there are a prodigious number of leases at all times in
the hands of the money-lenders. ,Sometimes it comes to pass
at the failure of a baker, butcher, or provision-dealer, that
the lease of his shop forms the sum-total of the assets of the
bankrupt, and even that, it may be, is mortgaged for its full
value. We have known a "smart" tradesman sell his lease
for a few hundreds, who at the same time had really no lease
to sell. He managed it in this way: having found a purchaser, and received a deposit upon the bargain, he went to
his landlord, of whom he had hitherto been a yearly tenant,
and demanded a lease, on the ground that he was contemplating certain expensive improvements in the premises
which of course he could not venture to undertake unless he
possessed the assurance which a lease would give him, that
he would not be deprived of the advantage of them. On the
faith of this imaginary project, the landlord gave him a lease

328:

LONDON SHOPS,

OLD AND

NEW.

renewable at the expiration of seven years, for seven or fourteen more-which lease he transferred to his customer the'
day after he got it. It is usual in London to hire houses and
shops with an agreement for a lease, which the tenant can
have executed at his own expense if after a trial he finds it
worth his while. It is as well to remember, however, that
such an agreement is not always found to be binding upon a
landlord's heirs: at anyrate, we have known a young tradesman ruined by being turned out of his shop after he had
spent £1,000 in alterations and fittings to suit his purposerelying upon a written agreement for a lease which he held
from his landlord, who died suddenly, and left him to the
mercy of a stranger who wanted the premises for his own
business.
If -the London shopkeeper groans beneath a heavy rent
and heavy taxes, and has to submit to a catalogue of minor
expenses of which the provincial dealer knows little or
nothing, he has also one great and compensating advantage,
which can be reaped to the same extent on no other spot,
and which lies at the foundation of his ultimate prosperity.
This is found in the continuous current of ready cash that
flows over his counter. Credit, which in many small towns
is the rule of the majority of commercial transactions, is in
London the rare exception. Of a hundred faces that stand
at his counter in the course of a day, it is likely that the shopkeeper in a frequented thoroughfare is hardly familiar with
one, or knows them but as occasional customers whom he
may see two or three times in the course of a season; and if
he is wise, he cultivates no intimacies, as they might lead to
a demand for credit. An immense proportion of his patrons
are of a migratory species-here to-day and gone to-morrow
-visitors, who come to see and to purchase, and withdraw
to be seen no more. Credit is rarely asked for, and still more
rarely given; and hence it follows that bad debts, which in
country towns are frequently the ruin of small dealers, affect

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

329

the London shopkeeper but very little. This advantage,
without doubt, is appreciated at its full value, and underlies
the furious competition for shops well situated, which has
raised their rents to such abnormal amounts. It has another
consequence, too, in the temptation it holds out to gangs of
unprincipled men, who infest some of the main channels of
commerce with specious establishments, which are actually
nothing more than dens of infamy; where, under the pretence
of unheard-of bargains, the public, and the sex in particular,
are bamboozled and bullied out of their cash; and where, if a
lady happens to lay her muff on the counter, she may chance
to see it cut into strips and barefacedly hung in the window
for sale. These banditti have been exposed again and again
in the public prints, and several of their gangs have become
so notorious, as to be compelled for a time to retire into
obscurity; but a change of name, or a change of locality, or
both, suffices to start them again. Towsery, from the West,
transforms himself into Chowsery in the East; and when he
is blown there, may figure again as Blowsery in the north,
or Mowsery in the south, carrying the same ruffianly gang
of robbers with him wherever he goes. Unfortunately, the
law has no hold upon these villains, unless an assault can be
proved, which in some instances has been done; and ladies
who go forth on shop}'ing expeditions have need to do so
under protection, or else first take the trouble to ascertain
whither their love of a bargain is likely to lead them. In
the old times, when the shopkeepers of one guild were mostly
congregated in one district, and each one acted under the
eyes of his brethren, there was at least nothing of this sort:
the regulations which kept up prices and prevented competition, at least kept down knavery and prevented robbery.
The catch-penny, catch-booby system of trade is altogether
of modern growth, and is one of the evils to be guarded
against, which has arisen out of an extension of trade not
possible under the old-fashioned restrictions.

330

LONDON SHOPS, OLD AND NEW.

The shop-windows of London have long formed the city's
principal attraction to strangers and visitors. Picturegalleries and museums present no points of interest that
can compete with them in the estimation of the mass of our
fellow-creatures. They are, in fact, open volumes, which he
who runs may read, and the tale they tell is one of wonder
and of wealth, of courage and daring, of hardship and perseverance, of danger, and difficulty and success. Whatever
art has to glory in, or science to boast of, the shop-window
exhibits to the admiration of mankind. To figure there is
the climax of the most arduous labours and the highest
emprise. It is for the shopkeeper that the navigator ploughs
the seas, the traveller braves the African Desert, the Mexican
labours in the mine, the swart Indian dives for pearls in the
ocean depths. It is for him that the steam-engine pants, the
lightning carries messages, and the sun paints pictures. He
stands before the face of the world-the exponent of the
world's worth, of all that it has done and can do, of all that it
has and is. He is the index of a nation's industry, enterprise,
and progress-the honoured and the honourable depository
of the last and best creations of the divinest faculties with
which God has endowed his human race. To be a nation of
shopkeepers' then, is no dishonour, because it is to be a
nation pre-eminent above all others in the possession and
appreciation of all that man was formed to produce and to
enjoy.

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.
A PAWNBROKER's shop-window has brought us up with a

sudden pull on our morning perambulations, and fascinates
us with its manifold contents. Where to begin our observations, that is the question. The embarras de richesses
which has sprung from the embarrassments of poverty is so
puzzling and. perplexing, that it is next to impossible to make
a choice. The window has a thousand voices waiting to
speak-a thousand memorials which seem watching but to
catch our eye to pour out the narrative of their sorrowful
experience. These memorials are the hypothecated hostages
left to guarantee the fulfilment of treaties which have all
been violated, and abandoned to the uncompassionated destiny which avenges a forfeited pledge. Among them are
the garments of both sexes and all ages, the personal trinkets
and adornments of hopeful youth and fading age-books, the
solace of the student and the companions of the solitarymusical instruments, the incentives to harmless mirth or
delicious melancholy; watches, cloclks, gold chains, necklaces,
bracelets, brooches, snuff-boxes, work-boxes, writing-desks,
surgical implements, mathematical and scientific instruments,
microscopes, telescopes, and stereoscopes; knives, forks, and
spoons, and all the adjuncts of the dinner-table; and a thousand things besides, comprising everything "between a flatiron and a diamond ring," both inclusive; not omitting an
unassorted collection of workmen's tools condemned to rust
for awhile in base inaction through the misfortunes or follies
of the quondam owners.

332

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

The pawnbroker's shop is the deep sea in which all these
mementoes and materials of former comfort and prosperitythe wrecks of foundered hopes-are swallowed up; and the
pawnbroker's shop-window shows them strewn together in
disordered heaps, like the spoils of the tempest in some coral
cave of ocean. In dim, yet dazzling confusion, the inharmonious collection floats before the vision, and will not be
disembarrassed of the living forms and faces with which
imagination connects each single item in the endless catalogue.
Let us invite from the mass one or two forlorn specimens, and
listen to their oracular voices. They will speak nothing but
the truth now, though they may have helped to spread many
a delusion in days that are gone. May we be the wiser for
the revelations they impart.
The first that comes forward to be heard is a neat and
elegant little dress of lavender-coloured silk. We feel assured by its timid rustle that it was not long ago a wedding
dress, and so it proves. " Ah !"it says mournfully, "I little
thought that I should ever come to this-I, who came into
the world with such mystery and secrecy, and was received
with such wonder and admiration. At my birth, down in
Daisydell, the best and prettiest faces blushed and smiled;
and when Patty put me on, and walked with Frank to the
village church, the garden-flowers lay in my path, and roses,
white and red, fell in showers upon every.flounce. Then I
rode in a carriage down to the sea-side, and for a whole
week I walked on the sunny beach among the shells and
sea-weed, and got a little sprinkled with the salt spray' only
a little, nothing to hurt. Then I was shut up in a box in
the dark, and when I saw the light again it was in this dirty
London, and Patty's cheeks of rosy red were growing pale,
and Frank was getting sallow and careworn. Once or twice
I went to church on the Sunday, and once or twice to a walk
in the park or out into the green lanes. Then I went into
the box again for a long, long while, and when I saw the

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

333

day once more, I felt Patty's warm tears falling upon me as
she took me out. There was a baby lying in a little cradle,
and Frank was sitting idle by a spark of fire, with his elbows
on his knees, and looking sulky andmiserable. Then I was
laid upon the table, and tied up in a handkerchief with
Frank's dress coat.
"'The rent must be paid to-day, Frank,' said Patty;
'there is no other way; will you take the things?'
"Frank did not answer, but bit his lips and breathed
heavily; then he rose and put me under his arm, and
went down-stairs into the street. He walked up and down
for near an hour, and passed the pawnbroker's several times,
looking over his shoulder at the door, but never entering.
Then he went home again, and threw the bundle on the
table, and said he couldn't do it, and he wouldn't do it. So
Patty, poor thing ! had to do it herself and, answering not
a word, she took me up and brought me here to the pawnbroker's, along with the coat, and took away a piece of gold
and some silver instead. I have been squeezed up on a shelf
here for more than a year, and I saw nothing of Patty all
the time until yesterday, when she came by in a miserable
old merino and garden bonnet that she had before she was
married. She looked up and caught sight of me hanging
here, and then, pressing her child to her breast, hurried
away. Ah I wish she was safe back again at Daisydell."
The next monitor is an overcoat, of the paletot order, an
article of good class, somewhat the worse for wear, yet still
serviceable enough for a winter's campaign. "I belonged,"
he says, "a year ago, or thereabouts, to Ben Plumer, the
law writer. Ben does not, as a rule, affect overcoats, having & knack of buttoning himself tight to the chin in his blue
frock. He bought me when he happened to be flush of
money, not exactly in a fit of extravagance, but rather as a
kind of convenient investment. He apologised to his friend
for the indulgence in such a luxury, by observing that as he

334

334
1ROMANCE OP A SIIOP-WINDOW..

found it impossible to keep any cash in his pocket, he had
made up his mind to try the experiment on his back;
adding, that if he should happen to want a pound, it would
only be to put me in, and have it. In three weeks he had
occasion to put his hypothesis to the test, and found it in all
respects sound. I have been put in and taken out five consecutive times during the six months that I had the honour
of being the property of Mr. Plumer, who always entertained
a grateful regard for my services, and considered me as a
veritable friend in need. What induced him to abandon me
at last is more than I can say. Here I am, however, after
twelve months of durance vile. You may have me for one,
seven, six-say one, five, and I don't think I shall be allowed
to hang on hand. I'm worth all the money, and really, if
you are a buyer, you may go further and fare worse."
Next comes a handsome gold watch and guard, by one of
the famous London makers. This is what it says :-" I was
bought in the Strand, two years ago, for thirty guineas, by a
city gentleman who had just made a good speculation, and
,took a fancy for my handsome dial. He put me in his
waistcoat pocket, and carried me home to Blackheath, where
he lived in luxury, and denied himself nothing. His wife
admired me exceedingly, and, lest I should be stolen, would
have me secured by an additional guard of her own hair. I
was the constant compani6n and faithful servant of Mr. Scrip
for six months, when there came a sudden panic and revolution in the-money-market, and I felt his heart beat tumultuously at a piece of news that came upon him unawares.
Twenty times at least within the next hour he drew me from
his pocket to mark the time, and I noticed that his jovial
face had grown haggard and wan, and grew longer and
longer with the passing moments. At four o'clock, instead
of going home as usual to dine with his family, he rushed
madly to various quarters of the town in search of friends to
save him from a default, which would be his ruin. His

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

835

success was bilt indifferent. When at length he reached
home, there was a wretched domestic scene of anxiety and
distress, embittered by mutual reproaches and outcries against
extravagance on one side, and gambling speculation on the
other. Next morning early, everything that was precious
and portable in the house was collected together and borne
off to be pledged before business hours. I saw the whole
contents of the plate-chest, and all Mrs. Scrip's jewels and
trinkets unpacked in the pawnbroker's private box, and exchanged for a roll of notes and a packet of duplicates. Last
of all came my turn. I was pulled out of the warm pocket
at exactly ten minutes to ten, and transferred to a private
drawer, where I was suffered to tick my last tick, and have
not been wound up again from that time to this. Whether
Mr. Scrip maintained his standing by the sacrifices he made,
I don't know; but he never came back for me, and here I
am to be sold for something over half price to anybody who
wants to know to a nicety what o'clock it is."
Between a gentleman's gold watch and the worn and battered tool of an artisan, there is a wide chasm; yet, nevertheless, the next monitor to be heard is a carpenter's jackplane, in a state of palpable decadence. "A queer sort of
life I've had of it," it begins, "and that's a fact. It is many
years ago since I was bought in Newgate Street one morning
by a very decent man, who put me into his basket and carried
me off to the workshop. He used me well, and in return I
did him justice for three years; but then I fell into the hands
of Sam Suckle, who not only used me shamefully himself, but
lent me right and left among a parcel of fellows, who knocked
me about at such a rate that I lost half my value ih no time.
Sam was fonder of the ale-house than of the workshop, and
going on from bad to worse, grew such a sot that he was
banished from the workshop altogether. He now had to
work on his own account; but as he liked to drink on his
own account much better, he was never out of the ale-house

336

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

until all the money was out of his pocket. Of course I was
soon pawned to buy beer; but I had not been in limbo three
days before Sam came, bringing my old companion, the handsaw, to take my place. I was released for three short days, and
then, happening to want the saw once more, Sam popped me
in again to release my old friend. The changes were rung
in this way month after month, and every time I got out of
durance I observed that Sam's nose grew more red and his
garments more ragged, his language more offensive and his
gait more staggering. The last time he ,pawned me I had a
presentiment of what was to follow, and it was verified but
too soon. Two days after came the hand-saw, as usual, but
not to release me; we were now companions in durance; and
a third was soon added to the party by Sam's stock and bits.
This was followed by the remainder bf his tools, which dribbled in, one at a time, down to the very gimlets and bradawls. The glue-pot brought up the rear one Saturday night,
and since then I have seen nothing of Sam, for the particulars
of whose final career I must refer you to the workhouse, if
you are curious about them."
A cabinet picture, about thirty inches by twenty-two, in a
broad and brilliant frame of finished gilding and exquisite
pattern, now claims to be heard. The rich hues of russet
brown contrasting with the sparkling tints in the foreground;
the delicious greens on the foliage, and the soft, delicate greys
mingling with the light clouds in the distance, all combine to
form an agreeable subject of contemplation, in which there
is yet wanting something-some indefinable element of barmon'y which ought to be, but is not there. What has it got
to say ? Listen: "I am an impostor," it says, "and a delusion; there is not a particle of truth or candour in my composition; I am a piece of embodied wickedness, and I am
heartily ashamed of myself. I am forced to present myself
to the public with a lie upon my face, and I am intrinsically
a lie and nothing else. If you look at my lower left-hand

ROMANCE

OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

337

corner, you will see the name of W. Maller painted in legible
characters. Now, I assure you, that artist never had anything to do with me-never in the whole course of his life so
much as set eyes upon me. How could he ? I came into
existence-an existence with which I am disgusted-two
years after his death. I was painted-manufactured is the
more appropriate term-by a drunken artist, who sold me
for forty shillings to a dealer, who praised me so magniloquently to a wealthy patron, that he was enchanted to
purchase me at ninety guineas. The moment I was hung in
his gallery I was suspected to be an impostor by those who
knew more than my purchaser did of the essentials of art.
The whispered suspicions reached his lordship's ears at last,
and he, to set the matter at rest, sent me to a picture-sale,
where I was knocked down for seven pounds ten, just thirty
shillings more than the worth of my frame. Since then I
have rub a complete round among ignorant collectors, and
brought a profit to some dozens of dealers. The last who had
me in possession found me too well known in the market to
be of further use, and he therefore brought me here and
pledged me for a five-pound note, and left me to my fate.
Don't have anything to do with me unless you wish to be
cheated; and if you would do me a kindness in return for
my candour, turn my face to the wall."
Here is a more serious claimant on our notice-a large
family folio Bible, sheathed in a brown holland scabbard, lies
in a corner. If it had a voice, it might speak something to
the following effect:-" I came into the world nearly forty
years ago, and nobody has read a couple of chapters in me
yet. I belonged first to a country servant-maid, who took
me in from the book-pedler, at sixpence a number, in blue
covers, and was paying sixpences every Saturday, for over
four years before she came to the end of the volume. She
sent my numbers to be bound, when she was on the point of
being married. When bound, I was put into a green-baize

338.

