The Uncommercial Traveller .............................................................................................................................1

No landlord is my friend and brother, no chambermaid loves me, no waiter worships me, no boots admires

and envies me. No round of beef or tongue or ham is expressly cooked for me, no pigeonpie is especially

made for me, no hoteladvertisement is personally addressed to me, no hotelroom tapestried with

greatcoats and railway wrappers is set apart for me, no house of public entertainment in the United

Kingdom greatly cares for my opinion of its brandy or sherry. When I go upon my journeys, I am not usually

rated at a low figure in the bill; when I come home from my journeys, I never get any commission. I know

nothing about prices, and should have no idea, if I were put to it, how to wheedle a man into ordering

something he doesn't want. As a town traveller, I am never to be seen driving a vehicle externally like a

young and volatile pianoforte van, and internally like an oven in which a number of flat boxes are baking in

layers. As a country traveller, I am rarely to be found in a gig, and am never to be encountered by a pleasure

train, waiting on the platform of a branch station, quite a Druid in the midst of a light Stonehenge of samples.

And yet proceeding now, to introduce myself positively I am both a town traveller and a country

traveller, and am always on the road. Figuratively speaking, I travel for the great house of Human Interest

Brothers, and have rather a large connection in the fancy goods way. Literally speaking, I am always

wandering here and there from my rooms in Coventgarden, London now about the city streets: now, about

the country byroads seeing many little things, and some great things, which, because they interest me, I

Never had I seen a year going out, or going on, under quieter circumstances. Eighteen hundred and fiftynine

had but another day to live, and truly its end was Peace on that seashore that morning.

So settled and orderly was everything seaward, in the bright light of the sun and under the transparent

shadows of the clouds, that it was hard to imagine the bay otherwise, for years past or to come, than it was

that very day. The Tugsteamer lying a little off the shore, the Lighter lying still nearer to the shore, the boat

alongside the Lighter, the regularlyturning windlass aboard the Lighter, the methodical figures at work, all

slowly and regularly heaving up and down with the breathing of the sea, all seemed as much a part of the

nature of the place as the tide itself. The tide was on the flow, and had been for some two hours and a half;

there was a slight obstruction in the sea within a few yards of my feet: as if the stump of a tree, with earth

enough about it to keep it from lying horizontally on the water, had slipped a little from the land and as I

stood upon the beach and observed it dimpling the light swell that was coming in, I cast a stone over it.

So orderly, so quiet, so regular the rising and falling of the Tugsteamer, the Lighter, and the boat the

turning of the windlass the coming in of the tide that I myself seemed, to my own thinking, anything but

new to the spot. Yet, I had never seen it in my life, a minute before, and had traversed two hundred miles to

get at it. That very morning I had come bowling down, and struggling up, hillcountry roads; looking back at

snowy summits; meeting courteous peasants well to do, driving fat pigs and cattle to market: noting the neat

and thrifty dwellings, with their unusual quantity of clean white linen, drying on the bushes; having windy

weather suggested by every cotter's little rick, with its thatch strawridged and extra strawridged into

overlapping compartments like the back of a rhinoceros. Had I not given a lift of fourteen miles to the

Coastguardsman (kit and all), who was coming to his spell of duty there, and had we not just now parted

company? So it was; but the journey seemed to glide down into the placid sea, with other chafe and trouble,

and for the moment nothing was so calmly and monotonously real under the sunlight as the gentle rising and

falling of the water with its freight, the regular turning of the windlass aboard the Lighter, and the slight

O reader, haply turning this page by the fireside at Home, and hearing the night wind rumble in the chimney,

that slight obstruction was the uppermost fragment of the Wreck of the Royal Charter, Australian trader and

passenger ship, Homeward bound, that struck here on the terrible morning of the twentysixth of this

October, broke into three parts, went down with her treasure of at least five hundred human lives, and has

From which point, or from which, she drove ashore, stern foremost; on which side, or on which, she passed

the little Island in the bay, for ages henceforth to be aground certain yards outside her; these are rendered

bootless questions by the darkness of that night and the darkness of death. Here she went down.

Even as I stood on the beach with the words 'Here she went down!' in my ears, a diver in his grotesque dress,

dipped heavily over the side of the boat alongside the Lighter, and dropped to the bottom. On the shore by the

water's edge, was a rough tent, made of fragments of wreck, where other divers and workmen sheltered

themselves, and where they had kept Christmasday with rum and roast beef, to the destruction of their frail

chimney. Cast up among the stones and boulders of the beach, were great spars of the lost vessel, and masses

of iron twisted by the fury of the sea into the strangest forms. The timber was already bleached and iron

rusted, and even these objects did no violence to the prevailing air the whole scene wore, of having been

Yet, only two short months had gone, since a man, living on the nearest hilltop overlooking the sea, being

blown out of bed at about daybreak by the wind that had begun to strip his roof off, and getting upon a ladder

with his nearest neighbour to construct some temporary device for keeping his house over his head, saw from

the ladder's elevation as he looked down by chance towards the shore, some dark troubled object close in

with the land. And he and the other, descending to the beach, and finding the sea mercilessly beating over a

great broken ship, had clambered up the stony ways, like staircases without stairs, on which the wild village

hangs in little clusters, as fruit hangs on boughs, and had given the alarm. And so, over the hillslopes, and

past the waterfall, and down the gullies where the land drains off into the ocean, the scattered quarrymen and

fishermen inhabiting that part of Wales had come running to the dismal sight their clergyman among them.

And as they stood in the leaden morning, stricken with pity, leaning hard against the wind, their breath and

vision often failing as the sleet and spray rushed at them from the ever forming and dissolving mountains of

sea, and as the wool which was a part of the vessel's cargo blew in with the salt foam and remained upon the

land when the foam melted, they saw the ship's lifeboat put off from one of the heaps of wreck; and first,

there were three men in her, and in a moment she capsized, and there were but two; and again, she was struck

by a vast mass of water, and there was but one; and again, she was thrown bottom upward, and that one, with

his arm struck through the broken planks and waving as if for the help that could never reach him, went down

It was the clergyman himself from whom I heard this, while I stood on the shore, looking in his kind

wholesome face as it turned to the spot where the boat had been. The divers were down then, and busy. They

were 'lifting' today the gold found yesterday some fiveandtwenty thousand pounds. Of three hundred

and fifty thousand pounds' worth of gold, three hundred thousand pounds' worth, in round numbers, was at

that time recovered. The great bulk of the remainder was surely and steadily coming up. Some loss of

sovereigns there would be, of course; indeed, at first sovereigns had drifted in with the sand, and been

scattered far and wide over the beach, like seashells; but most other golden treasure would be found. As it

was brought up, it went aboard the Tugsteamer, where good account was taken of it. So tremendous had the

force of the sea been when it broke the ship, that it had beaten one great ingot of gold, deep into a strong and

heavy piece of her solid ironwork: in which, also, several loose sovereigns that the ingot had swept in before

it, had been found, as firmly embedded as though the iron had been liquid when they were forced there. It had

been remarked of such bodies come ashore, too, as had been seen by scientific men, that they had been

stunned to death, and not suffocated. Observation, both of the internal change that had been wrought in them,

and of their external expression, showed death to have been thus merciful and easy. The report was brought,

while I was holding such discourse on the beach, that no more bodies had come ashore since last night. It

began to be very doubtful whether many more would be thrown up, until the northeast winds of the early

spring set in. Moreover, a great number of the passengers, and particularly the secondclass

womenpassengers, were known to have been in the middle of the ship when she parted, and thus the

collapsing wreck would have fallen upon them after yawning open, and would keep them down. A diver

made known, even then, that he had come upon the body of a man, and had sought to release it from a great

superincumbent weight; but that, finding he could not do so without mutilating the remains, he had left it

It was the kind and wholesome face I have made mention of as being then beside me, that I had purposed to

myself to see, when I left home for Wales. I had heard of that clergyman, as having buried many scores of the

shipwrecked people; of his having opened his house and heart to their agonised friends; of his having used a

most sweet and patient diligence for weeks and weeks, in the performance of the forlornest offices that Man

can render to his kind; of his having most tenderly and thoroughly devoted himself to the dead, and to those

who were sorrowing for the dead. I had said to myself, 'In the Christmas season of the year, I should like to

see that man!' And he had swung the gate of his little garden in coming out to meet me, not half an hour ago.

So cheerful of spirit and guiltless of affectation, as true practical Christianity ever is! I read more of the New

Testament in the fresh frank face going up the village beside me, in five minutes, than I have read in

anathematising discourses (albeit put to press with enormous flourishing of trumpets), in all my life. I heard

more of the Sacred Book in the cordial voice that had nothing to say about its owner, than in all the wouldbe

We climbed towards the little church, at a cheery pace, among the loose stones, the deep mud, the wet coarse

grass, the outlying water, and other obstructions from which frost and snow had lately thawed. It was a

mistake (my friend was glad to tell me, on the way) to suppose that the peasantry had shown any superstitious

avoidance of the drowned; on the whole, they had done very well, and had assisted readily. Ten shillings had

been paid for the bringing of each body up to the church, but the way was steep, and a horse and cart (in

which it was wrapped in a sheet) were necessary, and three or four men, and, all things considered, it was not

a great price. The people were none the richer for the wreck, for it was the season of the herringshoal and

He had the church keys in his hand, and opened the churchyard gate, and opened the church door; and we

It is a little church of great antiquity; there is reason to believe that some church has occupied the spot, these

thousand years or more. The pulpit was gone, and other things usually belonging to the church were gone,

owing to its living congregation having deserted it for the neighbouring schoolroom, and yielded it up to the

dead. The very Commandments had been shouldered out of their places, in the bringing in of the dead; the

black wooden tables on which they were painted, were askew, and on the stone pavement below them, and on

the stone pavement all over the church, were the marks and stains where the drowned had been laid down.

The eye, with little or no aid from the imagination, could yet see how the bodies had been turned, and where

the head had been and where the feet. Some faded traces of the wreck of the Australian ship may be

discernible on the stone pavement of this little church, hundreds of years hence, when the digging for gold in

Fortyfour shipwrecked men and women lay here at one time, awaiting burial. Here, with weeping and

wailing in every room of his house, my companion worked alone for hours, solemnly surrounded by eyes that

could not see him, and by lips that could not speak to him, patiently examining the tattered clothing, cutting

off buttons, hair, marks from linen, anything that might lead to subsequent identification, studying faces,

looking for a scar, a bent finger, a crooked toe, comparing letters sent to him with the ruin about him. 'My

dearest brother had bright grey eyes and a pleasant smile,' one sister wrote. O poor sister! well for you to be

The ladies of the clergyman's family, his wife and two sistersin law, came in among the bodies often. It

grew to be the business of their lives to do so. Any new arrival of a bereaved woman would stimulate their

pity to compare the description brought, with the dread realities. Sometimes, they would go back able to say,

'I have found him,' or, 'I think she lies there.' Perhaps, the mourner, unable to bear the sight of all that lay in

the church, would be led in blindfold. Conducted to the spot with many compassionate words, and

encouraged to look, she would say, with a piercing cry, 'This is my boy!' and drop insensible on the insensible

He soon observed that in some cases of women, the identification of persons, though complete, was quite at

variance with the marks upon the linen; this led him to notice that even the marks upon the linen were

sometimes inconsistent with one another; and thus he came to understand that they had dressed in great haste

and agitation, and that their clothes had become mixed together. The identification of men by their dress, was

rendered extremely difficult, in consequence of a large proportion of them being dressed alike in clothes of

one kind, that is to say, supplied by slopsellers and outfitters, and not made by single garments but by

hundreds. Many of the men were bringing over parrots, and had receipts upon them for the price of the birds;

others had bills of exchange in their pockets, or in belts. Some of these documents, carefully unwrinkled and

dried, were little less fresh in appearance that day, than the present page will be under ordinary

In that lonely place, it had not been easy to obtain even such common commodities in towns, as ordinary

disinfectants. Pitch had been burnt in the church, as the readiest thing at hand, and the fryingpan in which it

had bubbled over a brazier of coals was still there, with its ashes. Hard by the CommunionTable, were some

boots that had been taken off the drowned and preserved a golddigger's boot, cut down the leg for its

removal a trodden down man's ankleboot with a buff cloth top and others soaked and sandy, weedy

From the church, we passed out into the churchyard. Here, there lay, at that time, one hundred and fortyfive

bodies, that had come ashore from the wreck. He had buried them, when not identified, in graves containing

four each. He had numbered each body in a register describing it, and had placed a corresponding number on

each coffin, and over each grave. Identified bodies he had buried singly, in private graves, in another part of

the churchyard. Several bodies had been exhumed from the graves of four, as relatives had come from a

distance and seen his register; and, when recognised, these have been reburied in private graves, so that the

mourners might erect separate headstones over the remains. In all such cases he had performed the funeral

service a second time, and the ladies of his house had attended. There had been no offence in the poor ashes

when they were brought again to the light of day; the beneficent Earth had already absorbed it. The drowned

were buried in their clothes. To supply the great sudden demand for coffins, he had got all the neighbouring

people handy at tools, to work the livelong day, and Sunday likewise. The coffins were neatly formed; I

had seen two, waiting for occupants, under the lee of the ruined walls of a stone hut on the beach, within call

of the tent where the Christmas Feast was held. Similarly, one of the graves for four was lying open and

ready, here, in the churchyard. So much of the scanty space was already devoted to the wrecked people, that

the villagers had begun to express uneasy doubts whether they themselves could lie in their own ground, with

their forefathers and descendants, byandby. The churchyard being but a step from the clergyman's

dwellinghouse, we crossed to the latter; the white surplice was hanging up near the door ready to be put on

The cheerful earnestness of this good Christian minister was as consolatory, as the circumstances out of

which it shone were sad. I never have seen anything more delightfully genuine than the calm dismissal by

himself and his household of all they had undergone, as a simple duty that was quietly done and ended. In

speaking of it, they spoke of it with great compassion for the bereaved; but laid no stress upon their own hard

share in those weary weeks, except as it had attached many people to them as friends, and elicited many

touching expressions of gratitude. This clergyman's brother himself the clergyman of two adjoining

parishes, who had buried thirtyfour of the bodies in his own churchyard, and who had done to them all that

his brother had done as to the larger number must be understood as included in the family. He was there,

with his neatly arranged papers, and made no more account of his trouble than anybody else did. Down to

yesterday's post outward, my clergyman alone had written one thousand and seventyfive letters to relatives

and friends of the lost people. In the absence of selfassertion, it was only through my now and then

delicately putting a question as the occasion arose, that I became informed of these things. It was only when I

had remarked again and again, in the church, on the awful nature of the scene of death he had been required

so closely to familiarise himself with for the soothing of the living, that he had casually said, without the least

abatement of his cheerfulness, 'indeed, it had rendered him unable for a time to eat or drink more than a little

In this noble modesty, in this beautiful simplicity, in this serene avoidance of the least attempt to 'improve' an

occasion which might be supposed to have sunk of its own weight into my heart, I seemed to have happily

come, in a few steps, from the churchyard with its open grave, which was the type of Death, to the Christian

dwelling side by side with it, which was the type of Resurrection. I never shall think of the former, without

the latter. The two will always rest side by side in my memory. If I had lost any one dear to me in this

unfortunate ship, if I had made a voyage from Australia to look at the grave in the churchyard, I should go

away, thankful to GOD that that house was so close to it, and that its shadow by day and its domestic lights

by night fell upon the earth in which its Master had so tenderly laid my dear one's head.

The references that naturally arose out of our conversation, to the descriptions sent down of shipwrecked

persons, and to the gratitude of relations and friends, made me very anxious to see some of those letters. I was

presently seated before a shipwreck of papers, all bordered with black, and from them I made the following

REVEREND SIR. Amongst the many who perished on your shore was numbered my beloved son. I was only

just recovering from a severe illness, and this fearful affliction has caused a relapse, so that I am unable at

present to go to identify the remains of the loved and lost. My darling son would have been sixteen on

Christmasday next. He was a most amiable and obedient child, early taught the way of salvation. We fondly

hoped that as a British seaman he might be an ornament to his profession, but, 'it is well;' I feel assured my

dear boy is now with the redeemed. Oh, he did not wish to go this last voyage! On the fifteenth of October, I

received a letter from him from Melbourne, date August twelfth; he wrote in high spirits, and in conclusion

he says: 'Pray for a fair breeze, dear mamma, and I'll not forget to whistle for it! and, God permitting, I shall

see you and all my little pets again. Good bye, dear mother goodbye, dearest parents. Goodbye, dear

brother.' Oh, it was indeed an eternal farewell. I do not apologise for thus writing you, for oh, my heart is so

MY DEAR KIND SIR. Will you kindly inform me whether there are any initials upon the ring and guard you

have in possession, found, as the Standard says, last Tuesday? Believe me, my dear sir, when I say that I

cannot express my deep gratitude in words sufficiently for your kindness to me on that fearful and appalling

day. Will you tell me what I can do for you, and will you write me a consoling letter to prevent my mind

Left in such a state as I am, my friends and I thought it best that my dear husband should be buried where he

lies, and, much as I should have liked to have had it otherwise, I must submit. I feel, from all I have heard of

you, that you will see it done decently and in order. Little does it signify to us, when the soul has departed,

where this poor body lies, but we who are left behind would do all we can to show how we loved them. This

is denied me, but it is God's hand that afflicts us, and I try to submit. Some day I may be able to visit the spot,

and see where he lies, and erect a simple stone to his memory. Oh! it will be long, long before I forget that

dreadful night! Is there such a thing in the vicinity, or any shop in Bangor, to which I could send for a small

I have received your letter this morning, and do thank you most kindly for the interest you have taken about

my dear husband, as well for the sentiments yours contains, evincing the spirit of a Christian who can

May God bless and sustain you, and all in connection with you, in this great trial. Time may roll on and bear

all its sons away, but your name as a disinterested person will stand in history, and, as successive years pass,

many a widow will think of your noble conduct, and the tears of gratitude flow down many a cheek, the

I am at a loss to find words to sufficiently express my gratitude to you for your kindness to my son Richard

upon the melancholy occasion of his visit to his dear brother's body, and also for your ready attention in

pronouncing our beautiful burial service over my poor unfortunate son's remains. God grant that your prayers

over him may reach the Mercy Seat, and that his soul may be received (through Christ's intercession) into

I am overpowered when I think of you and your hospitable home. No words could speak language suited to

MY BELOVED FRIENDS. This is the first day that I have been able to leave my bedroom since I returned,

If I could only have had my last melancholy hope realised in recovering the body of my beloved and

lamented son, I should have returned home somewhat comforted, and I think I could then have been

The only consolation to my distressed mind is in having been so feelingly allowed by you to leave the matter

in your hands, by whom I well know that everything will be done that can be, according to arrangements

made before I left the scene of the awful catastrophe, both as to the identification of my dear son, and also his

I feel most anxious to hear whether anything fresh has transpired since I left you; will you add another to the

many deep obligations I am under to you by writing to me? And should the body of my dear and unfortunate

Words cannot express the gratitude I feel I owe to you all for your benevolent aid, your kindness, and your

MY DEARLY BELOVED FRIENDS. I arrived in safety at my house yesterday, and a night's rest has

restored and tranquillised me. I must again repeat, that language has no words by which I can express my

I have seen him! and can now realise my misfortune more than I have hitherto been able to do. Oh, the

bitterness of the cup I drink! But I bow submissive. God MUST have done right. I do not want to feel less,

There were some Jewish passengers on board the Royal Charter, and the gratitude of the Jewish people is

feelingly expressed in the following letter bearing date from 'the office of the Chief Rabbi:'

REVEREND SIR. I cannot refrain from expressing to you my heartfelt thanks on behalf of those of my flock

whose relatives have unfortunately been among those who perished at the late wreck of the Royal Charter.

You have, indeed, like Boaz, 'not left off your kindness to the living and the dead.'

You have not alone acted kindly towards the living by receiving them hospitably at your house, and

energetically assisting them in their mournful duty, but also towards the dead, by exerting yourself to have

our coreligionists buried in our ground, and according to our rites. May our heavenly Father reward you for

The 'Old Hebrew congregation of Liverpool' thus express themselves through their secretary:

REVEREND SIR. The wardens of this congregation have learned with great pleasure that, in addition to

those indefatigable exertions, at the scene of the late disaster to the Royal Charter, which have received

universal recognition, you have very benevolently employed your valuable efforts to assist such members of

our faith as have sought the bodies of lost friends to give them burial in our consecrated grounds, with the

The wardens desire me to take the earliest available opportunity to offer to you, on behalf of our community,

the expression of their warm acknowledgments and grateful thanks, and their sincere wishes for your

REVEREND AND DEAR SIR. I take the opportunity of thanking you right earnestly for the promptness you

displayed in answering my note with full particulars concerning my much lamented brother, and I also herein

beg to express my sincere regard for the willingness you displayed and for the facility you afforded for

getting the remains of my poor brother exhumed. It has been to us a most sorrowful and painful event, but

when we meet with such friends as yourself, it in a measure, somehow or other, abates that mental anguish,

and makes the suffering so much easier to be borne. Considering the circumstances connected with my poor

brother's fate, it does, indeed, appear a hard one. He had been away in all seven years; he returned four years

ago to see his family. He was then engaged to a very amiable young lady. He had been very successful

abroad, and was now returning to fulfil his sacred vow; he brought all his property with him in gold

uninsured. We heard from him when the ship stopped at Queenstown, when he was in the highest of hope,

Mournful in the deepest degree, but too sacred for quotation here, were the numerous references to those

miniatures of women worn round the necks of rough men (and found there after death), those locks of hair,

those scraps of letters, those many many slight memorials of hidden tenderness. One man cast up by the sea

bore about him, printed on a perforated lace card, the following singular (and unavailing) charm:

May the blessing of God await thee. May the sun of glory shine around thy bed; and may the gates of plenty,

honour, and happiness be ever open to thee. May no sorrow distress thy days; may no grief disturb thy nights.

May the pillow of peace kiss thy cheek, and the pleasures of imagination attend thy dreams; and when length

of years makes thee tired of earthly joys, and the curtain of death gently closes around thy last sleep of human

existence, may the Angel of God attend thy bed, and take care that the expiring lamp of life shall not receive

A sailor had these devices on his right arm. 'Our Saviour on the Cross, the forehead of the Crucifix and the

vesture stained red; on the lower part of the arm, a man and woman; on one side of the Cross, the appearance

of a half moon, with a face; on the other side, the sun; on the top of the Cross, the letters I.H.S.; on the left

arm, a man and woman dancing, with an effort to delineate the female's dress; under which, initials.' Another

seaman 'had, on the lower part of the right arm, the device of a sailor and a female; the man holding the

Union Jack with a streamer, the folds of which waved over her head, and the end of it was held in her hand.

On the upper part of the arm, a device of Our Lord on the Cross, with stars surrounding the head of the Cross,

and one large star on the side in Indian Ink. On the left arm, a flag, a true lover's knot, a face, and initials.'

This tattooing was found still plain, below the discoloured outer surface of a mutilated arm, when such

surface was carefully scraped away with a knife. It is not improbable that the perpetuation of this marking

custom among seamen, may be referred back to their desire to be identified, if drowned and flung ashore.

It was some time before I could sever myself from the many interesting papers on the table, and then I broke

bread and drank wine with the kind family before I left them. As I brought the Coastguard down, so I took

the Postman back, with his leathern wallet, walkingstick, bugle, and terrier dog. Many a heartbroken letter

had he brought to the Rectory House within two months many; a benignantly painstaking answer had he

As I rode along, I thought of the many people, inhabitants of this mother country, who would make

pilgrimages to the little churchyard in the years to come; I thought of the many people in Australia, who

would have an interest in such a shipwreck, and would find their way here when they visit the Old World; I

thought of the writers of all the wreck of letters I had left upon the table; and I resolved to place this little

record where it stands. Convocations, Conferences, Diocesan Epistles, and the like, will do a great deal for

Religion, I dare say, and Heaven send they may! but I doubt if they will ever do their Master's service half so

well, in all the time they last, as the Heavens have seen it done in this bleak spot upon the rugged coast of

Had I lost the friend of my life, in the wreck of the Royal Charter; had I lost my betrothed, the more than

friend of my life; had I lost my maiden daughter, had I lost my hopeful boy, had I lost my little child; I would

kiss the hands that worked so busily and gently in the church, and say, 'None better could have touched the

form, though it had lain at home.' I could be sure of it, I could be thankful for it: I could be content to leave

the grave near the house the good family pass in and out of every day, undisturbed, in the little churchyard

Without the name of the clergyman to whom I hope, not without carrying comfort to some heart at some

time I have referred, my reference would be as nothing. He is the Reverend Stephen Roose Hughes, of

Llanallgo, near Moelfra, Anglesey. His brother is the Reverend Hugh Robert Hughes, of Penrhos, Alligwy.

My day's nobusiness beckoning me to the Eastend of London, I had turned my face to that point of the

metropolitan compass on leaving Coventgarden, and had got past the India House, thinking in my idle

manner of TippooSahib and Charles Lamb, and had got past my little wooden midshipman, after

affectionately patting him on one leg of his kneeshorts for old acquaintance' sake, and had got past Aldgate

Pump, and had got past the Saracen's Head (with an ignominious rash of posting bills disfiguring his swarthy

countenance), and had strolled up the empty yard of his ancient neighbour the Black or Blue Boar, or Bull,

who departed this life I don't know when, and whose coaches are all gone I don't know where; and I had

come out again into the age of railways, and I had got past Whitechapel Church, and was rather

inappropriately for an Uncommercial Traveller in the Commercial Road. Pleasantly wallowing in the

abundant mud of that thoroughfare, and greatly enjoying the huge piles of building belonging to the sugar

refiners, the little masts and vanes in small back gardens in back streets, the neighbouring canals and docks,

the India vans lumbering along their stone tramway, and the pawnbrokers' shops where hardup Mates had

pawned so many sextants and quadrants, that I should have bought a few cheap if I had the least notion how

Not that I intended to take boat at Wapping Old Stairs, or that I was going to look at the locality, because I

believe (for I don't) in the constancy of the young woman who told her seagoing lover, to such a beautiful

old tune, that she had ever continued the same, since she gave him the 'baccerbox marked with his name; I

am afraid he usually got the worst of those transactions, and was frightfully taken in. No, I was going to

Wapping, because an Eastern police magistrate had said, through the morning papers, that there was no

classification at the Wapping workhouse for women, and that it was a disgrace and a shame, and divers other

hard names, and because I wished to see how the fact really stood. For, that Eastern police magistrates are not

always the wisest men of the East, may be inferred from their course of procedure respecting the

fancydressing and pantomimeposturing at St. George's in that quarter: which is usually, to discuss the

matter at issue, in a state of mind betokening the weakest perplexity, with all parties concerned and

unconcerned, and, for a final expedient, to consult the complainant as to what he thinks ought to be done with

the defendant, and take the defendant's opinion as to what he would recommend to be done with himself.

Long before I reached Wapping, I gave myself up as having lost my way, and, abandoning myself to the

narrow streets in a Turkish frame of mind, relied on predestination to bring me somehow or other to the place

I wanted if I were ever to get there. When I had ceased for an hour or so to take any trouble about the matter,

I found myself on a swingbridge looking down at some dark locks in some dirty water. Over against me,

stood a creature remotely in the likeness of a young man, with a puffed sallow face, and a figure all dirty and

shiny and slimy, who may have been the youngest son of his filthy old father, Thames, or the drowned man

about whom there was a placard on the granite post like a large thimble, that stood between us.

I asked this apparition what it called the place? Unto which, it replied, with a ghastly grin and a sound like

As it is a point of great sensitiveness with me on such occasions to be equal to the intellectual pressure of the

conversation, I deeply considered the meaning of this speech, while I eyed the apparition then engaged in

hugging and sucking a horizontal iron bar at the top of the locks. Inspiration suggested to me that Mr. Baker

'Sue?' returned the ghost, with a stare. 'Yes! And Poll. Likewise Emily. And Nancy. And Jane;' he sucked the

iron between each name; 'and all the bileing. Ketches off their bonnets or shorls, takes a run, and headers

'Ah!' said the apparition. 'THEY an't partickler. Two 'ull do for THEM. Three. All times o' night. On'y mind

you!' Here the apparition rested his profile on the bar, and gurgled in a sarcastic manner. 'There must be

somebody comin'. They don't go a headerin' down here, wen there an't no Bobby nor gen'ral Cove, fur to hear

According to my interpretation of these words, I was myself a General Cove, or member of the miscellaneous

'I dunno about restored,' said the apparition, who, for some occult reason, very much objected to that word;

'they're carried into the werkiss and put into a 'ot bath, and brought round. But I dunno about restored,' said

As it had shown a desire to become offensive, I was not sorry to find myself alone, especially as the 'werkiss'

it had indicated with a twist of its matted head, was close at hand. So I left Mr. Baker's terrible trap (baited

with a scum that was like the soapy rinsing of sooty chimneys), and made bold to ring at the workhouse gate,

A very bright and nimble little matron, with a bunch of keys in her hand, responded to my request to see the

House. I began to doubt whether the police magistrate was quite right in his facts, when I noticed her quick,

The Traveller (the matron intimated) should see the worst first. He was welcome to see everything. Such as it

This was the only preparation for our entering 'the Foul wards.' They were in an old building squeezed away

in a corner of a paved yard, quite detached from the more modern and spacious main body of the workhouse.

They were in a building most monstrously behind the time a mere series of garrets or lofts, with every

inconvenient and objectionable circumstance in their construction, and only accessible by steep and narrow

staircases, infamously illadapted for the passage upstairs of the sick or downstairs of the dead.

Abed in these miserable rooms, here on bedsteads, there (for a change, as I understood it) on the floor, were

women in every stage of distress and disease. None but those who have attentively observed such scenes, can

conceive the extraordinary variety of expression still latent under the general monotony and uniformity of

colour, attitude, and condition. The form a little coiled up and turned away, as though it had turned its back

on this world for ever; the uninterested face at once leadcoloured and yellow, looking passively upward

from the pillow; the haggard mouth a little dropped, the hand outside the coverlet, so dull and indifferent, so

light, and yet so heavy; these were on every pallet; but when I stopped beside a bed, and said ever so slight a

word to the figure lying there, the ghost of the old character came into the face, and made the Foul ward as

various as the fair world. No one appeared to care to live, but no one complained; all who could speak, said

that as much was done for them as could be done there, that the attendance was kind and patient, that their

suffering was very heavy, but they had nothing to ask for. The wretched rooms were as clean and sweet as it

is possible for such rooms to be; they would become a pesthouse in a single week, if they were illkept.