ROMANCE OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

'cover, in which I lay for twenty years on a side-table in her
cottage, in front of the tea-tray and under the knife-box,
being only taken out now and then, that the children, when
they grew big enough, might look at my pictures. I was
called the Family Bible; but I was never made the means
of giving instruction to the family. Had the lessons of pru'dence which I inculcated been noted and studied, my owners
wrould never have found it needful to part with me; for prosperity is the fruit of my counsel. I was left as an heir-loom
to the eldest daughter, who married about ten years back,
and with her husband removed to London, where they fell
into deep distress. I was pawned to buy bread for a starving
family. The pawnbroker would only advance twenty shillings
upon my security, though I had cost between six and seven
guineas in all."
We have not time to spare just now to listen to further
revelations. There is a diamond ring sparkling on a bed of
white cotton, in a way that convinces us that its story is
worth hearing; there is a collected edition of Schiller's works,
and a corpulent German dictionary, ready to unbosom their
reminiscences. In the shop is a cottage-piano, with a couple
of rents in its damask-silk front-" poor dumb mouths,"
which could furnish us with a family history varied enough
for a whole volume; and there are no end of mementoes of
the poor man's lot, of his hard labour and struggles to get
the materials and elements of comfort and respectability
about him, and of the determined battles he fought and
fought in vain, while forced by adversity to relinquish them
one by one, that he might drive the gaunt wolf from the
door, and feed his famishing little ones. All these we must
leave to the imagination of the reader. Each one of itself
might yield the groundwork of a romance, all the more
touching and instructive in that the details are drawn
from the realities of our social life.
By the perusal of the pawnbroker's window, we may

ROMANCE

OF A SHOP-WINDOW.

339

derive a more intense conviction than we are accustomed to
entertain of the fact, not pleasant to think of, that poverty,
so far as that is identical with want of money, is by no
means confined to the class whom we denominate "the
poor." Pawners, it would appear, abound in nearly all ranks
of life. The owners of jewels and precious metals and
articles of pure luxury impound them as readily, under the
pressure of temporary emergencies, as the needy man does
his clothes or his tools.* The quantity and variety of articles
yearly pledged and forfeited, which are of a description
proving that they could not have belonged to the poorer
classes, is enormous; and we'may learn from them how true
it is that misfortunes and reverses track all grades of society.

z2

THE PIHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.
THE bills of mortality, and the.reports of the registrar,
published weekly in the newspapers, inform us that above a
thousand of our fellow-creatures pass away by death during
the intervals between each recurring Sabbath. At the
moment we write, the general weekly average of a thousand
has risen to above sixteen hundred, and that without the
prevalence of any extraordinary epidemic or infectious disorder. The two and a half millions of people congregated
within the circle which contains London and its suburbs are,
by means of the tables of the registrar-general, converted
into a vast barometer of health and disease, of life and death
-- a barometer so susceptible of the numberless influences
which affect human health and existence, that the operation
of each one of them, however trifling compared with others
it may be, is marked and recorded with invariable precision
for the benefit and admonition of the survivors. In a city
where above a thousand die weekly, how great must be the
amount of the sickness and suffering which are the forerunners of decease ! How many must lie groaning in anguish from day to day, awaiting, amidst the strife and
turmoil of the surrounding multitudes, their dismission to that
silent land where no voice is heard, nor sound of human joy
or grief can penetrate! How many men are there in whom
the seeds of decay and dissolution, latent in all men, have
begun to germinate, and who, bound by a thousand ties to
the sympathies and obligations of life, are alarmed by the
indications of approaching disease, or, wrestling with it in

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

841

the midst of duties which may not be neglected, seek counsel
of the physician to ward off, if possible, or to defer to an
indefinite period, the execution of the sentence they know
and feel to be pronounced. Among this latter class we are
most of us-may we not say all of us ?-occasionally numbered-the exceptions being those favoured few who have
never been compelled by inward warnings to seek medical
advice.
The love of life is rarely manifested in a stronger light
than by those who for the first time feel its sacred outworks
assailed by the advance of some insidious or unsuspected
disorder. "All that a man hath will he give for his life."
Let him but feel that that is endangered, and away fly the
maxims of economy and miserly prudence; they are but
feathers in the balance against the life that God has given
him, to preserve which no sacrifice is too great. He seeks
for the best advice-the best, at least, that he is in circumstances to procure--and he acts upon it, postponing every
other consideration to the. means of restoring his lost health.
This state of feeling, with which no reasonable man will
quarrel, affords the key to the spectacle to which we are
about to introduce the reader.
The scene is in one of the genteel squares lying north of
the Holborn line of route, and verging towards the west end;
the time eight o'clock, or a minute after, on a cold and misty
November morning. If the sun has risen, no Londoner has
yet seen his face. The surrounding streets are still as a
church-yard; the footfall of a plodding policeman may be
heard at intervals, but no further echoes break the silence.
The inhabitants of this fashionable quarter are fast bound in
sleep; even the servants are not yet astir, as is evidenced
by the absence of smoke from the chimneys. The millnan
will not come round for this hour, and no morning crywill
disturb the sleeper's repose. But see! yonder comes a cab
gently round the corner; it pulls up at a private house in

342

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

the square, sets down an elderly gentleman, and draws off a
little to wait for him. At the same moment a middle-aged
woman, leading a young girl, ascends the steps, and all three
disappear into the house together. Another cab, and then
several others follow, discharging their fares at the same
door; some of the visitors have to be lifted from the vehicle,
and assisted up the steps; others spring out and in lightly
enough; some are accompanied by friends, some are alone.
Now the foot passengers increase in number; we have
hardly been watching half an hour ere between thirty and
forty people of various ages, and some of them bowed with
infirmity or pain, have vanished silently within that everopening door. What has brought all these pilgrims out on
:such a morning as this ? The love of life. That house is
the residence of Dr. Quinine, one of the most learned and
successful practitioners of the day, whose time is worth
many thousands a year .to him. He visits the aristocracy
during the day, travelling hither and thither in his coach,
,and he devotes an hour and a half every morning of the
year to those who choose to consult him personally at his
own house. He will see perhaps forty patients this morning,
and if he chose he might receive a guinea from each; but,
fromn what we know of him, he is. as likely to give a guinea
to some poor creature in need of it, and his advice into the
bargain, as to take her hard-earned or perhaps borrowed fee.
Let us enter the waiting-room and look around us. It is
a handsome and lofty chamber nearly thirty feet square.
Upon the walls are a few fine old portraits-one, apparently
of a court beauty, by Sir Peter Lely; there is a large landscape of the Flemish school; and over the sideboard, on
which stands a decanter of water and a few glasses, there is
a fruit and flower piece still larger. A cheerful fire is blazing
in the grate, warming the whole room, in which there are
substantial padded' chairs and settees enough to accommodate fifty sitters. On the table in the centre are a few

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

343

books and yesterday's newspapers. The majority of the
seats are occupied by the morning's arrivals, each waiting
his turn for admission to the physician in the inner room.
There sits by the fire a young fellow about town, who is
paying the penalty of dissipation by the endurance of its
retributive consecquences, and whose hard, noisy breathing
tells us, without the aid of the stethoscope, that the orgies
of his nights have borne their natural fruit of miserable
days. Beside him is an elderly tradesman, with a face of
dogged endurance deeply lined with the habit of silent
suffering, who has probably borne the martyrdom of an
unhealthy occupation for the best years of his life, and,
hopeless of cure, /seeks only a temporary relief. Opposite
to him is a widow with her only daughter, whose pallid face
and leaden eye bespeak the presence of some functional
derangement which has, perhaps, baffled the skill of former
advisers, and may elude the investigation even of Dr. Quinine himself. Behind the widow there sitsa girl whose
vacant expression tells you as plainly as possible that she has
long been growing deaf, and more deaf, and who is come, if
it may be done, to have her hearing restored. Then there
is a mother with two white-faced children, blighted buds of
promise, apparently withering away; and whom she has
brought up yesterday all the way from Maidstone, to show
to the famous London physician, and to have his advice.
But what needs it to catalogue the individual woes and
maladies'of this various, assembly. They all come with one
purpose, with one settled thought in their hearts, like the
hapless Israelites of old, who swarmed round the pool of
Bethesda to await the descent of the heavenly messenger.
of health.
Standing at a green-baize door, which has another door
close behind it, is an elderly footman with the stolid face of
a martinet, overshadowed by powdered hair.. He is the
janitor of the inner shrine, and his movements are directed

344

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

by the tinkling of a little bell, at the sound of which he
opens the door, and the patient comes forth after a consultation of a minute or two, generally carrying a prescription
in the hand. When the man-about-town comes forth, we
observe that he looks particularly serious, and takes extraordinary care in buttoning and bandaging himself up, while
the young man in Waiting in the lobby is gone to summon
his cab to the door-and we guess that he has received a
reprimand for venturing out of doors on such a day as this.
When the- mother with her two children comes out, we are
glad to see she brings a cheerful, quite a merry face with
her: there is evidently nothing seriously the matter with
her little ones, and the prescription she holds in her hand
will set them all to rights; and the golden fee too, which we
saw her slip under her glove when she entered, she now
puts back in her purse, because Dr. Quinine wouldn't take
it. The poor widow and her daughter are closeted a long
time, though it is plain they have not a fee to give; but
there is a gleam of hope on the face of each as they come
out, and we may indulge the expectation that the recovery
of the poor girl is not far distant.
We must leave the elderly tradesman, and the rest of the
rather motley company to the physician's management, and
proceed on our way, not, however, without a parting trait
of the celebrated Dr. Quinine himself. It happened some
years ago that an acquaintance of ours, a farmer of good
property, requested us to accompany him, on the ground of
his feeling rather nervous, on the occasion of his consulting
our physician on account of what he called "queer symptoms," such as seeing double, &c., &c. The doctor received
him politely, and whilst the patient was giving a description of the symptoms, examined him minutely. While he
was yet speaking the medicus seized his pen and wrote a
prescription. "You need say no more," he said; "take
this, and act upon it. There are twenty years of life in you

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

345

yet if you are wise. I don't know what your powers of
self-denial may be, but upon them depends your existence.
Take plenty of exercise-drink wine but rarely, ale and
spirits never. In that case you may look to be an old man:
pursue your present course, and I would not buy your life
at a year's purchase." The patient, who was what is called
a generous liver, had the sense to take the advice thus
sternly given, and profited by it.
It is an old maxim that advice which costs nothing is
rarely followed. In spite of this maxim, however, "ADVIcE
GRATIS" is a commodity as common as any other in London,
judging from the frequency with which these two words
confront us in our rambles. It is well for the poorer classes
that this practice is so general. Excellent advice in common
cases, that is, in the majority of the disorders to which we
are liable, is to be had for nothing; but it must be remarked,
charity is not the only element in this proffer of gratuitous
advice. The practitioner who gives you his advice expects,
reasonably enough, to sell you the medicines he prescribesand thus the commercial element steps in. It would be
worse than churlish, it would be ungrateful, to complain of
this mode of practice, where it is carried out in honesty and
good faith, as we know well enough that it is in a multiplicity of instances. Such an arrangement is deserving of
the highest countenance, because it meets the wants of a
large and -most praiseworthy class of the community, who,
being too poor to consult a first-rate physician, and at the
same time too honourable and independent to receive from
charitable institutions the relief which they can afford to
pay something for, are anxious to get good advice at a
cheap market. The misfortune is that this practice, from
its adaptation to the popular necessity and its recognised
usefulness, has, like most other good things, led to many
and infamous abuses. It has opened a door, which would
otherwise have been closed to them, to numerous quacks and

346

THE PHYSICIAN'S LEVEE.

pretenders, who, under the specious mask of giving" advice
gratis," are enabled to thrust down the public throat all
manner of abominable nostrums, prepared with no other
view than the unprincipled one of their own emolument.
Hence we have, on the one hand, the self-dubbed Doctor
Crossbones, inviting all London to come for his gratuitous
advice, and prescribing to the multitude for every imaginable
disease that flesh is heir to, his one infallible specific, contained in a square green bottle, "price four and sixpence ;"
and on the other hand we have the self-dubbed Doctor
Sarcophagus Pillcloud,
"Who, with one little wonderful pill,
Can every disorder keep under,"
at least according to his own account-who makes his
hogsheads of wonderful pills by steam machinery, and rains
them in a deluge of. boxes at one and three-halfpence
"treble boxes two and nine,"-upon all who apply to him
or to his ubiquitous agents for "advice gratis."
Such unprincipled abuses are among the crying scandals
of our day. They are abounding in every quarter-the
followers, rivals, and imitators of the Messrs. Crossbones and
Pillcloud infesting every populous district, and being always
most successful, which means most mischievous and most
murderous, where the population is most dense and least
educated. Let us warn our readers to act with judgment
in matters affecting their health, and remind them that,
inasmuch as no man in his senses would think of intrusting
a watch needing repairs into the hands of a scavenger, he
ought not to think of intrusting his bodily frame-which is
a machine infinitely more complex than a watch-to the
mercies of an ignoramus who knows nothing of its
mechanism.

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

MORNING.

WE are standing at the central point of one of the bridges
which span the Thames, when the first indication of the
coming dawn of a midsummer morning appears in the clear
and starry arch above our heads. There is a long feathery
ridge of light clouds in the north-eastern horizon; beneath
which a pale clear streak of reddish white shows where the
day will break, while above them a cool white light shoots
and flutters up towards the zenith. The stars grow pale
and twinkle feebly in that spreading light, and at length die
out and disappear. Now the light rises higher and higher,
and its broad image is reflected in the river below; the
dusky bosom of Father Thames puts on a light grey mantle,
and the red, glimmering pendants of reflected fire-light,
which hung like jewels on his vest, die out in their turn as
the stars died out above. The slow day-dawn creeps onwards and upwards in beautiful gradations; and every pulse
of morn, as she throbs into being, reveals to us afresh the
old and well-known shapes, and transforms once more into
familiar things the grotesque and shadowy images which the
gloom of night invests with mystery and awe. First against
that broad and quivering curtain, which seems to vibrate
fitfully above the couch of the awakening day, rises, like a
vision of supernatural strength and majesty, the magnificent
outline of St. Paul's Cathedral, which now, in the absence of
positive light, shows like a monster profile, black and flat, its

348

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

edges sharply defined upon the shimmering background.
Then the towers and spires and projecting columns of a
thousand churches and factories come gradually into view;
as though, in answer to some magical summons, they now
for the first time stepped forth into being, charged with the
mission to "stand and wait," in the dim chambers of
obscurity, around that one lofty and shadowy potentate.
But the day is rushing onwards, and now his herald, twilight, comes tripping over that low-lying line of clouds-the
red, glittering lamps on the bridges fade into viewless sparks
at his approach, and after a few ineffectual blinks are no
more visible. He enwraps the whole scene in a wondrous
shadowless semi-radiance, soft, soothing, and transparent, in
which all things appear in startling clearness and nearness,
and in which the minutest features of objects which lie
beyond our ken in the full glare of day are distinctly discerned. This- marvellous effect of the morning twilight,
which few take. the trouble to-.witness, endures but for a few
moments: it is over already;. the rays of the risen sun now
flash warmly upon the gilded cross of the cathedral, and,
gradually stealing down upon the dome, crown the noble
pile with a halo of glory.
As we look around upon the river, we become aware, for
the first time,. that old Father Thames is uttering his voices,
which, drowned all day long in the roar and din of the traffic
carried on upon his waters, are now, in this still hour of
sunrise, distinctly audible. We hear the floods, as the morning breeze blows freshly against the turning tide, clapping
their hands : we hear, too, the hoarse swirl of the surge
against the piers of the bridge, the moored barges, and the
floating gangways, and the rafts of timber alongside the
wharves. There is no sign of life upon the broad bosom of
the stream, save a navigator's cat stalking stealthily along
the edge of a coal-barge; and no voice of living thing breaks
the solemn and touching silence, amid which the dawning

TWENTY-FOU-R HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

349

day looks down upon the metropolis of the world, fast bound
in the bands of slumber.
"Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
The city now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning: silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep,
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still !"

Yes, the mighty heart of London is lying still; the hearts of
her mightiest and meanest partake of a common rest. With
one half the London world, the day is far spent before the
other half is awake to its duties and its pleasures. While the
rich and prosperous court repose on beds of down, houseless
poverty sleeps at ease, during the warm summer nights, in
any sheltering nook, dry arch, or covered door-way, where,
lapped in golden dreams, the penniless being may, for aught
we know, be far happier in his sleep than the fat millionaire,
who is too wide-awake to sleep soundly at all. If we had
but a true knowledge of the theory of compensations, we
might chance to find that the poor man's sleep is worth all
my lord's waking hours, and that the difference between the
fortunes of the two, all things considered, is not so great as
we imagine. This reflection comes in our way, and we can
hardly escape recording it, because the very first human
subject that presents himself for consideration on a summer's
morning in London, to any early bird who happens to be
astir in time to catch such an unfortunate worm, is that
social phenomenon, the houseless, homeless vagrant. Sum-

350

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

mer is the time of carnival, during which these gentry pay
no rent. We have passed two this morning on the bridge,
curled up on the seat, on the leeward side of the parapet,
and snoring audibly to the response of the river below; and
as we leave the bridge, and pursue our way northward to
the City, we see one @r two more fast locked in slumber, in
here and there an out-of-the-way recess, whose infringement
of the law the policeman, if he sees them at all, compassionately ignores, leaving them to recruit exhausted nature by a
few brief hours of rest. But the time of awakening is close at
hand; the wretchedness that " snores upon the flint" must
start from the comfortless lair at the first summons of authority, and forth again upon its weary pilgrimage.
First pioneer of the daily traffic in the ever-trafficking
world of London, on this fair summer morning,-as indeed,
on every morning of the year,-is the "salopian," whomwe
encounter not far from the foot of the bridge. Lest any of
our provincial readers, or lie-abed fellow-citizens should be
ignorant of the physiology, or even of the existence, of this
hospitable worthy, we will pause for a moment to recount
his derivation and witness his deeds. Like many a knight
who has never mounted war-steed or drawn a sword, 'he
bears a name-which no longer expresses his calling. In times
comparatively ancient, when tea was ten shillings a pound,
and coffee proportionately dear, the very poor were debarred
from their use; but knowing the virtues of a hot beverage,
they sought and found a substitute in a decoction of sassafras
wood, which, sweetened with sugar and softened with milk,
was very largely consumed and much relished by those
accustomed to its flavour. This liquid, for what reason we
do not know, but probably from some whimsical allusion to
the slopping sound emitted by those who imbibed it standing
in the street, obtained the designation: of "saloop," and the
sellers of it became salopians, a title which they still retain,
though they no longer dispense the beverage which originated

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

351

the term. The salopians of the last generation were the
bosom friends and comforters of the by-gone race of Charlies,
to each and all of whom they.were well known, and who
were perhaps their best customers. Many a time, in our
boyish days, have we seen those venerable mountains of
overcoats, armed with a rattle on one side and a lantern
about the size of a two-gallon cask on the other, congregated
in the dim light of a raw winter's morning around the banner
of the salopian, and quaffing his invigorating draughts. The
salopian of the present day sells tea and coffee instead of
saloop, and, in addition to bread-and-butter, supplies his
patrons with whelks, periwinkles:, and pickled eels and
shrimps of yesterday. He pitches his rude table at the
corner of a street or the foot of a bridge, as the likeliest place
to catch his customers, who consist of a class among whom
breakfast is not always a meal honoured in the observance,
and who if they do not get it with him are very likely to go
without it. He had need rise early enough from his bed,
for even in summer his hospitable table is set before daybreak, though that happen within three hours of midnight.
In winter he manages to erect a sort of tent by means of
a screen and an old umbrella, beneath which a low bench
accommodates his uncomplaining guests.
We find him this morning at the corner of a court branching off from the main approach to the bridge. His tea and
coffee are simmering in portly tin cans steaming over charcoal fires; he has mounted a clean apron, and turned his
ragged, brown-spotted table-cloth, to show to the best
advantage, and is cutting bread-and-butter in halfpenny
slices of liberal thickness, and handing them to the expectant
mouths grouped picturesquely around him. This matutinal
leve'e consists at present but of four persons. One is a hearty,
hungry fellow, in a buff jacket and blue cloth cap; his broad,
horny palms, ample shoulders, grimy face, with half a week's
beard on it, and stooping gait, suggest that he is stoker to

352

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS,

some steam-vessel; he seems to have an appetite like his
own furnace-putting the provender out of sight more as if
he were lodging it in some receptacle for future use than as
though he were actually consuming it on the spot. He holds
his cracked saucer in the hollow of his palm, and, never
heeding that the liquid is almhnost at the boiling-point, drains
it empty at a single inspiration, helping it on its way by a
blow on his chest with his fist, enough to knock a west-end
exquisite into a swoon. He will be off to get up his steam
as soon as his hurried repast is ended. By his side is an
unfortunate specimen of the one-pennied vagabond, who has
just been roused up by the policeman from his forbidden
bed, and who, gnawed by hunger, exchanges his one penny,
which the luxury of a lodging could not extort from him, for
the scanty meal which, for that sum, the salopian alone will
supply him. Our friend the stoker, muttering to himself, as
he eyes the hungry lad from top to toe, such phrases as,
"reg'lar poor crow"--"not a bad sort"-"hard up,no
doubt," orders him an additional slice, and hands him his
own unfinished third cup of coffee, with a recommendation
to " walk into it." The third customer is a sweep, but
whether a man or a boy it is not easy to say. He lugs a
lump of sooty bread from his pocket, and moistens it with
hot coffee, talking as he eats, and indulging in divers figures
of speech too profound for our comprehension. We gather
enough, however, to know that he is complaining of the
conduct of Betty, at No. 5 over the way, who ordered him
to come as soon as it was light to sweep the kitchen "chimly,''
and who won't get up to let him in to do it. "Here 've I a
bin," says he, " hever since afore three o'clock, a pullin' an'
a pullin' at that ere bell till I'm sick o' the soun' of it-an'
the more I pulls the more she won't git up: I don't think
she knows what time it's light of a mornin'; after all, she
likely meant six or seven o'clock, 'stead o' three." The
fourth guest is a quiet fellow, with an old basket on his

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

353

arm, who is probably on his way to one of the early markets
in search of a job, or perhaps off into the fields-to cut a stock
of turfs, for sale to the owners of pet thrushes and larks.
The stoker now moves off towards 'the river, and his place
is taken by an Irish labourer, and yonder come those two
identical vagrants whom we passed asleep on the bridge.
There will be no lack of customers: the salopian supplies a
recognised want; he is a sort of general housekeeper to the
houseless andto the struggling poor whom necessity sends
early afield in search of employment. But being, likemany
of his customers, himself a squatter, and paying no rent, he
must clear off so soon as his room is worth more to the public
than his company. He is the monarch of the dead time of
the dawn, when all other industries are asleep; but he must
fly from their jealous eyes before they awake, or he will have
to answer for his trespass to the law.
What a Sunday-morning aspect there is at this hour of
sunrise upon all these haunts of commerce through which
we pass! One might almost imagine that, instead of being
fast asleep in their beds, the population was all attending
church-an idea, however, which cannot be long entertained;
for, as the morning draws on, and we approach the central
channels of business, the sounds all unmistakeable of the
work-a-day world rise gradually upon the ear. The creaking of wains heavily grinding along, and the distant rumble
of more rapid wheels,- invade the solemn stillness of the
morning; but as yet there are quiet pauses between these
audible indications of life" there is no confusion of sounds,
but the distinct echoes of horses' hoofs and grinding wheels,
with the sharp crack of the driver's whip, are separately
heard; and as the great bell of the cathedral rings out the
hour of five, a score of surrounding steeples unanimously
echo the verdict, which all who are awake may plainly hear,
and which is the signal for many a deep sleeper to arouse
from his slumber, and to be up and doing and driving his
AA

354

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

business, unless he would be driven by it at a later hour.
Anon, light threads of smoke are seen streaming forth from
chimney tops; here and there an attic window is thrown up
to admit the morning breeze, and a night-capped head looks
out for a moment or two upon the empty street. Then come
the scavengers with their heavy carts, and monster horses
crowned with a tiara of jingling bells, pealing fitfully in
clouds of dust gathered from the well-worn pavements. Men
and boys, some girt around the waist with rolled-up aprons,
and others carrying the implements of their trade, traverse
the public ways, with no dilatory step, in all directions, bound
for the scene of their daily toil. Here and there, too, the
pale milliner, roused thus untimely from her bed, is seen, with
noiseless foot, hastening to the mart of fashion, to commence
a course of, it may be, sixteen hours labour or more, in the
vaih attempt to satisfy the impatience of female vanity.
Now, in all the avenues leading to Billingsgate and to
Covent Garden, the costers, with their grotesque and varied
equipages, are to be seen converging from all points of the
compass, and from distances frequently of many weary miles,
towards these common fountains of perambulatory traffic.
Now the early breakfast houses take down their shutters
and open their doors; and there, if you choose to enter one
of them, and invest three.halfpence or so in the knowledge
of human nature in London, you may read without much
trouble a good deal of the history of the past night. Here,
in one corner, that grog-and-tobacco-reeking youth sleeps
off his last night's debauch; and by his side the cleaned-out
gambler, his hands deep buried in his empty pockets, sits
moodily, racking his bewildered brain for some new device
by which to raise yet one more lucky stake that shall recover
his heavy losses. Here, in cheerful contrast to these, sits
the market gardener, the bloom of health on his sun-burnt
face, a hearty meal before him, and a brown canvas bag of
fairly-earned and honest cash :safe buttoned in his nether

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

355

corduroys. Here the poor basket-woman spends her hardwon penny, and the jobbing porter the price of his first
job in the purchase of his first meal; while the bricklayer's
labourer, drawing a hunch of bread from a big blue-andwhite bundle, washes it down with a pint of hot coffee, and
then trudges off to the building at which he works, where
he will cook the half-dozen leviathan potatoeswhich he has
in the blue-and-white bundle for his dinner, by simply imbedding them in the lime which it is his business to slack
for malking the mortar. Here a weary.cabman, who has
watched all night long upon the box, finishes, with his head
on the table, the nap begun in the street, dreamingdoubtless
of long fares and gentlemen "as don't want no change ;"
while a member of the fire-brigade, who has been handling
the hose at .a conflagration, doffs his iron helmet, and lays
himself out for a similar luxury. It is a sort of liberty hall,
where every man does as he likes so that hepays his way
and commits no breach of the peace. It is stiflingly hot,
however; the steaming flavours of coffee mingle with the
odours of fried rashers of bacon, and others not by any means
so agreeable, and we are glad to emerge again into the fresh
air and brilliant sunshine.
Further signs of life, which in London are always signs
of business, greet us as we step again into the street.
The mail-carts from the out-lying suburbs rattle along
towards St. Martin's-le-Grand; the day-cabs, dusted and
polished into some show of respectability, crawl up leisurely
to their appointed stands; and the night-cabs, some few of
them, roll off for a change of horses and drivers. Then there
is a sudden demand for Hansoms, the omnibuses not having
yet begun to run, and a discharge of bagmen, 'with boots at
their heels, from hotel doors,. whence they rush to early
railway trains, being bent on-doing business a hundred
miles off when business hours shal: have arrived. Early
risers now sally forth from their dwellings to pick up an
AA

2

356

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

appetite for a breakfast by a constitutional walk in the
parks, the gates of which are thrown open for their reception; and economical housewives visit the markets in search
of wholesale bargains, and for the pick and choose of the
animal, the marine, and the vegetable kingdoms.
We will suppose now, with the reader's permission, that
it is seven o'clock, or thereabouts; and if it is seven o'clock
on a summer's morning, then we may be sure that the major
part of London, by which we must be understood to mean
the business part, is yawning and stretching and rubbing its
eyes, and pulling off its night-cap, and sidling out of the
horizontal into the perpendicular position, and plunging its
head into the wash-hand-basin, and cleaning its teeth, and
combing its hair, and brushing its whiskers, if it has got
any, and pulling the string of its shower-bath, and having
a scrub at its epidermis with the flesh-brush, and putting
on its clothes, and thinking of coming down to breakfast.
And now the miilkman is abroad with his milk all the way
from Islington, pulling at bells, knocking at doors, peeping
down areas, and handing little brass-bound tin cans through
the railings, and ever and anon crying in a loud clear voice,
"Mi-eau!" which is tolerably good French for "halfwater," and a declaration sometimes containing very considerable truth, and far more candour than we should expect
from him, under the circumstances. And the watercressgirl is abroad, with her shrill voice, which can be heard in
everybody's back kitchen, tying up her little pennyworths
as she walks along, and marking her track upon the pavement by the drip, drip, drip of her moist and appetising
salads. And that light little mannikin, the news-boy, is
abroad with his damp sheets, rushing into shops where they
are open, and pitching them down areas or through ventilating fan-lights where they are not-now bolstering a
brother Mercury with a quire of the Times, now culling the
cream of last night's debate, from the leading article, thus

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

357

mingling business with pleasure, and the pursuit of knowledge with both. Now Betty, in tidy morning cap, brandishes
her broom in sturdy arms bare to the elbows, or, couchant
on bended knees before the street door, scours up the steps;
and that young Tom, the apprentice, is pulling down the
shop-shutters and rattling them over the roller through the
iron grating into the regions below; or, with wash-leather
and rottenstone, and a couple of sets of dirty fingers, he is
polishing the brass-plate, or, with rag and whiting, is scouring the crystal panes of the show windows; while the tall
young man inside, assisted by a tidy maiden in a neat morning gown of small-printed cotton, is decorating them with
whatever he imagines will prove most tempting to those
who on this fine day will come a-shopping.
By this time the railway stations are all in the thick of
business, and to the signal of the shrill whistle the long mail
trains are winding off towards the provinces, transmitting
every throb of London's beating heart to the utmost limits
of the land: and thousands are now taking their last look
upon the metropolis of the world, which they will
never see again; and thousands more, on the wings of
steam, are rushing into her ample bosom, some to fortune
and fame, it may be, and to such happiness as these can
bestow, but more to toil, and trial, and disappointment, and
the misery of blighted hopes, and the sad and sorrowful
history of a ruined life. And now on the river the steam is
up, and flags are flying, and from a hundred busy decks the
snorting engine and the belching funnel send forth their
vapour and smoke; and hoarse voices are roaring, and bells
are clamorously ringing, and parties of pleasure, in cabs and
hackney-coaches, or hurrying on foot, are rushing posthaste to Thames' crowded bank, whence they are off, with
streamers flying, mariners bawling, hats and handkerchiefs
waving, and musicians "tuning up," up the river and down
the river, in pursuit of health and recreation. There are the

358

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

Greenwich boats and the Gravesend boats, and the boats for
Ramsgate and Margate; there is the Dover boat and the
Boulogne boat, with the lynx-eyed detective on board, who,
smoking a cigar with the abstracted air of a gentleman at
ease, is all the/while 'diligently observant, and on the lookout for a gentleman who is wanted for a matter of swindling,
and who is meditating a trip to Paris this fine morning,
which, without the slightest noticeable demonstration of
anything unpleasant on the part of Mr. Nabscum, who
always does business in a gentlemanly way, will be quietly
converted into a trip to Horsemonger Lane. Then there is
the Ostend boat and the Rhine boat, to say nothing of
coasters to Ipswich, Yarmouth, Hull, and "Bonny Dundee"
in one direction, and to Southampton, Plymouth, and the
Land's End in another. There are the boats for inland
navigation between the green banks of the Thames, up to
Kew, and Richmond, and Hampton Court-all with their
bands of music and bands of pleasure-seekers, their shady
awnings and comfortable cabins, their wholesome provisions
and reasonable fares., The river is as wide awake now as it
was fast asleep when we saw it first a few hours ago. 'Those
veritable omnibuses of the deep, the halfpenny steamers, and
penny steamers, and twopenny steamers, are shooting to
and fro, transporting the multitudes of London along the
"silent highway," from one extremity of the city to the
other; barges heavily loaded to the brim are sturdily steered
up the returning tide through the arches of the several
bridges to their moorings off the wharves; the waterman is
feathering his oars as he skims rapidly over the sparkling
water; and Poor Jack, pulling a salute at his matted locks
for want of a hat, looks sharply after the stray coppers upon
which he depends for a dinner.
Cheapside, Fleet Street, Holborn, and the Strand, and a
hundred miles besides of commercial thoroughfares of which
they are the world-renowned representatives, are now

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

359

broad awake and responsive to the hum of active life. The
causeway echoes to the tread of hurrying feet; and that
indefinable boom of distant but ever-present sound which
tells that London is up and doing, and which will swell into
a deafening roar as the day grows older, now rises faintly
but continuously upon the ear. Business, that respectable,
comfortable, and responsible elderly gentleman, has opened
both his eyes and put on his spectacles, and with clean
linen, clean hands, and, it is to be hoped, a clear conscience,
has addressed himself anew to the battle of life which has
now fairly begun. His aides-de-camp are fast flocking
round his standard, borne in by a thousand omnibuses,
which now rush like descending cataracts towards the
centres of industry. Morning has merged into day-and
our first sketch is finished.
Finished, that is, as far as commercial London is concerned: but there is another world westward of the commercial mart, the world of Fashion, which turns day into
night and night into day-which makes morning calls while
the afternoon wanes-which dresses for dinner after the
birds have gone to roost, and eats its mid-day meal when
the sun has sunk to rest. Of what may be supposed to constitute morning to this section of society, who, if they ever
see the sun rise at all, must see him at the end of their'day
instead of the beginning, we do not profess to have any
very accurate notions. Fashionable life is a mystery to us,
which we have no wish to fathom, and which our readers
will hardly expect us to describe. We are content with the
order of nature as we find it; and having the agreeable task
to perform of getting our own living by our own industry,
are perhaps quite as well employed as we should be in
attempting to reverse her decrees. Most of our friends are
of the same opinion. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen!