I accompanied the brisk matron up another barbarous staircase, into a better kind of loft devoted to the idiotic

and imbecile. There was at least Light in it, whereas the windows in the former wards had been like sides of

schoolboys' birdcages. There was a strong grating over the fire here, and, holding a kind of state on either

side of the hearth, separated by the breadth of this grating, were two old ladies in a condition of feeble

dignity, which was surely the very last and lowest reduction of selfcomplacency to be found in this

wonderful humanity of ours. They were evidently jealous of each other, and passed their whole time (as some

people do, whose fires are not grated) in mentally disparaging each other, and contemptuously watching their

neighbours. One of these parodies on provincial gentlewomen was extremely talkative, and expressed a

strong desire to attend the service on Sundays, from which she represented herself to have derived the

greatest interest and consolation when allowed that privilege. She gossiped so well, and looked altogether so

cheery and harmless, that I began to think this a case for the Eastern magistrate, until I found that on the last

occasion of her attending chapel she had secreted a small stick, and had caused some confusion in the

So, these two old ladies, separated by the breadth of the grating otherwise they would fly at one another's

caps sat all day long, suspecting one another, and contemplating a world of fits. For everybody else in the

room had fits, except the wardswoman; an elderly, ablebodied pauperess, with a large upper lip, and an air

of repressing and saving her strength, as she stood with her hands folded before her, and her eyes slowly

rolling, biding her time for catching or holding somebody. This civil personage (in whom I regretted to

identify a reduced member of my honourable friend Mrs. Gamp's family) said, 'They has 'em continiwal, sir.

They drops without no more notice than if they was coachhorses dropped from the moon, sir. And when one

drops, another drops, and sometimes there'll be as many as four or five on 'em at once, dear me, a rolling and

She turned up this young woman's face with her hand as she said it. This young woman was seated on the

floor, pondering in the foreground of the afflicted. There was nothing repellent either in her face or head.

Many, apparently worse, varieties of epilepsy and hysteria were about her, but she was said to be the worst

here. When I had spoken to her a little, she still sat with her face turned up, pondering, and a gleam of the

Whether this young woman, and the rest of these so sorely troubled, as they sit or lie pondering in their

confused dull way, ever get mental glimpses among the motes in the sunlight, of healthy people and healthy

things? Whether this young woman, brooding like this in the summer season, ever thinks that somewhere

there are trees and flowers, even mountains and the great sea? Whether, not to go so far, this young woman

ever has any dim revelation of that young woman that young woman who is not here and never will come

here; who is courted, and caressed, and loved, and has a husband, and bears children, and lives in a home, and

who never knows what it is to have this lashing and tearing coming upon her? And whether this young

woman, God help her, gives herself up then and drops like a coachhorse from the moon?

I hardly knew whether the voices of infant children, penetrating into so hopeless a place, made a sound that

was pleasant or painful to me. It was something to be reminded that the weary world was not all aweary, and

was ever renewing itself; but, this young woman was a child not long ago, and a child not long hence might

be such as she. Howbeit, the active step and eye of the vigilant matron conducted me past the two provincial

gentlewomen (whose dignity was ruffled by the children), and into the adjacent nursery.

There were many babies here, and more than one handsome young mother. There were ugly young mothers

also, and sullen young mothers, and callous young mothers. But, the babies had not appropriated to

themselves any bad expression yet, and might have been, for anything that appeared to the contrary in their

soft faces, Princes Imperial, and Princesses Royal. I had the pleasure of giving a poetical commission to the

baker's man to make a cake with all despatch and toss it into the oven for one redheaded young pauper and

myself, and felt much the better for it. Without that refreshment, I doubt if I should have been in a condition

for 'the Refractories,' towards whom my quick little matron for whose adaptation to her office I had by this

time conceived a genuine respect drew me next, and marshalled me the way that I was going.

The Refractories were picking oakum, in a small room giving on a yard. They sat in line on a form, with their

backs to a window; before them, a table, and their work. The oldest Refractory was, say twenty; youngest

Refractory, say sixteen. I have never yet ascertained in the course of my uncommercial travels, why a

Refractory habit should affect the tonsils and uvula; but, I have always observed that Refractories of both

sexes and every grade, between a Ragged School and the Old Bailey, have one voice, in which the tonsils and

'Five pound indeed! I hain't a going fur to pick five pound,' said the Chief of the Refractories, keeping time to

herself with her head and chin. 'More than enough to pick what we picks now, in sich a place as this, and on

(This was in acknowledgment of a delicate intimation that the amount of work was likely to be increased. It

certainly was not heavy then, for one Refractory had already done her day's task it was barely two o'clock

'A pretty Ouse this is, matron, ain't it?' said Refractory Two, 'where a pleeseman's called in, if a gal says a

'And wen you're sent to prison for nothink or less!' said the Chief, tugging at her oakum as if it were the

matron's hair. 'But any place is better than this; that's one thing, and be thankful!'

A laugh of Refractories led by Oakum Head with folded arms who originated nothing, but who was in

'If any place is better than this,' said my brisk guide, in the calmest manner, 'it is a pity you left a good place

'Ho, no, I didn't, matron,' returned the Chief, with another pull at her oakum, and a very expressive look at the

'And I warn't a going,' exclaimed Refractory Two, 'though I was in one place for as long as four year I

warn't a going fur to stop in a place that warn't fit for me there! And where the family warn't 'spectable

characters there! And where I fortunately or hunfort'nately, found that the people warn't what they

pretended to make theirselves out to be there! And where it wasn't their faults, by chalks, if I warn't made

During this speech, Oakum Head had again made a diversion with the skirmishers, and had again withdrawn.

The Uncommercial Traveller ventured to remark that he supposed Chief Refractory and Number One, to be

'Yes!' said the Chief, 'we har! and the wonder is, that a pleeseman an't 'ad in now, and we took off agen. You

'I'm sure I'd be thankful,' protested the Chief, looking sideways at the Uncommercial, 'if I could be got into a

place, or got abroad. I'm sick and tired of this precious Ouse, I am, with reason.'

So would be, and so was, Number Two. So would be, and so was, Oakum Head. So would be, and so were,

The Uncommercial took the liberty of hinting that he hardly thought it probable that any lady or gentleman in

want of a likely young domestic of retiring manners, would be tempted into the engagement of either of the

'And I'm sure I'd be very thankful to be got into a place, or got abroad,' said the Chief.

Oakum Head then rose, and announced as an entirely new idea, the mention of which profound novelty might

be naturally expected to startle her unprepared hearers, that she would be very thankful to be got into a place,

or got abroad. And, as if she had then said, 'Chorus, ladies!' all the Skirmishers struck up to the same purpose.

We left them, thereupon, and began a long walk among the women who were simply old and infirm; but

whenever, in the course of this same walk, I looked out of any high window that commanded the yard, I saw

Oakum Head and all the other Refractories looking out at their low window for me, and never failing to catch

In ten minutes I had ceased to believe in such fables of a golden time as youth, the prime of life, or a hale old

age. In ten minutes, all the lights of womankind seemed to have been blown out, and nothing in that way to

And what was very curious, was, that these dim old women had one company notion which was the fashion

of the place. Every old woman who became aware of a visitor and was not in bed hobbled over a form into

her accustomed seat, and became one of a line of dim old women confronting another line of dim old women

across a narrow table. There was no obligation whatever upon them to range themselves in this way; it was

their manner of 'receiving.' As a rule, they made no attempt to talk to one another, or to look at the visitor, or

to look at anything, but sat silently working their mouths, like a sort of poor old Cows. In some of these

wards, it was good to see a few green plants; in others, an isolated Refractory acting as nurse, who did well

enough in that capacity, when separated from her compeers; every one of these wards, day room, night room,

or both combined, was scrupulously clean and fresh. I have seen as many such places as most travellers in my

Among the bedridden there was great patience, great reliance on the books under the pillow, great faith in

GOD. All cared for sympathy, but none much cared to be encouraged with hope of recovery; on the whole, I

should say, it was considered rather a distinction to have a complication of disorders, and to be in a worse

way than the rest. From some of the windows, the river could be seen with all its life and movement; the day

In one large ward, sitting by the fire in armchairs of distinction, like the President and Vice of the good

company, were two old women, upwards of ninety years of age. The younger of the two, just turned ninety,

was deaf, but not very, and could easily be made to hear. In her early time she had nursed a child, who was

now another old woman, more infirm than herself, inhabiting the very same chamber. She perfectly

understood this when the matron told it, and, with sundry nods and motions of her forefinger, pointed out the

woman in question. The elder of this pair, ninety three, seated before an illustrated newspaper (but not

reading it), was a brighteyed old soul, really not deaf, wonderfully preserved, and amazingly conversational.

She had not long lost her husband, and had been in that place little more than a year. At Boston, in the State

of Massachusetts, this poor creature would have been individually addressed, would have been tended in her

own room, and would have had her life gently assimilated to a comfortable life out of doors. Would that be

much to do in England for a woman who has kept herself out of a workhouse more than ninety rough long

years? When Britain first, at Heaven's command, arose, with a great deal of allegorical confusion, from out

the azure main, did her guardian angels positively forbid it in the Charter which has been so much besung?

The object of my journey was accomplished when the nimble matron had no more to show me. As I shook

hands with her at the gate, I told her that I thought justice had not used her very well, and that the wise men

Now, I reasoned with myself, as I made my journey home again, concerning those Foul wards. They ought

not to exist; no person of common decency and humanity can see them and doubt it. But what is this Union to

do? The necessary alteration would cost several thousands of pounds; it has already to support three

workhouses; its inhabitants work hard for their bare lives, and are already rated for the relief of the Poor to

the utmost extent of reasonable endurance. One poor parish in this very Union is rated to the amount of FIVE

AND SIXPENCE in the pound, at the very same time when the rich parish of Saint George's,

Hanoversquare, is rated at about SEVENPENCE in the pound, Paddington at about FOURPENCE, Saint

James's, Westminster, at about TENPENCE! It is only through the equalisation of Poor Rates that what is left

undone in this wise, can be done. Much more is left undone, or is illdone, than I have space to suggest in

these notes of a single uncommercial journey; but, the wise men of the East, before they can reasonably hold

forth about it, must look to the North and South and West; let them also, any morning before taking the seat

of Solomon, look into the shops and dwellings all around the Temple, and first ask themselves 'how much

more can these poor people many of whom keep themselves with difficulty enough out of the workhouse

I had yet other matter for reflection as I journeyed home, inasmuch as, before I altogether departed from the

neighbourhood of Mr. Baker's trap, I had knocked at the gate of the workhouse of St. George'sintheEast,

and had found it to be an establishment highly creditable to those parts, and thoroughly well administered by

a most intelligent master. I remarked in it, an instance of the collateral harm that obstinate vanity and folly

can do. 'This was the Hall where those old paupers, male and female, whom I had just seen, met for the

Church service, was it?' 'Yes.' 'Did they sing the Psalms to any instrument?' 'They would like to, very

much; they would have an extraordinary interest in doing so.' 'And could none be got?' 'Well, a piano

could even have been got for nothing, but these unfortunate dissensions ' Ah! better, far better, my

Christian friend in the beautiful garment, to have let the singing boys alone, and left the multitude to sing for

themselves! You should know better than I, but I think I have read that they did so, once upon a time, and that

'when they had sung an hymn,' Some one (not in a beautiful garment) went up into the Mount of Olives.

It made my heart ache to think of this miserable trifling, in the streets of a city where every stone seemed to

call to me, as I walked along, 'Turn this way, man, and see what waits to be done!' So I decoyed myself into

another train of thought to ease my heart. But, I don't know that I did it, for I was so full of paupers, that it

was, after all, only a change to a single pauper, who took possession of my remembrance instead of a

'I beg your pardon, sir,' he had said, in a confidential manner, on another occasion, taking me aside; 'but I

'But, allow me, sir, to mention it, as between yourself and a man who has seen better days, sir. The master

and myself are both masons, sir, and I make him the sign continually; but, because I am in this unfortunate

As I shut the door of my lodging behind me, and came out into the streets at six on a drizzling Saturday

evening in the last past month of January, all that neighbourhood of Coventgarden looked very desolate. It

is so essentially a neighbourhood which has seen better days, that bad weather affects it sooner than another

place which has not come down in the World. In its present reduced condition it bears a thaw almost worse

than any place I know. It gets so dreadfully lowspirited when damp breaks forth. Those wonderful houses

about Drurylane Theatre, which in the palmy days of theatres were prosperous and longsettled places of

business, and which now change hands every week, but never change their character of being divided and

subdivided on the ground floor into mouldy dens of shops where an orange and halfadozen nuts, or a

pomatumpot, one cake of fancy soap, and a cigar box, are offered for sale and never sold, were most

ruefully contemplated that evening, by the statue of Shakespeare, with the raindrops coursing one another

down its innocent nose. Those inscrutable pigeonhole offices, with nothing in them (not so much as an

inkstand) but a model of a theatre before the curtain, where, in the Italian Opera season, tickets at reduced

prices are kept on sale by nomadic gentlemen in smeary hats too tall for them, whom one occasionally seems

to have seen on racecourses, not wholly unconnected with strips of cloth of various colours and a rolling

ball those Bedouin establishments, deserted by the tribe, and tenantless, except when sheltering in one

corner an irregular row of ginger beer bottles, which would have made one shudder on such a night, but for

its being plain that they had nothing in them, shrunk from the shrill cries of the newsboys at their Exchange

in the kennel of Catherinestreet, like guilty things upon a fearful summons. At the pipeshop in Great

Russellstreet, the Death'shead pipes were like theatrical memento mori, admonishing beholders of the

decline of the playhouse as an Institution. I walked up Bowstreet, disposed to be angry with the shops there,

that were letting out theatrical secrets by exhibiting to workaday humanity the stuff of which diadems and

robes of kings are made. I noticed that some shops which had once been in the dramatic line, and had

struggled out of it, were not getting on prosperously like some actors I have known, who took to business

and failed to make it answer. In a word, those streets looked so dull, and, considered as theatrical streets, so

broken and bankrupt, that the FOUND DEAD on the black board at the police station might have announced

the decease of the Drama, and the pools of water outside the fireengine maker's at the corner of Longacre

might have been occasioned by his having brought out the whole of his stock to play upon its last

And yet, on such a night in so degenerate a time, the object of my journey was theatrical. And yet within half

an hour I was in an immense theatre, capable of holding nearly five thousand people.

What Theatre? Her Majesty's? Far better. Royal Italian Opera? Far better. Infinitely superior to the latter for

hearing in; infinitely superior to both, for seeing in. To every part of this Theatre, spacious fireproof ways of

ingress and egress. For every part of it, convenient places of refreshment and retiring rooms. Everything to

eat and drink carefully supervised as to quality, and sold at an appointed price; respectable female attendants

ready for the commonest women in the audience; a general air of consideration, decorum, and supervision,

most commendable; an unquestionably humanising influence in all the social arrangements of the place.

Surely a dear Theatre, then? Because there were in London (not very long ago) Theatres with entranceprices

up to halfaguinea a head, whose arrangements were not half so civilised. Surely, therefore, a dear Theatre?

Not very dear. A gallery at three pence, another gallery at fourpence, a pit at sixpence, boxes and pitstalls

My uncommercial curiosity induced me to go into every nook of this great place, and among every class of

the audience assembled in it amounting that evening, as I calculated, to about two thousand and odd

hundreds. Magnificently lighted by a firmament of sparkling chandeliers, the building was ventilated to

perfection. My sense of smell, without being particularly delicate, has been so offended in some of the

commoner places of public resort, that I have often been obliged to leave them when I have made an

uncommercial journey expressly to look on. The air of this Theatre was fresh, cool, and wholesome. To help

towards this end, very sensible precautions had been used, ingeniously combining the experience of hospitals

and railway stations. Asphalt pavements substituted for wooden floors, honest bare walls of glazed brick and

tile even at the back of the boxes for plaster and paper, no benches stuffed, and no carpeting or baize

used; a cool material with a light glazed surface, being the covering of the seats.

These various contrivances are as well considered in the place in question as if it were a Fever Hospital; the

result is, that it is sweet and healthful. It has been constructed from the ground to the roof, with a careful

reference to sight and sound in every corner; the result is, that its form is beautiful, and that the appearance of

the audience, as seen from the proscenium with every face in it commanding the stage, and the whole so

admirably raked and turned to that centre, that a hand can scarcely move in the great assemblage without the

movement being seen from thence is highly remarkable in its union of vastness with compactness. The

stage itself, and all its appurtenances of machinery, cellarage, height and breadth, are on a scale more like the

Scala at Milan, or the San Carlo at Naples, or the Grand Opera at Paris, than any notion a stranger would be

likely to form of the Britannia Theatre at Hoxton, a mile north of St. Luke's Hospital in the Old streetroad,

London. The Forty Thieves might be played here, and every thief ride his real horse, and the disguised

captain bring in his oil jars on a train of real camels, and nobody be put out of the way. This really

extraordinary place is the achievement of one man's enterprise, and was erected on the ruins of an

inconvenient old building in less than five months, at a round cost of fiveand twenty thousand pounds. To

dismiss this part of my subject, and still to render to the proprietor the credit that is strictly his due, I must add

that his sense of the responsibility upon him to make the best of his audience, and to do his best for them, is a

As the spectators at this theatre, for a reason I will presently show, were the object of my journey, I entered

on the play of the night as one of the two thousand and odd hundreds, by looking about me at my neighbours.

We were a motley assemblage of people, and we had a good many boys and young men among us; we had

also many girls and young women. To represent, however, that we did not include a very great number, and a

very fair proportion of family groups, would be to make a gross misstatement. Such groups were to be seen

in all parts of the house; in the boxes and stalls particularly, they were composed of persons of very decent

appearance, who had many children with them. Among our dresses there were most kinds of shabby and

greasy wear, and much fustian and corduroy that was neither sound nor fragrant. The caps of our young men

were mostly of a limp character, and we who wore them, slouched, highshouldered, into our places with our

hands in our pockets, and occasionally twisted our cravats about our necks like eels, and occasionally tied

them down our breasts like links of sausages, and occasionally had a screw in our hair over each cheek bone

with a slight Thiefflavour in it. Besides prowlers and idlers, we were mechanics, docklabourers,

costermongers, petty tradesmen, small clerks, milliners, staymakers, shoebinders, slopworkers, poor

workers in a hundred highways and byways. Many of us on the whole, the majority were not at all clean,

and not at all choice in our lives or conversation. But we had all come together in a place where our

convenience was well consulted, and where we were well looked after, to enjoy an evening's entertainment in

common. We were not going to lose any part of what we had paid for through anybody's caprice, and as a

community we had a character to lose. So, we were closely attentive, and kept excellent order; and let the

man or boy who did otherwise instantly get out from this place, or we would put him out with the greatest

We began at halfpast six with a pantomime with a pantomime so long, that before it was over I felt as if I

had been travelling for six weeks going to India, say, by the Overland Mail. The Spirit of Liberty was the

principal personage in the Introduction, and the Four Quarters of the World came out of the globe, glittering,

and discoursed with the Spirit, who sang charmingly. We were delighted to understand that there was no

liberty anywhere but among ourselves, and we highly applauded the agreeable fact. In an allegorical way,

which did as well as any other way, we and the Spirit of Liberty got into a kingdom of Needles and Pins, and

found them at war with a potentate who called in to his aid their old arch enemy Rust, and who would have

got the better of them if the Spirit of Liberty had not in the nick of time transformed the leaders into Clown,

Pantaloon, Harlequin, Columbine, Harlequina, and a whole family of Sprites, consisting of a remarkably

stout father and three spineless sons. We all knew what was coming when the Spirit of Liberty addressed the

king with a big face, and His Majesty backed to the sidescenes and began untying himself behind, with his

big face all on one side. Our excitement at that crisis was great, and our delight unbounded. After this era in

our existence, we went through all the incidents of a pantomime; it was not by any means a savage

pantomime, in the way of burning or boiling people, or throwing them out of window, or cutting them up;

was often very droll; was always liberally got up, and cleverly presented. I noticed that the people who kept

the shops, and who represented the passengers in the thoroughfares, and so forth, had no conventionality in

them, but were unusually like the real thing from which I infer that you may take that audience in (if you

wish to) concerning Knights and Ladies, Fairies, Angels, or such like, but they are not to be done as to

anything in the streets. I noticed, also, that when two young men, dressed in exact imitation of the

eelandsausagecravated portion of the audience, were chased by policemen, and, finding themselves in

danger of being caught, dropped so suddenly as to oblige the policemen to tumble over them, there was great

rejoicing among the caps as though it were a delicate reference to something they had heard of before.

The Pantomime was succeeded by a MeloDrama. Throughout the evening I was pleased to observe Virtue

quite as triumphant as she usually is out of doors, and indeed I thought rather more so. We all agreed (for the

time) that honesty was the best policy, and we were as hard as iron upon Vice, and we wouldn't hear of

Between the pieces, we almost all of us went out and refreshed. Many of us went the length of drinking beer

at the bar of the neighbouring publichouse, some of us drank spirits, crowds of us had sandwiches and

gingerbeer at the refreshmentbars established for us in the Theatre. The sandwich as substantial as was

consistent with portability, and as cheap as possible we hailed as one of our greatest institutions. It forced

its way among us at all stages of the entertainment, and we were always delighted to see it; its adaptability to

the varying moods of our nature was surprising; we could never weep so comfortably as when our tears fell

on our sandwich; we could never laugh so heartily as when we choked with sandwich; Virtue never looked so

beautiful or Vice so deformed as when we paused, sandwich in hand, to consider what would come of that

resolution of Wickedness in boots, to sever Innocence in flowered chintz from Honest Industry in striped

stockings. When the curtain fell for the night, we still fell back upon sandwich, to help us through the rain

This, as I have mentioned, was Saturday night. Being Saturday night, I had accomplished but the half of my

uncommercial journey; for, its object was to compare the play on Saturday evening with the preaching in the

Therefore, at the same hour of halfpast six on the similarly damp and muddy Sunday evening, I returned to

this Theatre. I drove up to the entrance (fearful of being late, or I should have come on foot), and found

myself in a large crowd of people who, I am happy to state, were put into excellent spirits by my arrival.

Having nothing to look at but the mud and the closed doors, they looked at me, and highly enjoyed the comic

spectacle. My modesty inducing me to draw off, some hundreds of yards, into a dark corner, they at once

forgot me, and applied themselves to their former occupation of looking at the mud and looking in at the

closed doors: which, being of grated ironwork, allowed the lighted passage within to be seen. They were

chiefly people of respectable appearance, odd and impulsive as most crowds are, and making a joke of being

In the dark corner I might have sat a long while, but that a very obliging passerby informed me that the

Theatre was already full, and that the people whom I saw in the street were all shut out for want of room.

After that, I lost no time in worming myself into the building, and creeping to a place in a Proscenium box

There must have been full four thousand people present. Carefully estimating the pit alone, I could bring it

out as holding little less than fourteen hundred. Every part of the house was well filled, and I had not found it

easy to make my way along the back of the boxes to where I sat. The chandeliers in the ceiling were lighted;

there was no light on the stage; the orchestra was empty. The green curtain was down, and, packed pretty

closely on chairs on the small space of stage before it, were some thirty gentlemen, and two or three ladies. In

the centre of these, in a desk or pulpit covered with red baize, was the presiding minister. The kind of rostrum

he occupied will be very well understood, if I liken it to a boardedup fireplace turned towards the audience,

with a gentleman in a black surtout standing in the stove and leaning forward over the mantelpiece.

A portion of Scripture was being read when I went in. It was followed by a discourse, to which the

congregation listened with most exemplary attention and uninterrupted silence and decorum. My own

attention comprehended both the auditory and the speaker, and shall turn to both in this recalling of the scene,

'A very difficult thing,' I thought, when the discourse began, 'to speak appropriately to so large an audience,

and to speak with tact. Without it, better not to speak at all. Infinitely better, to read the New Testament well,

and to let THAT speak. In this congregation there is indubitably one pulse; but I doubt if any power short of

I could not possibly say to myself as the discourse proceeded, that the minister was a good speaker. I could

not possibly say to myself that he expressed an understanding of the general mind and character of his

audience. There was a supposititious workingman introduced into the homily, to make supposititious

objections to our Christian religion and be reasoned down, who was not only a very disagreeable person, but

remarkably unlike life very much more unlike it than anything I had seen in the pantomime. The native

independence of character this artisan was supposed to possess, was represented by a suggestion of a dialect

that I certainly never heard in my uncommercial travels, and with a coarse swing of voice and manner

anything but agreeable to his feelings, I should conceive, considered in the light of a portrait, and as far away

from the fact as a Chinese Tartar. There was a model pauper introduced in like manner, who appeared to me

to be the most intolerably arrogant pauper ever relieved, and to show himself in absolute want and dire

necessity of a course of Stone Yard. For, how did this pauper testify to his having received the gospel of

humility? A gentleman met him in the workhouse, and said (which I myself really thought goodnatured of

him), 'Ah, John? I am sorry to see you here. I am sorry to see you so poor.' 'Poor, sir!' replied that man,

drawing himself up, 'I am the son of a Prince! MY father is the King of Kings. MY father is the Lord of

Lords. MY father is the ruler of all the Princes of the Earth!' And this was what all the preacher's

fellowsinners might come to, if they would embrace this blessed book which I must say it did some

violence to my own feelings of reverence, to see held out at arm's length at frequent intervals and soundingly

slapped, like a slow lot at a sale. Now, could I help asking myself the question, whether the mechanic before

me, who must detect the preacher as being wrong about the visible manner of himself and the like of himself,

and about such a noisy lipserver as that pauper, might not, most unhappily for the usefulness of the

occasion, doubt that preacher's being right about things not visible to human senses?

Again. Is it necessary or advisable to address such an audience continually as 'fellowsinners'? Is it not

enough to be fellow creatures, born yesterday, suffering and striving today, dying to morrow? By our

common humanity, my brothers and sisters, by our common capacities for pain and pleasure, by our common

laughter and our common tears, by our common aspiration to reach something better than ourselves, by our

common tendency to believe in something good, and to invest whatever we love or whatever we lose with

some qualities that are superior to our own failings and weaknesses as we know them in our own poor hearts

by these, Hear me! Surely, it is enough to be fellowcreatures. Surely, it includes the other designation,

Again. There was a personage introduced into the discourse (not an absolute novelty, to the best of my

remembrance of my reading), who had been personally known to the preacher, and had been quite a Crichton

in all the ways of philosophy, but had been an infidel. Many a time had the preacher talked with him on that

subject, and many a time had he failed to convince that intelligent man. But he fell ill, and died, and before he

died he recorded his conversion in words which the preacher had taken down, my fellowsinners, and

would read to you from this piece of paper. I must confess that to me, as one of an uninstructed audience,

they did not appear particularly edifying. I thought their tone extremely selfish, and I thought they had a

spiritual vanity in them which was of the beforementioned refractory pauper's family.

All slangs and twangs are objectionable everywhere, but the slang and twang of the conventicle as bad in

its way as that of the House of Commons, and nothing worse can be said of it should be studiously avoided

under such circumstances as I describe. The avoidance was not complete on this occasion. Nor was it quite

agreeable to see the preacher addressing his pet 'points' to his backers on the stage, as if appealing to those

disciples to show him up, and testify to the multitude that each of those points was a clincher.

But, in respect of the large Christianity of his general tone; of his renunciation of all priestly authority; of his

earnest and reiterated assurance to the people that the commonest among them could work out their own

salvation if they would, by simply, lovingly, and dutifully following Our Saviour, and that they needed the

mediation of no erring man; in these particulars, this gentleman deserved all praise. Nothing could be better

than the spirit, or the plain emphatic words of his discourse in these respects. And it was a most significant

and encouraging circumstance that whenever he struck that chord, or whenever he described anything which

Christ himself had done, the array of faces before him was very much more earnest, and very much more

And now, I am brought to the fact, that the lowest part of the audience of the previous night, WAS NOT

THERE. There is no doubt about it. There was no such thing in that building, that Sunday evening. I have

been told since, that the lowest part of the audience of the Victoria Theatre has been attracted to its Sunday

services. I have been very glad to hear it, but on this occasion of which I write, the lowest part of the usual

audience of the Britannia Theatre, decidedly and unquestionably stayed away. When I first took my seat and

looked at the house, my surprise at the change in its occupants was as great as my disappointment. To the

most respectable class of the previous evening, was added a great number of respectable strangers attracted

by curiosity, and drafts from the regular congregations of various chapels. It was impossible to fail in

identifying the character of these last, and they were very numerous. I came out in a strong, slow tide of them

setting from the boxes. Indeed, while the discourse was in progress, the respectable character of the auditory

was so manifest in their appearance, that when the minister addressed a supposititious 'outcast,' one really felt

a little impatient of it, as a figure of speech not justified by anything the eye could discover.

The time appointed for the conclusion of the proceedings was eight o'clock. The address having lasted until

full that time, and it being the custom to conclude with a hymn, the preacher intimated in a few sensible

words that the clock had struck the hour, and that those who desired to go before the hymn was sung, could

go now, without giving offence. No one stirred. The hymn was then sung, in good time and tune and unison,

and its effect was very striking. A comprehensive benevolent prayer dismissed the throng, and in seven or

That these Sunday meetings in Theatres are good things, I do not doubt. Nor do I doubt that they will work

lower and lower down in the social scale, if those who preside over them will be very careful on two heads:

firstly, not to disparage the places in which they speak, or the intelligence of their hearers; secondly, not to set

themselves in antagonism to the natural inborn desire of the mass of mankind to recreate themselves and to

There is a third head, taking precedence of all others, to which my remarks on the discourse I heard, have

tended. In the New Testament there is the most beautiful and affecting history conceivable by man, and there

are the terse models for all prayer and for all preaching. As to the models, imitate them, Sunday preachers

else why are they there, consider? As to the history, tell it. Some people cannot read, some people will not

read, many people (this especially holds among the young and ignorant) find it hard to pursue the verseform

in which the book is presented to them, and imagine that those breaks imply gaps and want of continuity.

Help them over that first stumblingblock, by setting forth the history in narrative, with no fear of exhausting

it. You will never preach so well, you will never move them so profoundly, you will never send them away

with half so much to think of. Which is the better interest: Christ's choice of twelve poor men to help in those

merciful wonders among the poor and rejected; or the pious bullying of a whole Unionfull of paupers? What

is your changed philosopher to wretched me, peeping in at the door out of the mud of the streets and of my

life, when you have the widow's son to tell me about, the ruler's daughter, the other figure at the door when

the brother of the two sisters was dead, and one of the two ran to the mourner, crying, 'The Master is come

and calleth for thee'? Let the preacher who will thoroughly forget himself and remember no individuality

but one, and no eloquence but one, stand up before four thousand men and women at the Britannia Theatre

any Sunday night, recounting that narrative to them as fellow creatures, and he shall see a sight!