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.
DAY.

IT does not much signify where we commence our brief
survey of the aspect of London at Work. The daily labour
of this monster city is so prodigious and multifarious an
exploit, that to catch the merest glimpse of some few of its
outward and visible energies and tokens, is the utmost that
we can safely promise ourselves or our readers within the
limits of a single article. Even to do thus much, we must
take the liberty of flitting from one scene to another, rather
faster than even the most improved means of locomotion
would'carry us, and of gathering here one feature, and there
another, lest we be hindered in the purpose we have in view,
of presenting to the stranger a general sketch, approximating,
if possible, in some degree to the reality.
By way of commencement, let us make our exit from an
omnibus, somewhere in the centre of the Strand, say at
twelve o'clock at noon. The first rather startling phenomenon that greets the ear of a stranger who drops thus
suddenly into the arms of the metropolis, is the uninterrupted and crashing roar of deafening sounds, which tell of
the rush of the current of London's life-blood through its
thousand channels-a phenomenon, however, of which the
born Londoner is no more unpleasantly conscious, than is the
Indian savage, cradled at the foot of a cataract, of its everlasting voice. The sound of ever-rumbling wheels is to the
one what the ever-dashing water is to the other; both are
neutralised by long habit, which makes things which are as

TWENTY FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

361

though they were not. But the eye of the stranger is
assailed no less forcibly by the rushing tide of population
along the foot-ways, and he is apt to imagine, as hundreds
have done before him, that he has arrived at the precise
moment when some monster meeting has just broken up,
and perchance he may instinctively turn aside to let the
crowd disperse before he pursues his way. But we shall not
allow him to pause under any such delusion.
Passing on eastwards, and leaving Waterloo Bridge, and
Somerset House, with its college, public offices, and Royal
Society, at our right; and leaving various musty old streets
on our left; leaving, too, a clergyman, in a white surplice,
reading amid the crash and racket of the Strand, the burialservice to a bald-headed sexton and one mourner in a rusty
brown-black cloak, who, we fear, can hear very little of its
impressive truths-and wondering why, in the middle of the
nineteenth century, people are buried in the middle of the
street because it happens to be a churchyard; we pass on
towards Temple-bar.
Ve catch a glimpse now and then,
through the quiet down-hill streets to the right, of the silver
Thames, on the breast of which the boats are passing and
re-passing; and at every step we take, a world of new faces
flit in rapid succession before our eyes, all vivid with an
eager purpose, and vital with some definite and present
object. The shops are thronged with customers, and the
windows are crowded with their best display. There is not
an instant's ebb in the flow of population-not a moment's
pause in the roar of traffic. A glimpse or two up the: malodorous courts leading away to Clare-market, and beyond
that to Clement's-inn and Lincoln's-inn, and we are at
Temple -bar-an ornament, if you will, and time -honoured in
treasonable and barbarous associations, but an unquestionable
obstruction to the public thoroughfare. Now from Bell
Yard and Chancery Lane visions of blue bags and red tape,
and black gowns and horsehair wigs, mingle with the human

362

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREET8.

torrent that pours incessantly along. The Temple-with its
quiet retreats, and restored Norman church, where, stretched
and stiff amidst the clamour of modern London, the old
Knights Templars lie cross-legged on the cold stones; and
where a hundred or two of briefless barristers vegetate in
upper stories, and labour hard with ink and goose-quill to
earn by literature that necessary competence which the law
denies them; where the fresh and sparkling fountain plays;
and where, in the gardens fronting the river, the children
gambol and the pale student wanders-the Temple, endeared
and abhorred in the memory of multitudes, lies on our right.
Fleet Street is before us, with a its host of reminiscences,
with its numerous courts, in one of which Johnson loved to
dwell, and where the coffee-house wits, and his friends and
cronies the literary men of his time, had their meetings and
their pleasures. The genius of Business has long ago driven
the Muses from these their old-fashioned abodes, and in all
of them now, money-making, and that alone, is the order of
the day. Whitefriars, the ancient asylum of rogues and
assassins, now the abode of industry and enterprise, but at
which we cannot tarry to glance, lies down at our right.
As we enter on Ludgate Hill, the crowd thickens and the
hurry increases: we may scarcely pause an instant to gaze
at the splendid shops that line the way; idling is impracticable, and standing still out of the question. On we go
with the current, through St. Paul's Churchyard, and, leaving "the Row," with all its responsibilities, behind us,
debouch into Cheapside. In the middle of a fine summer's
day, this, the oldest of the London marts, and still at all
times the most frequented, is so overcrowded with human
life, that-in spite of the admirable and accommodating system of walking instinct among Londoners, by which every
one, by a tacit agreement, keeps the right side of the pavement-it is yet impossible to get on but at a slow and fitful
pace. Here, as we slowly advance, we are flanked on either

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

363

side by such accumulations of the world's material wealth as
perhaps can scarcely be witnessed at any other spot on its
surface. Dazzling stores of costly gems and the precious
metals, displayed in glittering profusion, look out upon us
from the shop-windows; and all that industry, ingenuity,
and the rarest talent can furnish to the demands of luxury, is
here offered to its acceptance. All the ends of the earth
have sent in their choicest contributions; and whatever the
treasures of the natural world, controlled and combined by
the skill of man, can supply for the satisfaction of his most
urgent wants or his slightest caprice, is here gathered
together and submitted for his approval.
From Cheapside, past the Guildhall, where Gog and
Magog, those abstinent witnesses of so many banquets, keep
faithful watch and ward, and through the Poultry, long ago
plucked of its feathers, we emerge into the grand central
area, matched in commercial importance by no other spot of
less or greater extent upon the surface of the globe. Oh,
for the glance of an Argus, clearly to see, and for a paragon
pen faithfully to record, all that is now going on upon the
scene around us i Then should the mysteries of the Stock
Exchange, the recondite wisdom of the Mansion-House, the
craft of Capel Court, and the hidden resources of the Bank
of England, all figure in our page in their true aspect, and
the world be made wiser than it is ever likely to be on these
matters. But we must be content to look on with common
eyes, and make the best of them. The Mansion-House, as
usual, looks heavy and glum, and is clustered round with
omnibuses, and crowds on foot, and plastered with proclamations, and the magistrate within has enough to do to get
through the business of the hour. The Exchange is populous with burly forms and anxious and stolid faces; and
stock-brokers and their slim clerks are flitting to and fro,
and, with little oblong square papers in their hands are
bursting through doors made to open noiselessly either way,

364

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

and appearing with outstretched necks again in a minute,
and disappearing as fast. Cabs are rushing up, and dropping
their fares, who fly out with a leap and bury themselves Instanter in the jaws of a share-office. Omnibuses are rolling
off, and more are rolling in, and each one comes laden with
the sons of commerce bound for this central shrine. The
Bank of England to-day is a general house of call. Thousands are flocking into its inky precincts; some going
straight to their mark, and transacting their business at once,
and others wandering about and losing themselves, and finding themselves at last in the wrong department, where they
are angrily boring the wrong person to do what be is not
justified in doing, and could not do if he would. Notes by
the ream and sovereigns by the shovelful are flying and
rustling and jingling about; corpulent pocket-books suddenly
collapse into flatness, and lean ones grow stout with a moment's feeding. In all these localities Commerce has very
much the aspect of a gentleman:his garb is refined and unexceptionable, his manners bland and polite, his voice subdued and persuasive; and if at times he is a little hasty, and
at others a little abstracted, it may be said in apology for
him that the old gentleman has got upon his shoulders
matters far more weighty and of more importance to the
interests of the world (whatever statesmen may think to the
contrary) than ever perplexed a prime-minister or puzzled a
cabinet council. His diplomacy, if it centre more exclusively
in Number One than that ofthe statesman, has a wider
range and more extensive ramifications than that of governments can boast of. Far-off nations, whom our laws cannot
influence, he can rally round his banner with a word; he
feeds and clothes the naked and hungry savage, marshals his
untaught hordes in the ranks of industry, and despatches
them into the bowels of the earth, or the depths of the sea,
or over the barren sands of the desert, or across the pathless
snows of the arctic regions, to do his bidding. As we

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

0065

wander thoughtfully among these grand and noble edifices,
his messages, winged by lightning, are flashing beneath our
feet with the speed of thought to distant cities and foreign
lands. He has but to lay his'hand on the magic wires of the
electric telegraph, and he can feel the pulse of the three
kingdoms which regulate half the business of the world.
Around him is the aggregate of half that world's wealth, and
more than half its influence: there, just round the corner, in
silent Lombard Street, where the poor stall-woman sells her
fruit, and messengers in neat white aprons, worn solely for
distinction, wait for employ-there, in dim and spacious
halls, he stores his vast resources; and day by day, and hour
by hour, sends them forth on errands of usefulness and increase, and adds to their undiminished hoards fresh products
of his prophetic foresight and unwearied effort.
Away now at one bound from one extreme of the commercial scale to another-from the men of unlimited capital,
who turn over thousands in a morning, to those who toil in
"sun and sweat" the livelong day for pence. Here we are,
then, three miles at least from where we stood a moment
ago-in one of the outlying suburbs, far from the crash and
din of the city, which now comes upon the ear like the swell
of the sea-surge beating upon a pebbly shore when it is
heard far inland. That distant boom rises, however, but at
intervals, when there is a pause in the shrill, loud, deep, and
half musical cries vibrating almost incessantly in the air
around us ;-some clear and sonorous, ringing over an area
of half a mile, others short, gruff, and shot forth fitfully from
dry and husky throats.
It is now that the main substance of the vast daily importations into the morning markets of London, chiefly into
Billingsgate and Covent Garden, are, in the charge of thirty
thousand costermongers, traversing, it may be, a hundred
thousand miles of streets, to supply the daily consumptioi of

366

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

the inhabitants. The coster's equipage comprehends every
variety of turn-out, from the substantial cart and well-fed
and neatly-harnessed horse, down to the half-starved and
miserable " moke," whose raw and bleeding sides are galled
with the knots of an old rope, by which it is clumsily made
fast to a few rotten planks mounted upon a couple of rickety
wheels of different size and colour-and down still lower
than that, to the rotten basket borne on the head of its
ragged proprietor. But whatever his equipage, the coster is
abroad with his voice and his wares, and some quarter of a
million of attentive ears are listening for his well-known
accents, and as many hands are busy in the kitchen preparing
for his arrival:-" Gooseberries, three-pence a quar-ar-art!
-Fine cauliflowers !-Rhubarb !"-" Soles, oh !-Live haddick, live haddick !-Ee-ee-eels alive, oh !"-" Green peas,
young peas, sixpence a peck!"-" Mackareel! mack-makmakareel!" Such are a few of the cries, in every possible
variety of voice and tone, which reverberate along the quiet
ways. The costers may be said almost to monopolise the
public ear till dinner is over and done; and we may remark
that they know perfectly well the hour at which any particular street on their beat goes to dinner, and you seldom find
them crying green-peas, or green anything, when the time
for cooking the article is past.
Among these dealers, though not in the road, but on the
pavement, walks the peripatetic tradesman, calling quietly
upon his "connection," if he has any, and now and then
lifting up his voice with the view of creating or extending
it. There is the chair-mender, swaddled in split-canes, followed by his weary wife carrying an old bottomless chair,
which she has picked up somewhere during the morningcalls, and on the edge of which she will rest herself for a
moment or two, while her bigger half knocks at a door and
solicits custom. There is the knife-grinder, who startles the
neighbourhood with a noise like the springing of fifty watch-

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

367

men's rattles, and which stills for a moment all other noises,
and which he produces by applying the rusty blade of an
old butcher's cleaver to the rough side of his rotating grindstone. Thus he spares his lungs, which are not generally in
the best possible order, seeing that from his grinding, many
things dry, he gets the particles of steel into them. There
is the umbrella-mender, with his fagot of crippled umbrellas, of questionable parasols, and apochryphal whalebones
at his back, and his leathern bag of tools and knicknacks
round his waist, to say nothing of his fishingrods and walking-sticks, both of which it is odds but you will find in the
involutions of his fat fagot, if you should happen to want
them. There is the basket-maker, who this morning measures exactly eighteen feet in circumference, and consequently
occupies the whole of the pathway, so that you are obliged
to step into the road to pass him. He moves with a slow
and dignified step in his framework of many-coloured wicker,
but he splits it in two and lets himself out in an instant, at
the call of a customer, through whose garden-gate he must
enter before he can get at him. There is the band-box
maker shouldering a huge palanquin of purple-splashed receptacles of all sizes, but of that precise shape and pattern
which lies in your garret among the fluff under Betty's bed,
and in which her best Sunday's bonnet, with its plain neat
ribbons, lies eclipsed all the week. There is the bird-cagemaker, with his bright brass-wired cages domed at the top,
just the thing for your tame canary; and a big one, with a
Great Exhibition transept, large enough to accommodate
your talking parrot, with a perch as thick as a mop-stick,
exactly fitting the grasp of Polly's claws. There is the
garden-fitter, with his stock of bright-green splints and contrivances for sticking your sweet-peas and supporting your
plants; and there is the gardener himself, with his geraniums, and balsams, and ice-plants, and cactuses, and musks,
and flowers of all colours and odours, and "all a-growin' and

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TWENITY-FOUR HOURS OFLONDON STREETS.

a-blowin' !" as he says loud enough for anybody to hear,
while he peers about upstairs and down, and makes a dead
stop wherever he discovers the signs and tokens of a fondness for his merchandise. Then there is a cry of "Oranges,
oranges !" as the market-girl lounges by, with her heavy
basket on her arm. There is the little Jew-boy with his
lemons, which he holds up between his fingers as he passes
the parlour windows, content with that silent appeal, nor
caring to let his voice be heard; and there is the older Jew,
with his patriarchal beard, his triple tiara of castaway
beavers, and corpulent bag-ejaculating solemnly at regular
intervals, "Clo', do', dclo'!" glancing round ever and
and
anon, with flashing eye, for the slightest visible movement in
the regions of the kitchen. And then there is his rival, the
china-man, who, having no license, cannot lawfully hawk his
goods, but professing to give a new tea-service for an old
coat, effects an exchange very different from that, if you let
him catch you attempting a bargain.
At the heels of the travelling tradesmen come the wandering street-minstrels, who give you sweet sounds for the
chance of your sympathies and coppers. First comes a band
of stunted Germans in green surtouts, puffing as if for their
lives (and it is really for nothing less) into enormous brazen
tubes. One empties himself into an ophicleide, clawing it
the while convulsively, as though it were some savage beast;
another is feeling for the right note in a curly French horn;
a third is showing fight to the chimney tops with a battered
trombone ; a fourth is talking through his nose by means of
a bandaged clarionet; and the rest are making faces at the
sky. All, however, make admirable music of the good old
harmonies of the fatherland, and find that honest John Bull
is not ungrateful for it. Then comes a grinder with a
barrel organ, who vacillates between a grave tune and a jig;
then another grinder with a barrel piano, who adds to it the
charm of his voice, and groans rather than sings an Italian