Is the sweet little cherub who sits smiling aloft and keeps watch on life of poor Jack, commissioned to take

charge of Mercantile Jack, as well as Jack of the national navy? If not, who is? What is the cherub about, and

Mercantile Jack is having his brains slowly knocked out by penny weights, aboard the brig Beelzebub, or

the barque Bowieknife when he looks his last at that infernal craft, with the first officer's iron bootheel in

his remaining eye, or with his dying body towed overboard in the ship's wake, while the cruel wounds in it do

Is it unreasonable to entertain a belief that if, aboard the brig Beelzebub or the barque Bowieknife, the first

officer did half the damage to cotton that he does to men, there would presently arise from both sides of the

Atlantic so vociferous an invocation of the sweet little cherub who sits calculating aloft, keeping watch on the

markets that pay, that such vigilant cherub would, with a winged sword, have that gallant officer's organ of

If it be unreasonable, then am I the most unreasonable of men, for I believe it with all my soul.

This was my thought as I walked the dockquays at Liverpool, keeping watch on poor Mercantile Jack. Alas

for me! I have long outgrown the state of sweet little cherub; but there I was, and there Mercantile Jack was,

and very busy he was, and very cold he was: the snow yet lying in the frozen furrows of the land, and the

northeast winds snipping off the tops of the little waves in the Mersey, and rolling them into hailstones to

pelt him with. Mercantile Jack was hard at it, in the hard weather: as he mostly is in all weathers, poor Jack.

He was girded to ships' masts and funnels of steamers, like a forester to a great oak, scraping and painting; he

was lying out on yards, furling sails that tried to beat him off; he was dimly discernible up in a world of giant

cobwebs, reefing and splicing; he was faintly audible down in holds, stowing and unshipping cargo; he was

winding round and round at capstans melodious, monotonous, and drunk; he was of a diabolical aspect, with

coaling for the Antipodes; he was washing decks barefoot, with the breast of his red shirt open to the blast,

though it was sharper than the knife in his leathern girdle; he was looking over bulwarks, all eyes and hair; he

was standing by at the shoot of the Cunard steamer, off tomorrow, as the stocks in trade of several butchers,

poulterers, and fishmongers, poured down into the icehouse; he was coming aboard of other vessels, with

his kit in a tarpaulin bag, attended by plunderers to the very last moment of his shoregoing existence. As

though his senses, when released from the uproar of the elements, were under obligation to be confused by

other turmoil, there was a rattling of wheels, a clattering of hoofs, a clashing of iron, a jolting of cotton and

hides and casks and timber, an incessant deafening disturbance on the quays, that was the very madness of

sound. And as, in the midst of it, he stood swaying about, with his hair blown all manner of wild ways, rather

crazedly taking leave of his plunderers, all the rigging in the docks was shrill in the wind, and every little

steamer coming and going across the Mersey was sharp in its blowing off, and every buoy in the river bobbed

spitefully up and down, as if there were a general taunting chorus of 'Come along, Mercantile Jack!

Illlodged, illfed, illused, hocussed, entrapped, anticipated, cleaned out. Come along, Poor Mercantile

The uncommercial transaction which had brought me and Jack together, was this: I had entered the

Liverpool police force, that I might have a look at the various unlawful traps which are every night set for

Jack. As my term of service in that distinguished corps was short, and as my personal bias in the capacity of

one of its members has ceased, no suspicion will attach to my evidence that it is an admirable force. Besides

that it is composed, without favour, of the best men that can be picked, it is directed by an unusual

intelligence. Its organisation against Fires, I take to be much better than the metropolitan system, and in all

respects it tempers its remarkable vigilance with a still more remarkable discretion.

Jack had knocked off work in the docks some hours, and I had taken, for purposes of identification, a

photographlikeness of a thief, in the portraitroom at our head police office (on the whole, he seemed rather

complimented by the proceeding), and I had been on police parade, and the small hand of the clock was

moving on to ten, when I took up my lantern to follow Mr. Superintendent to the traps that were set for Jack.

In Mr. Superintendent I saw, as anybody might, a tall, welllooking, wellsetup man of a soldierly bearing,

with a cavalry air, a good chest, and a resolute but not by any means ungentle face. He carried in his hand a

plain black walkingstick of hard wood; and whenever and wherever, at any aftertime of the night, he

struck it on the pavement with a ringing sound, it instantly produced a whistle out of the darkness, and a

policeman. To this remarkable stick, I refer an air of mystery and magic which pervaded the whole of my

We began by diving into the obscurest streets and lanes of the port. Suddenly pausing in a flow of cheerful

discourse, before a dead wall, apparently some ten miles long, Mr. Superintendent struck upon the ground,

and the wall opened and shot out, with military salute of hand to temple, two policemen not in the least

So, Sharpeye went before, and Mr. Superintendent and I went next, and Trampfoot and Quickear marched as

rearguard. Sharpeye, I soon had occasion to remark, had a skilful and quite professional way of opening

doors touched latches delicately, as if they were keys of musical instruments opened every door he

touched, as if he were perfectly confident that there was stolen property behind it instantly insinuated

Sharpeye opened several doors of traps that were set for Jack, but Jack did not happen to be in any of them.

They were all such miserable places that really, Jack, if I were you, I would give them a wider berth. In every

trap, somebody was sitting over a fire, waiting for Jack. Now, it was a crouching old woman, like the picture

of the Norwood Gipsy in the old sixpenny dreambooks; now, it was a crimp of the male sex, in a checked

shirt and without a coat, reading a newspaper; now, it was a man crimp and a woman crimp, who always

introduced themselves as united in holy matrimony; now, it was Jack's delight, his (un)lovely Nan; but they

'Who have you got upstairs here?' says Sharpeye, generally. (In the Moveon tone.)

'What do you mean by nobody? Didn't I hear a woman's step go up stairs when my hand was on the latch?'

'Ah! sure thin you're right, surr, I forgot her! 'Tis on'y Betsy White, surr. Ah! you know Betsy, surr. Come

Generally, Betsy looks over the banisters (the steep staircase is in the room) with a forcible expression in her

protesting face, of an intention to compensate herself for the present trial by grinding Jack finer than usual

when he does come. Generally, Sharpeye turns to Mr. Superintendent, and says, as if the subjects of his

'One of the worst, sir, this house is. This woman has been indicted three times. This man's a regular bad one

'Never had sitch a name as Pegg near me back, thin, since I was in this house, bee the good Lard!' says the

Generally, the man says nothing at all, but becomes exceedingly roundshouldered, and pretends to read his

paper with rapt attention. Generally, Sharpeye directs our observation with a look, to the prints and pictures

that are invariably numerous on the walls. Always, Trampfoot and Quickear are taking notice on the

doorstep. In default of Sharpeye being acquainted with the exact individuality of any gentleman encountered,

one of these two is sure to proclaim from the outer air, like a gruff spectre, that Jackson is not Jackson, but

knows himself to be Fogle; or that Canlon is Walker's brother, against whom there was not sufficient

evidence; or that the man who says he never was at sea since he was a boy, came ashore from a voyage last

Thursday, or sails tomorrow morning. 'And that is a bad class of man, you see,' says Mr. Superintendent,

when he got out into the dark again, 'and very difficult to deal with, who, when he has made this place too hot

to hold him, enters himself for a voyage as steward or cook, and is out of knowledge for months, and then

When we had gone into many such houses, and had come out (always leaving everybody relapsing into

waiting for Jack), we started off to a singinghouse where Jack was expected to muster strong.

The vocalisation was taking place in a long low room upstairs; at one end, an orchestra of two performers,

and a small platform; across the room, a series of open pews for Jack, with an aisle down the middle; at the

other end a larger pew than the rest, entitled SNUG, and reserved for mates and similar good company. About

the room, some amazing coffeecoloured pictures varnished an inch deep, and some stuffed creatures in

cases; dotted among the audience, in Sung and out of Snug, the 'Professionals;' among them, the celebrated

comic favourite Mr. Banjo Bones, looking very hideous with his blackened face and limp sugarloaf hat;

beside him, sipping rumandwater, Mrs. Banjo Bones, in her natural colours a little heightened.

It was a Friday night, and Friday night was considered not a good night for Jack. At any rate, Jack did not

show in very great force even here, though the house was one to which he much resorts, and where a good

deal of money is taken. There was British Jack, a little maudlin and sleepy, lolling over his empty glass, as if

he were trying to read his fortune at the bottom; there was Loafing Jack of the Stars and Stripes, rather an

unpromising customer, with his long nose, lank cheek, high cheekbones, and nothing soft about him but his

cabbageleaf hat; there was Spanish Jack, with curls of black hair, rings in his ears, and a knife not far from

his hand, if you got into trouble with him; there were Maltese Jack, and Jack of Sweden, and Jack the Finn,

looming through the smoke of their pipes, and turning faces that looked as if they were carved out of dark

wood, towards the young lady dancing the hornpipe: who found the platform so exceedingly small for it, that

I had a nervous expectation of seeing her, in the backward steps, disappear through the window. Still, if all

hands had been got together, they would not have more than halffilled the room. Observe, however, said

Mr. Licensed Victualler, the host, that it was Friday night, and, besides, it was getting on for twelve, and Jack

had gone aboard. A sharp and watchful man, Mr. Licensed Victualler, the host, with tight lips and a complete

edition of Cocker's arithmetic in each eye. Attended to his business himself, he said. Always on the spot.

When he heard of talent, trusted nobody's account of it, but went off by rail to see it. If true talent, engaged it.

Pounds a week for talent four pound five pound. Banjo Bones was undoubted talent. Hear this instrument

that was going to play it was real talent! In truth it was very good; a kind of piano accordion, played by a

young girl of a delicate prettiness of face, figure, and dress, that made the audience look coarser. She sang to

the instrument, too; first, a song about village bells, and how they chimed; then a song about how I went to

sea; winding up with an imitation of the bagpipes, which Mercantile Jack seemed to understand much the

best. A good girl, said Mr. Licensed Victualler. Kept herself select. Sat in Snug, not listening to the

blandishments of Mates. Lived with mother. Father dead. Once a merchant well to do, but overspeculated

himself. On delicate inquiry as to salary paid for item of talent under consideration, Mr. Victualler's pounds

dropped suddenly to shillings still it was a very comfortable thing for a young person like that, you know;

she only went on six times a night, and was only required to be there from six at night to twelve. What was

more conclusive was, Mr. Victualler's assurance that he 'never allowed any language, and never suffered any

disturbance.' Sharpeye confirmed the statement, and the order that prevailed was the best proof of it that

could have been cited. So, I came to the conclusion that poor Mercantile Jack might do (as I am afraid he

does) much worse than trust himself to Mr. Victualler, and pass his evenings here.

But we had not yet looked, Mr. Superintendent said Trampfoot, receiving us in the street again with

military salute for Dark Jack. True, Trampfoot. Ring the wonderful stick, rub the wonderful lantern, and

There was no disappointment in the matter of Dark Jack; HE was producible. The Genii set us down in the

little first floor of a little publichouse, and there, in a stiflingly close atmosphere, were Dark Jack, and Dark

Jack's delight, his WHITE unlovely Nan, sitting against the wall all round the room. More than that: Dark

Jack's delight was the least unlovely Nan, both morally and physically, that I saw that night.

As a fiddle and tambourine band were sitting among the company, Quickear suggested why not strike up?

'Ah, la'ads!' said a negro sitting by the door, 'gib the jebblem a darnse. Tak' yah pardlers, jebblem, for 'um

This was the landlord, in a Greek cap, and a dress half Greek and half English. As master of the ceremonies,

he called all the figures, and occasionally addressed himself parenthetically after this manner. When he was

'Now den! Hoy! ONE. Right and left. (Put a steam on, gib 'um powder.) LAdies' chail. BALloon say.

Lemonade! TWO. AD warnse and go back (gib 'ell a breakdown, shake it out o' yerselbs, keep a movil).

SWINGcorners, BALloon say, and Lemonade! (Hoy!) THREE. GENT come for'ard with a lady and go

back, hoppersite come for'ard and do what yer can. (Aeiohoy!) BALloon say, and leetle lemonade. (Dat hair

nigger by 'um fireplace 'hind a' time, shake it out o' yerselbs, gib 'ell a breakdown.) Now den! Hoy! FOUR!

Lemonade. BALloon say, and swing. FOUR ladies meet in 'um middle, FOUR gents goes round 'um ladies,

FOUR gents passes out under 'um ladies' arms, SWING and Lemonade till 'a moosic can't play no more!

The male dancers were all blacks, and one was an unusually powerful man of six feet three or four. The

sound of their flat feet on the floor was as unlike the sound of white feet as their faces were unlike white

faces. They toed and heeled, shuffled, double shuffled, doubledoubleshuffled, covered the buckle, and

beat the time out, rarely, dancing with a great show of teeth, and with a childish goodhumoured enjoyment

that was very prepossessing. They generally kept together, these poor fellows, said Mr. Superintendent,

because they were at a disadvantage singly, and liable to slights in the neighbouring streets. But, if I were

Light Jack, I should be very slow to interfere oppressively with Dark Jack, for, whenever I have had to do

with him I have found him a simple and a gentle fellow. Bearing this in mind, I asked his friendly permission

to leave him restoration of beer, in wishing him good night, and thus it fell out that the last words I heard him

say as I blundered down the worn stairs, were, 'Jebblem's elth! Ladies drinks fust!'

The night was now well on into the morning, but, for miles and hours we explored a strange world, where

nobody ever goes to bed, but everybody is eternally sitting up, waiting for Jack. This exploration was among

a labyrinth of dismal courts and blind alleys, called Entries, kept in wonderful order by the police, and in

much better order than by the corporation: the want of gaslight in the most dangerous and infamous of these

places being quite unworthy of so spirited a town. I need describe but two or three of the houses in which

Jack was waited for as specimens of the rest. Many we attained by noisome passages so profoundly dark that

we felt our way with our hands. Not one of the whole number we visited, was without its show of prints and

ornamental crockery; the quantity of the latter set forth on little shelves and in little cases, in otherwise

wretched rooms, indicating that Mercantile Jack must have an extraordinary fondness for crockery, to

Among such garniture, in one front parlour in the dead of the night, four women were sitting by a fire. One of

them had a male child in her arms. On a stool among them was a swarthy youth with a guitar, who had

'Pretty well, sir, and hope you gentlemen are going to treat us ladies, now you have come to see us.'

Trampfoot, outside, is heard to confide to himself, 'Meggisson's lot this is. And a bad 'un!'

'Well!' says Mr. Superintendent, laying his hand on the shoulder of the swarthy youth, 'and who's this?'

'And he don't know a word you say, not he; not if you was to talk to him till doomsday.' (Triumphantly, as if

'Oh, yes, if you like. Play something, Antonio. YOU ain't ashamed to play something; are you?'

The cracked guitar raises the feeblest ghost of a tune, and three of the women keep time to it with their heads,

and the fourth with the child. If Antonio has brought any money in with him, I am afraid he will never take it

out, and it even strikes me that his jacket and guitar may be in a bad way. But, the look of the young man and

the tinkling of the instrument so change the place in a moment to a leaf out of Don Quixote, that I wonder

I am bound to acknowledge (as it tends rather to my uncommercial confusion), that I occasioned a difficulty

in this establishment, by having taken the child in my arms. For, on my offering to restore it to a ferocious

joker not unstimulated by rum, who claimed to be its mother, that unnatural parent put her hands behind her,

and declined to accept it; backing into the fireplace, and very shrilly declaring, regardless of remonstrance

from her friends, that she knowed it to be Law, that whoever took a child from its mother of his own will, was

bound to stick to it. The uncommercial sense of being in a rather ridiculous position with the poor little child

beginning to be frightened, was relieved by my worthy friend and fellowconstable, Trampfoot; who, laying

hands on the article as if it were a Bottle, passed it on to the nearest woman, and bade her 'take hold of that.'

As we came out the Bottle was passed to the ferocious joker, and they all sat down as before, including

Antonio and the guitar. It was clear that there was no such thing as a nightcap to this baby's head, and that

even he never went to bed, but was always kept up and would grow up, kept up waiting for Jack.

Later still in the night, we came (by the court 'where the man was murdered,' and by the other court across the

street, into which his body was dragged) to another parlour in another Entry, where several people were

sitting round a fire in just the same way. It was a dirty and offensive place, with some ragged clothes drying

in it; but there was a high shelf over the entrancedoor (to be out of the reach of marauding hands, possibly)

'Well!' says Mr. Superintendent, with a comprehensive look all round. 'How do YOU do?'

'Not much to boast of, sir.' From the curtseying woman of the house. 'This is my good man, sir.'

Sharpeye (in the Moveon tone) puts in the pertinent inquiry, 'Then why ain't you?'

'Ain't got no one here, Mr. Sharpeye,' rejoin the woman and my good man together, 'but our own family.'

The woman takes time to count, under pretence of coughing, and adds, as one scant of breath, 'Seven, sir.'

The young man here, takes the reply upon himself, and shortly answers, 'Ain't got nothing to do.'

The young man here, is modestly brooding behind a damp apron pendent from a clothesline. As I glance at

him I become but I don't know why vaguely reminded of Woolwich, Chatham, Portsmouth, and Dover.

When we get out, my respected fellowconstable Sharpeye, addressing Mr. Superintendent, says:

Mr. Sharpeye further intimates that when we have done with his services, he will step back and take that

young man. Which in course of time he does: feeling at perfect ease about finding him, and knowing for a

Later still in the night, we came to another parlour up a step or two from the street, which was very cleanly,

neatly, even tastefully, kept, and in which, set forth on a draped chest of drawers masking the staircase, was

such a profusion of ornamental crockery, that it would have furnished forth a handsome salebooth at a fair.

It backed up a stout old lady HOGARTH drew her exact likeness more than once and a boy who was

Sweetly, she can assure the dear gentlemen, sweetly. Charmingly, charmingly. And overjoyed to see us!

'Why, this is a strange time for this boy to be writing his copy. In the middle of the night!'

'So it is, dear gentlemen, Heaven bless your welcome faces and send ye prosperous, but he has been to the

Play with a young friend for his diversion, and he combinates his improvement with entertainment, by doing

The copy admonished human nature to subjugate the fire of every fierce desire. One might have thought it

recommended stirring the fire, the old lady so approved it. There she sat, rosily beaming at the copybook

and the boy, and invoking showers of blessings on our heads, when we left her in the middle of the night,

Later still in the night, we came to a nauseous room with an earth floor, into which the refuse scum of an

alley trickled. The stench of this habitation was abominable; the seeming poverty of it, diseased and dire. Yet,

here again, was visitor or lodger a man sitting before the fire, like the rest of them elsewhere, and

apparently not distasteful to the mistress's niece, who was also before the fire. The mistress herself had the

Three weird old women of transcendent ghastliness, were at needlework at a table in this room. Says

'Bags to hold your money,' says the witch, shaking her head, and setting her teeth; 'you as has got it.'

She holds up a common cashbag, and on the table is a heap of such bags. Witch Two laughs at us. Witch

Three scowls at us. Witch sisterhood all, stitch, stitch. First Witch has a circle round each eye. I fancy it like

the beginning of the development of a perverted diabolical halo, and that when it spreads all round her head,

Trampfoot wishes to be informed what First Witch has got behind the table, down by the side of her, there?

She drags out a skinny little arm from a brown dustheap on the ground. Adjured not to disturb the child, she

lets it drop again. Thus we find at last that there is one child in the world of Entries who goes to bed if this

How long? First Witch repeats. Going to have supper presently. See the cups and saucers, and the plates.

'Late? Ay! But we has to 'arn our supper afore we eats it!' Both the other witches repeat this after First Witch,

and take the Uncommercial measurement with their eyes, as for a charmed winding sheet. Some grim

discourse ensues, referring to the mistress of the cave, who will be released from jail tomorrow. Witches

pronounce Trampfoot 'right there,' when he deems it a trying distance for the old lady to walk; she shall be

As I took a parting look at First Witch in turning away, the red marks round her eyes seemed to have already

grown larger, and she hungrily and thirstily looked out beyond me into the dark doorway, to see if Jack was

there. For, Jack came even here, and the mistress had got into jail through deluding Jack.

When I at last ended this night of travel and got to bed, I failed to keep my mind on comfortable thoughts of

Seaman's Homes (not overdone with strictness), and improved dock regulations giving Jack greater benefit of

fire and candle aboard ship, through my mind's wandering among the vermin I had seen. Afterwards the same

vermin ran all over my sleep. Evermore, when on a breezy day I see Poor Mercantile Jack running into port

with a fair wind under all sail, I shall think of the unsleeping host of devourers who never go to bed, and are

In the late high winds I was blown to a great many places and indeed, wind or no wind, I generally have

extensive transactions on hand in the article of Air but I have not been blown to any English place lately,

and I very seldom have blown to any English place in my life, where I could get anything good to eat and

This is a curious thing to consider. But before (stimulated by my own experiences and the representations of

many fellowtravellers of every uncommercial and commercial degree) I consider it further, I must utter a

I wonder why metropolitan gales always blow so hard at Walworth. I cannot imagine what Walworth has

done, to bring such windy punishment upon itself, as I never fail to find recorded in the newspapers when the

wind has blown at all hard. Brixton seems to have something on its conscience; Peckham suffers more than a

virtuous Peckham might be supposed to deserve; the howling neighbourhood of Deptford figures largely in

the accounts of the ingenious gentlemen who are out in every wind that blows, and to whom it is an ill high

wind that blows no good; but, there can hardly be any Walworth left by this time. It must surely be blown

away. I have read of more chimneystacks and housecopings coming down with terrific smashes at

Walworth, and of more sacred edifices being nearly (not quite) blown out to sea from the same accursed

locality, than I have read of practised thieves with the appearance and manners of gentlemen a popular

phenomenon which never existed on earth out of fiction and a police report. Again: I wonder why people are

always blown into the Surrey Canal, and into no other piece of water! Why do people get up early and go out

in groups, to be blown into the Surrey Canal? Do they say to one another, 'Welcome death, so that we get into

the newspapers'? Even that would be an insufficient explanation, because even then they might sometimes

put themselves in the way of being blown into the Regent's Canal, instead of always saddling Surrey for the

field. Some nameless policeman, too, is constantly, on the slightest provocation, getting himself blown into

this same Surrey Canal. Will SIR RICHARD MAYNE see to it, and restrain that weakminded and

To resume the consideration of the curious question of Refreshment. I am a Briton, and, as such, I am aware

that I never will be a slave and yet I have latent suspicion that there must be some slavery of wrong custom

I travel by railroad. I start from home at seven or eight in the morning, after breakfasting hurriedly. What

with skimming over the open landscape, what with mining in the damp bowels of the earth, what with

banging, booming and shrieking the scores of miles away, I am hungry when I arrive at the 'Refreshment'

station where I am expected. Please to observe, expected. I have said, I am hungry; perhaps I might say, with

greater point and force, that I am to some extent exhausted, and that I need in the expressive French sense

of the word to be restored. What is provided for my restoration? The apartment that is to restore me is a

windtrap, cunningly set to inveigle all the draughts in that countryside, and to communicate a special

intensity and velocity to them as they rotate in two hurricanes: one, about my wretched head: one, about my

wretched legs. The training of the young ladies behind the counter who are to restore me, has been from their

infancy directed to the assumption of a defiant dramatic show that I am NOT expected. It is in vain for me to

represent to them by my humble and conciliatory manners, that I wish to be liberal. It is in vain for me to

represent to myself, for the encouragement of my sinking soul, that the young ladies have a pecuniary interest

in my arrival. Neither my reason nor my feelings can make head against the cold glazed glare of eye with

which I am assured that I am not expected, and not wanted. The solitary man among the bottles would

sometimes take pity on me, if he dared, but he is powerless against the rights and mights of Woman. (Of the

page I make no account, for, he is a boy, and therefore the natural enemy of Creation.) Chilling fast, in the

deadly tornadoes to which my upper and lower extremities are exposed, and subdued by the moral

disadvantage at which I stand, I turn my disconsolate eyes on the refreshments that are to restore me. I find

that I must either scald my throat by insanely ladling into it, against time and for no wager, brown hot water

stiffened with flour; or I must make myself flaky and sick with Banbury cake; or, I must stuff into my

delicate organisation, a currant pincushion which I know will swell into immeasurable dimensions when it

has got there; or, I must extort from an iron bound quarry, with a fork, as if I were farming an inhospitable

soil, some glutinous lumps of gristle and grease, called porkpie. While thus forlornly occupied, I find that

the depressing banquet on the table is, in every phase of its profoundly unsatisfactory character, so like the

banquet at the meanest and shabbiest of evening parties, that I begin to think I must have 'brought down' to

supper, the old lady unknown, blue with cold, who is setting her teeth on edge with a cool orange at my

elbow that the pastrycook who has compounded for the company on the lowest terms per head, is a

fraudulent bankrupt, redeeming his contract with the stale stock from his window that, for some

unexplained reason, the family giving the party have become my mortal foes, and have given it on purpose to

affront me. Or, I fancy that I am 'breaking up' again, at the evening conversazione at school, charged

twoandsixpence in the halfyear's bill; or breaking down again at that celebrated evening party given at

Mrs. Bogles's boardinghouse when I was a boarder there, on which occasion Mrs. Bogles was taken in

execution by a branch of the legal profession who got in as the harp, and was removed (with the keys and

subscribed capital) to a place of durance, half an hour prior to the commencement of the festivities.

Mr. Grazinglands, of the Midland Counties, came to London by railroad one morning last week, accompanied

by the amiable and fascinating Mrs. Grazinglands. Mr. G. is a gentleman of a comfortable property, and had a

little business to transact at the Bank of England, which required the concurrence and signature of Mrs. G.

Their business disposed of, Mr. and Mrs. Grazinglands viewed the Royal Exchange, and the exterior of St.

Paul's Cathedral. The spirits of Mrs. Grazinglands then gradually beginning to flag, Mr. Grazinglands (who is

the tenderest of husbands) remarked with sympathy, 'Arabella', my dear, 'fear you are faint.' Mrs.

Grazinglands replied, 'Alexander, I am rather faint; but don't mind me, I shall be better presently.' Touched

by the feminine meekness of this answer, Mr. Grazinglands looked in at a pastrycook's window, hesitating as

to the expediency of lunching at that establishment. He beheld nothing to eat, but butter in various forms,

slightly charged with jam, and languidly frizzling over tepid water. Two ancient turtleshells, on which was

inscribed the legend, 'SOUPS,' decorated a glass partition within, enclosing a stuffy alcove, from which a

ghastly mockery of a marriagebreakfast spread on a rickety table, warned the terrified traveller. An oblong

box of stale and broken pastry at reduced prices, mounted on a stool, ornamented the doorway; and two high

chairs that looked as if they were performing on stilts, embellished the counter. Over the whole, a young lady

presided, whose gloomy haughtiness as she surveyed the street, announced a deepseated grievance against

society, and an implacable determination to be avenged. From a beetlehaunted kitchen below this

institution, fumes arose, suggestive of a class of soup which Mr. Grazinglands knew, from painful

experience, enfeebles the mind, distends the stomach, forces itself into the complexion, and tries to ooze out

at the eyes. As he decided against entering, and turned away, Mrs. Grazinglands becoming perceptibly

weaker, repeated, 'I am rather faint, Alexander, but don't mind me.' Urged to new efforts by these words of

resignation, Mr. Grazinglands looked in at a cold and floury baker's shop, where utilitarian buns unrelieved

by a currant, consorted with hard biscuits, a stone filter of cold water, a hard pale clock, and a hard little old

woman with flaxen hair, of an undevelopedfarinaceous aspect, as if she had been fed upon seeds. He might

have entered even here, but for the timely remembrance coming upon him that Jairing's was but round the

Now, Jairing's being an hotel for families and gentlemen, in high repute among the midland counties, Mr.

Grazinglands plucked up a great spirit when he told Mrs. Grazinglands she should have a chop there. That

lady, likewise felt that she was going to see Life. Arriving on that gay and festive scene, they found the

second waiter, in a flabby undress, cleaning the windows of the empty coffeeroom; and the first waiter,

denuded of his white tie, making up his cruets behind the PostOffice Directory. The latter (who took them in

hand) was greatly put out by their patronage, and showed his mind to be troubled by a sense of the pressing

necessity of instantly smuggling Mrs. Grazinglands into the obscurest corner of the building. This slighted

lady (who is the pride of her division of the county) was immediately conveyed, by several dark passages,

and up and down several steps, into a penitential apartment at the back of the house, where five invalided old

plate warmers leaned up against one another under a discarded old melancholy sideboard, and where the

wintry leaves of all the diningtables in the house lay thick. Also, a sofa, of incomprehensible form regarded

from any sofane point of view, murmured 'Bed;' while an air of mingled fluffiness and heeltaps, added,

'Second Waiter's.' Secreted in this dismal hold, objects of a mysterious distrust and suspicion, Mr.

Grazinglands and his charming partner waited twenty minutes for the smoke (for it never came to a fire),

twentyfive minutes for the sherry, half an hour for the tablecloth, forty minutes for the knives and forks,

three quarters of an hour for the chops, and an hour for the potatoes. On settling the little bill which was

not much more than the day's pay of a Lieutenant in the navy Mr. Grazinglands took heart to remonstrate

against the general quality and cost of his reception. To whom the waiter replied, substantially, that Jairing's

made it a merit to have accepted him on any terms: 'for,' added the waiter (unmistakably coughing at Mrs.

Grazinglands, the pride of her division of the county), 'when indiwiduals is not staying in the 'Ouse, their

favours is not as a rule looked upon as making it worth Mr. Jairing's while; nor is it, indeed, a style of

business Mr. Jairing wishes.' Finally, Mr. and Mrs. Grazinglands passed out of Jairing's hotel for Families

and Gentlemen, in a state of the greatest depression, scorned by the bar; and did not recover their selfrespect

You are going off by railway, from any Terminus. You have twenty minutes for dinner, before you go. You

want your dinner, and like Dr. Johnson, Sir, you like to dine. You present to your mind, a picture of the

refreshmenttable at that terminus. The conventional shabby eveningparty supper accepted as the model

for all termini and all refreshment stations, because it is the last repast known to this state of existence of

which any human creature would partake, but in the direst extremity sickens your contemplation, and your

words are these: 'I cannot dine on stale spongecakes that turn to sand in the mouth. I cannot dine on shining

brown patties, composed of unknown animals within, and offering to my view the device of an indigestible

starfish in leaden piecrust without. I cannot dine on a sandwich that has long been pining under an

exhausted receiver. I cannot dine on barleysugar. I cannot dine on Toffee.' You repair to the nearest hotel,

It is a most astonishing fact that the waiter is very cold to you. Account for it how you may, smooth it over

how you will, you cannot deny that he is cold to you. He is not glad to see you, he does not want you, he

would much rather you hadn't come. He opposes to your flushed condition, an immovable composure. As if

this were not enough, another waiter, born, as it would seem, expressly to look at you in this passage of your

life, stands at a little distance, with his napkin under his arm and his hands folded, looking at you with all his

might. You impress on your waiter that you have ten minutes for dinner, and he proposes that you shall begin

with a bit of fish which will be ready in twenty. That proposal declined, he suggests as a neat originality

'a weal or mutton cutlet.' You close with either cutlet, any cutlet, anything. He goes, leisurely, behind a door

and calls down some unseen shaft. A ventriloquial dialogue ensues, tending finally to the effect that weal

only, is available on the spur of the moment. You anxiously call out, 'Veal, then!' Your waiter having settled

that point, returns to array your tablecloth, with a table napkin folded cockedhatwise (slowly, for

something out of window engages his eye), a white wineglass, a green wineglass, a blue finger glass, a

tumbler, and a powerful field battery of fourteen casters with nothing in them; or at all events which is

enough for your purpose with nothing in them that will come out. All this time, the other waiter looks at

you with an air of mental comparison and curiosity, now, as if it had occurred to him that you are rather

like his brother. Half your time gone, and nothing come but the jug of ale and the bread, you implore your

waiter to 'see after that cutlet, waiter; pray do!' He cannot go at once, for he is carrying in seventeen pounds

of American cheese for you to finish with, and a small Landed Estate of celery and watercresses. The other

waiter changes his leg, and takes a new view of you, doubtfully, now, as if he had rejected the resemblance to

his brother, and had begun to think you more like his aunt or his grandmother. Again you beseech your waiter

with pathetic indignation, to 'see after that cutlet!' He steps out to see after it, and byandby, when you are

going away without it, comes back with it. Even then, he will not take the sham silver cover off, without a

pause for a flourish, and a look at the musty cutlet as if he were surprised to see it which cannot possibly be

the case, he must have seen it so often before. A sort of fur has been produced upon its surface by the cook's

art, and in a sham silver vessel staggering on two feet instead of three, is a cutaneous kind of sauce of brown

pimples and pickled cucumber. You order the bill, but your waiter cannot bring your bill yet, because he is

bringing, instead, three flintyhearted potatoes and two grim head of broccoli, like the occasional ornaments

on area railings, badly boiled. You know that you will never come to this pass, any more than to the cheese

and celery, and you imperatively demand your bill; but, it takes time to get, even when gone for, because

your waiter has to communicate with a lady who lives behind a sash window in a corner, and who appears

to have to refer to several Ledgers before she can make it out as if you had been staying there a year. You

become distracted to get away, and the other waiter, once more changing his leg, still looks at you but

suspiciously, now, as if you had begun to remind him of the party who took the greatcoats last winter. Your

bill at last brought and paid, at the rate of sixpence a mouthful, your waiter reproachfully reminds you that

'attendance is not charged for a single meal,' and you have to search in all your pockets for sixpence more. He

has a worse opinion of you than ever, when you have given it to him, and lets you out into the street with the

air of one saying to himself, as you cannot again doubt he is, 'I hope we shall never see YOU here again!'

Or, take any other of the numerous travelling instances in which, with more time at your disposal, you are,

have been, or may be, equally ill served. Take the oldestablished Bull's Head with its oldestablished

knifeboxes on its oldestablished sideboards, its oldestablished flue under its oldestablished fourpost

bedsteads in its oldestablished airless rooms, its oldestablished frouziness upstairs and downstairs, its

oldestablished cookery, and its oldestablished principles of plunder. Count up your injuries, in its

sidedishes of ailing sweetbreads in white poultices, of apothecaries' powders in rice for curry, of pale stewed

bits of calf ineffectually relying for an adventitious interest on forcemeat balls. You have had experience of

the old established Bull's Head stringy fowls, with lower extremities like wooden legs, sticking up out of the

dish; of its cannibalic boiled mutton, gushing horribly among its capers, when carved; of its little dishes of

pastry roofs of spermaceti ointment, erected over half an apple or four gooseberries. Well for you if you

have yet forgotten the oldestablished Bull's Head fruity port: whose reputation was gained solely by the

oldestablished price the Bull's Head put upon it, and by the oldestablished air with which the Bull's Head

set the glasses and D'Oyleys on, and held that Liquid Gout to the threeandsixpenny waxcandle, as if its

We all know the new hotel near the station, where it is always gusty, going up the lane which is always

muddy, where we are sure to arrive at night, and where we make the gas start awfully when we open the front

door. We all know the flooring of the passages and staircases that is too new, and the walls that are too new,

and the house that is haunted by the ghost of mortar. We all know the doors that have cracked, and the

cracked shutters through which we get a glimpse of the disconsolate moon. We all know the new people, who

have come to keep the new hotel, and who wish they had never come, and who (inevitable result) wish WE

had never come. We all know how much too scant and smooth and bright the new furniture is, and how it has

never settled down, and cannot fit itself into right places, and will get into wrong places. We all know how

the gas, being lighted, shows maps of Damp upon the walls. We all know how the ghost of mortar passes into

our sandwich, stirs our negus, goes up to bed with us, ascends the pale bedroom chimney, and prevents the

smoke from following. We all know how a leg of our chair comes off at breakfast in the morning, and how

the dejected waiter attributes the accident to a general greenness pervading the establishment, and informs us,

in reply to a local inquiry, that he is thankful to say he is an entire stranger in that part of the country and is

We all know, on the other hand, the great station hotel belonging to the company of proprietors, which has

suddenly sprung up in the back outskirts of any place we like to name, and where we look out of our palatial

windows at little back yards and gardens, old summerhouses, fowlhouses, pigeontraps, and pigsties. We

all know this hotel in which we can get anything we want, after its kind, for money; but where nobody is glad

to see us, or sorry to see us, or minds (our bill paid) whether we come or go, or how, or when, or why, or

cares about us. We all know this hotel, where we have no individuality, but put ourselves into the general

post, as it were, and are sorted and disposed of according to our division. We all know that we can get on

very well indeed at such a place, but still not perfectly well; and this may be, because the place is largely

wholesale, and there is a lingering personal retail interest within us that asks to be satisfied.

To sum up. My uncommercial travelling has not yet brought me to the conclusion that we are close to

perfection in these matters. And just as I do not believe that the end of the world will ever be near at hand, so

long as any of the very tiresome and arrogant people who constantly predict that catastrophe are left in it, so,

I shall have small faith in the Hotel Millennium, while any of the uncomfortable superstitions I have glanced

I got into the travelling chariot it was of German make, roomy, heavy, and unvarnished I got into the

travelling chariot, pulled up the steps after me, shut myself in with a smart bang of the door, and gave the

Immediately, all that W. and S.W. division of London began to slide away at a pace so lively, that I was over

the river, and past the Old Kent Road, and out on Blackheath, and even ascending Shooter's Hill, before I had

I had two ample Imperials on the roof, other fitted storage for luggage in front, and other up behind; I had a

net for books overhead, great pockets to all the windows, a leathern pouch or two hung up for odds and ends,

and a reading lamp fixed in the back of the chariot, in case I should be benighted. I was amply provided in all

respects, and had no idea where I was going (which was delightful), except that I was going abroad.

So smooth was the old high road, and so fresh were the horses, and so fast went I, that it was midway

between Gravesend and Rochester, and the widening river was bearing the ships, white sailed or

I took him up in a moment, and we went on. Presently, the very queer small boy says, 'This is Gadshill we

'All about him,' said the very queer small boy. 'I am old (I am nine), and I read all sorts of books. But DO let

'Bless you, sir,' said the very queer small boy, 'when I was not more than half as old as nine, it used to be a

treat for me to be brought to look at it. And now, I am nine, I come by myself to look at it. And ever since I

can recollect, my father, seeing me so fond of it, has often said to me, "If you were to be very persevering and

were to work hard, you might some day come to live in it." Though that's impossible!' said the very queer

small boy, drawing a low breath, and now staring at the house out of window with all his might.

I was rather amazed to be told this by the very queer small boy; for that house happens to be MY house, and I

Well! I made no halt there, and I soon dropped the very queer small boy and went on. Over the road where

the old Romans used to march, over the road where the old Canterbury pilgrims used to go, over the road

where the travelling trains of the old imperious priests and princes used to jingle on horseback between the

continent and this Island through the mud and water, over the road where Shakespeare hummed to himself,

'Blow, blow, thou winter wind,' as he sat in the saddle at the gate of the inn yard noticing the carriers; all

among the cherry orchards, apple orchards, corn fields, and hopgardens; so went I, by Canterbury to

Dover. There, the sea was tumbling in, with deep sounds, after dark, and the revolving French light on Cape

Grinez was seen regularly bursting out and becoming obscured, as if the head of a gigantic light keeper in

an anxious state of mind were interposed every half minute, to look how it was burning.

Early in the morning I was on the deck of the steampacket, and we were aiming at the bar in the usual

intolerable manner, and the bar was aiming at us in the usual intolerable manner, and the bar got by far the

But, when I was clear of the Custom House on the other side, and when I began to make the dust fly on the

thirsty French roads, and when the twigsome trees by the wayside (which, I suppose, never will grow leafy,

for they never did) guarded here and there a dusty soldier, or field labourer, baking on a heap of broken

stones, sound asleep in a fiction of shade, I began to recover my travelling spirits. Coming upon the breaker

of the broken stones, in a hard, hot, shining hat, on which the sun played at a distance as on a burningglass, I

felt that now, indeed, I was in the dear old France of my affections. I should have known it, without the

wellremembered bottle of rough ordinary wine, the cold roast fowl, the loaf, and the pinch of salt, on which

I lunched with unspeakable satisfaction, from one of the stuffed pockets of the chariot.

I must have fallen asleep after lunch, for when a bright face looked in at the window, I started, and said:

Welcome the old French hill, with the old French lunatic (not in the most distant degree related to Sterne's

Maria) living in a thatched dogkennel halfway up, and flying out with his crutch and his big head and

extended nightcap, to be beforehand with the old men and women exhibiting crippled children, and with the

children exhibiting old men and women, ugly and blind, who always seemed by resurrectionary process to be

'It is well,' said I, scattering among them what small coin I had; 'here comes Louis, and I am quite roused

We journeyed on again, and I welcomed every new assurance that France stood where I had left it. There

were the postinghouses, with their archways, dirty stableyards, and clean postmasters' wives, bright

women of business, looking on at the puttingto of the horses; there were the postilions counting what money

they got, into their hats, and never making enough of it; there were the standard population of grey horses of

Flanders descent, invariably biting one another when they got a chance; there were the fleecy sheepskins,

looped on over their uniforms by the postilions, like bibbed aprons when it blew and rained; there were their

Jackboots, and their cracking whips; there were the cathedrals that I got out to see, as under some cruel

bondage, in no wise desiring to see them; there were the little towns that appeared to have no reason for being

towns, since most of their houses were to let and nobody could be induced to look at them, except the people

who couldn't let them and had nothing else to do but look at them all day. I lay a night upon the road and

enjoyed delectable cookery of potatoes, and some other sensible things, adoption of which at home would

inevitably be shown to be fraught with ruin, somehow or other, to that rickety national blessing, the British

farmer; and at last I was rattled, like a single pill in a box, over leagues of stones, until madly cracking,

plunging, and flourishing two grey tails about I made my triumphal entry into Paris.

At Paris, I took an upper apartment for a few days in one of the hotels of the Rue de Rivoli; my front

windows looking into the garden of the Tuileries (where the principal difference between the nursemaids and

the flowers seemed to be that the former were locomotive and the latter not): my back windows looking at all

the other back windows in the hotel, and deep down into a paved yard, where my German chariot had retired

under a tightfitting archway, to all appearance for life, and where bells rang all day without anybody's

minding them but certain chamberlains with feather brooms and green baize caps, who here and there leaned

out of some high window placidly looking down, and where neat waiters with trays on their left shoulders

Whenever I am at Paris, I am dragged by invisible force into the Morgue. I never want to go there, but am

always pulled there. One Christmas Day, when I would rather have been anywhere else, I was attracted in, to

see an old grey man lying all alone on his cold bed, with a tap of water turned on over his grey hair, and

running, drip, drip, drip, down his wretched face until it got to the corner of his mouth, where it took a turn,

and made him look sly. One New Year's Morning (by the same token, the sun was shining outside, and there

was a mountebank balancing a feather on his nose, within a yard of the gate), I was pulled in again to look at

a flaxenhaired boy of eighteen, with a heart hanging on his breast 'from his mother,' was engraven on it

who had come into the net across the river, with a bullet wound in his fair forehead and his hands cut with a

knife, but whence or how was a blank mystery. This time, I was forced into the same dread place, to see a

large dark man whose disfigurement by water was in a frightful manner comic, and whose expression was

that of a prizefighter who had closed his eyelids under a heavy blow, but was going immediately to open

them, shake his head, and 'come up smiling.' Oh what this large dark man cost me in that bright city!

It was very hot weather, and he was none the better for that, and I was much the worse. Indeed, a very neat

and pleasant little woman with the key of her lodging on her forefinger, who had been showing him to her

little girl while she and the child ate sweetmeats, observed monsieur looking poorly as we came out together,

and asked monsieur, with her wondering little eyebrows prettily raised, if there were anything the matter?

Faintly replying in the negative, monsieur crossed the road to a wineshop, got some brandy, and resolved to

The bath was crowded in the usual airy manner, by a male population in striped drawers of various gay

colours, who walked up and down arm in arm, drank coffee, smoked cigars, sat at little tables, conversed

politely with the damsels who dispensed the towels, and every now and then pitched themselves into the river

head foremost, and came out again to repeat this social routine. I made haste to participate in the water part of

the entertainments, and was in the full enjoyment of a delightful bath, when all in a moment I was seized with

I was out of the river, and dressing instantly. In the shock I had taken some water into my mouth, and it

turned me sick, for I fancied that the contamination of the creature was in it. I had got back to my cool

darkened room in the hotel, and was lying on a sofa there, before I began to reason with myself.

Of course, I knew perfectly well that the large dark creature was stone dead, and that I should no more come

upon him out of the place where I had seen him dead, than I should come upon the cathedral of NotreDame

in an entirely new situation. What troubled me was the picture of the creature; and that had so curiously and

strongly painted itself upon my brain, that I could not get rid of it until it was worn out.

I noticed the peculiarities of this possession, while it was a real discomfort to me. That very day, at dinner,

some morsel on my plate looked like a piece of him, and I was glad to get up and go out. Later in the evening,

I was walking along the Rue St. Honore, when I saw a bill at a public room there, announcing smallsword

exercise, broadsword exercise, wrestling, and other such feats. I went in, and some of the swordplay being

very skilful, remained. A specimen of our own national sport, The British Boaxe, was announced to be given

at the close of the evening. In an evil hour, I determined to wait for this Boaxe, as became a Briton. It was a

clumsy specimen (executed by two English grooms out of place), but one of the combatants, receiving a

straight right hander with the glove between his eyes, did exactly what the large dark creature in the Morgue

There was rather a sickly smell (not at all an unusual fragrance in Paris) in the little anteroom of my

apartment at the hotel. The large dark creature in the Morgue was by no direct experience associated with my

sense of smell, because, when I came to the knowledge of him, he lay behind a wall of thick plateglass as

good as a wall of steel or marble for that matter. Yet the whiff of the room never failed to reproduce him.

What was more curious, was the capriciousness with which his portrait seemed to light itself up in my mind,

elsewhere. I might be walking in the Palais Royal, lazily enjoying the shop windows, and might be regaling

myself with one of the readymade clothes shops that are set out there. My eyes, wandering over

impossiblewaisted dressinggowns and luminous waistcoats, would fall upon the master, or the shopman, or

even the very dummy at the door, and would suggest to me, 'Something like him!' and instantly I was

This would happen at the theatre, in the same manner. Often it would happen in the street, when I certainly

was not looking for the likeness, and when probably there was no likeness there. It was not because the

creature was dead that I was so haunted, because I know that I might have been (and I know it because I have

been) equally attended by the image of a living aversion. This lasted about a week. The picture did not fade

by degrees, in the sense that it became a whit less forcible and distinct, but in the sense that it obtruded itself

less and less frequently. The experience may be worth considering by some who have the care of children. It

would be difficult to overstate the intensity and accuracy of an intelligent child's observation. At that

impressible time of life, it must sometimes produce a fixed impression. If the fixed impression be of an object

terrible to the child, it will be (for want of reasoning upon) inseparable from great fear. Force the child at

such a time, be Spartan with it, send it into the dark against its will, leave it in a lonely bedroom against its

On a bright morning I rattled away from Paris, in the German chariot, and left the large dark creature behind

me for good. I ought to confess, though, that I had been drawn back to the Morgue, after he was put

underground, to look at his clothes, and that I found them frightfully like him particularly his boots.

However, I rattled away for Switzerland, looking forward and not backward, and so we parted company.

Welcome again, the long, long spell of France, with the queer country inns, full of vases of flowers and

clocks, in the dull little town, and with the little population not at all dull on the little Boulevard in the

evening, under the little trees! Welcome Monsieur the Cure, walking alone in the early morning a short way

out of the town, reading that eternal Breviary of yours, which surely might be almost read, without book, by

this time! Welcome Monsieur the Cure, later in the day, jolting through the highway dust (as if you had

already ascended to the cloudy region), in a very bigheaded cabriolet, with the dried mud of a dozen winters

on it. Welcome again Monsieur the Cure, as we exchange salutations; you, straightening your back to look at

the German chariot, while picking in your little village garden a vegetable or two for the day's soup: I,

looking out of the German chariot window in that delicious traveller's trance which knows no cares, no

yesterdays, no tomorrows, nothing but the passing objects and the passing scents and sounds! And so I

came, in due course of delight, to Strasbourg, where I passed a wet Sunday evening at a window, while an

How such a large house came to have only three people living in it, was its own affair. There were at least a

score of windows in its high roof alone; how many in its grotesque front, I soon gave up counting. The owner

was a shopkeeper, by name Straudenheim; by trade I couldn't make out what by trade, for he had forborne

At first, as I looked at Straudenheim's, through the steadily falling rain, I set him up in business in the

gooseliver line. But, inspection of Straudenheim, who became visible at a window on the second floor,

convinced me that there was something more precious than liver in the case. He wore a black velvet

skullcap, and looked usurious and rich. A largelipped, pearnosed old man, with white hair, and keen eyes,

though nearsighted. He was writing at a desk, was Straudenheim, and ever and again left off writing, put his

pen in his mouth, and went through actions with his right hand, like a man steadying piles of cash. Fivefranc

pieces, Straudenheim, or golden Napoleons? A jeweller, Straudenheim, a dealer in money, a diamond

Below Straudenheim, at a window on the first floor, sat his housekeeper far from young, but of a comely

presence, suggestive of a wellmatured foot and ankle. She was cheerily dressed, had a fan in her hand, and

wore large gold earrings and a large gold cross. She would have been out holidaymaking (as I settled it) but

for the pestilent rain. Strasbourg had given up holidaymaking for that once, as a bad job, because the rain

was jerking in gushes out of the old roofspouts, and running in a brook down the middle of the street. The

housekeeper, her arms folded on her bosom and her fan tapping her chin, was bright and smiling at her open

window, but otherwise Straudenheim's house front was very dreary. The housekeeper's was the only open

window in it; Straudenheim kept himself close, though it was a sultry evening when air is pleasant, and

though the rain had brought into the town that vague refreshing smell of grass which rain does bring in the

The dim appearance of a man at Straudenheim's shoulder, inspired me with a misgiving that somebody had

come to murder that flourishing merchant for the wealth with which I had handsomely endowed him: the

rather, as it was an excited man, lean and long of figure, and evidently stealthy of foot. But, he conferred with

Straudenheim instead of doing him a mortal injury, and then they both softly opened the other window of that

room which was immediately over the housekeeper's and tried to see her by looking down. And my

opinion of Straudenheim was much lowered when I saw that eminent citizen spit out of window, clearly with

The unconscious housekeeper fanned herself, tossed her head, and laughed. Though unconscious of

After leaning so far out of the window, that I confidently expected to see their heels tilt up, Straudenheim and

the lean man drew their heads in and shut the window. Presently, the house door secretly opened, and they

slowly and spitefully crept forth into the pouring rain. They were coming over to me (I thought) to demand

satisfaction for my looking at the housekeeper, when they plunged into a recess in the architecture under my

window and dragged out the puniest of little soldiers, begirt with the most innocent of little swords. The tall

glazed headdress of this warrior, Straudenheim instantly knocked off, and out of it fell two sugarsticks,

The warrior made no effort to recover his property or to pick up his shako, but looked with an expression of

attention at Straudenheim when he kicked him five times, and also at the lean man when HE kicked him five

times, and again at Straudenheim when he tore the breast of his (the warrior's) little coat open, and shook all

his ten fingers in his face, as if they were ten thousand. When these outrages had been committed,

Straudenheim and his man went into the house again and barred the door. A wonderful circumstance was,

that the housekeeper who saw it all (and who could have taken six such warriors to her buxom bosom at

once), only fanned herself and laughed as she had laughed before, and seemed to have no opinion about it,

But, the chief effect of the drama was the remarkable vengeance taken by the little warrior. Left alone in the

rain, he picked up his shako; put it on, all wet and dirty as it was; retired into a court, of which

Straudenheim's house formed the corner; wheeled about; and bringing his two forefingers close to the top of

his nose, rubbed them over one another, crosswise, in derision, defiance, and contempt of Straudenheim.

Although Straudenheim could not possibly be supposed to be conscious of this strange proceeding, it so

inflated and comforted the little warrior's soul, that twice he went away, and twice came back into the court to

repeat it, as though it must goad his enemy to madness. Not only that, but he afterwards came back with two

other small warriors, and they all three did it together. Not only that as I live to tell the tale! but just as it

was falling quite dark, the three came back, bringing with them a huge bearded Sapper, whom they moved,

by recital of the original wrong, to go through the same performance, with the same complete absence of all

possible knowledge of it on the part of Straudenheim. And then they all went away, arm in arm, singing.

I went away too, in the German chariot at sunrise, and rattled on, day after day, like one in a sweet dream;

with so many clear little bells on the harness of the horses, that the nursery rhyme about Banbury Cross and

the venerable lady who rode in state there, was always in my ears. And now I came to the land of wooden

houses, innocent cakes, thin butter soup, and spotless little inn bedrooms with a family likeness to Dairies.

And now the Swiss marksmen were for ever rifleshooting at marks across gorges, so exceedingly near my

ear, that I felt like a new Gesler in a Canton of Tells, and went in highlydeserved danger of my tyrannical

life. The prizes at these shootings, were watches, smart handkerchiefs, hats, spoons, and (above all) teatrays;

and at these contests I came upon a more than usually accomplished and amiable countryman of my own,

who had shot himself deaf in whole years of competition, and had won so many teatrays that he went about

In the mountaincountry into which I had now travelled, a yoke of oxen were sometimes hooked on before

the posthorses, and I went lumbering up, up, up, through mist and rain, with the roar of falling water for

change of music. Of a sudden, mist and rain would clear away, and I would come down into picturesque little

towns with gleaming spires and odd towers; and would stroll afoot into marketplaces in steep winding

streets, where a hundred women in bodices, sold eggs and honey, butter and fruit, and suckled their children

as they sat by their clean baskets, and had such enormous goitres (or glandular swellings in the throat) that it

became a science to know where the nurse ended and the child began. About this time, I deserted my German

chariot for the back of a mule (in colour and consistency so very like a dusty old hair trunk I once had at

school, that I half expected to see my initials in brassheaded nails on his backbone), and went up a thousand

rugged ways, and looked down at a thousand woods of fir and pine, and would on the whole have preferred

my mule's keeping a little nearer to the inside, and not usually travelling with a hoof or two over the precipice

though much consoled by explanation that this was to be attributed to his great sagacity, by reason of his

carrying broad loads of wood at other times, and not being clear but that I myself belonged to that station of

life, and required as much room as they. He brought me safely, in his own wise way, among the passes of the

Alps, and here I enjoyed a dozen climates a day; being now (like Don Quixote on the back of the wooden

horse) in the region of wind, now in the region of fire, now in the region of unmelting ice and snow. Here, I

passed over trembling domes of ice, beneath which the cataract was roaring; and here was received under

arches of icicles, of unspeakable beauty; and here the sweet air was so bracing and so light, that at

haltingtimes I rolled in the snow when I saw my mule do it, thinking that he must know best. At this part of

the journey we would come, at midday, into half an hour's thaw: when the rough mountain inn would be

found on an island of deep mud in a sea of snow, while the baiting strings of mules, and the carts full of casks

and bales, which had been in an Arctic condition a mile off, would steam again. By such ways and means, I

would come to the cluster of chalets where I had to turn out of the track to see the waterfall; and then, uttering

a howl like a young giant, on espying a traveller in other words, something to eat coming up the steep,

the idiot lying on the woodpile who sunned himself and nursed his goitre, would rouse the womanguide

within the hut, who would stream out hastily, throwing her child over one of her shoulders and her goitre over

the other, as she came along. I slept at religious houses, and bleak refuges of many kinds, on this journey, and

by the stove at night heard stories of travellers who had perished within call, in wreaths and drifts of snow.

One night the stove within, and the cold outside, awakened childish associations long forgotten, and I

dreamed I was in Russia the identical serf out of a picturebook I had, before I could read it for myself

and that I was going to be knouted by a noble personage in a fur cap, boots, and earrings, who, I think, must

Commend me to the beautiful waters among these mountains! Though I was not of their mind: they, being

inveterately bent on getting down into the level country, and I ardently desiring to linger where I was. What

desperate leaps they took, what dark abysses they plunged into, what rocks they wore away, what echoes they

invoked! In one part where I went, they were pressed into the service of carrying wood down, to be burnt

next winter, as costly fuel, in Italy. But, their fierce savage nature was not to be easily constrained, and they

fought with every limb of the wood; whirling it round and round, stripping its bark away, dashing it against

pointed corners, driving it out of the course, and roaring and flying at the peasants who steered it back again

from the bank with long stout poles. Alas! concurrent streams of time and water carried ME down fast, and I

came, on an exquisitely clear day, to the Lausanne shore of the Lake of Geneva, where I stood looking at the

bright blue water, the flushed white mountains opposite, and the boats at my feet with their furled

Mediterranean sails, showing like enormous magnifications of this goosequill pen that is now in my hand.

The sky became overcast without any notice; a wind very like the March east wind of England, blew across

I had merely shut myself, for half a minute, in a German travelling chariot that stood for sale in the Carriage

Department of the London Pantechnicon. I had a commission to buy it, for a friend who was going abroad;

and the look and manner of the chariot, as I tried the cushions and the springs, brought all these hints of

'It will do very well,' said I, rather sorrowfully, as I got out at the other door, and shut the carriage up.

I travel constantly, up and down a certain line of railway that has a terminus in London. It is the railway for a

large military depot, and for other large barracks. To the best of my serious belief, I have never been on that

It is in the nature of things that such an institution as our English army should have many bad and

troublesome characters in it. But, this is a reason for, and not against, its being made as acceptable as possible

to welldisposed men of decent behaviour. Such men are assuredly not tempted into the ranks, by the beastly

inversion of natural laws, and the compulsion to live in worse than swinish foulness. Accordingly, when any

such Circumlocutional embellishments of the soldier's condition have of late been brought to notice, we

civilians, seated in outer darkness cheerfully meditating on an Income Tax, have considered the matter as

being our business, and have shown a tendency to declare that we would rather not have it misregulated, if

such declaration may, without violence to the Church Catechism, be hinted to those who are put in authority

Any animated description of a modern battle, any private soldier's letter published in the newspapers, any

page of the records of the Victoria Cross, will show that in the ranks of the army, there exists under all

disadvantages as fine a sense of duty as is to be found in any station on earth. Who doubts that if we all did

our duty as faithfully as the soldier does his, this world would be a better place? There may be greater

difficulties in our way than in the soldier's. Not disputed. But, let us at least do our duty towards HIM.

I had got back again to that rich and beautiful port where I had looked after Mercantile Jack, and I was

walking up a hill there, on a wild March morning. My conversation with my official friend Pangloss, by

whom I was accidentally accompanied, took this direction as we took the uphill direction, because the

object of my uncommercial journey was to see some discharged soldiers who had recently come home from

India. There were men of HAVELOCK's among them; there were men who had been in many of the great

battles of the great Indian campaign, among them; and I was curious to note what our discharged soldiers

I was not the less interested (as I mentioned to my official friend Pangloss) because these men had claimed to

be discharged, when their right to be discharged was not admitted. They had behaved with unblemished

fidelity and bravery; but, a change of circumstances had arisen, which, as they considered, put an end to their

compact and entitled them to enter on a new one. Their demand had been blunderingly resisted by the

authorities in India: but, it is to be presumed that the men were not far wrong, inasmuch as the bungle had

ended in their being sent home discharged, in pursuance of orders from home. (There was an immense waste

Under these circumstances thought I, as I walked up the hill, on which I accidentally encountered my

official friend under these circumstances of the men having successfully opposed themselves to the Pagoda

Department of that great Circumlocution Office on which the sun never sets and the light of reason never

rises, the Pagoda Department will have been particularly careful of the national honour. It will have shown

these men, in the scrupulous good faith, not to say the generosity, of its dealing with them, that great national

authorities can have no small retaliations and revenges. It will have made every provision for their health on

the passage home, and will have landed them, restored from their campaigning fatigues by a seavoyage,

pure air, sound food, and good medicines. And I pleased myself with dwelling beforehand, on the great

accounts of their personal treatment which these men would carry into their various towns and villages, and

on the increasing popularity of the service that would insensibly follow. I almost began to hope that the

hithertoneverfailing deserters on my railroad would byandby become a phenomenon.

In this agreeable frame of mind I entered the workhouse of Liverpool. For, the cultivation of laurels in a

Before going into their wards to visit them, I inquired how they had made their triumphant entry there? They

had been brought through the rain in carts it seemed, from the landingplace to the gate, and had then been

carried upstairs on the backs of paupers. Their groans and pains during the performance of this glorious

pageant, had been so distressing, as to bring tears into the eyes of spectators but too well accustomed to

scenes of suffering. The men were so dreadfully cold, that those who could get near the fires were hard to be

restrained from thrusting their feet in among the blazing coals. They were so horribly reduced, that they were

awful to look upon. Racked with dysentery and blackened with scurvy, one hundred and forty wretched

My official friend Pangloss is lineally descended from a learned doctor of that name, who was once tutor to

Candide, an ingenious young gentleman of some celebrity. In his personal character, he is as humane and

worthy a gentleman as any I know; in his official capacity, he unfortunately preaches the doctrines of his

renowned ancestor, by demonstrating on all occasions that we live in the best of all possible official worlds.