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

369

song to an English tune. He is followed by a whole family
on pilgrimage, preceded by a.
cracked violoncello on one leg,
the rear being brought up by a couple of infants in white
pinafores, who are but just big enough to go alone. What
next,? A travelling tinker swinging his pot of live coal, and
growling, "Pots to mend, kittles to mend!" A wandering
.voice rising from the rear of a hand-cart, and ejaculating
with the ear,nestness of an: orator, "Penniwinkles, penniwinkles, wink, wink, WINK! Ladies, now's your time!" A
sorrowful, heartbroken wail from a decrepit old man bearing
a few boxes of lucifers clutched in his long bony fingers, who
tries to intonate the word " Lucifers," but breaks down at
the first syllable, and looks around piteously for that compassion which he is too feeble even to demand by a wordand then suddenly the burst of trumpets, the bang of big
drums, and the clamorous bray of brass, as the advertising
van prances up, to let the wondering world know where
pantaloons are to be had. Thus! wags the world by day
in the London suburbs. We must again change the scene.
We start this time from Tower Hill, and leaving the
Tower at our right, without a thought just now of its grim
secrets and murderous injustice-and leaving the Mint at
our left, never heeding either aught that is there done in
connection with those interesting initials, £. s. d.-we push
on our way through a wilderness of oddly-mixed merchandise which obtrusively blocks our path-through groups of
seamen's .chests daubed with tar and smelling of new paint,
emigrants' tents pitched in the open air, canvas trousers,
tarpaulin cloaks, bear-skin overcoats, bruised telescopes, disabled quadrants, second-hand sou'westers-past dirty shops
crammed with cobwebs and dilapidated marine wares,-past
yawning beer-cellars and reeking spirit-shops-past the
sloppy cab-stand and a furlong or two of dead-wall, and all
the way through a swarm of hurrying passengers, the crush
B B

370

TWENTY-FOUR HlOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

of heavy waggons, the rattle of dingy cabs, the bawling of
drivers, and the clatter of horses' feet-and turning short to
the right, of a sudden make a descent upon St. Katherine's
Docks. Here is another strange phase of London's daily
life. We seem at first in a land of barrels, all new and clean,
the very elysium of coopers. On we go through an acre of
port-wine, every cask brimming full with its mouth open,
down which inquisitive fellows are poking long sticks, to
measure the capacity of their stomachs. On again through
a couple of acres of brandy, in bran-new barrels, undergoing
the same ceremony-then another acre of wine, port and
sherry, mingled with madeira in its taper, vase-like casksand then on to the wine-vaults, where, in a cavern of some
ten acres in extent, and piled upon iron tram-like supports,
of which about thirty miles in length is laid down, is stored
in bond the produce of the grape.
At this spot we present an order for admission, and, arming ourselves each with a portable lamp, with a handle half
a yard in length, plunge, with the cooper for our guide,
down one of the long dark avenues of this treasury of the
vintage. Dim red lights, suspended from the roof and glimmering at long distances at the ends and turnings of the
various passages, reveal in some degree the enormous extent
of these national wine-cellars. Walls of barrels, heaped one
upon another, line the way, and the odour of their contents
impregnates the air and ascends into the brain. Here and
there we happen unexpectedly upon a party of tasters, furnished with capacious bell-shaped glasses, and testing the
flavour of the wines, with the accompaniments of biscuits
and cheese. The guide elevates his lamp and points to the
myriad festoons of cobwebs which, black with age and dust,
droop in dense clustering tassels from the ceiling, and wave
even with the impulse of our breath. We are at first sceptical about the existence of cobwebs, seeing no means of
support for the spiders who must spin them; but he talks of

TWENTY FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

371

a species of fly which engenders here in millions, and, lowering his lamp, shows where, amidst the moist exudations
around the bung of a cask of old sherry, swarms of reddishlooking maggots are wriggling about, who must have had
flies for their progenitors, and will be flies themselves in
their turn. We are now at the limits of the vault: a ray of
cool daylight shoots down the ventilating cavity through the
long thickness of the wall, and, peeping out, we discern the
ships lying in the docks. Declining an invitation to taste of
last year's vintage, we return by another route, and, surrendering our lamps, are again in the open air.
On again to the left, through another meadow of brandycasks-through wildernesses of warehouses stored with sugar,
and timber, and hides, and bales, and boxes, and packages,
and every description of taxable goods-on, over stone quays
and swinging bridges, overshadowed by a forest of masts and
sails, amid the creaking of cordage, the hoarse song of the
mariner, the cry of the sailor-boy aloft, and a host of other
undefinable sounds, and up a flight of steps which hangs
invitingly adown the hull of a tall ship of twelve hundred
tons burden, and on to the deck of an emigrant vessel bound
for Australia, and which is destined to warp out into the
river at twelve o'clock to-night, and drop down to Gravesend, whence she takes her departure twenty-four hours
later. The deck is alive with a various and motley population, all busily engaged in preparation for the impending
voyage-young and old, the well-to-do and the very poor,
children in arms and the fathers and mothers of familiessome crying bitterly, more with woe-begone and bewildered
looks, and many in unnaturally good spirits, artificially excited. Even at this last hohr, carpenters are at work erecting additional berths, chiefly round the captain's cabin, and
seriously encroaching on that forbidden ground. A young
gentleman, who has paid seventy pounds for his passage, is
administering a scold to the agent for breach of contract, and
BB

2

372

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

loudly demanding an exchange of cabins. Tomkins is jumping about like one distracted for the loss of his luggage, all
packed away in the entrails of a stage cart, which ought to
have come on board yesterday. His wife has padlocked the
three children in his berth, and there they are all three, with
their dirty little faces at the grill, blubbering to be let out of
the dark hole. Sailors are rigging up the long-boat to serve
as a pig-stye, as the pigs will arrive on board to-morrow;
the fowls, a good many of them, are already in durance vile,
but, despairing of being heard in sucha clamour, are quietly
reserving their voices for a fitter opportunity. A knot of
country girls, seated in a circle round the mainmast, are discussing some home topic which brings tears into the eyes of
most of them. Lascars, brown, lean, thin, undersized, and
hungry-looking, loll lazily about, as though there was nothing
for them to do, which is most likely the case. Jack-tar
swings himself up over the heads of the country girls and
bids them cheerup, and promises them all a husband a-piece
in the golden land. The black cook is boiling his kettles over
a blazing fire in the fore part of the vessel, and, surrounded
by a part of the crew, is dishing out their dinner. Looking
over the side, we are greeted by the apparition of a painter
slung by ropes, with his pots on a plank, and stolidly daubing away at the ship's hull, as oblivious as the timbers he is
at work upon of the world of cares, and aspirations, and
hopes, and uncertainties around him.
Descending through the open hatchway into the steerage,
we step into just such a scene as might be realised were
twenty houses, with all their inhabitants and furniture,
pitched out of windows pell-mell through the roof of an
unlighted barn-only the poor humans seem to take it very
patiently, being for the most part asleep, stretched on
bundles of bedding on the floor, or on the shelves at the
sides of the long chamber which is to be their home for the
next four or five months. A good proportion of them are

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

873

children; and of these, those not asleep are eating breadand-butter with the evident expression of persons enjoying
a luxury. Close under the hatchway are two elderly people,
who are dictating to a young girl a joint epistle, which she,
sitting on the ground, and using a deal box for a writing.
table, is blotting down on a crumpled sheet of black-bordered
vellum. Some are busy in storing away in their narrow
berths the articles and provisions which they will want
during the voyage; and two or three of the crew are lowering through a trap-door in the floor bales and packing-cases,
and iron and wooden implements, for which there can be no
demand until the good ship has arrived at her destination.
A blinking lantern, suspended from a cross-beam, lights
them at their work, and in the gloomy cavity below burns
another. While we are watching the process of stowage,
down rushes Tomkins through the hatchway, dives into the
dark hold, and, after a search of about three minutes, rises
again, his face beaming with satisfaction, by which we are
led to suppose that his luggage is all right, after all. The
vision of the three little Tomkinses, with right merry faces,
released from prison and playing with the fowls in the hencoop, which is the first sight we see on regaining the deck,
assures us that that is the fact. As we leave the vessel, we
observe with satisfaction that she is not likely to be starved
on her passage, inasmuch as a couple of waggon-loads of
cured hams are flying through one of the lower ports, being
checked off by the provision-broker as fast as the men pitch
them in. May she escape the perils of the deep, and reach
in peace her distant haven! She will be gone to-morrow,
with all her living freight; and though her departure will
make a void in a hundred families, here she will not -be
missed, and in a day or two will be forgotten. A fleet of
gallant vessels, tall and goodly as she, are resting on their
shadows around her; one of them will glide into her place
before the morning dawns, and on the same spot, ere the

374

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

world is a week older, the same scene in the drama of
London life shall be again rehearsed.
Once more the scene is changed. The docks and shipping
are miles away, and now the air we inhale is poisonous with
miasma and nauseous with dank and dismal stenches. We
stand in a close court, into which the midsummer sun only
penetrates for a few minutes at high noon, and which
debouches in a filthy lane in one of the poverty-stricken
districts, the locality of which we do not care to specify.
The houses on either side stand hardly more than six feet
apart, and one might imagine they had just been fighting
together, they show such battered and multilated faces to
the day. Rags and brown paper substitute half the glass of
the windows, and what is left is so crusted with dirt that it
shuts out the light it was intended to admit. Slattern
women, with folded arms, project their uncombed heads and
rail at one another in language not to be written; gaunt,
sallow -looking men, old with vicious excess before they are
mature in years, stand smoking and gambling in the open
doorways; pale and rickety children pine and whine fretfully in their mothers' arms, or crawl and roll about on the
dirty flags in a melancholy attempt at play. Every house
stands with its door perpetually open, and offers hospitality
at the rate of twopence a night to the whole world of
vagrants, and the whole world of vagrants accordingly
comes and goes at its own will, and seethes and soddens,
and riots and rots, and dies in its own filth, none daring to
make it clean and wholesome. Here typhus walked in
twenty years ago, and has never walked out since, but lurks
unseen in the squalor and darkness, and fangs his starved
and weary and drunken victims, and shoulders them into
the grave. Here, too, his bosom friend and coadjutor
cholera dwells, and from this, his primary head-quarters,
sallies forth to the work of slaughter. Here consumption

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

375

tracks his unconscious prey, and beguiles and fools them to
the last breath; and here racking rheumatism and foul
cancer, and a whole battalion of loathsome diseases, hold
their high court and execute summary sentence upon poor
heedless and miserable humanity, that laughs and quaffs the
inebriating cup, and revels and riots here in the reeking
vestibule of the charnel-house.
Out of the court, and into the lane-into a congregation
of accumulations of all that comfort and respectability have
banished from their dwellings, cast off from their backs, and
dismissed for ever from their acquaintance and acknowledgment-among stores of crazed and rickety furniture, crumbling with the dry-rot and populous with multiplied tribes
not to be named-of beds bursting with matted millpuffs,
and bedsteads warranted effectually to "murder sleep"tables minus a leg or two, and with flaps that will. do
nothing but flap, available for tipping without the trouble of
a magnetic circle-of chairs without a seat, and carpets with
the pattern trodden out long ago-of linen of no particular
colour, but of a very particular smell-of piles of old iron
and brass, and shreds of copper and rusty nails, and monster
bunches of keys, of sooty pots and pans and spoutless teakettles and coffee-biggins-of regiments of phials and bottles,
and stacks of conserve jars and gallipots, and shreds of cloth,
and bundles of rags, and barrels of kitchen-stuff, and gibbeted black dolls-of flat-irons and sixpenny clothes-horses
-of hampered locks, and cashiered bolts, and severed doorhandles, and screwed-off knockers, and ripped-up scrapers,
and of brass-plates for Mr. Smith's private-door, and of
second-foot mats, and fractured fenders and isolated fireirons, and the numberless oiher articles or fragments of
articles which go to make up the museum whither poverty
and wretchedness resort, with a few hard-saved pence, or
perhaps a shilling snatched painfully from the savage grasp of
want, to supplement the scanty conveniences of their joyless

376

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

abodes. Hither the Irish hodman "about to marry," whose
custom the regular broker would rather be without, comes
in search of his matrimonial couch, hisdeal table, couple of
chairs, and iron pot. Here it is that the travelling tradesman, who knocks at your door for a job, has his home, and
you may see him, after the wanderings of the morning,
cobbling his broken goods or haggling with a customer who
has ventured to bid for them. Here, in the gloom of the
back-room, comes the juvenile thief with his ill-gotten
plunder to his patron the receiver, who robs him in his turn
while supplying him with the means of midnight debauch.
Here come the poor widow and the sick workman, with
their last trifling iremnants of property which the pawnbroker will not receive, but which must be parted with for
bread. And here, too, and not "very seldom, come the
policemen and the owner of lost valuables, armed with a
warrant from the magistrate, to search for stolen goods. To
the eye of the spectator this place appears the paradise of
refuse and rubbish fit only for the fire and the melting-pot;
but, repulsive as is its aspect, it may yet be looked upon, in the
present state of society at least, as an indispensable adjunct
to the commerce of a great overgrown city, where abject
poverty is always the lot of multitudes, whose wants, moderate and even mean as they are, are yet as imperative as
those of their betters, and thus present a merchantable field
'to the class which is but one remove above them.
We are warned by the length to which we have already
run, that we must not further indulge our inclination in thus
shifting the scenes on the great stage of London's activities.
We might wing our flight in a moment from the stifling
abodes of struggling want to the pleasant resorts of luxury
and fashion, and, taking our stand in Hyde Park, watch the
nobility of England, with their-sons and daughters, careering before us on noble steeds, or drawn in cushioned

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

377

chariots. Or we might penetrate the swarming workshops,
where the half-million host of London's toiling sons, waging
the industrial war, are adding, hour by hour, by every
motion of their labouring muscles, to the increase of the
world's positive wealth. We might, had we time, wander
among the palatial and princely residences of Belgravia, and
enter the portals of those magnificent abodes where magnates and millionaires repose in the lap of luxury; and we
might, in imagination at least, attend her Majesty at the
leve'e which is held to-day at St. James's Palace, and watch
the gorgeous crowds of noble sires and dames, and their
offspring, who come to yield that honour so justly due to
her.- Or we might follow the city missionary in exploring
the homes and haunts of the vicious and predatory races,
and carrying the gospel of peace to social outcast§, selfabandoned and at war with God and man.
Again, if we had leisure at command, we might look in
upon London at dinner-and a curious sight we might
chance to find it if we made good use of our opportunity.
Or we might enter the gloomy prison.gates, and see how
London deals with that minor section of her rogues, who,
transgressing the law, become amenable to its punishments,
and, shut up in silent cells, or climbing revolving millwheels, or working in oakum-yards, or grinding at heavy
cranks with no other result than their own weariness, are
compelled to appease its offended majesty. Then we might
mark how, in the chamber of the sybarite, on downy
couches, or in the unventilated hovel, on mouldy straw,
"stretched in disease's shapes abhorred," London languishes
and writhes in sickness and in pain, and turns its weary face
to the wall, and moans in anguish. We might track the
flight of the Angel of Death, who, with shadowy sombre
wing, ever outspread over the dwellings of man, dispatches
to their solemn account a thousand souls a week of our
fellow-citizens alone. And we might track, too, the path

378

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LO.NDON STREETS.

of the Angel of Life, who fills the void his brother angel
makes, by ushering into the world a race *of new immortals,
born to fight on the same battle-field, in the same momentons strife. But the day would not suffice, nor the morrow
either, nor the month, nor the year, to complete our survey
of the living panorama that London presents to the view of
observation between the rising and setting of the sun.. We
have traced but a few outlines of the multitudinous picture
-touched on a few spots only of its ample canvas. The
imagination of the reader may fill up many of its details;
but it would demand the study of a life to. accord them all
even a moderate measure of justice. Good day, ladies and
gentlemen 1

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.
EVENTIDE.