'In the name of Humanity,' said I, 'how did the men fall into this deplorable state? Was the ship well found in

'I am not here to asseverate that I know the fact, of my own knowledge,' answered Pangloss, 'but I have

A medical officer laid before us, a handful of rotten biscuit, and a handful of split peas. The biscuit was a

honeycombed heap of maggots, and the excrement of maggots. The peas were even harder than this filth. A

similar handful had been experimentally boiled six hours, and had shown no signs of softening. These were

But, behold, there was laid before us certain evidence given at the Coroner's Inquest, holden on some of the

men (who had obstinately died of their treatment), and from that evidence it appeared that the beef was the

'Then I lay my hand upon my heart, and take my stand,' said Pangloss, 'by the pork, which was the best of all

'But look at this food before our eyes, if one may so misuse the word,' said I. 'Would any Inspector who did

'There would certainly seem to have been something wrong somewhere,' said he; 'but I am prepared to prove

I never heard of any impeached public authority in my life, who was not the best public authority in

'We are told of these unfortunate men being laid low by scurvy,' said I. 'Since limejuice has been regularly

stored and served out in our navy, surely that disease, which used to devastate it, has almost disappeared?

My official friend was beginning 'the best of all possible ' when an inconvenient medical forefinger pointed

out another passage in the evidence, from which it appeared that the limejuice had been bad too. Not to

mention that the vinegar had been bad too, the vegetables bad too, the cooking accommodation insufficient

(if there had been anything worth mentioning to cook), the water supply exceedingly inadequate, and the beer

'Then the men,' said Pangloss, a little irritated, 'Were the worst of all possible men.'

But, again the same incorrigible medical forefinger pointed out another passage in the evidence, showing that

the dead men had been examined after death, and that they, at least, could not possibly have been habitual

drunkards, because the organs within them which must have shown traces of that habit, were perfectly sound.

'And besides,' said the three doctors present, 'one and all, habitual drunkards brought as low as these men

have been, could not recover under care and food, as the great majority of these men are recovering. They

'Reckless and improvident dogs, then,' said Pangloss. 'Always are nine times out of ten.'

I turned to the master of the workhouse, and asked him whether the men had any money?

'Money?' said he. 'I have in my iron safe, nearly four hundred pounds of theirs; the agents have nearly a

'Hah!' said I to myself, as we went upstairs, 'this is not the best of all possible stories, I doubt!'

We went into a large ward, containing some twenty or fiveand twenty beds. We went into several such

wards, one after another. I find it very difficult to indicate what a shocking sight I saw in them, without

frightening the reader from the perusal of these lines, and defeating my object of making it known.

O the sunken eyes that turned to me as I walked between the rows of beds, or worse still that glazedly

looked at the white ceiling, and saw nothing and cared for nothing! Here, lay the skeleton of a man, so lightly

covered with a thin unwholesome skin, that not a bone in the anatomy was clothed, and I could clasp the arm

above the elbow, in my finger and thumb. Here, lay a man with the black scurvy eating his legs away, his

gums gone, and his teeth all gaunt and bare. This bed was empty, because gangrene had set in, and the patient

had died but yesterday. That bed was a hopeless one, because its occupant was sinking fast, and could only be

roused to turn the poor pinched mask of face upon the pillow, with a feeble moan. The awful thinness of the

fallen cheeks, the awful brightness of the deep set eyes, the lips of lead, the hands of ivory, the recumbent

human images lying in the shadow of death with a kind of solemn twilight on them, like the sixty who had

died aboard the ship and were lying at the bottom of the sea, O Pangloss, GOD forgive you!

In one bed, lay a man whose life had been saved (as it was hoped) by deep incisions in the feet and legs.

While I was speaking to him, a nurse came up to change the poultices which this operation had rendered

necessary, and I had an instinctive feeling that it was not well to turn away, merely to spare myself. He was

sorely wasted and keenly susceptible, but the efforts he made to subdue any expression of impatience or

suffering, were quite heroic. It was easy to see, in the shrinking of the figure, and the drawing of the

bedclothes over the head, how acute the endurance was, and it made me shrink too, as if I were in pain; but,

when the new bandages were on, and the poor feet were composed again, he made an apology for himself

(though he had not uttered a word), and said plaintively, 'I am so tender and weak, you see, sir!' Neither from

him nor from any one sufferer of the whole ghastly number, did I hear a complaint. Of thankfulness for

I think I could have recognised in the dismalest skeleton there, the ghost of a soldier. Something of the old air

was still latent in the palest shadow of life I talked to. One emaciated creature, in the strictest literality worn

to the bone, lay stretched on his back, looking so like death that I asked one of the doctors if he were not

dying, or dead? A few kind words from the doctor, in his ear, and he opened his eyes, and smiled looked, in

a moment, as if he would have made a salute, if he could. 'We shall pull him through, please God,' said the

Doctor. 'Plase God, surr, and thankye,' said the patient. 'You are much better today; are you not?' said the

Doctor. 'Plase God, surr; 'tis the slape I want, surr; 'tis my breathin' makes the nights so long.' 'He is a careful

fellow this, you must know,' said the Doctor, cheerfully; 'it was raining hard when they put him in the open

cart to bring him here, and he had the presence of mind to ask to have a sovereign taken out of his pocket that

he had there, and a cab engaged. Probably it saved his life.' The patient rattled out the skeleton of a laugh, and

said, proud of the story, ''Deed, surr, an open cairt was a comical means o' bringin' a dyin' man here, and a

clever way to kill him.' You might have sworn to him for a soldier when he said it.

One thing had perplexed me very much in going from bed to bed. A very significant and cruel thing. I could

find no young man but one. He had attracted my notice, by having got up and dressed himself in his soldier's

jacket and trousers, with the intention of sitting by the fire; but he had found himself too weak, and had crept

back to his bed and laid himself down on the outside of it. I could have pronounced him, alone, to be a young

man aged by famine and sickness. As we were standing by the Irish soldier's bed, I mentioned my perplexity

to the Doctor. He took a board with an inscription on it from the head of the Irishman's bed, and asked me

what age I supposed that man to be? I had observed him with attention while talking to him, and answered,

confidently, 'Fifty.' The Doctor, with a pitying glance at the patient, who had dropped into a stupor again, put

All the arrangements of the wards were excellent. They could not have been more humane, sympathising,

gentle, attentive, or wholesome. The owners of the ship, too, had done all they could, liberally. There were

bright fires in every room, and the convalescent men were sitting round them, reading various papers and

periodicals. I took the liberty of inviting my official friend Pangloss to look at those convalescent men, and to

tell me whether their faces and bearing were or were not, generally, the faces and bearing of steady

respectable soldiers? The master of the workhouse, overhearing me, said he had had a pretty large experience

of troops, and that better conducted men than these, he had never had to do with. They were always (he

added) as we saw them. And of us visitors (I add) they knew nothing whatever, except that we were there.

It was audacious in me, but I took another liberty with Pangloss. Prefacing it with the observation that, of

course, I knew beforehand that there was not the faintest desire, anywhere, to hush up any part of this

dreadful business, and that the Inquest was the fairest of all possible Inquests, I besought four things of

Pangloss. Firstly, to observe that the Inquest WAS NOT HELD IN THAT PLACE, but at some distance off.

Secondly, to look round upon those helpless spectres in their beds. Thirdly, to remember that the witnesses

produced from among them before that Inquest, could not have been selected because they were the men who

had the most to tell it, but because they happened to be in a state admitting of their safe removal. Fourthly, to

say whether the coroner and jury could have come there, to those pillows, and taken a little evidence? My

There was a sergeant, reading, in one of the fireside groups. As he was a man of very intelligent countenance,

and as I have a great respect for noncommissioned officers as a class, I sat down on the nearest bed, to have

some talk with him. (It was the bed of one of the grisliest of the poor skeletons, and he died soon afterwards.)

'I was glad to see, in the evidence of an officer at the Inquest, sergeant, that he never saw men behave better

'I was glad to see, too, that every man had a hammock.' The sergeant gravely shook his head. 'There must be

some mistake, sir. The men of my own mess had no hammocks. There were not hammocks enough on board,

and the men of the two next messes laid hold of hammocks for themselves as soon as they got on board, and

'None, sir. As men died, their hammocks were used by other men, who wanted hammocks; but many men had

'There is some mistake on that point too, sir. Men were under the impression I knew it for a fact at the time

that it was not allowed to take blankets or bedding on board, and so men who had things of that sort came

'They did, sir.' (I believe there never was a more truthful witness than the sergeant. He had no inclination to

'Some, sir' (considering the question). 'Soldierlike. They had been long marching in the rainy season, by bad

roads no roads at all, in short and when they got to Calcutta, men turned to and drank, before taking a last

'Do you see any men in this ward, for example, who sold clothes for drink at that time?'

The sergeant's wan eye, happily just beginning to rekindle with health, travelled round the place and came

'Yet what with the rest and the sea air, I should have thought that the men (even the men who got drunk)

'So they might; but the bad food told upon them, and when we got into a cold latitude, it began to tell more,

If the sergeant, who was a man of a few orderly words, had spoken the amount of this volume, he could not

have settled that question better. I believe the sick could as soon have eaten the ship, as the ship's provisions.

I took the additional liberty with my friend Pangloss, when I had left the sergeant with good wishes, of asking

Pangloss whether he had ever heard of biscuit getting drunk and bartering its nutritious qualities for

putrefaction and vermin; of peas becoming hardened in liquor; of hammocks drinking themselves off the face

of the earth; of limejuice, vegetables, vinegar, cooking accommodation, water supply, and beer, all taking to

drinking together and going to ruin? 'If not (I asked him), what did he say in defence of the officers

condemned by the Coroner's jury, who, by signing the General Inspection report relative to the ship Great

Tasmania, chartered for these troops, had deliberately asserted all that bad and poisonous dunghill refuse, to

be good and wholesome food?' My official friend replied that it was a remarkable fact, that whereas some

officers were only positively good, and other officers only comparatively better, those particular officers were

My hand and my heart fail me, in writing my record of this journey. The spectacle of the soldiers in the

hospitalbeds of that Liverpool workhouse (a very good workhouse, indeed, be it understood), was so

shocking and so shameful, that as an Englishman I blush to remember it. It would have been simply

unbearable at the time, but for the consideration and pity with which they were soothed in their sufferings.

No punishment that our inefficient laws provide, is worthy of the name when set against the guilt of this

transaction. But, if the memory of it die out unavenged, and if it do not result in the inexorable dismissal and

disgrace of those who are responsible for it, their escape will be infamous to the Government (no matter of

what party) that so neglects its duty, and infamous to the nation that tamely suffers such intolerable wrong to

If the confession that I have often travelled from this Covent Garden lodging of mine on Sundays, should

give offence to those who never travel on Sundays, they will be satisfied (I hope) by my adding that the

Not that I have any curiosity to hear powerful preachers. Time was, when I was dragged by the hair of my

head, as one may say, to hear too many. On summer evenings, when every flower, and tree, and bird, might

have better addressed my soft young heart, I have in my day been caught in the palm of a female hand by the

crown, have been violently scrubbed from the neck to the roots of the hair as a purification for the Temple,

and have then been carried off highly charged with saponaceous electricity, to be steamed like a potato in the

unventilated breath of the powerful Boanerges Boiler and his congregation, until what small mind I had, was

quite steamed out of me. In which pitiable plight I have been haled out of the place of meeting, at the

conclusion of the exercises, and catechised respecting Boanerges Boiler, his fifthly, his sixthly, and his

seventhly, until I have regarded that reverend person in the light of a most dismal and oppressive Charade.

Time was, when I was carried off to platform assemblages at which no human child, whether of wrath or

grace, could possibly keep its eyes open, and when I felt the fatal sleep stealing, stealing over me, and when I

gradually heard the orator in possession, spinning and humming like a great top, until he rolled, collapsed,

and tumbled over, and I discovered to my burning shame and fear, that as to that last stage it was not he, but

I. I have sat under Boanerges when he has specifically addressed himself to us us, the infants and at this

present writing I hear his lumbering jocularity (which never amused us, though we basely pretended that it

did), and I behold his big round face, and I look up the inside of his outstretched coatsleeve as if it were a

telescope with the stopper on, and I hate him with an unwholesome hatred for two hours. Through such

means did it come to pass that I knew the powerful preacher from beginning to end, all over and all through,

while I was very young, and that I left him behind at an early period of life. Peace be with him! More peace

Now, I have heard many preachers since that time not powerful; merely Christian, unaffected, and

reverential and I have had many such preachers on my roll of friends. But, it was not to hear these, any

more than the powerful class, that I made my Sunday journeys. They were journeys of curiosity to the

numerous churches in the City of London. It came into my head one day, here had I been cultivating a

familiarity with all the churches of Rome, and I knew nothing of the insides of the old churches of London!

This befell on a Sunday morning. I began my expeditions that very same day, and they lasted me a year.

I never wanted to know the names of the churches to which I went, and to this hour I am profoundly ignorant

in that particular of at least ninetenths of them. Indeed, saying that I know the church of old GOWER'S

tomb (he lies in effigy with his head upon his books) to be the church of Saint Saviour's, Southwark; and the

church of MILTON'S tomb to be the church of Cripplegate; and the church on Cornhill with the great golden

keys to be the church of Saint Peter; I doubt if I could pass a competitive examination in any of the names.

No question did I ever ask of living creature concerning these churches, and no answer to any antiquarian

question on the subject that I ever put to books, shall harass the reader's soul. A full half of my pleasure in

them arose out of their mystery; mysterious I found them; mysterious they shall remain for me.

Where shall I begin my round of hidden and forgotten old churches in the City of London?

It is twenty minutes short of eleven on a Sunday morning, when I stroll down one of the many narrow hilly

streets in the City that tend due south to the Thames. It is my first experiment, and I have come to the region

of Whittington in an omnibus, and we have put down a fierceeyed, spare old woman, whose slatecoloured

gown smells of herbs, and who walked up Aldersgatestreet to some chapel where she comforts herself with

brimstone doctrine, I warrant. We have also put down a stouter and sweeter old lady, with a pretty large

prayerbook in an unfolded pockethandkerchief, who got out at a corner of a court near Stationers' Hall, and

who I think must go to church there, because she is the widow of some deceased old Company's Beadle. The

rest of our freight were mere chance pleasureseekers and rural walkers, and went on to the Blackwall

railway. So many bells are ringing, when I stand undecided at a street corner, that every sheep in the

ecclesiastical fold might be a bellwether. The discordance is fearful. My state of indecision is referable to,

and about equally divisible among, four great churches, which are all within sight and sound, all within the

As I stand at the street corner, I don't see as many as four people at once going to church, though I see as

many as four churches with their steeples clamouring for people. I choose my church, and go up the flight of

steps to the great entrance in the tower. A mouldy tower within, and like a neglected washhouse. A rope

comes through the beamed roof, and a man in the corner pulls it and clashes the bell a whitybrown man,

whose clothes were once black a man with flue on him, and cobweb. He stares at me, wondering how I

come there, and I stare at him, wondering how he comes there. Through a screen of wood and glass, I peep

into the dim church. About twenty people are discernible, waiting to begin. Christening would seem to have

faded out of this church long ago, for the font has the dust of desuetude thick upon it, and its wooden cover

(shaped like an oldfashioned tureencover) looks as if it wouldn't come off, upon requirement. I perceive

the altar to be rickety and the Commandments damp. Entering after this survey, I jostle the clergyman in his

canonicals, who is entering too from a dark lane behind a pew of state with curtains, where nobody sits. The

pew is ornamented with four blue wands, once carried by four somebodys, I suppose, before somebody else,

but which there is nobody now to hold or receive honour from. I open the door of a family pew, and shut

myself in; if I could occupy twenty family pews at once I might have them. The clerk, a brisk young man

(how does HE come here?), glances at me knowingly, as who should say, 'You have done it now; you must

stop.' Organ plays. Organloft is in a small gallery across the church; gallery congregation, two girls. I

There is a pale heap of books in the corner of my pew, and while the organ, which is hoarse and sleepy, plays

in such fashion that I can hear more of the rusty working of the stops than of any music, I look at the books,

which are mostly bound in faded baize and stuff. They belonged in 1754, to the Dowgate family; and who

were they? Jane Comport must have married Young Dowgate, and come into the family that way; Young

Dowgate was courting Jane Comport when he gave her her prayerbook, and recorded the presentation in the

flyleaf; if Jane were fond of Young Dowgate, why did she die and leave the book here? Perhaps at the

rickety altar, and before the damp Commandments, she, Comport, had taken him, Dowgate, in a flush of

youthful hope and joy, and perhaps it had not turned out in the long run as great a success as was expected?

The opening of the service recalls my wandering thoughts. I then find, to my astonishment, that I have been,

and still am, taking a strong kind of invisible snuff, up my nose, into my eyes, and down my throat. I wink,

sneeze, and cough. The clerk sneezes; the clergyman winks; the unseen organist sneezes and coughs (and

probably winks); all our little party wink, sneeze, and cough. The snuff seems to be made of the decay of

matting, wood, cloth, stone, iron, earth, and something else. Is the something else, the decay of dead citizens

in the vaults below? As sure as Death it is! Not only in the cold, damp February day, do we cough and sneeze

dead citizens, all through the service, but dead citizens have got into the very bellows of the organ, and half

choked the same. We stamp our feet to warm them, and dead citizens arise in heavy clouds. Dead citizens

stick upon the walls, and lie pulverised on the soundingboard over the clergyman's head, and, when a gust

In this first experience I was so nauseated by too much snuff, made of the Dowgate family, the Comport

branch, and other families and branches, that I gave but little heed to our dull manner of ambling through the

service; to the brisk clerk's manner of encouraging us to try a note or two at psalm time; to the

gallerycongregation's manner of enjoying a shrill duet, without a notion of time or tune; to the whitybrown

man's manner of shutting the minister into the pulpit, and being very particular with the lock of the door, as if

he were a dangerous animal. But, I tried again next Sunday, and soon accustomed myself to the dead citizens

when I found that I could not possibly get on without them among the City churches.

After being again rung for by conflicting bells, like a leg of mutton or a laced hat a hundred years ago, I make

selection of a church oddly put away in a corner among a number of lanes a smaller church than the last,

and an ugly: of about the date of Queen Anne. As a congregation, we are fourteen strong: not counting an

exhausted charity school in a gallery, which has dwindled away to four boys, and two girls. In the porch, is a

benefaction of loaves of bread, which there would seem to be nobody left in the exhausted congregation to

claim, and which I saw an exhausted beadle, long faded out of uniform, eating with his eyes for self and

family when I passed in. There is also an exhausted clerk in a brown wig, and two or three exhausted doors

and windows have been bricked up, and the service books are musty, and the pulpit cushions are threadbare,

and the whole of the church furniture is in a very advanced stage of exhaustion. We are three old women

(habitual), two young lovers (accidental), two tradesmen, one with a wife and one alone, an aunt and nephew,

again two girls (these two girls dressed out for church with everything about them limp that should be stiff,

and VICE VERSA, are an invariable experience), and three sniggering boys. The clergyman is, perhaps, the

chaplain of a civic company; he has the moist and vinous look, and eke the bulbous boots, of one acquainted

We are so quiet in our dulness that the three sniggering boys, who have got away into a corner by the

altarrailing, give us a start, like crackers, whenever they laugh. And this reminds me of my own village

church where, during sermontime on bright Sundays when the birds are very musical indeed, farmers' boys

patter out over the stone pavement, and the clerk steps out from his desk after them, and is distinctly heard in

the summer repose to pursue and punch them in the churchyard, and is seen to return with a meditative

countenance, making believe that nothing of the sort has happened. The aunt and nephew in this City church

are much disturbed by the sniggering boys. The nephew is himself a boy, and the sniggerers tempt him to

secular thoughts of marbles and string, by secretly offering such commodities to his distant contemplation.

This young Saint Anthony for a while resists, but presently becomes a backslider, and in dumb show defies

the sniggerers to 'heave' a marble or two in his direction. Here in he is detected by the aunt (a rigorous

reduced gentlewoman who has the charge of offices), and I perceive that worthy relative to poke him in the

side, with the corrugated hooked handle of an ancient umbrella. The nephew revenges himself for this, by

holding his breath and terrifying his kinswoman with the dread belief that he has made up his mind to burst.

Regardless of whispers and shakes, he swells and becomes discoloured, and yet again swells and becomes

discoloured, until the aunt can bear it no longer, but leads him out, with no visible neck, and with his eyes

going before him like a prawn's. This causes the sniggerers to regard flight as an eligible move, and I know

which of them will go out first, because of the overdevout attention that he suddenly concentrates on the

clergyman. In a little while, this hypocrite, with an elaborate demonstration of hushing his footsteps, and with

a face generally expressive of having until now forgotten a religious appointment elsewhere, is gone. Number

two gets out in the same way, but rather quicker. Number three getting safely to the door, there turns reckless,

and banging it open, flies forth with a Whoop! that vibrates to the top of the tower above us.

The clergyman, who is of a prandial presence and a muffled voice, may be scant of hearing as well as of

breath, but he only glances up, as having an idea that somebody has said Amen in a wrong place, and

continues his steady jogtrot, like a farmer's wife going to market. He does all he has to do, in the same easy

way, and gives us a concise sermon, still like the jogtrot of the farmer's wife on a level road. Its drowsy

cadence soon lulls the three old women asleep, and the unmarried tradesman sits looking out at window, and

the married tradesman sits looking at his wife's bonnet, and the lovers sit looking at one another, so

superlatively happy, that I mind when I, turned of eighteen, went with my Angelica to a City church on

account of a shower (by this special coincidence that it was in Hugginlane), and when I said to my

Angelica, 'Let the blessed event, Angelica, occur at no altar but this!' and when my Angelica consented that it

should occur at no other which it certainly never did, for it never occurred anywhere. And O, Angelica,

what has become of you, this present Sunday morning when I can't attend to the sermon; and, more difficult

But, we receive the signal to make that unanimous dive which surely is a little conventional like the strange

rustlings and settlings and clearings of throats and noses, which are never dispensed with, at certain points of

the Church service, and are never held to be necessary under any other circumstances. In a minute more it is

all over, and the organ expresses itself to be as glad of it as it can be of anything in its rheumatic state, and in

another minute we are all of us out of the church, and Whitybrown has locked it up. Another minute or little

more, and, in the neighbouring churchyard not the yard of that church, but of another a churchyard like a

great shabby old mignonette box, with two trees in it and one tomb I meet Whitybrown, in his private

capacity, fetching a pint of beer for his dinner from the publichouse in the corner, where the keys of the

rotting fireladders are kept and were never asked for, and where there is a ragged, whiteseamed,

In one of these City churches, and only in one, I found an individual who might have been claimed as

expressly a City personage. I remember the church, by the feature that the clergyman couldn't get to his own

desk without going through the clerk's, or couldn't get to the pulpit without going through the readingdesk

I forget which, and it is no matter and by the presence of this personage among the exceedingly sparse

congregation. I doubt if we were a dozen, and we had no exhausted charity school to help us out. The

personage was dressed in black of square cut, and was stricken in years, and wore a black velvet cap, and

cloth shoes. He was of a staid, wealthy, and dissatisfied aspect. In his hand, he conducted to church a

mysterious child: a child of the feminine gender. The child had a beaver hat, with a stiff drab plume that

surely never belonged to any bird of the air. The child was further attired in a nankeen frock and spencer,

brown boxinggloves, and a veil. It had a blemish, in the nature of currant jelly, on its chin; and was a thirsty

child. Insomuch that the personage carried in his pocket a green bottle, from which, when the first psalm was

given out, the child was openly refreshed. At all other times throughout the service it was motionless, and

stood on the seat of the large pew, closely fitted into the corner, like a rainwater pipe.

The personage never opened his book, and never looked at the clergyman. He never sat down either, but

stood with his arms leaning on the top of the pew, and his forehead sometimes shaded with his right hand,

always looking at the church door. It was a long church for a church of its size, and he was at the upper end,

but he always looked at the door. That he was an old bookkeeper, or an old trader who had kept his own

books, and that he might be seen at the Bank of England about Dividend times, no doubt. That he had lived in

the City all his life and was disdainful of other localities, no doubt. Why he looked at the door, I never

absolutely proved, but it is my belief that he lived in expectation of the time when the citizens would come

back to live in the City, and its ancient glories would be renewed. He appeared to expect that this would

occur on a Sunday, and that the wanderers would first appear, in the deserted churches, penitent and humbled.

Hence, he looked at the door which they never darkened. Whose child the child was, whether the child of a

disinherited daughter, or some parish orphan whom the personage had adopted, there was nothing to lead up

to. It never played, or skipped, or smiled. Once, the idea occurred to me that it was an automaton, and that the

personage had made it; but following the strange couple out one Sunday, I heard the personage say to it,

'Thirteen thousand pounds;' to which it added in a weak human voice, 'Seventeen and fourpence.' Four

Sundays I followed them out, and this is all I ever heard or saw them say. One Sunday, I followed them

home. They lived behind a pump, and the personage opened their abode with an exceeding large key. The one

solitary inscription on their house related to a fireplug. The house was partly undermined by a deserted and

closed gateway; its windows were blind with dirt; and it stood with its face disconsolately turned to a wall.

Five great churches and two small ones rang their Sunday bells between this house and the church the couple

frequented, so they must have had some special reason for going a quarter of a mile to it. The last time I saw

them, was on this wise. I had been to explore another church at a distance, and happened to pass the church

they frequented, at about two of the afternoon when that edifice was closed. But, a little sidedoor, which I

had never observed before, stood open, and disclosed certain cellarous steps. Methought 'They are airing the

vaults today,' when the personage and the child silently arrived at the steps, and silently descended. Of

course, I came to the conclusion that the personage had at last despaired of the lookedfor return of the

penitent citizens, and that he and the child went down to get themselves buried.

In the course of my pilgrimages I came upon one obscure church which had broken out in the melodramatic

style, and was got up with various tawdry decorations, much after the manner of the extinct London

maypoles. These attractions had induced several young priests or deacons in black bibs for waistcoats, and

several young ladies interested in that holy order (the proportion being, as I estimated, seventeen young ladies

to a deacon), to come into the City as a new and odd excitement. It was wonderful to see how these young

people played out their little play in the heart of the City, all among themselves, without the deserted City's

knowing anything about it. It was as if you should take an empty counting house on a Sunday, and act one

of the old Mysteries there. They had impressed a small school (from what neighbourhood I don't know) to

assist in the performances, and it was pleasant to notice frantic garlands of inscription on the walls, especially

addressing those poor innocents in characters impossible for them to decipher. There was a remarkably

But, in other cases, rot and mildew and dead citizens formed the uppermost scent, while, infused into it in a

dreamy way not at all displeasing, was the staple character of the neighbourhood. In the churches about

Marklane, for example, there was a dry whiff of wheat; and I accidentally struck an airy sample of barley

out of an aged hassock in one of them. From Roodlane to Towerstreet, and thereabouts, there was often a

subtle flavour of wine: sometimes, of tea. One church near Mincinglane smelt like a druggist's drawer.

Behind the Monument the service had a flavour of damaged oranges, which, a little further down towards the

river, tempered into herrings, and gradually toned into a cosmopolitan blast of fish. In one church, the exact

counterpart of the church in the Rake's Progress where the hero is being married to the horrible old lady, there

was no speciality of atmosphere, until the organ shook a perfume of hides all over us from some adjacent

Be the scent what it would, however, there was no speciality in the people. There were never enough of them

to represent any calling or neighbourhood. They had all gone elsewhere overnight, and the few stragglers in

Among the Uncommercial travels in which I have engaged, this year of Sunday travel occupies its own place,

apart from all the rest. Whether I think of the church where the sails of the oysterboats in the river almost

flapped against the windows, or of the church where the railroad made the bells hum as the train rushed by

above the roof, I recall a curious experience. On summer Sundays, in the gentle rain or the bright sunshine

either, deepening the idleness of the idle City I have sat, in that singular silence which belongs to

restingplaces usually astir, in scores of buildings at the heart of the world's metropolis, unknown to far

greater numbers of people speaking the English tongue, than the ancient edifices of the Eternal City, or the

Pyramids of Egypt. The dark vestries and registries into which I have peeped, and the little hemmedin

churchyards that have echoed to my feet, have left impressions on my memory as distinct and quaint as any it

has in that way received. In all those dusty registers that the worms are eating, there is not a line but made

some hearts leap, or some tears flow, in their day. Still and dry now, still and dry! and the old tree at the

window with no room for its branches, has seen them all out. So with the tomb of the old Master of the old

Company, on which it drips. His son restored it and died, his daughter restored it and died, and then he had

been remembered long enough, and the tree took possession of him, and his name cracked out.

There are few more striking indications of the changes of manners and customs that two or three hundred

years have brought about, than these deserted churches. Many of them are handsome and costly structures,

several of them were designed by WREN, many of them arose from the ashes of the great fire, others of them

outlived the plague and the fire too, to die a slow death in these later days. No one can be sure of the coming

time; but it is not too much to say of it that it has no sign in its outsetting tides, of the reflux to these churches

of their congregations and uses. They remain like the tombs of the old citizens who lie beneath them and

around them, Monuments of another age. They are worth a Sunday exploration, now and then, for they yet

echo, not unharmoniously, to the time when the City of London really was London; when the 'Prentices and

Trained Bands were of mark in the state; when even the Lord Mayor himself was a Reality not a Fiction

conventionally bepuffed on one day in the year by illustrious friends, who no less conventionally laugh at

So much of my travelling is done on foot, that if I cherished betting propensities, I should probably be found

registered in sporting newspapers under some such title as the Elastic Novice, challenging all eleven stone

mankind to competition in walking. My last special feat was turning out of bed at two, after a hard day,

pedestrian and otherwise, and walking thirty miles into the country to breakfast. The road was so lonely in the

night, that I fell asleep to the monotonous sound of my own feet, doing their regular four miles an hour. Mile

after mile I walked, without the slightest sense of exertion, dozing heavily and dreaming constantly. It was

only when I made a stumble like a drunken man, or struck out into the road to avoid a horseman close upon

me on the path who had no existence that I came to myself and looked about. The day broke mistily (it

was autumn time), and I could not disembarrass myself of the idea that I had to climb those heights and banks

of cloud, and that there was an Alpine Convent somewhere behind the sun, where I was going to breakfast.

This sleepy notion was so much stronger than such substantial objects as villages and haystacks, that, after

the sun was up and bright, and when I was sufficiently awake to have a sense of pleasure in the prospect, I

still occasionally caught myself looking about for wooden arms to point the right track up the mountain, and

wondering there was no snow yet. It is a curiosity of broken sleep that I made immense quantities of verses

on that pedestrian occasion (of course I never make any when I am in my right senses), and that I spoke a

certain language once pretty familiar to me, but which I have nearly forgotten from disuse, with fluency. Of

both these phenomena I have such frequent experience in the state between sleeping and waking, that I

sometimes argue with myself that I know I cannot be awake, for, if I were, I should not be half so ready. The

readiness is not imaginary, because I often recall long strings of the verses, and many turns of the fluent

My walking is of two kinds: one, straight on end to a definite goal at a round pace; one, objectless, loitering,

and purely vagabond. In the latter state, no gipsy on earth is a greater vagabond than myself; it is so natural to

me, and strong with me, that I think I must be the descendant, at no great distance, of some irreclaimable

One of the pleasantest things I have lately met with, in a vagabond course of shy metropolitan

neighbourhoods and small shops, is the fancy of a humble artist, as exemplified in two portraits representing

Mr. Thomas Sayers, of Great Britain, and Mr. John Heenan, of the United States of America. These

illustrious men are highly coloured in fighting trim, and fighting attitude. To suggest the pastoral and

meditative nature of their peaceful calling, Mr. Heenan is represented on emerald sward, with primroses and

other modest flowers springing up under the heels of his half boots; while Mr. Sayers is impelled to the

administration of his favourite blow, the Auctioneer, by the silent eloquence of a village church. The humble

homes of England, with their domestic virtues and honeysuckle porches, urge both heroes to go in and win;

and the lark and other singing birds are observable in the upper air, ecstatically carolling their thanks to

Heaven for a fight. On the whole, the associations entwined with the pugilistic art by this artist are much in

But, it is with the lower animals of back streets and byways that my present purpose rests. For human notes

Nothing in shy neighbourhoods perplexes my mind more, than the bad company birds keep. Foreign birds

often get into good society, but British birds are inseparable from low associates. There is a whole street of

them in St. Giles's; and I always find them in poor and immoral neighbourhoods, convenient to the

publichouse and the pawnbroker's. They seem to lead people into drinking, and even the man who makes

their cages usually gets into a chronic state of black eye. Why is this? Also, they will do things for people in

shortskirted velveteen coats with bone buttons, or in sleeved waistcoats and fur caps, which they cannot be

persuaded by the respectable orders of society to undertake. In a dirty court in Spitalfields, once, I found a

goldfinch drawing his own water, and drawing as much of it as if he were in a consuming fever. That

goldfinch lived at a birdshop, and offered, in writing, to barter himself against old clothes, empty bottles, or

even kitchen stuff. Surely a low thing and a depraved taste in any finch! I bought that goldfinch for money.

He was sent home, and hung upon a nail over against my table. He lived outside a counterfeit dwelling

house, supposed (as I argued) to be a dyer's; otherwise it would have been impossible to account for his perch

sticking out of the garret window. From the time of his appearance in my room, either he left off being thirsty

which was not in the bond or he could not make up his mind to hear his little bucket drop back into his

well when he let it go: a shock which in the best of times had made him tremble. He drew no water but by

stealth and under the cloak of night. After an interval of futile and at length hopeless expectation, the

merchant who had educated him was appealed to. The merchant was a bowlegged character, with a flat and

cushiony nose, like the last new strawberry. He wore a fur cap, and shorts, and was of the velveteen race,

velveteeny. He sent word that he would 'look round.' He looked round, appeared in the doorway of the room,

and slightly cocked up his evil eye at the goldfinch. Instantly a raging thirst beset that bird; when it was

appeased, he still drew several unnecessary buckets of water; and finally, leaped about his perch and

Donkeys again. I know shy neighbourhoods where the Donkey goes in at the street door, and appears to live

upstairs, for I have examined the backyard from over the palings, and have been unable to make him out.

Gentility, nobility, Royalty, would appeal to that donkey in vain to do what he does for a costermonger. Feed

him with oats at the highest price, put an infant prince and princess in a pair of panniers on his back, adjust

his delicate trappings to a nicety, take him to the softest slopes at Windsor, and try what pace you can get out

of him. Then, starve him, harness him anyhow to a truck with a flat tray on it, and see him bowl from

Whitechapel to Bayswater. There appears to be no particular private understanding between birds and

donkeys, in a state of nature; but in the shy neighbourhood state, you shall see them always in the same hands

and always developing their very best energies for the very worst company. I have known a donkey by

sight; we were not on speaking terms who lived over on the Surrey side of Londonbridge, among the

fastnesses of Jacob's Island and Dockhead. It was the habit of that animal, when his services were not in

immediate requisition, to go out alone, idling. I have met him a mile from his place of residence, loitering

about the streets; and the expression of his countenance at such times was most degraded. He was attached to

the establishment of an elderly lady who sold periwinkles, and he used to stand on Saturday nights with a

cartful of those delicacies outside a ginshop, pricking up his ears when a customer came to the cart, and too

evidently deriving satisfaction from the knowledge that they got bad measure. His mistress was sometimes

overtaken by inebriety. The last time I ever saw him (about five years ago) he was in circumstances of

difficulty, caused by this failing. Having been left alone with the cart of periwinkles, and forgotten, he went

off idling. He prowled among his usual low haunts for some time, gratifying his depraved tastes, until, not

taking the cart into his calculations, he endeavoured to turn up a narrow alley, and became greatly involved.

He was taken into custody by the police, and, the Green Yard of the district being near at hand, was backed

into that place of durance. At that crisis, I encountered him; the stubborn sense he evinced of being not to

compromise the expression a blackguard, I never saw exceeded in the human subject. A flaring candle in a

paper shade, stuck in among his periwinkles, showed him, with his ragged harness broken and his cart

extensively shattered, twitching his mouth and shaking his hanging head, a picture of disgrace and obduracy.

I have seen boys being taken to stationhouses, who were as like him as his own brother.

The dogs of shy neighbourhoods, I observe to avoid play, and to be conscious of poverty. They avoid work,

too, if they can, of course; that is in the nature of all animals. I have the pleasure to know a dog in a back

street in the neighbourhood of Walworth, who has greatly distinguished himself in the minor drama, and who

takes his portrait with him when he makes an engagement, for the illustration of the playbill. His portrait

(which is not at all like him) represents him in the act of dragging to the earth a recreant Indian, who is

supposed to have tomahawked, or essayed to tomahawk, a British officer. The design is pure poetry, for there

is no such Indian in the piece, and no such incident. He is a dog of the Newfoundland breed, for whose

honesty I would be bail to any amount; but whose intellectual qualities in association with dramatic fiction, I

cannot rate high. Indeed, he is too honest for the profession he has entered. Being at a town in Yorkshire last

summer, and seeing him posted in the bill of the night, I attended the performance. His first scene was

eminently successful; but, as it occupied a second in its representation (and five lines in the bill), it scarcely

afforded ground for a cool and deliberate judgment of his powers. He had merely to bark, run on, and jump

through an inn window, after a comic fugitive. The next scene of importance to the fable was a little marred

in its interest by his overanxiety; forasmuch as while his master (a belated soldier in a den of robbers on a

tempestuous night) was feelingly lamenting the absence of his faithful dog, and laying great stress on the fact

that he was thirty leagues away, the faithful dog was barking furiously in the prompter's box, and clearly

choking himself against his collar. But it was in his greatest scene of all, that his honesty got the better of

him. He had to enter a dense and trackless forest, on the trail of the murderer, and there to fly at the murderer

when he found him resting at the foot of a tree, with his victim bound ready for slaughter. It was a hot night,

and he came into the forest from an altogether unexpected direction, in the sweetest temper, at a very

deliberate trot, not in the least excited; trotted to the footlights with his tongue out; and there sat down,

panting, and amiably surveying the audience, with his tail beating on the boards, like a Dutch clock.

Meanwhile the murderer, impatient to receive his doom, was audibly calling to him 'COOOME here!'

while the victim, struggling with his bonds, assailed him with the most injurious expressions. It happened

through these means, that when he was in course of time persuaded to trot up and rend the murderer limb

from limb, he made it (for dramatic purposes) a little too obvious that he worked out that awful retribution by

In a shy street, behind Longacre, two honest dogs live, who perform in Punch's shows. I may venture to say

that I am on terms of intimacy with both, and that I never saw either guilty of the falsehood of failing to look

down at the man inside the show, during the whole performance. The difficulty other dogs have in satisfying

their minds about these dogs, appears to be never overcome by time. The same dogs must encounter them

over and over again, as they trudge along in their offminutes behind the legs of the show and beside the

drum; but all dogs seem to suspect their frills and jackets, and to sniff at them as if they thought those articles

of personal adornment, an eruption a something in the nature of mange, perhaps. From this Coventgarden

window of mine I noticed a country dog, only the other day, who had come up to Coventgarden Market

under a cart, and had broken his cord, an end of which he still trailed along with him. He loitered about the

corners of the four streets commanded by my window; and bad London dogs came up, and told him lies that

he didn't believe; and worse London dogs came up, and made proposals to him to go and steal in the market,

which his principles rejected; and the ways of the town confused him, and he crept aside and lay down in a

doorway. He had scarcely got a wink of sleep, when up comes Punch with Toby. He was darting to Toby for

consolation and advice, when he saw the frill, and stopped, in the middle of the street, appalled. The show

was pitched, Toby retired behind the drapery, the audience formed, the drum and pipes struck up. My country

dog remained immovable, intently staring at these strange appearances, until Toby opened the drama by

appearing on his ledge, and to him entered Punch, who put a tobaccopipe into Toby's mouth. At this

spectacle, the country dog threw up his head, gave one terrible howl, and fled due west.

We talk of men keeping dogs, but we might often talk more expressively of dogs keeping men. I know a

bulldog in a shy corner of Hammersmith who keeps a man. He keeps him up a yard, and makes him go to

publichouses and lay wagers on him, and obliges him to lean against posts and look at him, and forces him

to neglect work for him, and keeps him under rigid coercion. I once knew a fancy terrier who kept a

gentleman a gentleman who had been brought up at Oxford, too. The dog kept the gentleman entirely for

his glorification, and the gentleman never talked about anything but the terrier. This, however, was not in a

There are a great many dogs in shy neighbourhoods, who keep boys. I have my eye on a mongrel in

Somerstown who keeps three boys. He feigns that he can bring down sparrows, and unburrow rats (he can do

neither), and he takes the boys out on sporting pretences into all sorts of suburban fields. He has likewise

made them believe that he possesses some mysterious knowledge of the art of fishing, and they consider

themselves incompletely equipped for the Hampstead ponds, with a picklejar and widemouthed bottle,

unless he is with them and barking tremendously. There is a dog residing in the Borough of Southwark who

keeps a blind man. He may be seen, most days, in Oxfordstreet, haling the blind man away on expeditions

wholly uncontemplated by, and unintelligible to, the man: wholly of the dog's conception and execution.

Contrariwise, when the man has projects, the dog will sit down in a crowded thoroughfare and meditate. I

saw him yesterday, wearing the money tray like an easy collar, instead of offering it to the public, taking the

man against his will, on the invitation of a disreputable cur, apparently to visit a dog at Harrow he was so

intent on that direction. The north wall of Burlington House Gardens, between the Arcade and the Albany,

offers a shy spot for appointments among blind men at about two or three o'clock in the afternoon. They sit

(very uncomfortably) on a sloping stone there, and compare notes. Their dogs may always be observed at the

same time, openly disparaging the men they keep, to one another, and settling where they shall respectively

take their men when they begin to move again. At a small butcher's, in a shy neighbourhood (there is no

reason for suppressing the name; it is by Notting hill, and gives upon the district called the Potteries), I

know a shaggy black and white dog who keeps a drover. He is a dog of an easy disposition, and too

frequently allows this drover to get drunk. On these occasions, it is the dog's custom to sit outside the

publichouse, keeping his eye on a few sheep, and thinking. I have seen him with six sheep, plainly casting

up in his mind how many he began with when he left the market, and at what places he has left the rest. I

have seen him perplexed by not being able to account to himself for certain particular sheep. A light has

gradually broken on him, he has remembered at what butcher's he left them, and in a burst of grave

satisfaction has caught a fly off his nose, and shown himself much relieved. If I could at any time have

doubted the fact that it was he who kept the drover, and not the drover who kept him, it would have been

abundantly proved by his way of taking undivided charge of the six sheep, when the drover came out

besmeared with red ochre and beer, and gave him wrong directions, which he calmly disregarded. He has

taken the sheep entirely into his own hands, has merely remarked with respectful firmness, 'That instruction

would place them under an omnibus; you had better confine your attention to yourself you will want it all;'

and has driven his charge away, with an intelligence of ears and tail, and a knowledge of business, that has

As the dogs of shy neighbourhoods usually betray a slinking consciousness of being in poor circumstances

for the most part manifested in an aspect of anxiety, an awkwardness in their play, and a misgiving that

somebody is going to harness them to something, to pick up a living so the cats of shy neighbourhoods

exhibit a strong tendency to relapse into barbarism. Not only are they made selfishly ferocious by ruminating

on the surplus population around them, and on the densely crowded state of all the avenues to cat's meat; not

only is there a moral and politico economical haggardness in them, traceable to these reflections; but they

evince a physical deterioration. Their linen is not clean, and is wretchedly got up; their black turns rusty, like

old mourning; they wear very indifferent fur; and take to the shabbiest cotton velvet, instead of silk velvet. I

am on terms of recognition with several small streets of cats, about the Obelisk in Saint George's Fields, and

also in the vicinity of Clerkenwell green, and also in the back settlements of Drurylane. In appearance,

they are very like the women among whom they live. They seem to turn out of their unwholesome beds into

the street, without any preparation. They leave their young families to stagger about the gutters, unassisted,

while they frouzily quarrel and swear and scratch and spit, at street corners. In particular, I remark that when

they are about to increase their families (an event of frequent recurrence) the resemblance is strongly

expressed in a certain dusty dowdiness, downatheel selfneglect, and general giving up of things. I cannot

honestly report that I have ever seen a feline matron of this class washing her face when in an interesting

Not to prolong these notes of uncommercial travel among the lower animals of shy neighbourhoods, by

dwelling at length upon the exasperated moodiness of the tomcats, and their resemblance in many respects

to a man and a brother, I will come to a close with a word on the fowls of the same localities.

That anything born of an egg and invested with wings, should have got to the pass that it hops contentedly

down a ladder into a cellar, and calls THAT going home, is a circumstance so amazing as to leave one

nothing more in this connexion to wonder at. Otherwise I might wonder at the completeness with which these

fowls have become separated from all the birds of the air have taken to grovelling in bricks and mortar and

mud have forgotten all about live trees, and make roostingplaces of shopboards, barrows, oystertubs,

bulkheads, and doorscrapers. I wonder at nothing concerning them, and take them as they are. I accept as

products of Nature and things of course, a reduced Bantam family of my acquaintance in the Hackneyroad,

who are incessantly at the pawnbroker's. I cannot say that they enjoy themselves, for they are of a melancholy

temperament; but what enjoyment they are capable of, they derive from crowding together in the

pawnbroker's sideentry. Here, they are always to be found in a feeble flutter, as if they were newly come

down in the world, and were afraid of being identified. I know a low fellow, originally of a good family from

Dorking, who takes his whole establishment of wives, in single file, in at the door of the jug Department of a

disorderly tavern near the Haymarket, manoeuvres them among the company's legs, emerges with them at the

Bottle Entrance, and so passes his life: seldom, in the season, going to bed before two in the morning. Over

Waterloobridge, there is a shabby old speckled couple (they belong to the wooden Frenchbedstead,

washingstand, and towel horsemaking trade), who are always trying to get in at the door of a chapel.

Whether the old lady, under a delusion reminding one of Mrs. Southcott, has an idea of entrusting an egg to

that particular denomination, or merely understands that she has no business in the building and is

consequently frantic to enter it, I cannot determine; but she is constantly endeavouring to undermine the

principal door: while her partner, who is infirm upon his legs, walks up and down, encouraging her and

defying the Universe. But, the family I have been best acquainted with, since the removal from this trying

sphere of a Chinese circle at Brentford, reside in the densest part of Bethnalgreen. Their abstraction from

the objects among which they live, or rather their conviction that those objects have all come into existence in

express subservience to fowls, has so enchanted me, that I have made them the subject of many journeys at

divers hours. After careful observation of the two lords and the ten ladies of whom this family consists, I have

come to the conclusion that their opinions are represented by the leading lord and leading lady: the latter, as I

judge, an aged personage, afflicted with a paucity of feather and visibility of quill, that gives her the

appearance of a bundle of office pens. When a railway goods van that would crush an elephant comes round

the corner, tearing over these fowls, they emerge unharmed from under the horses, perfectly satisfied that the

whole rush was a passing property in the air, which may have left something to eat behind it. They look upon

old shoes, wrecks of kettles and saucepans, and fragments of bonnets, as a kind of meteoric discharge, for

fowls to peck at. Pegtops and hoops they account, I think, as a sort of hail; shuttlecocks, as rain, or dew.

Gaslight comes quite as natural to them as any other light; and I have more than a suspicion that, in the minds

of the two lords, the early publichouse at the corner has superseded the sun. I have established it as a certain

fact, that they always begin to crow when the publichouse shutters begin to be taken down, and that they

salute the potboy, the instant he appears to perform that duty, as if he were Phoebus in person.

The chance use of the word 'Tramp' in my last paper, brought that numerous fraternity so vividly before my

mind's eye, that I had no sooner laid down my pen than a compulsion was upon me to take it up again, and

make notes of the Tramps whom I perceived on all the summer roads in all directions.

Whenever a tramp sits down to rest by the wayside, he sits with his legs in a dry ditch; and whenever he goes

to sleep (which is very often indeed), he goes to sleep on his back. Yonder, by the high road, glaring white in

the bright sunshine, lies, on the dusty bit of turf under the bramblebush that fences the coppice from the

highway, the tramp of the order savage, fast asleep. He lies on the broad of his back, with his face turned up

to the sky, and one of his ragged arms loosely thrown across his face. His bundle (what can be the contents of

that mysterious bundle, to make it worth his while to carry it about?) is thrown down beside him, and the

waking woman with him sits with her legs in the ditch, and her back to the road. She wears her bonnet

rakishly perched on the front of her head, to shade her face from the sun in walking, and she ties her skirts

round her in conventionally tight trampfashion with a sort of apron. You can seldom catch sight of her,

resting thus, without seeing her in a despondently defiant manner doing something to her hair or her bonnet,

and glancing at you between her fingers. She does not often go to sleep herself in the daytime, but will sit for

any length of time beside the man. And his slumberous propensities would not seem to be referable to the

fatigue of carrying the bundle, for she carries it much oftener and further than he. When they are afoot, you

will mostly find him slouching on ahead, in a gruff temper, while she lags heavily behind with the burden. He

is given to personally correcting her, too which phase of his character develops itself oftenest, on benches

outside alehouse doors and she appears to become strongly attached to him for these reasons; it may usually

be noticed that when the poor creature has a bruised face, she is the most affectionate. He has no occupation

whatever, this order of tramp, and has no object whatever in going anywhere. He will sometimes call himself

a brickmaker, or a sawyer, but only when he takes an imaginary flight. He generally represents himself, in a

vague way, as looking out for a job of work; but he never did work, he never does, and he never will. It is a

favourite fiction with him, however (as if he were the most industrious character on earth), that YOU never

work; and as he goes past your garden and sees you looking at your flowers, you will overhear him growl

The slinking tramp is of the same hopeless order, and has the same injured conviction on him that you were

born to whatever you possess, and never did anything to get it: but he is of a less audacious disposition. He

will stop before your gate, and say to his female companion with an air of constitutional humility and

propitiation to edify any one who may be within hearing behind a blind or a bush 'This is a sweet spot,

ain't it? A lovelly spot! And I wonder if they'd give two poor footsore travellers like me and you, a drop of

fresh water out of such a pretty genteel crib? We'd take it wery koind on 'em, wouldn't us? Wery koind,

upon my word, us would?' He has a quick sense of a dog in the vicinity, and will extend his modestlyinjured

propitiation to the dog chained up in your yard; remarking, as he slinks at the yard gate, 'Ah! You are a foine

breed o' dog, too, and YOU ain't kep for nothink! I'd take it wery koind o' your master if he'd elp a traveller

and his woife as envies no gentlefolk their good fortun, wi' a bit o' your broken wittles. He'd never know the

want of it, nor more would you. Don't bark like that, at poor persons as never done you no arm; the poor is

downtrodden and broke enough without that; O DON'T!' He generally heaves a prodigious sigh in moving

away, and always looks up the lane and down the lane, and up the road and down the road, before going on.

Both of these orders of tramp are of a very robust habit; let the hardworking labourer at whose cottagedoor

they prowl and beg, have the ague never so badly, these tramps are sure to be in good health.

There is another kind of tramp, whom you encounter this bright summer day say, on a road with the

seabreeze making its dust lively, and sails of ships in the blue distance beyond the slope of Down. As you

walk enjoyingly on, you descry in the perspective at the bottom of a steep hill up which your way lies, a

figure that appears to be sitting airily on a gate, whistling in a cheerful and disengaged manner. As you

approach nearer to it, you observe the figure to slide down from the gate, to desist from whistling, to uncock

its hat, to become tender of foot, to depress its head and elevate its shoulders, and to present all the

characteristics of profound despondency. Arriving at the bottom of the hill and coming close to the figure,

you observe it to be the figure of a shabby young man. He is moving painfully forward, in the direction in

which you are going, and his mind is so preoccupied with his misfortunes that he is not aware of your

approach until you are close upon him at the hillfoot. When he is aware of you, you discover him to be a

remarkably wellbehaved young man, and a remarkably wellspoken young man. You know him to be

wellbehaved, by his respectful manner of touching his hat: you know him to be wellspoken, by his smooth

manner of expressing himself. He says in a flowing confidential voice, and without punctuation, 'I ask your

pardon sir but if you would excuse the liberty of being so addressed upon the public Iway by one who is

almost reduced to rags though it as not always been so and by no fault of his own but through ill elth in his

family and many unmerited sufferings it would be a great obligation sir to know the time.' You give the

wellspoken young man the time. The wellspoken young man, keeping well up with you, resumes: 'I am

aware sir that it is a liberty to intrude a further question on a gentleman walking for his entertainment but

might I make so bold as ask the favour of the way to Dover sir and about the distance?' You inform the

wellspoken young man that the way to Dover is straight on, and the distance some eighteen miles. The

wellspoken young man becomes greatly agitated. 'In the condition to which I am reduced,' says he, 'I could

not ope to reach Dover before dark even if my shoes were in a state to take me there or my feet were in a state

to old out over the flinty road and were not on the bare ground of which any gentleman has the means to

satisfy himself by looking Sir may I take the liberty of speaking to you?' As the wellspoken young man

keeps so well up with you that you can't prevent his taking the liberty of speaking to you, he goes on, with

fluency: 'Sir it is not begging that is my intention for I was brought up by the best of mothers and begging is

not my trade I should not know sir how to follow it as a trade if such were my shameful wishes for the best of

mothers long taught otherwise and in the best of omes though now reduced to take the present liberty on the

Iway Sir my business was the lawstationering and I was favourably known to the Solicitor General the

AttorneyGeneral the majority of the judges and the ole of the legal profession but through ill elth in my

family and the treachery of a friend for whom I became security and he no other than my own wife's brother

the brother of my own wife I was cast forth with my tender partner and three young children not to beg for I

will sooner die of deprivation but to make my way to the sea port town of Dover where I have a relative i in

respect not only that will assist me but that would trust me with untold gold Sir in appier times and hare this

calamity fell upon me I made for my amusement when I little thought that I should ever need it excepting for

my air this' here the wellspoken young man put his hand into his breast 'this comb! Sir I implore you in

the name of charity to purchase a tortoiseshell comb which is a genuine article at any price that your

humanity may put upon it and may the blessings of a ouseless family awaiting with beating arts the return of

a husband and a father from Dover upon the cold stone seats of Londonbridge ever attend you Sir may I

take the liberty of speaking to you I implore you to buy this comb!' By this time, being a reasonably good

walker, you will have been too much for the wellspoken young man, who will stop short and express his

disgust and his want of breath, in a long expectoration, as you leave him behind.

Towards the end of the same walk, on the same bright summer day, at the corner of the next little town or

village, you may find another kind of tramp, embodied in the persons of a most exemplary couple whose only

improvidence appears to have been, that they spent the last of their little All on soap. They are a man and

woman, spotless to behold John Anderson, with the frost on his short smockfrock instead of his 'pow,'

attended by Mrs. Anderson. John is overostentatious of the frost upon his raiment, and wears a curious and,

you would say, an almost unnecessary demonstration of girdle of white linen wound about his waist a

girdle, snowy as Mrs. Anderson's apron. This cleanliness was the expiring effort of the respectable couple,

and nothing then remained to Mr. Anderson but to get chalked upon his spade in snowwhite copybook

characters, HUNGRY! and to sit down here. Yes; one thing more remained to Mr. Anderson his character;

Monarchs could not deprive him of his hardearned character. Accordingly, as you come up with this

spectacle of virtue in distress, Mrs. Anderson rises, and with a decent curtsey presents for your consideration

a certificate from a Doctor of Divinity, the reverend the Vicar of Upper Dodgington, who informs his

Christian friends and all whom it may concern that the bearers, John Anderson and lawful wife, are persons

to whom you cannot be too liberal. This benevolent pastor omitted no work of his hands to fit the good

Another class of tramp is a man, the most valuable part of whose stockintrade is a highly perplexed

demeanour. He is got up like a countryman, and you will often come upon the poor fellow, while he is

endeavouring to decipher the inscription on a milestone quite a fruitless endeavour, for he cannot read. He

asks your pardon, he truly does (he is very slow of speech, this tramp, and he looks in a bewildered way all

round the prospect while he talks to you), but all of us shold do as we wold be done by, and he'll take it kind,

if you'll put a power man in the right road fur to jine his eldest son as has broke his leg bad in the masoning,

and is in this heere Orspit'l as is wrote down by Squire Pouncerby's own hand as wold not tell a lie fur no

man. He then produces from under his dark frock (being always very slow and perplexed) a neat but worn old

leathern purse, from which he takes a scrap of paper. On this scrap of paper is written, by Squire Pouncerby,

of The Grove, 'Please to direct the Bearer, a poor but very worthy man, to the Sussex County Hospital, near

Brighton' a matter of some difficulty at the moment, seeing that the request comes suddenly upon you in the

depths of Hertfordshire. The more you endeavour to indicate where Brighton is when you have with the

greatest difficulty remembered the less the devoted father can be made to comprehend, and the more

obtusely he stares at the prospect; whereby, being reduced to extremity, you recommend the faithful parent to

begin by going to St. Albans, and present him with half acrown. It does him good, no doubt, but scarcely

helps him forward, since you find him lying drunk that same evening in the wheelwright's sawpit under the

But, the most vicious, by far, of all the idle tramps, is the tramp who pretends to have been a gentleman.

'Educated,' he writes, from the village beershop in pale ink of a ferruginous complexion; 'educated at Trin.

Coll. Cam. nursed in the lap of affluence once in my small way the pattron of the Muses,' surely a

sympathetic mind will not withhold a trifle, to help him on to the markettown where he thinks of giving a

Lecture to the FRUGES CONSUMERE NATI, on things in general? This shameful creature lolling about

hedge taprooms in his ragged clothes, now so far from being black that they look as if they never can have

been black, is more selfish and insolent than even the savage tramp. He would sponge on the poorest boy for

a farthing, and spurn him when he had got it; he would interpose (if he could get anything by it) between the

baby and the mother's breast. So much lower than the company he keeps, for his maudlin assumption of being

higher, this pitiless rascal blights the summer road as he maunders on between the luxuriant hedges; where

(to my thinking) even the wild convolvulus and rose and sweetbriar, are the worse for his going by, and

The young fellows who trudge along barefoot, five or six together, their boots slung over their shoulders,

their shabby bundles under their arms, their sticks newly cut from some roadside wood, are not eminently

prepossessing, but are much less objectionable. There is a trampfellowship among them. They pick one

another up at resting stations, and go on in companies. They always go at a fast swing though they

generally limp too and there is invariably one of the company who has much ado to keep up with the rest.

They generally talk about horses, and any other means of locomotion than walking: or, one of the company

relates some recent experiences of the road which are always disputes and difficulties. As for example. 'So

as I'm a standing at the pump in the market, blest if there don't come up a Beadle, and he ses, "Mustn't stand

here," he ses. "Why not?" I ses. "No beggars allowed in this town," he ses. "Who's a beggar?" I ses. "You

are," he ses. "Who ever see ME beg? Did YOU?" I ses. "Then you're a tramp," he ses. "I'd rather be that than

a Beadle," I ses.' (The company express great approval.) '"Would you?" he ses to me. "Yes, I would," I ses to

him. "Well," he ses, "anyhow, get out of this town." "Why, blow your little town!" I ses, "who wants to be in

it? Wot does your dirty little town mean by comin' and stickin' itself in the road to anywhere? Why don't you

get a shovel and a barrer, and clear your town out o' people's way?"' (The company expressing the highest

Then, there are the tramp handicraft men. Are they not all over England, in this Midsummer time? Where

does the lark sing, the corn grow, the mill turn, the river run, and they are not among the lights and shadows,

tinkering, chairmending, umbrellamending, clockmending, knifegrinding? Surely, a pleasant thing, if

we were in that condition of life, to grind our way through Kent, Sussex, and Surrey. For the worst six weeks

or so, we should see the sparks we ground off, fiery bright against a background of green wheat and green

leaves. A little later, and the ripe harvest would pale our sparks from red to yellow, until we got the dark

newlyturned land for a background again, and they were red once more. By that time, we should have

ground our way to the sea cliffs, and the whirr of our wheel would be lost in the breaking of the waves. Our

next variety in sparks would be derived from contrast with the gorgeous medley of colours in the autumn

woods, and, by the time we had ground our way round to the heathy lands between Reigate and Croydon,

doing a prosperous stroke of business all along, we should show like a little firework in the light frosty air,

and be the next best thing to the blacksmith's forge. Very agreeable, too, to go on a chairmending tour. What

judges we should be of rushes, and how knowingly (with a sheaf and a bottomless chair at our back) we

should lounge on bridges, looking over at osierbeds! Among all the innumerable occupations that cannot

possibly be transacted without the assistance of lookerson, chairmending may take a station in the first

rank. When we sat down with our backs against the barn or the publichouse, and began to mend, what a

sense of popularity would grow upon us! When all the children came to look at us, and the tailor, and the

general dealer, and the farmer who had been giving a small order at the little saddler's, and the groom from

the great house, and the publican, and even the two skittleplayers (and here note that, howsoever busy all

the rest of village humankind may be, there will always be two people with leisure to play at skittles,

wherever village skittles are), what encouragement would be on us to plait and weave! No one looks at us

while we plait and weave these words. Clockmending again. Except for the slight inconvenience of carrying

a clock under our arm, and the monotony of making the bell go, whenever we came to a human habitation,

what a pleasant privilege to give a voice to the dumb cottageclock, and set it talking to the cottage family

again! Likewise we foresee great interest in going round by the park plantations, under the overhanging

boughs (hares, rabbits, partridges, and pheasants, scudding like mad across and across the chequered ground

before us), and so over the park ladder, and through the wood, until we came to the Keeper's lodge. Then,

would, the Keeper be discoverable at his door, in a deep nest of leaves, smoking his pipe. Then, on our

accosting him in the way of our trade, would he call to Mrs. Keeper, respecting 't'ould clock' in the kitchen.