IT is pleasant to stroll leisurely through the highways and
by-ways, to saunter in the thoroughfares and no-thoroughfares of a great city, as the shadows of evening are settling
down upon it. "Parting day," says a noble poet,
"Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues
With a new colour as it gasps away!
The last still loveliest, till-'tis gone-and all is grey."

To the mind of the artist, "in populous city pent," this
description is not a whit less applicable than to him who,
accustomed to rove at will, "by meadow, grove and stream,"
might be apt to appropriate the praises of the poet exclusively to the subjects he loves best to contemplate. We are
not sure that the city, after all, does not gain more in picturesque beauty by the descending twilight than the choicest
landscape can do. That grey curtain which closes in the
wide panorama of the country, and robs it of its charm of
infinity, adds that very charm to the town, by concealing its
narrower limits, and clothing with a veil of vague and mystic
unsubstantiality its loftiest structures. We are aware that
this notion will be accounted by poets, and painters too, as
decidedly erroneous; but still it is one, we will venture to
say, which has often crossed the brain of the casual lounger
among the half-deserted haunts of his busy brethren, at that
dim hour when the solid masses of granite in the gloom of
which he wanders appear to fade away into shadowy forms,

380

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

and mingle their viewless outlines with the dusky harbinger
of night.
But we must not indulge in speculations, artistic or msthetic.
We are far from twilight as yet, and have many things to
notice before London puts on that peculiar and pensive phase
which she always assumes as the shadows of evening gather
over her countless towers and spires-her moiling and everrestless population.
Long before the summer sun sinks to a level with the
horizon, what the great heart of this mercantile Babylon has
that day determined to do, is done and ended, and in its
deepest and widest channels the grand current of commerce has ceased to flow. With all the gigantic activity
that characterises London's commercial exploits, there is
combined an unmistakeable appreciation of gentlemanly ease
and leisure. Her merchant princes enjoy their state like
princes, in spite of their toil, and they fly from the arena of
business to the retreat of home when the first cool breath of
evening sweeps refreshingly through the sweltering streets.
The banks are all closed-counting-houses are empty-the
Exchange is a desert-and the Titans of wholesale traffic
have abandoned the market, and left it to the rule of the
shopkeepers, by the time the Post-office, at the sound of the
last stroke of six, has barred up its letter-boxes. Here and
there a few anxious speculators may linger in their dens,
calculating probabilities, and waiting for the departure of the
last mail ere they dispatch their orders or resolve upon their
sales and purchases; but these are only the exceptions that
prove the rule. Those who rank as the aristocracy of London's commerce for the most part wind up their commercial
day with the hour of dinner, and set themselves and their
humbler coadjutors free to enjoy the pleasures of the evening
as they list.
Then it is that the army of clerks is disbanded, filing
off in whole brigades from Lombard Street and the courts

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

381

adjacent-emerging from countless avenues in the vicinity
of the Bank, the Exchange, and Threadneedle Street, and
starting off at a tangent in cab or omnibus, or slowly sauntering off on foot to indulge in the rest or recreation of the
hour. For some, a thousand places of amusement, with
doors wide open, present a bewildering choice of recreation
or excitement; for others, the library or the lecture-room
has superior attractions; and for all, the free air of the suburbs, and the outlying country, present the healthful opportunity for exercise and change of scene. Family men now,
as a general rule, return to the bosom of home, and in the
society of wife and children-it may be in a patch of gardenground twenty feet square, ornamented with half-a-dozen
flower roots, a water-butt, dust-box, and central bush of
laurel, or it may be in a family procession to the nearest
park or trespassable field-spend the quiet hours in the
relish of domestic enjoyment. Now, the numerous teagardens that fringe the dusty metropolis on every side are
boiling their huge kettles, and are beard to be exceedingly
talkative through the screen of pitchy railings and stunted
bushes which protects them from the intrusive gaze of
passers-by. Now, as we pass the door of some rural inn,
the sound of tremendous and barbaric blows assails the ear,
followed immediately by a dismal rumbling, which to a
nervous poet might suggest a distant earthquake or a far-off
battle-field, but which to that bricklayer's labourer advancing.
says "Skittles" as plain as it can speak. Now, the schoolboys are out for their evening games, and rejoicing in the
soundness of their lungs and the fleetness of their legs-and
the prattle of infant children, and the thumping of toy-drums,
and the inarticulate appeals of penny whistles, and the involuntary crowings of babies in arms, are heard in back
gardens-and nursing mothers are in their glory, while the
little fat-faced, bare-legged youngsters tumble about, and
papa in his dressing-gown looks on, and forgets that stocks

882

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

fell three-eighths since eleven o'clock this morning, and he
bought in yesterday.
As the evening advances, the dense hosts of labour begin
to pour forth from unnumbered workshops, warehouses, and
factories. Multitudes, worn and weary'with the exactions
of the day, hasten to throw themselves on their pallets to
recruit strength for the morrow; multitudes rush to the
reeking purlieus of the tavern, longing for the beggarly
delights of intoxication; and multitudes more roam abroad
in search of such recreation as may chance to come within
their reach. A tide of the population of our industrial establishments sets in towards the parks, where a thousand
different groups may be seen squatted or supine on the grass,
gazing, it may be, up into the sky, where one or two, or perhaps
half-a-dozen balloons, freighted with adventurers for whom
the common earth has not perils enough, are voyaging slowly
in the breezeless upper air--or watching the children chasing
their long shadows on the close-cropped sward, or feeding the
fowls in the pond, or sending up paper messengers to the
kite steadied far aloft. Crowds of released artizans rush to
the river, and on the decks of steamers run down to Greenwich for a stroll beneath the chestnut-trees, or a ramble on
Blackheath; or up the river to Chelsea, and Vauxhall, and
Battersea, and Putney. The wherries are out in swarms
upon the Thames, and amateur rowing-matches are coming
off amid the cheers and outcries of backers on shore and
afloat. The angling tribe, mustering their maggots and
fishing-rods, are off to the New River, or the Surrey Canal,
or the Docks, or the Grand Junction, where, notwithstanding
they have been at work since seven in the morning, and must
begin again at seven to-morrow, they will sit, with marvellous
patience, watching the bobbing float till long after the stars
wink out at them, dreaming of a bite.
Whole, battalions
mount in double rows on the backs of omnibuses, bound for
Highgate or Hampstead, to enjoy an hour's ramble on hill

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

383

or heath. From Hyde Park in the west to Victoria Park
in the east all the verdant spots and gardens which constitute
the lungs of London are dotted over with her inhabitants of
all ages and grades, come forth to breathe the air of heaven
and look the welcome sky in the face. The fields and
meadows of the debatable land, where the grass is invaded
by endless regiments of unburnt brick, and where green lanes
are gradually undergoing a transformation into brick streets,
are alive with human shapes; and throughout the hundred
miles of thoroughfare that lead in different radii from the
centre to the suburbs of the metropolis, the publicans' hives
are swarming with thirsty bees flocking thither, not to store
up honey, but to waste it. Notmwithstanding all this, and ten
times more, every street, court, and back-lying lane, is populous with life and crowded with animate forms. What is the
reason? It is the hour when industrial London is out of
doors-when the toil of the day is supposed to be over, and,
for the major part of the toilers, the only season of recreation
is to be enjoyed.
But there is a numerous tribe whose labours are n6ver
done,' or are not subject to the laws which regulate the
business world, and whose traffic thrives best when the
streets are fullest. They cannot afford to take a holiday:
.too many holidays are thrust upon them; and when the
public are abroad, and that portion of the public in particular
who are their special patrons, they must be up and doing, or
suffer the cohsequences of idleness. The industrial
hordes
who labour for their daily bread are themselves, in their
turn, the patrons and paymasters of another distinct and
nomadic horde, who hang upon their skirts wherever they are
to be found, and, like the lowest orders of the animal creation,
derive support and nutriment, from sources which, by the
unreflecting, are often ignorantly despised and undervalued.
Let us wander this fine evening. through a furlong or two
of that long route which, like the Boulevards of Paris, girdles

384

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

the metropolis on its northern and eastern sides, and glance
for a brief space at a few of these peripatetic professorsthese commercial Bedouins, who peacefully waylay the monster caravan that nightly files off along this well-known track
in the desert of London.
If, leaving Finsbury Square, we walk towards the Angel,
we shall not proceed far without meeting with a specimen.
Here is one already-a weather-worn man, seated on a high
stool in front of a slender and rickety framework supporting
a whole gamut of little bells. Having a row of wooden keys
under his feet, which act upon hammers that strike the bells,
and a fiddle under his chin, he contrives to scrape and jingle
oilt "Auld Lang Syne," or " Home, sweet Home," with an
effect not too nearly approaching to the harmonious. His
audience are not disposed to be hypercritical; the spectacle
pleases them in all probability more than the music, which
is of a rather doubtful quality; but Englishmen love to see a
man doing a good deal, and the industrious fellow, who is
wriggling from his fingers' ends to his toes, and only sits
because his is a profession at which nobody could stand,
receives his modest reward of coppers, as a despot receives
homage, on his self-erected throne. Here is another specimen-a prodigiously loud-voiced stentor, standing erect as
you wooden Highlander at the snuff-shop, but, unlike him,
giving forth utterances distinguishable above the roar of the
omnibus wheels and the hum of the crowd at a hundred
yards' distance. He has always a goodly company around
him at this hour of the day, if the weather is at all favourable, being an outspoken fellow and a bit of a wag to boot.
He carries a broad tray in front of him, suspended from his
shoulders, and resting against his stomach, which is never
troubled with indigestion. Upon his tray are piled a curious
heap of knicknacks, useful and amusing, manufactured by his
own hands, from tin, and iron, and brass wire. Hear him as
he dilates upon the marvels of a puzzling toy which he holds

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

385

in his hand, and which is nothing more nor less than a miniature set of the apparatus known in many parts of England
as the "tiring-irons," and occasionally drawn forth from the
tower of the church, when, upon any fair-day or festival
some brawny blacksmith, bold enough to attempt the solution of their mystery, makes application to the sexton for
the purpose. "Here you are, gentlemen," says he, "here
you are! This is the comfoozlem, so called because it was
invented by the celebrated Chinese feelusover Confuse-us,
and certainly it does confuse moAt folks; you must feel it
over a good many times, I can tell'ee, afore you finds out
the trick of it; but it's easy enough when you know it,
till you forgit again, and then it's amusement for another
week to find it out. It's only tuppens-good hard brainwork for a fortnight, and all for tuppens. This is how

you do it" (speaking very rapidly, and as rapidly performing the exploit): "the first ring don't come off first,
but the second, you see, then the first drops, you see, then
the second goes on again, then the third comes off, you see,
then the second drops, then the third goes on again, then
the fourth comes off, then the, third drops, you see, then the
fourth goes on again, then the fifth," &c. &c. In half a
minute the rings are all off, and in a minute more on again,
'all done with a rapidity of manipulation which it is impossible to follow with the eye. " One for you, sir ? Yes, sirthank'ee.-Two for you ?. Oh, three-an even sixpencethank'ee sir ; I wish you may find it out, sir, before you go
to sleep. Who wants a save-all? save-alls a penny a-piece!
Why they calls 'em save-alls, never could think, though I've
made thousands on 'em. If you wants to save your candleends, don't have nothin' to do with this contrivance, it burns
'em all up till there's none left. Did you ask what this is,
sir ?-them's candle-springs. I never could abear to see the
old voman a roppin' bits o' paper round the candles to make
'em fit the candlesticks, so I invented this here article to
cc

386

TWENTY-FOURI HOTURS OF LONDON STREETS.

keep 'erm tight-a penny a pair, sir; thank'ee, sir. That,
sir ? that's a mouse-trap; you wouldn't think it, would you?
no more would a mouse-there's the beauty on it-a penny;
thank'ee, sir." In this manner, pausing now and then to
fetch breath, and to re-arrange the condition of his tray, and
to pile up the halfpence, of which he makes a grand show
in one corner, this clever and confident genius amuses the
mob, and makes his own market. He sells vast numbers of
his puzzling toy, but it is hardly one purchaser ina thousand who succeeds in penetrating the mystery of its construction so as to perform the difficult feat which to him,
from long practice, is as easy as drawing on a glove.
Not far from the friend of Confucius stands a man who
boasts, in a confidential and half-mysterious voice, the possession of three important secrets, which no consideration
should induce him to reveal to the world, but the benefits of
which, at the small charge of one penny each, he is ready,
here and now, to confer upon mankind in general, and
womankind in particular. The first of these secrets is embodied in certain small cakes of a grey-coloured composition,
by the proper use of which grease of all kinds is summarily
eradicated from linen, woollen, and silken fabrics, with the
utmost ease and certainty. Making a sudden dash with his
left hand, and seizing a boy with a greasy collar, and dragging him forward to the proof, he applies his nostrum, and
giving it a few rubs with an old tooth-brush dipped in
water, the grease instantly disappears, and its place shows
like a patch of new cloth upon an old garment. The second
secret is a wonderful cement which joins broken china or
glass in a most marvellously effectual manner; and the third,
which only by a stretch of imagination can be supposed useful
to ladies, is a composition for the sharpening of razors, in
proof of whose efficiency he makes trial of it upon an old
blade, triumphantly severing with it a single hair, held
between his finger and: thumb. He chatters volubly all the

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

387

while, and performs a variety of experiments with each of
his talismanic properties-selling and delivering his goods,
and giving change if necessary, without the slightest pause
in the torrent of his elocution.
A few steps further, and we are confronted by Fowler
Jack, with a large cage in compartments, filled with young
birds, among which we observe with concern our old confident acquaintance, the red-breast, whom of late years it
has been a fashion with Londoners to immure in a cage
for the sake of his charming though simple song. In rural
districts the cock-robin used to be safe from the snares of
the fowler, and the gun of the juvenile sportsman; and
twenty times when he has been caught in the clap-nets have
we seen him restored to liberty, as a thing of course, by
Hedge, who would have accounted it a crime to injure him.
But the London fowler knows nothing about this, or if he
does, regards it as an ignorant superstition, and turns a
penny, if he can, by anything and everything that comes
into his met. His best customers are the working-men, an
immense proportion of whom keep birds, and are not bad
judges in matters ornithological. Jack's colony of blackbirds, thrushes, larks, linnets, and finches-golden, bull, and
other-have each hardly room to turn'round in their narrow
habitations; but being sold cheap, they soon get released
into larger premises, and, if they chance to survive a London
seasoning, they make the dark lanes and back streets of the
smoky city vocal with their cheerful music.
Here we are at the establishment of our old friend Penny
Peter, with his broad platform of a hand-cart, heaped with
his collection of multitudinous wares, all at a penny a-piece.
Peter has been on a journey to Somers-Town and Pentonville all the morning and afternoon, tempting the servantmaids and children with his unaccountable bargains;,and
just as evening was drawing on, he pushed his ample equipage (not unlike the floor of a small room mounted on wheels)
cc2

388

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

down the City Road to -meet the current which experience
tells him sets in northerly towards the close of the labouring
day. What does not Peter sell for a penny ? It is hard to
say-and what he does sell were long to tell. There is a
box of toys, a box of nine-pins, a box of trenchers, a box of
wafers, and a box of boxes. There is a card of steel pens, a
serviceable slate, a half-a-quire of paper, and a bottle of ink.
There are cups 'and saucers, and drinking-mugs, presents
for Mary and Susan, and Emma and Sarah, and Jane and
Bessy, and Willy and Charley, and all the names in the
register. There are plates, and dishes, and drinking-glasses,
and mirrors, and mousetraps, and memorandum-books, and
fifty other things besides-and " all, gentlemen, for a penny
each," though how they could ever be manufactured at the
cost of even double the money is a mystery that has often
puzzled us, and is likely to puzzle us longer. Penny Peter
is a man of few words; his merchandise speaks for itself; a
dignified wave of the hand in semicircular sweep over the
surface of his travelling stage, and the occasional ejaculation
of " One penny each, gentlemen," is all the demonstration
he condescends to make. He is a great man in the eyes of
small nursery-girls and very little children, and no small
proportion of his stock is destined to undergo the process
of dissection by infant fingers, for the gratification of infant
curiosity. His museum is a great treat to the workingman's child; and in working-men's pockets, at the present
moment, some dozens of his most substantial merchandise
are on their way to the domestic hearth.
Close by Penny Peter, where she is always sure of an
audience, and upon whom perhaps she relies for protection
in case of need, stands a pale-faced girl of ten years of age,
playing with remarkable skill, " considerin'," as her admirers
say, upon the violin. She is well versed in the popular
airs of the day, and bows them out with a good round tone,
tapping the strings with her flying fingers with all the