Then, would Mrs. Keeper ask us into the lodge, and on due examination we should offer to make a good job

of it for eighteenpence; which offer, being accepted, would set us tinkling and clinking among the chubby,

awestruck little Keepers for an hour and more. So completely to the family's satisfaction would we achieve

our work, that the Keeper would mention how that there was something wrong with the bell of the turret

stableclock up at the Hall, and that if we thought good of going up to the housekeeper on the chance of that

job too, why he would take us. Then, should we go, among the branching oaks and the deep fern, by silent

ways of mystery known to the Keeper, seeing the herd glancing here and there as we went along, until we

came to the old Hall, solemn and grand. Under the Terrace Flower Garden, and round by the stables, would

the Keeper take us in, and as we passed we should observe how spacious and stately the stables, and how fine

the painting of the horses' names over their stalls, and how solitary all: the family being in London. Then,

should we find ourselves presented to the housekeeper, sitting, in hushed state, at needlework, in a bay

window looking out upon a mighty grim redbrick quadrangle, guarded by stone lions disrespectfully

throwing somersaults over the escutcheons of the noble family. Then, our services accepted and we

insinuated with a candle into the stableturret, we should find it to be a mere question of pendulum, but one

that would hold us until dark. Then, should we fall to work, with a general impression of Ghosts being about,

and of pictures indoors that of a certainty came out of their frames and 'walked,' if the family would only own

it. Then, should we work and work, until the day gradually turned to dusk, and even until the dusk gradually

turned to dark. Our task at length accomplished, we should be taken into an enormous servants' hall, and

there regaled with beef and bread, and powerful ale. Then, paid freely, we should be at liberty to go, and

should be told by a pointing helper to keep round over yinder by the blasted ash, and so straight through the

woods, till we should see the townlights right afore us. Then, feeling lonesome, should we desire upon the

whole, that the ash had not been blasted, or that the helper had had the manners not to mention it. However,

we should keep on, all right, till suddenly the stable bell would strike ten in the dolefullest way, quite chilling

our blood, though we had so lately taught him how to acquit himself. Then, as we went on, should we recall

old stories, and dimly consider what it would be most advisable to do, in the event of a tall figure, all in

white, with saucer eyes, coming up and saying, 'I want you to come to a churchyard and mend a church clock.

Follow me!' Then, should we make a burst to get clear of the trees, and should soon find ourselves in the

open, with the townlights bright ahead of us. So should we lie that night at the ancient sign of the Crispin

Bricklayers often tramp, in twos and threes, lying by night at their 'lodges,' which are scattered all over the

country. Bricklaying is another of the occupations that can by no means be transacted in rural parts, without

the assistance of spectators of as many as can be convened. In thinlypeopled spots, I have known

bricklayers on tramp, coming up with bricklayers at work, to be so sensible of the indispensability of

lookerson, that they themselves have sat up in that capacity, and have been unable to subside into the

acceptance of a proffered share in the job, for two or three days together. Sometimes, the 'navvy,' on tramp,

with an extra pair of halfboots over his shoulder, a bag, a bottle, and a can, will take a similar part in a job of

excavation, and will look at it without engaging in it, until all his money is gone. The current of my

uncommercial pursuits caused me only last summer to want a little body of workmen for a certain spell of

work in a pleasant part of the country; and I was at one time honoured with the attendance of as many as

Who can be familiar with any rustic highway in summertime, without storing up knowledge of the many

tramps who go from one oasis of town or village to another, to sell a stock in trade, apparently not worth a

shilling when sold? Shrimps are a favourite commodity for this kind of speculation, and so are cakes of a soft

and spongy character, coupled with Spanish nuts and brandy balls. The stock is carried on the head in a

basket, and, between the head and the basket, are the trestles on which the stock is displayed at trading times.

Fleet of foot, but a careworn class of tramp this, mostly; with a certain stiffness of neck, occasioned by much

anxious balancing of baskets; and also with a long, Chinese sort of eye, which an overweighted forehead

On the hot dusty roads near seaport towns and great rivers, behold the tramping Soldier. And if you should

happen never to have asked yourself whether his uniform is suited to his work, perhaps the poor fellow's

appearance as he comes distressfully towards you, with his absurdly tight jacket unbuttoned, his neckgear in

his hand, and his legs well chafed by his trousers of baize, may suggest the personal inquiry, how you think

YOU would like it. Much better the tramping Sailor, although his cloth is somewhat too thick for land

service. But, why the tramping merchantmate should put on a black velvet waistcoat, for a chalky country in

the dog days, is one of the great secrets of nature that will never be discovered.

I have my eye upon a piece of Kentish road, bordered on either side by a wood, and having on one hand,

between the roaddust and the trees, a skirting patch of grass. Wild flowers grow in abundance on this spot,

and it lies high and airy, with a distant river stealing steadily away to the ocean, like a man's life. To gain the

milestone here, which the moss, primroses, violets, bluebells, and wild roses, would soon render illegible

but for peering travellers pushing them aside with their sticks, you must come up a steep hill, come which

way you may. So, all the tramps with carts or caravans the Gipsytramp, the Showtramp, the Cheap Jack

find it impossible to resist the temptations of the place, and all turn the horse loose when they come to it,

and boil the pot. Bless the place, I love the ashes of the vagabond fires that have scorched its grass! What

tramp children do I see here, attired in a handful of rags, making a gymnasium of the shafts of the cart,

making a featherbed of the flints and brambles, making a toy of the hobbled old horse who is not much

more like a horse than any cheap toy would be! Here, do I encounter the cart of mats and brooms and baskets

with all thoughts of business given to the evening wind with the stew made and being served out with

Cheap Jack and Dear Jill striking soft music out of the plates that are rattled like warlike cymbals when put

up for auction at fairs and markets their minds so influenced (no doubt) by the melody of the nightingales

as they begin to sing in the woods behind them, that if I were to propose to deal, they would sell me anything

at cost price. On this hallowed ground has it been my happy privilege (let me whisper it), to behold the

Whitehaired Lady with the pink eyes, eating meatpie with the Giant: while, by the hedgeside, on the box

of blankets which I knew contained the snakes, were set forth the cups and saucers and the teapot. It was on

an evening in August, that I chanced upon this ravishing spectacle, and I noticed that, whereas the Giant

reclined half concealed beneath the overhanging boughs and seemed indifferent to Nature, the white hair of

the gracious Lady streamed free in the breath of evening, and her pink eyes found pleasure in the landscape. I

heard only a single sentence of her uttering, yet it bespoke a talent for modest repartee. The illmannered

Giant accursed be his evil race! had interrupted the Lady in some remark, and, as I passed that enchanted

corner of the wood, she gently reproved him, with the words, 'Now, Cobby;' Cobby! so short a name!

Within appropriate distance of this magic ground, though not so near it as that the song trolled from tap or

bench at door, can invade its woodland silence, is a little hostelry which no man possessed of a penny was

ever known to pass in warm weather. Before its entrance, are certain pleasant, trimmed limes; likewise, a cool

well, with so musical a buckethandle that its fall upon the bucket rim will make a horse prick up his ears and

neigh, upon the droughty road half a mile off. This is a house of great resort for haymaking tramps and

harvest tramps, insomuch that as they sit within, drinking their mugs of beer, their relinquished scythes and

reapinghooks glare out of the open windows, as if the whole establishment were a family warcoach of

Ancient Britons. Later in the season, the whole countryside, for miles and miles, will swarm with hopping

tramps. They come in families, men, women, and children, every family provided with a bundle of bedding,

an iron pot, a number of babies, and too often with some poor sick creature quite unfit for the rough life, for

whom they suppose the smell of the fresh hop to be a sovereign remedy. Many of these hoppers are Irish, but

many come from London. They crowd all the roads, and camp under all the hedges and on all the scraps of

commonland, and live among and upon the hops until they are all picked, and the hopgardens, so beautiful

through the summer, look as if they had been laid waste by an invading army. Then, there is a vast exodus of

tramps out of the country; and if you ride or drive round any turn of any road, at more than a foot pace, you

will be bewildered to find that you have charged into the bosom of fifty families, and that there are splashing

up all around you, in the utmost prodigality of confusion, bundles of bedding, babies, iron pots, and a

goodhumoured multitude of both sexes and all ages, equally divided between perspiration and intoxication.

It lately happened that I found myself rambling about the scenes among which my earliest days were passed;

scenes from which I departed when I was a child, and which I did not revisit until I was a man. This is no

uncommon chance, but one that befalls some of us any day; perhaps it may not be quite uninteresting to

compare notes with the reader respecting an experience so familiar and a journey so uncommercial.

I call my boyhood's home (and I feel like a Tenor in an English Opera when I mention it) Dullborough. Most

As I left Dullborough in the days when there were no railroads in the land, I left it in a stagecoach. Through

all the years that have since passed, have I ever lost the smell of the damp straw in which I was packed like

game and forwarded, carriage paid, to the Cross Keys, Woodstreet, Cheapside, London? There was no

other inside passenger, and I consumed my sandwiches in solitude and dreariness, and it rained hard all the

With this tender remembrance upon me, I was cavalierly shunted back into Dullborough the other day, by

train. My ticket had been previously collected, like my taxes, and my shining new portmanteau had had a

great plaster stuck upon it, and I had been defied by Act of Parliament to offer an objection to anything that

was done to it, or me, under a penalty of not less than forty shillings or more than five pounds, compoundable

for a term of imprisonment. When I had sent my disfigured property on to the hotel, I began to look about

me; and the first discovery I made, was, that the Station had swallowed up the playingfield.

It was gone. The two beautiful hawthorntrees, the hedge, the turf, and all those buttercups and daisies, had

given place to the stoniest of jolting roads: while, beyond the Station, an ugly dark monster of a tunnel kept

its jaws open, as if it had swallowed them and were ravenous for more destruction. The coach that had carried

me away, was melodiously called Timpson's BlueEyed Maid, and belonged to Timpson, at the coachoffice

upstreet; the locomotive engine that had brought me back, was called severely No. 97, and belonged to

When I had been let out at the platformdoor, like a prisoner whom his turnkey grudgingly released, I looked

in again over the low wall, at the scene of departed glories. Here, in the haymaking time, had I been delivered

from the dungeons of Seringapatam, an immense pile (of haycock), by my own countrymen, the victorious

British (boy next door and his two cousins), and had been recognised with ecstasy by my affianced one (Miss

Green), who had come all the way from England (second house in the terrace) to ransom me, and marry me.

Here, had I first heard in confidence, from one whose father was greatly connected, being under Government,

of the existence of a terrible banditti, called 'The Radicals,' whose principles were, that the Prince Regent

wore stays, and that nobody had a right to any salary, and that the army and navy ought to be put down

horrors at which I trembled in my bed, after supplicating that the Radicals might be speedily taken and

hanged. Here, too, had we, the small boys of Boles's, had that cricket match against the small boys of Coles's,

when Boles and Coles had actually met upon the ground, and when, instead of instantly hitting out at one

another with the utmost fury, as we had all hoped and expected, those sneaks had said respectively, 'I hope

Mrs. Boles is well,' and 'I hope Mrs. Coles and the baby are doing charmingly.' Could it be that, after all this,

and much more, the Playingfield was a Station, and No. 97 expectorated boiling water and redhot cinders on

As it could be, and was, I left the place with a heavy heart for a walk all over the town. And first of

Timpson's upstreet. When I departed from Dullborough in the strawy arms of Timpson's BlueEyed Maid,

Timpson's was a moderatesized coachoffice (in fact, a little coachoffice), with an oval transparency in the

window, which looked beautiful by night, representing one of Timpson's coaches in the act of passing a

milestone on the London road with great velocity, completely full inside and out, and all the passengers

dressed in the first style of fashion, and enjoying themselves tremendously. I found no such place as

Timpson's now no such bricks and rafters, not to mention the name no such edifice on the teeming earth.

Pickford had come and knocked Timpson's down. Pickford had not only knocked Timpson's down, but had

knocked two or three houses down on each side of Timpson's, and then had knocked the whole into one great

establishment with a pair of big gates, in and out of which, his (Pickford's) waggons are, in these days,

always rattling, with their drivers sitting up so high, that they look in at the secondfloor windows of the

oldfashioned houses in the Highstreet as they shake the town. I have not the honour of Pickford's

acquaintance, but I felt that he had done me an injury, not to say committed an act of boyslaughter, in running

over my Childhood in this rough manner; and if ever I meet Pickford driving one of his own monsters, and

smoking a pipe the while (which is the custom of his men), he shall know by the expression of my eye, if it

Moreover, I felt that Pickford had no right to come rushing into Dullborough and deprive the town of a public

picture. He is not Napoleon Bonaparte. When he took down the transparent stagecoach, he ought to have

given the town a transparent van. With a gloomy conviction that Pickford is wholly utilitarian and

It is a mercy I have not a red and green lamp and a nightbell at my door, for in my very young days I was

taken to so many lyingsin that I wonder I escaped becoming a professional martyr to them in afterlife. I

suppose I had a very sympathetic nurse, with a large circle of married acquaintance. However that was, as I

continued my walk through Dullborough, I found many houses to be solely associated in my mind with this

particular interest. At one little greengrocer's shop, down certain steps from the street, I remember to have

waited on a lady who had had four children (I am afraid to write five, though I fully believe it was five) at a

birth. This meritorious woman held quite a reception in her room on the morning when I was introduced

there, and the sight of the house brought vividly to my mind how the four (five) deceased young people lay,

side by side, on a clean cloth on a chest of drawers; reminding me by a homely association, which I suspect

their complexion to have assisted, of pigs' feet as they are usually displayed at a neat tripeshop. Hot candle

was handed round on the occasion, and I further remembered as I stood contemplating the greengrocer's, that

a subscription was entered into among the company, which became extremely alarming to my consciousness

of having pocketmoney on my person. This fact being known to my conductress, whoever she was, I was

earnestly exhorted to contribute, but resolutely declined: therein disgusting the company, who gave me to

How does it happen that when all else is change wherever one goes, there yet seem, in every place, to be

some few people who never alter? As the sight of the greengrocer's house recalled these trivial incidents of

long ago, the identical greengrocer appeared on the steps, with his hands in his pockets, and leaning his

shoulder against the doorpost, as my childish eyes had seen him many a time; indeed, there was his old

mark on the doorpost yet, as if his shadow had become a fixture there. It was he himself; he might formerly

have been an oldlooking young man, or he might now be a younglooking old man, but there he was. In

walking along the street, I had as yet looked in vain for a familiar face, or even a transmitted face; here was

the very greengrocer who had been weighing and handling baskets on the morning of the reception. As he

brought with him a dawning remembrance that he had had no proprietary interest in those babies, I crossed

the road, and accosted him on the subject. He was not in the least excited or gratified, or in any way roused,

by the accuracy of my recollection, but said, Yes, summut out of the common he didn't remember how

many it was (as if halfadozen babes either way made no difference) had happened to a Mrs.

What'shername, as once lodged there but he didn't call it to mind, particular. Nettled by this phlegmatic

conduct, I informed him that I had left the town when I was a child. He slowly returned, quite unsoftened,

and not without a sarcastic kind of complacency, HAD I? Ah! And did I find it had got on tolerably well

without me? Such is the difference (I thought, when I had left him a few hundred yards behind, and was by so

much in a better temper) between going away from a place and remaining in it. I had no right, I reflected, to

be angry with the greengrocer for his want of interest, I was nothing to him: whereas he was the town, the

cathedral, the bridge, the river, my childhood, and a large slice of my life, to me.

Of course the town had shrunk fearfully, since I was a child there. I had entertained the impression that the

Highstreet was at least as wide as Regentstreet, London, or the Italian Boulevard at Paris. I found it little

better than a lane. There was a public clock in it, which I had supposed to be the finest clock in the world:

whereas it now turned out to be as inexpressive, moon faced, and weak a clock as ever I saw. It belonged to

a Town Hall, where I had seen an Indian (who I now suppose wasn't an Indian) swallow a sword (which I

now suppose he didn't). The edifice had appeared to me in those days so glorious a structure, that I had set it

up in my mind as the model on which the Genie of the Lamp built the palace for Aladdin. A mean little brick

heap, like a demented chapel, with a few yawning persons in leather gaiters, and in the last extremity for

something to do, lounging at the door with their hands in their pockets, and calling themselves a Corn

The Theatre was in existence, I found, on asking the fishmonger, who had a compact show of stock in his

window, consisting of a sole and a quart of shrimps and I resolved to comfort my mind by going to look at

it. Richard the Third, in a very uncomfortable cloak, had first appeared to me there, and had made my heart

leap with terror by backing up against the stagebox in which I was posted, while struggling for life against

the virtuous Richmond. It was within those walls that I had learnt as from a page of English history, how that

wicked King slept in wartime on a sofa much too short for him, and how fearfully his conscience troubled

his boots. There, too, had I first seen the funny countryman, but countryman of noble principles, in a flowered

waistcoat, crunch up his little hat and throw it on the ground, and pull off his coat, saying, 'Dom thee, squire,

coom on with thy fistes then!' At which the lovely young woman who kept company with him (and who went

out gleaning, in a narrow white muslin apron with five beautiful bars of five differentcoloured ribbons

across it) was so frightened for his sake, that she fainted away. Many wondrous secrets of Nature had I come

to the knowledge of in that sanctuary: of which not the least terrific were, that the witches in Macbeth bore an

awful resemblance to the Thanes and other proper inhabitants of Scotland; and that the good King Duncan

couldn't rest in his grave, but was constantly coming out of it and calling himself somebody else. To the

Theatre, therefore, I repaired for consolation. But I found very little, for it was in a bad and declining way. A

dealer in wine and bottled beer had already squeezed his trade into the box office, and the theatrical money

was taken when it came in a kind of meatsafe in the passage. The dealer in wine and bottled beer must

have insinuated himself under the stage too; for he announced that he had various descriptions of alcoholic

drinks 'in the wood,' and there was no possible stowage for the wood anywhere else. Evidently, he was by

degrees eating the establishment away to the core, and would soon have sole possession of it. It was To Let,

and hopelessly so, for its old purposes; and there had been no entertainment within its walls for a long time

except a Panorama; and even that had been announced as 'pleasingly instructive,' and I know too well the

fatal meaning and the leaden import of those terrible expressions. No, there was no comfort in the Theatre. It

was mysteriously gone, like my own youth. Unlike my own youth, it might be coming back some day; but

As the town was placarded with references to the Dullborough Mechanics' Institution, I thought I would go

and look at that establishment next. There had been no such thing in the town, in my young day, and it

occurred to me that its extreme prosperity might have brought adversity upon the Drama. I found the

Institution with some difficulty, and should scarcely have known that I had found it if I had judged from its

external appearance only; but this was attributable to its never having been finished, and having no front:

consequently, it led a modest and retired existence up a stableyard. It was (as I learnt, on inquiry) a most

flourishing Institution, and of the highest benefit to the town: two triumphs which I was glad to understand

were not at all impaired by the seeming drawbacks that no mechanics belonged to it, and that it was steeped

in debt to the chimneypots. It had a large room, which was approached by an infirm stepladder: the builder

having declined to construct the intended staircase, without a present payment in cash, which Dullborough

(though profoundly appreciative of the Institution) seemed unaccountably bashful about subscribing. The

large room had cost or would, when paid for five hundred pounds; and it had more mortar in it and more

echoes, than one might have expected to get for the money. It was fitted up with a platform, and the usual

lecturing tools, including a large black board of a menacing appearance. On referring to lists of the courses of

lectures that had been given in this thriving Hall, I fancied I detected a shyness in admitting that human

nature when at leisure has any desire whatever to be relieved and diverted; and a furtive sliding in of any poor

make weight piece of amusement, shamefacedly and edgewise. Thus, I observed that it was necessary for

the members to be knocked on the head with Gas, Air, Water, Food, the Solar System, the Geological

periods, Criticism on Milton, the Steamengine, John Bunyan, and ArrowHeaded Inscriptions, before they

might be tickled by those unaccountable choristers, the negro singers in the court costume of the reign of

George the Second. Likewise, that they must be stunned by a weighty inquiry whether there was internal

evidence in Shakespeare's works, to prove that his uncle by the mother's side lived for some years at Stoke

Newington, before they were brought to by a Miscellaneous Concert. But, indeed, the masking of

entertainment, and pretending it was something else as people mask bedsteads when they are obliged to

have them in sittingrooms, and make believe that they are bookcases, sofas, chests of drawers, anything

rather than bedsteads was manifest even in the pretence of dreariness that the unfortunate entertainers

themselves felt obliged in decency to put forth when they came here. One very agreeable professional singer,

who travelled with two professional ladies, knew better than to introduce either of those ladies to sing the

ballad 'Comin' through the Rye' without prefacing it himself, with some general remarks on wheat and clover;

and even then, he dared not for his life call the song, a song, but disguised it in the bill as an 'Illustration.' In

the library, also fitted with shelves for three thousand books, and containing upwards of one hundred and

seventy (presented copies mostly), seething their edges in damp plaster there was such a painfully

apologetic return of 62 offenders who had read Travels, Popular Biography, and mere Fiction descriptive of

the aspirations of the hearts and souls of mere human creatures like themselves; and such an elaborate parade

of 2 bright examples who had had down Euclid after the day's occupation and confinement; and 3 who had

had down Metaphysics after ditto; and 1 who had had down Theology after ditto; and 4 who had worried

Grammar, Political Economy, Botany, and Logarithms all at once after ditto; that I suspected the boasted

Emerging from the Mechanics' Institution and continuing my walk about the town, I still noticed everywhere

the prevalence, to an extraordinary degree, of this custom of putting the natural demand for amusement out of

sight, as some untidy housekeepers put dust, and pretending that it was swept away. And yet it was

ministered to, in a dull and abortive manner, by all who made this feint. Looking in at what is called in

Dullborough 'the serious bookseller's,' where, in my childhood, I had studied the faces of numbers of

gentlemen depicted in rostrums with a gaslight on each side of them, and casting my eyes over the open

pages of certain printed discourses there, I found a vast deal of aiming at jocosity and dramatic effect, even in

them yes, verily, even on the part of one very wrathful expounder who bitterly anathematised a poor little

Circus. Similarly, in the reading provided for the young people enrolled in the Lasso of Love, and other

excellent unions, I found the writers generally under a distressing sense that they must start (at all events) like

storytellers, and delude the young persons into the belief that they were going to be interesting. As I looked

in at this window for twenty minutes by the clock, I am in a position to offer a friendly remonstrance not

bearing on this particular point to the designers and engravers of the pictures in those publications. Have

they considered the awful consequences likely to flow from their representations of Virtue? Have they asked

themselves the question, whether the terrific prospect of acquiring that fearful chubbiness of head,

unwieldiness of arm, feeble dislocation of leg, crispiness of hair, and enormity of shirtcollar, which they

represent as inseparable from Goodness, may not tend to confirm sensitive waverers, in Evil? A most

impressive example (if I had believed it) of what a Dustman and a Sailor may come to, when they mend their

ways, was presented to me in this same shopwindow. When they were leaning (they were intimate friends)

against a post, drunk and reckless, with surpassingly bad hats on, and their hair over their foreheads, they

were rather picturesque, and looked as if they might be agreeable men, if they would not be beasts. But, when

they had got over their bad propensities, and when, as a consequence, their heads had swelled alarmingly,

their hair had got so curly that it lifted their blownout cheeks up, their coatcuffs were so long that they

never could do any work, and their eyes were so wide open that they never could do any sleep, they presented

But, the clock that had so degenerated since I saw it last, admonished me that I had stayed here long enough;

I had not gone fifty paces along the street when I was suddenly brought up by the sight of a man who got out

of a little phaeton at the doctor's door, and went into the doctor's house. Immediately, the air was filled with

the scent of trodden grass, and the perspective of years opened, and at the end of it was a little likeness of this

Through many changes and much work, I had preserved a tenderness for the memory of Joe, forasmuch as

we had made the acquaintance of Roderick Random together, and had believed him to be no ruffian, but an

ingenuous and engaging hero. Scorning to ask the boy left in the phaeton whether it was really Joe, and

scorning even to read the brass plate on the door so sure was I I rang the bell and informed the servant

maid that a stranger sought audience of Mr. Specks. Into a room, half surgery, half study, I was shown to

await his coming, and I found it, by a series of elaborate accidents, bestrewn with testimonies to Joe. Portrait

of Mr. Specks, bust of Mr. Specks, silver cup from grateful patient to Mr. Specks, presentation sermon from

local clergyman, dedication poem from local poet, dinnercard from local nobleman, tract on balance of

When my old schoolfellow came in, and I informed him with a smile that I was not a patient, he seemed

rather at a loss to perceive any reason for smiling in connexion with that fact, and inquired to what was he to

attribute the honour? I asked him with another smile, could he remember me at all? He had not (he said) that

pleasure. I was beginning to have but a poor opinion of Mr. Specks, when he said reflectively, 'And yet

there's a something too.' Upon that, I saw a boyish light in his eyes that looked well, and I asked him if he

could inform me, as a stranger who desired to know and had not the means of reference at hand, what the

name of the young lady was, who married Mr. Random? Upon that, he said 'Narcissa,' and, after staring for a

moment, called me by my name, shook me by the hand, and melted into a roar of laughter. 'Why, of course,

you'll remember Lucy Green,' he said, after we had talked a little. 'Of course,' said I. 'Whom do you think she

married?' said he. 'You?' I hazarded. 'Me,' said Specks, 'and you shall see her.' So I saw her, and she was fat,

and if all the hay in the world had been heaped upon her, it could scarcely have altered her face more than

Time had altered it from my remembrance of the face that had once looked down upon me into the fragrant

dungeons of Seringapatam. But when her youngest child came in after dinner (for I dined with them, and we

had no other company than Specks, Junior, Barristeratlaw, who went away as soon as the cloth was

removed, to look after the young lady to whom he was going to be married next week), I saw again, in that

little daughter, the little face of the hayfield, unchanged, and it quite touched my foolish heart. We talked

immensely, Specks and Mrs. Specks, and I, and we spoke of our old selves as though our old selves were

dead and gone, and indeed, indeed they were dead and gone as the playingfield that had become a

Specks, however, illuminated Dullborough with the rays of interest that I wanted and should otherwise have

missed in it, and linked its present to its past, with a highly agreeable chain. And in Specks's society I had

new occasion to observe what I had before noticed in similar communications among other men. All the

schoolfellows and others of old, whom I inquired about, had either done superlatively well or superlatively ill

had either become uncertificated bankrupts, or been felonious and got themselves transported; or had made

great hits in life, and done wonders. And this is so commonly the case, that I never can imagine what

becomes of all the mediocre people of people's youth especially considering that we find no lack of the

species in our maturity. But, I did not propound this difficulty to Specks, for no pause in the conversation

gave me an occasion. Nor, could I discover one single flaw in the good doctor when he reads this, he will

receive in a friendly spirit the pleasantly meant record except that he had forgotten his Roderick Random,

and that he confounded Strap with Lieutenant Hatchway; who never knew Random, howsoever intimate with

When I went alone to the Railway to catch my train at night (Specks had meant to go with me, but was

inopportunely called out), I was in a more charitable mood with Dullborough than I had been all day; and yet

in my heart I had loved it all day too. Ah! who was I that I should quarrel with the town for being changed to

me, when I myself had come back, so changed, to it! All my early readings and early imaginations dated from

this place, and I took them away so full of innocent construction and guileless belief, and I brought them back

Some years ago, a temporary inability to sleep, referable to a distressing impression, caused me to walk about

the streets all night, for a series of several nights. The disorder might have taken a long time to conquer, if it

had been faintly experimented on in bed; but, it was soon defeated by the brisk treatment of getting up

In the course of those nights, I finished my education in a fair amateur experience of houselessness. My

principal object being to get through the night, the pursuit of it brought me into sympathetic relations with

The month was March, and the weather damp, cloudy, and cold. The sun not rising before halfpast five, the

night perspective looked sufficiently long at halfpast twelve: which was about my time for confronting it.

The restlessness of a great city, and the way in which it tumbles and tosses before it can get to sleep, formed

one of the first entertainments offered to the contemplation of us houseless people. It lasted about two hours.

We lost a great deal of companionship when the late publichouses turned their lamps out, and when the

potmen thrust the last brawling drunkards into the street; but stray vehicles and stray people were left us, after

that. If we were very lucky, a policeman's rattle sprang and a fray turned up; but, in general, surprisingly little

of this diversion was provided. Except in the Haymarket, which is the worst kept part of London, and about

Kentstreet in the Borough, and along a portion of the line of the Old Kentroad, the peace was seldom

violently broken. But, it was always the case that London, as if in imitation of individual citizens belonging

to it, had expiring fits and starts of restlessness. After all seemed quiet, if one cab rattled by, halfadozen

would surely follow; and Houselessness even observed that intoxicated people appeared to be magnetically

attracted towards each other; so that we knew when we saw one drunken object staggering against the

shutters of a shop, that another drunken object would stagger up before five minutes were out, to fraternise or

fight with it. When we made a divergence from the regular species of drunkard, the thinarmed, pufffaced,

leadenlipped gindrinker, and encountered a rarer specimen of a more decent appearance, fifty to one but

that specimen was dressed in soiled mourning. As the street experience in the night, so the street experience

in the day; the common folk who come unexpectedly into a little property, come unexpectedly into a deal of

At length these flickering sparks would die away, worn out the last veritable sparks of waking life trailed

from some late pieman or hotpotato man and London would sink to rest. And then the yearning of the

houseless mind would be for any sign of company, any lighted place, any movement, anything suggestive of

any one being up nay, even so much as awake, for the houseless eye looked out for lights in windows.