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

389

precision and confidence of a professor. A little brother of
six or seven carries round a small wicker tray among the
listeners, putting the halfpence in his sister's pocket as fast
as he receives them. It is rumoured, with what truth we
know not, that the fiddling girl of ten is the sole support of
three younger children left parentless, who, but for her
exertions and extraordinary talent, would be consigned to
the care of the parish.
Then we come upon a travelling picture-gallery, with
above five hundred specimens all jumbled pell-mell in the
cavity of an inverted umbrella, and all offered for sale at a
farthing each. Among them are a numerous body of divines
lying quietly on their backs, together with radical reformers,
boa-constrictors, fat oxen, prize-fighters, and caverns of
Fingal-not to mention such trifles as the Spanish giant,
Tom Thumb, Daniel Lambert,, the Siamese twins, and a host
of other lusus naturce, mingled together with magnified
monsters rescued from the waste paper of some old Cyclopaedia. Then there is a marine smell, and we are stopped
on a sudden by Sam Scollop's oyster-bench, upon which, in
spite of the regulation which compels oysters to be unwholesome in months spelled without an R, those unfortunate
bivalves are doomed to be eaten all the year round, their
chief consumers being of that order who never spell their
months at all-street-porters, coal-heavers, hod-men, costers,
sweeps, scavengers, et hoc genus omne, innocent of orthography, Then there comes a barrow-load of pine-apples
split into sections of a pennyworth each, and another of
cocoa-nuts, retailed at a still cheaper rate. Nor is the
ballad-singer wanting, with his six yards of melodious verse
for a halfpenny, and his two hundred songs in a neat volume
for a penny;' nor the "patterer," with the full, true, and
particular account " of the last shocking murder ;" nor the
mutilated sailor, with his model of a ship in full sail; nor
the blown-up miner, with his one arm and two stumps for

390

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

legs, and- one eye, and his terrible picture of the explosion
unfolded on the ground, where you may see legs, arms, and
heads, flying about like hail, and dying men writhing in
the flames; nor the man born blind, who reads you a chapter
with his finger; nor that poor woman who, working away
like a machine, cuts .ornamental fire-screens out of lumps of
wood. All these, and it may chance a dozen or score beside,
relying upon the sympathies or the humble taste of the
artizan class, find it to their advantage to confront them at
the hour when they are most abroad, and are to be found
nightly in the path of .the working-man returning from his
labour. If we were to diverge from the regular route, and
mingle among the bibulous crowds sitting on the benches
around the public-houses, we should meet with the professors of a different species of industry-an industry not by
any means so commendable, carried on by a nomadic class,
to whom the atmosphere of the low tavern and the beershop has become a natural and congenial element. These
are a species of self-taught and half-taught conjurors and
jugglers, who, for the chance of a few halfpence, skulk
about among the various summer-eve encampments of beerdrinkers and tobacco-smokers, exhibiting their stale and
clumsy tricks as a provocation to the smallest cbntribution
of copper encomiums. One possesses the art of driving,
by force of magic, sixpennyworth of small change sheer
through the solid table into his hat held beneath. Another
produces an old silk handkerchief, from which, drawing it
repeatedly through his clenched hand, he yet shakes forth
various solid articles, such as eggs, padlocks, or a shoemaker's last and a third borrows a marked shilling, which
every man in the company finds in his own pocket when
requested to search for it.
But while we have been amusing ourselves with these
discursive glances at the characteristic scenes around us, the
hours have flown imperceptibly away. The sun has gone

TWENTY FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

39139

down exactly in the north-west, the hazy twilight is settling
down upon the dusty road, and the gas-lamps glimmering
one by one into being, already mark out its definite track
for a full mile in our rear. A cool breeze rising from the
west brings with it the far-off hum of life, which fillsup the
pauses between the rattling and rumbling of cabs and
omnibuses flying to and from the city, and reminds us that,
to complete even our scanty outline, we must change the
scene.
It is done-and we are standing now in one of the broad
shop-thoroughfares, where the current of population is ever
the strongest, and where commercial London trenches upon
the fashionable domain of the west-end. The evening is
unusually fine, and though the sunshine has disappeared,
there is yet a faint reflection of its parting glow upon the
summits of the lofty buildings, and the street is yet as light
almost as day, though nine o'clock has rung from the neighbouring towers. The shops, with very few exceptions, are
all open; and at this precise hour, when daylight yet reigns
without and gaslight within, some of them present an appearance bordering on the magical or supernatural. As we
glance down their long avenues, lighted up with regular
rows of pendant lamps, richly ornamented and multiplied
by ample mirrors, we half realise the fairy visions of
oriental romancists, and recognise in the genius of commerce the veritable magician who has the wealth of the
world at his command. The attraction of such a spectacle
is too great not to be widely appreciated; and the pathways
are consequently crowded with passengers, the majority of
whom, in the characters of mere spectators, are enjoying
the rich and varied display. Dr. Johnson, in his day,
preferred the spectacle of Fleet Street to all the picturesque
forms of nature in any other locality; and it is no marvel
that with myriads in London* the magnificence of her
unrivalled shops, enriched with a luxurious profusion, and

392

TWENTY-FOUR. HO'URS OF LONDON STREETS.

illuminated with a splendour of which the philosophic doctor
could not have had the smallest conception, should possess
more charms than anything or everything else that can be
gratuitously enjoyed. There is a fascination in the scene
which the sight-loving public cannot withstand-a fascination
well appreciated by the shopkeeper, whose end is more than
half accomplished if he can succeed in attracting general observation. But agreeable, brilliant, and dazzling as is the
picture, it has yet a dark and dismal side-dark with moral
and physical evils, and dismal in its consequences to the
unfortunate "slaves of the lamp" who are compelled to
minister, for the profit of the proprietors, to the caprice of
their patrons, the public. We have seen the clerk and the
handicraftsman long ago relieved from their toils, and
enjoying the repose or recreation which they need, and at
liberty to devote the evening hours to purposes of health
or improvement. But the shopman, whose duties through
the day scarcely admit of the necessary intermission for
meals, still stands at his wearisome work, and not till the
night is far spent will he be at liberty to snatch a single
hour from sleep to recruit by exercise or change of scene his
exhausted powers. Then, indeed, when libraries, lecturerooms, and institutions are closed or closing for the night,
and when only the tavern, the theatre, and the gaminghouse are open for their reception-forth come thousands of
respectable and responsible youth-who have character to
form, and to whose success in life character above all things
is essential-to encounter the temptations of London streets.
We are bound to lift up our voice against this social anomaly,
the complete reform of which isdemanded by every consideration of humanity, justice, and good policy; and we
trust that the movement begun with the view of effecting it,
and hitherto carried on nobly, will be prosecuted with
renewed vigour until crowned with entire success.
Night closes in as we turn out of the populous shop-

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

393

thoroughfare, and direct our steps homeward.. In the quiet
streets in the rear, the sounds of pleasant harmony from
harp and lute, violin and pensive horn, agreeably greet the
ear. A group of foreign musicians have chosen a tranquil
spot whereon to appeal to a choice audience for sympathy
in their exile, and are executing a melancholy national air,
the strains of which are interdicted in their own country.
The sounds reverberate amid the lofty houses as we pursue
our way, and have hardly died off in the distance when, in
turning a corner, we are suddenly confronted by a small
group assembled round the proprietor of a very long telescope, which he has pitched upon a convenient spot, and
pointed at the planet Jupiter, who, having just cleared the
chimney-tops, is shining with uncommon brilliancy, and
presents a capital object for the range of his instrument.
Twopence for a practical lesson in, astronomy is cheap
enough-so we join the group, and, when our turn comes
round, renew our acquaintance with the planet whom we
'have not looked fairly in the face for seven years. Wefind
the broad belts in his disc perfectly distinct, and three of his
satellites in attendance, two on the left hand and one on the
right, the fourth having.been eclipsed by the planet himself
just two minutes before we paid our respects to him. As
we gaze at the beautiful spectacle with a pleasure not easily
defined, the street astronomer obligingly recites the natural
history of the planet-his size, distance from the earth and
sun at the present moment, his periods of revolution on his
own axis,, and round his primary, &c., &c., for all which we
refer those of our readers who do not happen to have it at
their fingers' ends to the Catechism of Astronomy. While.yet
stooping absorbed in the sight, a nudge at our elbow from an
expectant star-gazer admonishes us that we have had our
two-pennyworth, and must make room for the next comer
-so good bye, Jupiter.
Evening is now fast merging into night-such night as a

394

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

star-lighted summer sky sheds upon the earth in the waning
month of June. With the comparative darkness comes
forth that class of beggars which no police regulations can
put down, who in a garb of shabby gentility assail the lonely
pedestrian with most elaborate fictions of unheard-of calamity, which the hardest of hearts finds it impossible to
resist. These rivals of the moles and the bats do all their day's
work in the one hour that ushers in the darkness. One of
them hangs upon our skirts as we wend our homeward-way,
and talks, and talks, and talks, until, having three times
contradicted his own story (which he is generally sure to do
if you give him time enough), we remind him curtly of that
fact, when he suddenly drops behind and frees us of his
company. We have sundry visions, as we quicken our
steps-of belated organ-grinders; of solitary minstrels chanting at area railings; of ragged flower-girls desperately
urging the purchase of a bunch of papered violets; of anglers
returning home with weary feet and empty creels; of tall
sixty-foot fire-escapes walking along the centre of the road
in charge of parish beadles; of the extinguishing of shoplights, and the lifting of shop-shutters; of loitering and
gossiping servant-girls carrying bulbous mugs of supperbeer; and various other demonstrations of the kind, all
tending to remind us that, to those of our readers at least
who have not been fashionably bred, it is time to say, Good
evening, ladies and gentlemen!

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.
NIGHT.

IT is past the hour of midnight when we wander forth, to
view the solitudes of the great city, as it lies wrapt in
slumber. The waning moon has risen late into the starlighted sky, and, just glimmering above the chimney-pots,
sheds now and then a feeble light upon our path. That
humming, booming, surge-like sound, which all day long and
late into the night tells of the active turmoil of London's
wakeful existence, has subsided by degrees into a silence,
settled, calm, and-deep, and only brokennow by the echoing
footfall of some belated traveller hastening homeward, or
houseless vagrant wandering drearily in search of a secret
nook or hospitable shelter in which to stretch his wearied
limbs. The slightest sound is reverberated between the
lofty walls of houses, and the echoes of our own footsteps, as
we plod quietly along, return to us from the other side of the
way, as though some invisible companion dogged our march
and mimicked every movement we make. Now and then
the loud discordant voices of a group of late revellers returning from their orgies, affront the solemn ear of midnight
with yells of insane merriment and drunken laughter, at
which the heart of genuine and innocent mirth sickens with
disgust. At intervals the heavy-laden team is heard grinding its laborious way along the central causeway, on its
route, with huge piles of luggage, to the out-lying railway
station; and the clang of the ariver's whip, the trampling of
the horses' feet, and the tinkling of their garniture of bells,

396

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

wake the discomfited sleeper from his first repose, who lies
and listens as the disturbance dies into a lullaby, and he
dreams again. But even these indications of life gradually
vanish and subside, and as we enter the precincts of the old
city, nought beyond the stealthy tread of the policeman on
his round intrudes upon the quiet of the hour.
It seems strange to remark that the city, which is by day
the centre of life and activity--the very focus of commerce,
with all its accompanying bustle and turmoil-is at night the
most undisturbed and tranquil portion of the whole metropolis. A dead, sepulchral silence seems to reign in the
deserted thoroughfares, where but a few hours ago the ear
was distracted by every variety of sounds, blending in one
confused and overwhelming murmur. A stillness so sudden
and complete, amidst those lofty avenues of wealth and
traffic, where now no sound or tread is distinguishable-no
voice of inquiry or response is heard-has a solemn suggestiveness, and awakens a train of pensive reflections which is
easier, and to some minds pleasanter, to entertain than it
might be to give them a definite expression. The deep
silence which broods around is explainable by the fact that
tbis, the most populous quarter of London during business
hours, is the least populous after nightfall. Of the myriads
who during the day congregate here to pursue the engrossing occupations of their lives, not one-tithe remain during
the night; and the majority of those who do remain, whatever their status in society, are, far the most part, of that
class who in their waking hours have paid the price of sleep
sound and deep, and are now enjoying it. The times are
altered since the good old citizens each barred himself in his
citadel at sunset, and abandoned the causeway to knaves,
swashbucklers, and plunderers, who looked upon every one
as their lawful prey that ventured into the dim-lighted streets
after darkness had set in. We can walk these quiet solitudes now at this hour, as safely as though the sun were

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS. OF LONDON STREETS.

397

high in the sky and the busy world of London on foot around
us-perhaps, indeed, more so. The modern robber is no
brawling bully, but a lurking sneak, who glides about in
shadow and darkness, and whose design is defeated if he be
seen by the vigilant eye of the police. And though it may
chance that to-morrow's Times may tell of some daring and
successful foray upon the hoarded stock of jeweller or banker,
upon the very spot where we are now loitering, the exploit
will be betrayed by no unusual or suspicious sound: perchance, if violence is to be used, it will be done under cover
of a clanking cart, ingeniously loaded to produce the greatest
uproar, in which the lesser noise of the wrench or the crowbar will be drowned.
As the clock strikes one, we are on London Bridge, and,
for'a wonder-for such a thing is not usual even at that
hour-find it apparently deserted. The forest of shipping
which lines either bank, but faintly discerned in the waning
moonlight, is buried in profound repose, broken only by the
gurgling of the water, and the feeble far-off hiss of some latearrived steamer, discharging her steam for the night. As
we gaze down upon the rushing stream, a boat shoots rapidly
beneath the arch, in which four human forms are for a moment visible, and then lost in the gloom. They are the
Thames Police, on the look-out for river pirates, who, but for
their watchful guardianship, would levy terrible contributions
upon the cargoes of vessels lying at anchor. On the other
side, long rows of lights, reflected in glimmering red drops
in the current below, mark the track of the various bridges
across the channel of the river. Nothing moves upon its
.I
surface save its own noiseless ripple.
But let us now take such a glance as our limits will allow,
of that section of London society whose lot it is to be frequently, if not always, awake while others slumber, and to
earn their daily bread, or to perpetrate their follies, or suffer
the woes of their cheerless lot, during the hours of night.

398

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

Whither shall we go? Here comes a night cab-man, who
will drive us anywhere-and by his side we mount on the
box. He is ready of speech, and has no secrets, and details
his history as he drives along. He tells us he was a journeyman printer-a pressman-and worked at Strahan's for
many years; that when there he married, but soon found
that his earnings would not support his wife and rising family in the comfort she had been used to. So he expended
the little money they had in the purchase of a cab and horses,
by means of which, being his own proprietor, he managed by
diligence, and by the use of a commodity scarce among his
craft, called civility, to double his income. He has taken to
night-work latterly, he says, because he wants to make a
little money to apprentice his eldest boy to an engineer, on
board one of the foreign steamers. He is fluent on the statistics of the cab business, and no consideration, short of absolute starvation, would induce him to drive another man's
cab or to let his son do so. Whither shall he drive us? To
the printing-office, where, amidst the glare of gas and the
heat and stench of an abominable atmosphere, the miles of
columns which, when morning comes, are to feed the ptblic
appetite for news, are hustling and scrambling into existence
-where' compositors and "readers," and "grass-cutters,"
and makers-up, and galley-slaves and engine-men, and machine-boys and messengers, reporters and penny-a-liners,
&c. &c., all dripping with perspiration and frantic with
haste, are seething and steaming in one tremendous stew,
the dishing-up of which will be the morning paper as it lies
dump on your breakfast table ? or where, in gangs of a
hundred or more, men and boys are engaged in similar
labours, which are to result in a blue-book for parliamentary
digestion, and which is guaranteed to come forth and
enlighten the world to-morrow ? It were curious to observe
how thoroughly the order of nature is inverted by the race
of men whose midnight is twelve at noon, who breakfast at

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

3J-9

eight or nine in the evening, and dine at two in the morning
-taking their supper and "turning in" just as other people
are turning out. In this life-long game of contrarieties, they
drag at their heels a large tribe of the humblest class, who
make a living by ministering to their wants.
While we are inwardly debating whither we shall go, our
driver has brought us to the verge of what still survives of
the old rookery of St. Giles's, and we dismount to take a
glance at this old and classic locality. A few minutes' walk,
and we are in the heart of the far-famed district of dirt, and
in piresence of a spectacle worthy of remark, and not likely
soon to fade from the remembrance. It is an hour and a half
street, in
past midnight, or nearly that, as we stand inwhich every house is a lodging-house, open for the reception
of no particular number of occupants, but for all, who or
whatever they may be, that can pay threepence for a bed or
a penny for liberty to lie on the floor. This locality is a
nightly and well-known refuge for the lowest dregs of
society, whether needy or criminal, or both. It is here that
the most wretched class of unfortunates of either sex, goaded
by famine and exhaustion, seek oblivion of their sorrows in
sleep. Hither come the ruined tradesman and the moneyless
artizan for a shelter, in company with the habitual drunkard,
who lives but for the gratification of his own unnatural
appetite, and who wants but a congenial stye in which to
kennel himself for the night. Hither come the pickpocket
and the smasher, because here, under cover of darkness, they
can skulk in security; and with them comes the friendless
and homeless wanderer, guiltless of all but poverty, to find
temporary repose at a price which even he can pay. And
here they are all, swarming in the open-air, seated on door.
steps, or supine upon the pavement-notyet daring to go to
bed, though they have mostly paid the price of
their lodgings. There are a thousand reasons-reasons not to be
mentioned to ears polite-why they should not turn in, after

400

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

a day so hot as: the past has been, until the first streak of
dawn begins to appear.- Some few who can afford the expense of a candle are already fast asleep, and we see their
lights blinking dimly in upper stories; but the majority are
waiting for the first appearance of day, whose rising beams
will put the entomological host to flight, before they venture
into their grim chambers of repose. The lane is very partially lighted, and the glass of the gas-lamps has been wantonly pelted away to the last fragment. The flame flickers
in the night-breeze, and casts its fitful gleams upon every
form of poverty and wretchedness and vice, here huddled
together as in a common asylum. Men and boys of all ages,
old women and young girls-some bareheaded and with
naked feet-are crowded together in one indiscriminate mass
of rags and squalor;, and all, utterly beaten and exhausted
with combined hunger and weariness, -await the coming of
that brief oblivion which slumber confers on the hopeless and
desolate.
Leaving these London lazzaroni to the enjoyment of
such solace as sleep can afford them, we pursue our way
westward, and, attracted by a light at the end of a court
which debouches. upon a cab-stand in a main street, enter
without ceremony one of those night-houses of refreshment
whose doors are never closed to the public. Coffee, of a
rather second-hand sort of flavour, is set before us, the discussion of which affords an opportunity of looking round
upon the company. They are not very numerous, hardly a
dozen in all. Four or five of them are evidently "watermen," in attendance upon the cab-stand outside, and these
are sleeping, or attempting to sleep, over their empty cups
and saucers. Some are jobbers in the neighbouring market,
who have no regular home-at least in summer time-and
who will remain here till the dawn gives them a chance of
employment. A few are cab-drivers, some of whom are
busy with plates of hot sausages and mugs of steaming

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

401

coffee. There is a vehement discussion, partaking very
much of the nature of a monologue, going forward-the presiding genius being a nondescript figure, in whom an air of
recldess daring and independence is combined with every
outward and visible demonstration of the most abject necessity. He is not much above thirty years of age, and is
buttoned to the chin in an old surtout so closely as to leave
the existence of a shirt a matter of doubt, were it not that
by his violent gesticulation he discloses, through innumerable
rents and slits, the fact that that indispensable item to the
respectability of a gentleman is wanting. His hat has but
half a rim, but his chin is shadowed by a fortnight's growth
of stubble. His nether habiliments are fringed about his
ankles with dirty, pendulous shreds, and his toes look out
upon society through chasms in a pair of Wellingtons. He
talks loudly, fluently, and correctly, if not exactly in the
language of a gentleman, yet in the diction, at least, of one
accustomed to educated company. Her majesty's ministers
have the good fortune to merit his approbation, so far as
they have acted hitherto; but he foresees the rock upon
which they will split, unless-of which he has his doubtsthey be well backed by the country. He is satirical on the
score of the budget; but, had he been at the chancellor's
elbow, he could have whispered just the one thing which
would have made it acceptable to the public. In the heat of
his harangue he calls, rather pompously and parenthetically,
or "coffee and two thin." The waiter or landlord, or both
in one, steals out of the little dark cavern in the rear, and
holds out his hand to the orator-a silent reminder of an
unpaid score chalked up against the inner wall. The politician draws himself up with dignity, and gives a halfappealing, half-indignant look around upon the company.
A devouring but sympathising cabman looks up from his
plate and roars, "Sarve it, I'll stand treat for vonce;" and
the viands are set before the starving Demosthenes, who,
DD

402

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

drawing off the fragment of a glove, addresses himself
deliberately to their consumption. He talks on, nevertheless,
perhaps in self-defence, to ward off the coarse jocularity of
his entertainers, who, strangers to delicacy, and insensible
themselves to the shafts of satire, are apt to administer it
with a barbarous clumsiness, lacerating to the feelings of one
who, though confessing that he is unfortunate, feels himself
a gentleman notwithstanding. Ten minutes in the atmosphere of this midnight hostel have set us perspiring at
every pore, and in spite of the charms of his ihetorie, we
bid adieu to the orator in the middle of one of his finest
periods.
6
Our way lies still westwards, though not in the m st
beaten route, and we are soon on the skirts of what has
always appeared to us, when viewed at this dead hour before
the dawn, as the most remarkable and suggestive spectacle
which London has to offer to the contemplation of the
nightly wanderer. We allude to the apparently numberless
and interminable rows of streets lying in the voiceless
silence, and distinctly mapped out by the long and regular
lines of lamps on either side of the way. There is no other
spectacle that we know of that intimates so significantly the
huge extent of this overgrown metropolis. The dead dumbnegs that reigns in these long, empty avenues appals the
mind, and sends the imagination of the pedestrian wandering
for ever onwards and onwards. Lost in some such reverie,
we wander on unwittingly, till happening to trench upon
the world of fashion, we are aroused suddenly by the consciousness that, amidst the city of the dead, there is a focus of
feverish life, where pleasure holds her court while all around
is hushed in tranquillity. The echoes are all at once invaded
by the trampling of steeds and the rattle of chariots, which
rush rapidly by us, and almost before we are aware of it we
are in the presence of a score or two more, .drawn up in
double lines fronting the city residence of some one whose

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

403

lady has been holding a soire to-night, which is now on the
point of breaking up. The honourable Miss So-and-so's
carriage stops the way for a moment or two and then rolls
off; there is a loud cry for my Lord Somebody's vehicle,
which the coachman has contrived to lock between two
others, to the imminent danger of two footmen in calves,
who are hanging on behind. The police have some trouble
in disentangling the Gordian knot, and at length my lord is
gone, " Lady Dashville's carriage !" is the next sonorous
utterance which makes vocal the midnight air, and her ladyship is accommodated in her turn. In the meanwhile there
is a sound of music and revelry in the brilliant drawingroom above, and the assembly, falling off by degrees, will
occupy yet an hour in dissolving away. We have not
leisure to await the finale, but turning our face northward,
and quickening our pace, soon leave the gay world of bon ton
to its questionable enjoyments.
The moon, which for the last hour has got fixed by the
horns in a low cloud, now glimmers out above it, and lights
us pleasantly on our path as we enter upon a district the
very reverse of fashionable, where the sons of trade who
keep open market for the middle and lower classes, lead
their lives of anxiety and toil. It is now half-past two
o'clock, and the nearest approach to complete and general
silence that London ever knows, reigns around as we pursue
our solitary way. Hark! what noise is that? "Bang!
bang !" a loud and furious knocking at doors-the startling
and incessant crash of rattles-the heavy tramp of hurrying
feet-the vision of dusky forms hastening to and fro, which
almost appear to rise out of the earth-and the loud and
reiterated cry of "Fire! fire!"
Householders, leaping from
their sleep, throw up their windows, and projecting themselves half out in their night-gear, ask anxiously, "Where ?
where ?" It is round the corner; and on coming in sight
of the house we see the dense smoke issuing from the fanDD 2

404-

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

light over the entrance to the shop, and from the interstices
between the shutters. The policeman is banging at the
door with all his might, but no one answers. The house
appears to be empty. In a few minutes a crowd of some
hundreds has collected, and the neighbours have illuminated
their windows to throw light on the scene;but as yet
nothing can be done to check the conflagration. Already
the long tongues of flame curl round the blistered shutters,
which are glowing in a red heat, and soon fall in charred
fragments to the ground. Now the windows of the firstfloor burst outwards with a sharp explosion, and the flame
pours forth like a stream rushing upwards. Now comes the
first engine, crashing and galloping over the stones with a
portentous deafening din but too well known to the dwellers
in London, The street is ankle-deep in water from the
mains which the turncock has opened, and in a few seconds
after the arrival of the firemen, a copious stream from the
hose is hissing in the flames. The neighbours on each side
of the burning house are with good reason alarmed, and it is
interesting to watch the difference in their conduct. The
one on the right,begins throwing out his goods, which the
crowd receive, and, carrying them across the road, pile them
up against an opposite house. The other, who appears to
have confidence in the party-wall, or else in the exertions of
the firemen, is seen walking about his drawing-room,
carrying a candle with him, and occasionally feeling the wall with
his hand-now taking down a picture or a mirror-now
drawing away a piece of furniture from the hot brick-work.
It is plain that he -intendsto risk his property, for, having sent
off his family to the shelter of a neighbour's house, he follows
himself, locking the door after him, and pocketing the key.
The roof of the burning house falls in, and now nothing but
the four walls, glowing red as an oven, remain. More
engines have arrived; and though: the destruction of the
dwelling is complete, they prevent the'spread of the fire by

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

405

torrents of water on the houses adjoining. When the uproar
has a little subsided, the voice of a female is distinguished
screaming beneath the ground, when it is discovered that a
very juvenile servant-girl and a baby have taken refuge in
the coal-cellar, from which their egress is barred by accumulations of fallen rubbish. The firemen dig up the grating,
and soon hoist them out; and then it appears that they
were the only persons in the house, the master and mistress
having gone off early in the evening to join a wedding party,
and left the girl to wait up for them till their return. She
had fallen asleep with the babe in her lap, and being awoke
by the fire, which occurred she cannot tell how, had barely
time to escape with the infant into the coal-cellar. This
explanation is hardly furnished when up drive the master
and mistress in a cab. A single glance shows the extent of
the calamity; from the skirts of the crowd we can discern
nothing but a few gestures of alarm on the part of the
husband, a few more of maternal feeling on the part of the
wife; the nurse and babe are received into the cab, and
the whole freight drives off again. Day-dawn is beginning
to glimmer in the east as we leave behind us the scene
of this brief but eventful act in the life of a London shopkeeper.
We are verging homewards, and are almost upon the
boundary of the suburb where we dwell, when we are unexpectedly confronted by an intimation that the coming day is
quarter-day. This intimation is one which we are sorry to
observe is disgracefully common in London, and is nothing
less than a stolen night-march, a surreptitious flitting by
starlight from the threatening grasp of the landlord, by a
defaulting tenant. A couple of those monster vans used for
moving goods are drawn up, with their open mouths yawning
towards the street door of a semi-genteel semi-villa. Both
vans are loading at once, and with the aid of a dozen pair of
hands, a whole auctioneer's catalogue of furniture is tumbled

406

' TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

into them, and in less than twent~ minutes the house will be
empty of both goods and tenants. When the landlord comes,
as he has threatened to come, at twelve o'clock, he will find
neither debtor to dun, nor property to seize. If the migratory tenant be an old systematic practitioner, it is a chance
whether he even find the key, and have not to redeem possession of his own house by payment of something more than
a trifling gratuity.
The stars begin to pale in the sky; and that cold, winterbreathing wind, the sure precursor of coming dawn, stirs the
dense foliage of June, as we hasten homewards. At this
hour the cats have the sole possession of the causeway,
and stalk leisurely and confidently from area to area, from
wall to wall, and from roof to roof, making the morning
twilight vocal with their squalling serenades. These are
soon thrown into the shade by the sparrows, whose unnumbered hosts wake into voice at the first blink of daylight, and
with endless chirrup and twitter commence their domestic
duties. At this particular season their nests are filled with
unfledged young, in whose behalf they do battle fiercely with
one another for the possession of those thoughtless gentry
the worms and slugs, who would risk their necks if they had
necks, for the sake of revelling in the fresh dew of the morning. Cock-sparrow is monarch of London during these
"small hours," and certainly is more numerous, in his generation than any other tribe, either of bipeds or quadrupeds,
living above ground, located within the sound of Bow-bells.
If a census could be taken of the London sparrows, we
are inclined to think that the sum total would amount
to five millions at least-more than doubling the human
population.
Here wel put an end to our ramble. We have spent
twenty-four hours in wandering through the modern Babylon,
and contemplating some few of the multiplied phases of life

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.

407

Te
which her ever-shifting panorama presents to the eye.
in few reflections-not because the subject is
have indulged
not sufficiently suggestive, but because, on the contrary, it
is so abounding in matter for the profoundest speculation,
that any attempt of the kind would have led us beyond our
limits, which it may be thought we have, as it is, too far
exceeded. We leave our readers to manufacture their own
philosophy out of the materials we have supplied. Varied,
and fragmentary, and startling, and even repulsive as are
some of the details in the general picture we have drawn, it
has yet its bright and hopeful aspects, upon which it is a
pleasure to dwell; and it must be a true picture, as far as it
goes, because we have set down nothing which our own eyes
have not witnessed. If we have sought sometimes to amuse,
we have also had a higher object in view; and we may be
allowed to commend the reader, in revolving the subject in
his mind, to adopt the spirit of one of America's poets, in
whose words we close our desultory survey.
"Not in the solitude
Alone may man commune with heaven, or see
Only in savage wood
And sunny vale, the p)resent Deity:
Or only hear his voice
Where the winds whisper and the waves rejoice.
"Even here do I behold
Almighty;-here amidst the crowd,
Thy steps,
Through the great city roll'd,
With everlasting murmur deep and loudChoking the ways that wind
'Mongst the proud piles, the work of human kind.
"Thy golden sunshine comes
From the round heaven, and ontheir dwelling lies,
And lights their inner homes;
For them thou fill'st with air the unbounded skies,
And givest them the stores
Of ocean, and the harvests of its shores.

408

TWENTY-FOUR HOURS OF LONDON STREETS.
"Thy spirit is around,
Quickening the restless mass that sweeps along;
And this eternal soundVoices and footfalls of the numberless throngLike the resounding sea,
Or like the rainy tempest, speaks of thee.
"And when the hours of rest
Come, like a calm upon the mid-sea brine,
Hushing its billowy breastThe quiet of that moment too is thine;
It breathes of Him who keeps
The vast and helpless city while it sleeps."

THE END.

JAMES S. VIRTUE, PEINTER, CITY ROAD, LONDON.

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Di

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12. THE SISTERS.

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7.

WIDOW.

DAUGHTER-IN-LAW.
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15. YOUNG CRUSOE.

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Impressions of America.

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Libellus a Margareta

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14

CATALOGUE OF WORKS

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MAIDEN AND MARRIED LIFE OF MARY POWELL, afterwards
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THE HILL SIDE.
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AND

THE

YeFcap.

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TANNER

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18

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RIPPON'S (DR.) SELECTION

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