Walking the streets under the pattering rain, Houselessness would walk and walk and walk, seeing nothing

but the interminable tangle of streets, save at a corner, here and there, two policemen in conversation, or the

sergeant or inspector looking after his men. Now and then in the night but rarely Houselessness would

become aware of a furtive head peering out of a doorway a few yards before him, and, coming up with the

head, would find a man standing bolt upright to keep within the doorway's shadow, and evidently intent upon

no particular service to society. Under a kind of fascination, and in a ghostly silence suitable to the time,

Houselessness and this gentleman would eye one another from head to foot, and so, without exchange of

speech, part, mutually suspicious. Drip, drip, drip, from ledge and coping, splash from pipes and

waterspouts, and byandby the houseless shadow would fall upon the stones that pave the way to

Waterloobridge; it being in the houseless mind to have a halfpenny worth of excuse for saying 'Goodnight'

to the tollkeeper, and catching a glimpse of his fire. A good fire and a good greatcoat and a good woollen

neckshawl, were comfortable things to see in conjunction with the tollkeeper; also his brisk wakefulness

was excellent company when he rattled the change of halfpence down upon that metal table of his, like a man

who defied the night, with all its sorrowful thoughts, and didn't care for the coming of dawn. There was need

of encouragement on the threshold of the bridge, for the bridge was dreary. The choppedup murdered man,

had not been lowered with a rope over the parapet when those nights were; he was alive, and slept then

quietly enough most likely, and undisturbed by any dream of where he was to come. But the river had an

awful look, the buildings on the banks were muffled in black shrouds, and the reflected lights seemed to

originate deep in the water, as if the spectres of suicides were holding them to show where they went down.

The wild moon and clouds were as restless as an evil conscience in a tumbled bed, and the very shadow of

Between the bridge and the two great theatres, there was but the distance of a few hundred paces, so the

theatres came next. Grim and black within, at night, those great dry Wells, and lonesome to imagine, with the

rows of faces faded out, the lights extinguished, and the seats all empty. One would think that nothing in

them knew itself at such a time but Yorick's skull. In one of my night walks, as the church steeples were

shaking the March winds and rain with the strokes of Four, I passed the outer boundary of one of these great

deserts, and entered it. With a dim lantern in my hand, I groped my wellknown way to the stage and looked

over the orchestra which was like a great grave dug for a time of pestilence into the void beyond. A

dismal cavern of an immense aspect, with the chandelier gone dead like everything else, and nothing visible

through mist and fog and space, but tiers of windingsheets. The ground at my feet where, when last there, I

had seen the peasantry of Naples dancing among the vines, reckless of the burning mountain which

threatened to overwhelm them, was now in possession of a strong serpent of enginehose, watchfully lying in

wait for the serpent Fire, and ready to fly at it if it showed its forked tongue. A ghost of a watchman, carrying

a faint corpse candle, haunted the distant upper gallery and flitted away. Retiring within the proscenium, and

holding my light above my head towards the rolledup curtain green no more, but black as ebony my

sight lost itself in a gloomy vault, showing faint indications in it of a shipwreck of canvas and cordage.

In those small hours when there was no movement in the streets, it afforded matter for reflection to take

Newgate in the way, and, touching its rough stone, to think of the prisoners in their sleep, and then to glance

in at the lodge over the spiked wicket, and see the fire and light of the watching turnkeys, on the white wall.

Not an inappropriate time either, to linger by that wicked little Debtors' Door shutting tighter than any other

door one ever saw which has been Death's Door to so many. In the days of the uttering of forged

onepound notes by people tempted up from the country, how many hundreds of wretched creatures of both

sexes many quite innocent swung out of a pitiless and inconsistent world, with the tower of yonder

Christian church of Saint Sepulchre monstrously before their eyes! Is there any haunting of the Bank Parlour,

by the remorseful souls of old directors, in the nights of these later days, I wonder, or is it as quiet as this

To walk on to the Bank, lamenting the good old times and bemoaning the present evil period, would be an

easy next step, so I would take it, and would make my houseless circuit of the Bank, and give a thought to the

treasure within; likewise to the guard of soldiers passing the night there, and nodding over the fire. Next, I

went to Billingsgate, in some hope of marketpeople, but it proving as yet too early, crossed Londonbridge

and got down by the waterside on the Surrey shore among the buildings of the great brewery. There was

plenty going on at the brewery; and the reek, and the smell of grains, and the rattling of the plump dray horses

at their mangers, were capital company. Quite refreshed by having mingled with this good society, I made a

new start with a new heart, setting the old King's Bench prison before me for my next object, and resolving,

when I should come to the wall, to think of poor Horace Kinch, and the Dry Rot in men.

A very curious disease the Dry Rot in men, and difficult to detect the beginning of. It had carried Horace

Kinch inside the wall of the old King's Bench prison, and it had carried him out with his feet foremost. He

was a likely man to look at, in the prime of life, well to do, as clever as he needed to be, and popular among

many friends. He was suitably married, and had healthy and pretty children. But, like some fairlooking

houses or fairlooking ships, he took the Dry Rot. The first strong external revelation of the Dry Rot in men,

is a tendency to lurk and lounge; to be at streetcorners without intelligible reason; to be going anywhere

when met; to be about many places rather than at any; to do nothing tangible, but to have an intention of

performing a variety of intangible duties tomorrow or the day after. When this manifestation of the disease

is observed, the observer will usually connect it with a vague impression once formed or received, that the

patient was living a little too hard. He will scarcely have had leisure to turn it over in his mind and form the

terrible suspicion 'Dry Rot,' when he will notice a change for the worse in the patient's appearance: a certain

slovenliness and deterioration, which is not poverty, nor dirt, nor intoxication, nor illhealth, but simply Dry

Rot. To this, succeeds a smell as of strong waters, in the morning; to that, a looseness respecting money; to

that, a stronger smell as of strong waters, at all times; to that, a looseness respecting everything; to that, a

trembling of the limbs, somnolency, misery, and crumbling to pieces. As it is in wood, so it is in men. Dry

Rot advances at a compound usury quite incalculable. A plank is found infected with it, and the whole

structure is devoted. Thus it had been with the unhappy Horace Kinch, lately buried by a small subscription.

Those who knew him had not nigh done saying, 'So well off, so comfortably established, with such hope

before him and yet, it is feared, with a slight touch of Dry Rot!' when lo! the man was all Dry Rot and dust.

From the dead wall associated on those houseless nights with this too common story, I chose next to wander

by Bethlehem Hospital; partly, because it lay on my road round to Westminster; partly, because I had a night

fancy in my head which could be best pursued within sight of its walls and dome. And the fancy was this:

Are not the sane and the insane equal at night as the sane lie a dreaming? Are not all of us outside this

hospital, who dream, more or less in the condition of those inside it, every night of our lives? Are we not

nightly persuaded, as they daily are, that we associate preposterously with kings and queens, emperors and

empresses, and notabilities of all sorts? Do we not nightly jumble events and personages and times and

places, as these do daily? Are we not sometimes troubled by our own sleeping inconsistencies, and do we not

vexedly try to account for them or excuse them, just as these do sometimes in respect of their waking

delusions? Said an afflicted man to me, when I was last in a hospital like this, 'Sir, I can frequently fly.' I was

half ashamed to reflect that so could I by night. Said a woman to me on the same occasion, 'Queen Victoria

frequently comes to dine with me, and her Majesty and I dine off peaches and maccaroni in our nightgowns,

and his Royal Highness the Prince Consort does us the honour to make a third on horseback in a

FieldMarshal's uniform.' Could I refrain from reddening with consciousness when I remembered the

amazing royal parties I myself had given (at night), the unaccountable viands I had put on table, and my

extraordinary manner of conducting myself on those distinguished occasions? I wonder that the great master

who knew everything, when he called Sleep the death of each day's life, did not call Dreams the insanity of

By this time I had left the Hospital behind me, and was again setting towards the river; and in a short

breathing space I was on Westminsterbridge, regaling my houseless eyes with the external walls of the

British Parliament the perfection of a stupendous institution, I know, and the admiration of all surrounding

nations and succeeding ages, I do not doubt, but perhaps a little the better now and then for being pricked up

to its work. Turning off into Old Palaceyard, the Courts of Law kept me company for a quarter of an hour;

hinting in low whispers what numbers of people they were keeping awake, and how intensely wretched and

horrible they were rendering the small hours to unfortunate suitors. Westminster Abbey was fine gloomy

society for another quarter of an hour; suggesting a wonderful procession of its dead among the dark arches

and pillars, each century more amazed by the century following it than by all the centuries going before. And

indeed in those houseless night walks which even included cemeteries where watchmen went round among

the graves at stated times, and moved the telltale handle of an index which recorded that they had touched it

at such an hour it was a solemn consideration what enormous hosts of dead belong to one old great city,

and how, if they were raised while the living slept, there would not be the space of a pin's point in all the

streets and ways for the living to come out into. Not only that, but the vast armies of dead would overflow the

hills and valleys beyond the city, and would stretch away all round it, God knows how far.

When a church clock strikes, on houseless ears in the dead of the night, it may be at first mistaken for

company and hailed as such. But, as the spreading circles of vibration, which you may perceive at such a time

with great clearness, go opening out, for ever and ever afterwards widening perhaps (as the philosopher has

suggested) in eternal space, the mistake is rectified and the sense of loneliness is profounder. Once it was

after leaving the Abbey and turning my face north I came to the great steps of St. Martin's church as the

clock was striking Three. Suddenly, a thing that in a moment more I should have trodden upon without

seeing, rose up at my feet with a cry of loneliness and houselessness, struck out of it by the bell, the like of

which I never heard. We then stood face to face looking at one another, frightened by one another. The

creature was like a beetlebrowed hairlipped youth of twenty, and it had a loose bundle of rags on, which it

held together with one of its hands. It shivered from head to foot, and its teeth chattered, and as it stared at me

persecutor, devil, ghost, whatever it thought me it made with its whining mouth as if it were snapping at

me, like a worried dog. Intending to give this ugly object money, I put out my hand to stay it for it recoiled

as it whined and snapped and laid my hand upon its shoulder. Instantly, it twisted out of its garment, like

the young man in the New Testament, and left me standing alone with its rags in my hands.

Coventgarden Market, when it was market morning, was wonderful company. The great waggons of

cabbages, with growers' men and boys lying asleep under them, and with sharp dogs from marketgarden

neighbourhoods looking after the whole, were as good as a party. But one of the worst night sights I know in

London, is to be found in the children who prowl about this place; who sleep in the baskets, fight for the

offal, dart at any object they think they can lay their their thieving hands on, dive under the carts and barrows,

dodge the constables, and are perpetually making a blunt pattering on the pavement of the Piazza with the

rain of their naked feet. A painful and unnatural result comes of the comparison one is forced to institute

between the growth of corruption as displayed in the so much improved and cared for fruits of the earth, and

the growth of corruption as displayed in these all uncared for (except inasmuch as everhunted) savages.

There was early coffee to be got about Coventgarden Market, and that was more company warm

company, too, which was better. Toast of a very substantial quality, was likewise procurable: though the

towzledheaded man who made it, in an inner chamber within the coffeeroom, hadn't got his coat on yet,

and was so heavy with sleep that in every interval of toast and coffee he went off anew behind the partition

into complicated crossroads of choke and snore, and lost his way directly. Into one of these establishments

(among the earliest) near Bowstreet, there came one morning as I sat over my houseless cup, pondering

where to go next, a man in a high and long snuffcoloured coat, and shoes, and, to the best of my belief,

nothing else but a hat, who took out of his hat a large cold meat pudding; a meat pudding so large that it was

a very tight fit, and brought the lining of the hat out with it. This mysterious man was known by his pudding,

for on his entering, the man of sleep brought him a pint of hot tea, a small loaf, and a large knife and fork and

plate. Left to himself in his box, he stood the pudding on the bare table, and, instead of cutting it, stabbed it,

overhand, with the knife, like a mortal enemy; then took the knife out, wiped it on his sleeve, tore the

pudding asunder with his fingers, and ate it all up. The remembrance of this man with the pudding remains

with me as the remembrance of the most spectral person my houselessness encountered. Twice only was I in

that establishment, and twice I saw him stalk in (as I should say, just out of bed, and presently going back to

bed), take out his pudding, stab his pudding, wipe the dagger, and eat his pudding all up. He was a man

whose figure promised cadaverousness, but who had an excessively red face, though shaped like a horse's.

On the second occasion of my seeing him, he said huskily to the man of sleep, 'Am I red tonight?' 'You are,'

he uncompromisingly answered. 'My mother,' said the spectre, 'was a redfaced woman that liked drink, and

I looked at her hard when she laid in her coffin, and I took the complexion.' Somehow, the pudding seemed

When there was no market, or when I wanted variety, a railway terminus with the morning mails coming in,

was remunerative company. But like most of the company to be had in this world, it lasted only a very short

time. The station lamps would burst out ablaze, the porters would emerge from places of concealment, the

cabs and trucks would rattle to their places (the postoffice carts were already in theirs), and, finally, the bell

would strike up, and the train would come banging in. But there were few passengers and little luggage, and

everything scuttled away with the greatest expedition. The locomotive postoffices, with their great nets as

if they had been dragging the country for bodies would fly open as to their doors, and would disgorge a

smell of lamp, an exhausted clerk, a guard in a red coat, and their bags of letters; the engine would blow and

heave and perspire, like an engine wiping its forehead and saying what a run it had had; and within ten

But now, there were driven cattle on the high road near, wanting (as cattle always do) to turn into the midst of

stone walls, and squeeze themselves through six inches' width of iron railing, and getting their heads down

(also as cattle always do) for tossing purchase at quite imaginary dogs, and giving themselves and every

devoted creature associated with them a most extraordinary amount of unnecessary trouble. Now, too, the

conscious gas began to grow pale with the knowledge that daylight was coming, and straggling workpeople

were already in the streets, and, as waking life had become extinguished with the last pieman's sparks, so it

began to be rekindled with the fires of the first streetcorner breakfast sellers. And so by faster and faster

degrees, until the last degrees were very fast, the day came, and I was tired and could sleep. And it is not, as I

used to think, going home at such times, the least wonderful thing in London, that in the real desert region of

the night, the houseless wanderer is alone there. I knew well enough where to find Vice and Misfortune of all

kinds, if I had chosen; but they were put out of sight, and my houselessness had many miles upon miles of

Having occasion to transact some business with a solicitor who occupies a highly suicidal set of chambers in

Gray's Inn, I afterwards took a turn in the large square of that stronghold of Melancholy, reviewing, with

I began, as was natural, with the Chambers I had just left. They were an upper set on a rotten staircase, with a

mysterious bunk or bulkhead on the landing outside them, of a rather nautical and Screw Collierlike

appearance than otherwise, and painted an intense black. Many dusty years have passed since the

appropriation of this Davy Jones's locker to any purpose, and during the whole period within the memory of

living man, it has been hasped and padlocked. I cannot quite satisfy my mind whether it was originally meant

for the reception of coals, or bodies, or as a place of temporary security for the plunder 'looted' by

laundresses; but I incline to the last opinion. It is about breast high, and usually serves as a bulk for

defendants in reduced circumstances to lean against and ponder at, when they come on the hopeful errand of

trying to make an arrangement without money under which auspicious circumstances it mostly happens

that the legal gentleman they want to see, is much engaged, and they pervade the staircase for a considerable

period. Against this opposing bulk, in the absurdest manner, the tomblike outer door of the solicitor's

chambers (which is also of an intense black) stands in dark ambush, half open, and half shut, all day. The

solicitor's apartments are three in number; consisting of a slice, a cell, and a wedge. The slice is assigned to

the two clerks, the cell is occupied by the principal, and the wedge is devoted to stray papers, old game

baskets from the country, a washingstand, and a model of a patent Ship's Caboose which was exhibited in

Chancery at the commencement of the present century on an application for an injunction to restrain

infringement. At about halfpast nine on every weekday morning, the younger of the two clerks (who, I

have reason to believe, leads the fashion at Pentonville in the articles of pipes and shirts) may be found

knocking the dust out of his official doorkey on the bunk or locker before mentioned; and so exceedingly

subject to dust is his key, and so very retentive of that superfluity, that in exceptional summer weather when a

ray of sunlight has fallen on the locker in my presence, I have noticed its inexpressive countenance to be

This set of chambers (as I have gradually discovered, when I have had restless occasion to make inquiries or

leave messages, after office hours) is under the charge of a lady named Sweeney, in figure extremely like an

old familyumbrella: whose dwelling confronts a dead wall in a court off Gray's Innlane, and who is usually

fetched into the passage of that bower, when wanted, from some neighbouring home of industry, which has

the curious property of imparting an inflammatory appearance to her visage. Mrs. Sweeney is one of the race

of professed laundresses, and is the compiler of a remarkable manuscript volume entitled 'Mrs. Sweeney's

Book,' from which much curious statistical information may be gathered respecting the high prices and small

uses of soda, soap, sand, firewood, and other such articles. I have created a legend in my mind and

consequently I believe it with the utmost pertinacity that the late Mr. Sweeney was a ticketporter under

the Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, and that, in consideration of his long and valuable services, Mrs.

Sweeney was appointed to her present post. For, though devoid of personal charms, I have observed this lady

to exercise a fascination over the elderly tickerporter mind (particularly under the gateway, and in corners

and entries), which I can only refer to her being one of the fraternity, yet not competing with it. All that need

be said concerning this set of chambers, is said, when I have added that it is in a large double house in Gray's

Innsquare, very much out of repair, and that the outer portal is ornamented in a hideous manner with certain

stone remains, which have the appearance of the dismembered bust, torso, and limbs of a petrified bencher.

Indeed, I look upon Gray's Inn generally as one of the most depressing institutions in brick and mortar,

known to the children of men. Can anything be more dreary than its arid Square, Sahara Desert of the law,

with the ugly old tiledtopped tenements, the dirty windows, the bills To Let, To Let, the doorposts

inscribed like gravestones, the crazy gateway giving upon the filthy Lane, the scowling, ironbarred

prisonlike passage into Verulam buildings, the mouldy rednosed ticketporters with little coffin plates,

and why with aprons, the dry, hard, atomylike appearance of the whole dustheap? When my uncommercial

travels tend to this dismal spot, my comfort is its rickety state. Imagination gloats over the fulness of time

when the staircases shall have quite tumbled down they are daily wearing into an illsavoured powder, but

have not quite tumbled down yet when the last old prolix bencher all of the olden time, shall have been got

out of an upper window by means of a Fire Ladder, and carried off to the Holborn Union; when the last clerk

shall have engrossed the last parchment behind the last splash on the last of the mudstained windows,

which, all through the miry year, are pilloried out of recognition in Gray's Innlane. Then, shall a squalid

little trench, with rank grass and a pump in it, lying between the coffeehouse and South square, be wholly

given up to cats and rats, and not, as now, have its empire divided between those animals and a few briefless

bipeds surely called to the Bar by voices of deceiving spirits, seeing that they are wanted there by no mortal

who glance down, with eyes better glazed than their casements, from their dreary and lacklustre rooms.

Then shall the way Nor' Westward, now lying under a short grim colonnade where in summertime pounce

flies from lawstationering windows into the eyes of laymen, be choked with rubbish and happily become

impassable. Then shall the gardens where turf, trees, and gravel wear a legal livery of black, run rank, and

pilgrims go to Gorhambury to see Bacon's effigy as he sat, and not come here (which in truth they seldom do)

to see where he walked. Then, in a word, shall the oldestablished vendor of periodicals sit alone in his little

crib of a shop behind the Holborn Gate, like that lumbering Marius among the ruins of Carthage, who has sat

At one period of my uncommercial career I much frequented another set of chambers in Gray's Innsquare.

They were what is familiarly called 'a top set,' and all the eatables and drinkables introduced into them

acquired a flavour of Cockloft. I have known an unopened Strasbourg pate fresh from Fortnum and Mason's,

to draw in this cockloft tone through its crockery dish, and become penetrated with cockloft to the core of its

inmost truffle in threequarters of an hour. This, however, was not the most curious feature of those

chambers; that, consisted in the profound conviction entertained by my esteemed friend Parkle (their tenant)

that they were clean. Whether it was an inborn hallucination, or whether it was imparted to him by Mrs.

Miggot the laundress, I never could ascertain. But, I believe he would have gone to the stake upon the

question. Now, they were so dirty that I could take off the distinctest impression of my figure on any article

of furniture by merely lounging upon it for a few moments; and it used to be a private amusement of mine to

print myself off if I may use the expression all over the rooms. It was the first large circulation I had. At

other times I have accidentally shaken a window curtain while in animated conversation with Parkle, and

struggling insects which were certainly red, and were certainly not ladybirds, have dropped on the back of my

hand. Yet Parkle lived in that top set years, bound body and soul to the superstition that they were clean. He

used to say, when congratulated upon them, 'Well, they are not like chambers in one respect, you know; they

are clean.' Concurrently, he had an idea which he could never explain, that Mrs. Miggot was in some way

connected with the Church. When he was in particularly good spirits, he used to believe that a deceased uncle

of hers had been a Dean; when he was poorly and low, he believed that her brother had been a Curate. I and

Mrs. Miggot (she was a genteel woman) were on confidential terms, but I never knew her to commit herself

to any distinct assertion on the subject; she merely claimed a proprietorship in the Church, by looking when it

was mentioned, as if the reference awakened the slumbering Past, and were personal. It may have been his

amiable confidence in Mrs. Miggot's better days that inspired my friend with his delusion respecting the

chambers, but he never wavered in his fidelity to it for a moment, though he wallowed in dirt seven years.

Two of the windows of these chambers looked down into the garden; and we have sat up there together many

a summer evening, saying how pleasant it was, and talking of many things. To my intimacy with that top set,

I am indebted for three of my liveliest personal impressions of the loneliness of life in chambers. They shall

First. My Gray's Inn friend, on a time, hurt one of his legs, and it became seriously inflamed. Not knowing of

his indisposition, I was on my way to visit him as usual, one summer evening, when I was much surprised by

meeting a lively leech in Fieldcourt, Gray's Inn, seemingly on his way to the West End of London. As the

leech was alone, and was of course unable to explain his position, even if he had been inclined to do so

(which he had not the appearance of being), I passed him and went on. Turning the corner of Gray's

Innsquare, I was beyond expression amazed by meeting another leech also entirely alone, and also

proceeding in a westerly direction, though with less decision of purpose. Ruminating on this extraordinary

circumstance, and endeavouring to remember whether I had ever read, in the Philosophical Transactions or

any work on Natural History, of a migration of Leeches, I ascended to the top set, past the dreary series of

closed outer doors of offices and an empty set or two, which intervened between that lofty region and the

surface. Entering my friend's rooms, I found him stretched upon his back, like Prometheus Bound, with a

perfectly demented ticketporter in attendance on him instead of the Vulture: which helpless individual, who

was feeble and frightened, and had (my friend explained to me, in great choler) been endeavouring for some

hours to apply leeches to his leg, and as yet had only got on two out of twenty. To this Unfortunate's

distraction between a damp cloth on which he had placed the leeches to freshen them, and the wrathful

adjurations of my friend to 'Stick 'em on, sir!' I referred the phenomenon I had encountered: the rather as two

fine specimens were at that moment going out at the door, while a general insurrection of the rest was in

progress on the table. After a while our united efforts prevailed, and, when the leeches came off and had

recovered their spirits, we carefully tied them up in a decanter. But I never heard more of them than that they

were all gone next morning, and that the Outofdoor young man of Bickle, Bush and Bodger, on the ground

floor, had been bitten and blooded by some creature not identified. They never 'took' on Mrs. Miggot, the

laundress; but, I have always preserved fresh, the belief that she unconsciously carried several about her, until

Second. On the same staircase with my friend Parkle, and on the same floor, there lived a man of law who

pursued his business elsewhere, and used those chambers as his place of residence. For three or four years,

Parkle rather knew of him than knew him, but after that for Englishmen short pause of consideration,

they began to speak. Parkle exchanged words with him in his private character only, and knew nothing of his

business ways, or means. He was a man a good deal about town, but always alone. We used to remark to one

another, that although we often encountered him in theatres, concertrooms, and similar public places, he

was always alone. Yet he was not a gloomy man, and was of a decidedly conversational turn; insomuch that

he would sometimes of an evening lounge with a cigar in his mouth, half in and half out of Parkle's rooms,

and discuss the topics of the day by the hour. He used to hint on these occasions that he had four faults to find

with life; firstly, that it obliged a man to be always winding up his watch; secondly, that London was too

small; thirdly, that it therefore wanted variety; fourthly, that there was too much dust in it. There was so much

dust in his own faded chambers, certainly, that they reminded me of a sepulchre, furnished in prophetic

anticipation of the present time, which had newly been brought to light, after having remained buried a few

thousand years. One dry, hot autumn evening at twilight, this man, being then five years turned of fifty,

looked in upon Parkle in his usual lounging way, with his cigar in his mouth as usual, and said, 'I am going

out of town.' As he never went out of town, Parkle said, 'Oh indeed! At last?' 'Yes,' says he, 'at last. For what

is a man to do? London is so small! If you go West, you come to Hounslow. If you go East, you come to

Bow. If you go South, there's Brixton or Norwood. If you go North, you can't get rid of Barnet. Then, the

monotony of all the streets, streets, streets and of all the roads, roads, roads and the dust, dust, dust!'

When he had said this, he wished Parkle a good evening, but came back again and said, with his watch in his

hand, 'Oh, I really cannot go on winding up this watch over and over again; I wish you would take care of it.'

So, Parkle laughed and consented, and the man went out of town. The man remained out of town so long, that

his letterbox became choked, and no more letters could be got into it, and they began to be left at the lodge

and to accumulate there. At last the headporter decided, on conference with the steward, to use his

masterkey and look into the chambers, and give them the benefit of a whiff of air. Then, it was found that he

had hanged himself to his bedstead, and had left this written memorandum: 'I should prefer to be cut down by

my neighbour and friend (if he will allow me to call him so), H. Parkle, Esq.' This was an end of Parkle's

Third. While Parkle lived in Gray's Inn, and I myself was uncommercially preparing for the Bar which is

done, as everybody knows, by having a frayed old gown put on in a pantry by an old woman in a chronic

state of Saint Anthony's fire and dropsy, and, so decorated, bolting a bad dinner in a party of four, whereof

each individual mistrusts the other three I say, while these things were, there was a certain elderly

gentleman who lived in a court of the Temple, and was a great judge and lover of port wine. Every day he

dined at his club and drank his bottle or two of port wine, and every night came home to the Temple and went

to bed in his lonely chambers. This had gone on many years without variation, when one night he had a fit on

coming home, and fell and cut his head deep, but partly recovered and groped about in the dark to find the

door. When he was afterwards discovered, dead, it was clearly established by the marks of his hands about

the room that he must have done so. Now, this chanced on the night of Christmas Eve, and over him lived a

young fellow who had sisters and young country friends, and who gave them a little party that night, in the

course of which they played at Blindman's Buff. They played that game, for their greater sport, by the light of

the fire only; and once, when they were all quietly rustling and stealing about, and the blindman was trying to

pick out the prettiest sister (for which I am far from blaming him), somebody cried, Hark! The man below

must be playing Blindman's Buff by himself tonight! They listened, and they heard sounds of some one

falling about and stumbling against furniture, and they all laughed at the conceit, and went on with their play,

more lighthearted and merry than ever. Thus, those two so different games of life and death were played out

Such are the occurrences, which, coming to my knowledge, imbued me long ago with a strong sense of the

loneliness of chambers. There was a fantastic illustration to much the same purpose implicitly believed by a

strange sort of man now dead, whom I knew when I had not quite arrived at legal years of discretion, though I

This was a man who, though not more than thirty, had seen the world in divers irreconcilable capacities had

been an officer in a South American regiment among other odd things but had not achieved much in any

way of life, and was in debt, and in hiding. He occupied chambers of the dreariest nature in Lyons Inn; his

name, however, was not up on the door, or doorpost, but in lieu of it stood the name of a friend who had

died in the chambers, and had given him the furniture. The story arose out of the furniture, and was to this

effect: Let the former holder of the chambers, whose name was still upon the door and doorpost, be Mr.

Mr. Testator took a set of chambers in Lyons Inn when he had but very scanty furniture for his bedroom, and

none for his sitting room. He had lived some wintry months in this condition, and had found it very bare and

cold. One night, past midnight, when he sat writing and still had writing to do that must be done before he

went to bed, he found himself out of coals. He had coals down stairs, but had never been to his cellar;

however the cellarkey was on his mantelshelf, and if he went down and opened the cellar it fitted, he might

fairly assume the coals in that cellar to be his. As to his laundress, she lived among the coalwaggons and

Thames watermen for there were Thames watermen at that time in some unknown rathole by the river,

down lanes and alleys on the other side of the Strand. As to any other person to meet him or obstruct him,

Lyons Inn was dreaming, drunk, maudlin, moody, betting, brooding over billdiscounting or renewing

asleep or awake, minding its own affairs. Mr. Testator took his coalscuttle in one hand, his candle and key

in the other, and descended to the dismallest underground dens of Lyons Inn, where the late vehicles in the

streets became thunderous, and all the waterpipes in the neighbourhood seemed to have Macbeth's Amen

sticking in their throats, and to be trying to get it out. After groping here and there among low doors to no

purpose, Mr. Testator at length came to a door with a rusty padlock which his key fitted. Getting the door

open with much trouble, and looking in, he found, no coals, but a confused pile of furniture. Alarmed by this

intrusion on another man's property, he locked the door again, found his own cellar, filled his scuttle, and

But the furniture he had seen, ran on castors across and across Mr. Testator's mind incessantly, when, in the

chill hour of five in the morning, he got to bed. He particularly wanted a table to write at, and a table

expressly made to be written at, had been the piece of furniture in the foreground of the heap. When his

laundress emerged from her burrow in the morning to make his kettle boil, he artfully led up to the subject of

cellars and furniture; but the two ideas had evidently no connexion in her mind. When she left him, and he sat

at his breakfast, thinking about the furniture, he recalled the rusty state of the padlock, and inferred that the

furniture must have been stored in the cellars for a long time was perhaps forgotten owner dead, perhaps?

After thinking it over, a few days, in the course of which he could pump nothing out of Lyons Inn about the

furniture, he became desperate, and resolved to borrow that table. He did so, that night. He had not had the

table long, when he determined to borrow an easychair; he had not had that long, when he made up his mind

to borrow a bookcase; then, a couch; then, a carpet and rug. By that time, he felt he was 'in furniture stepped

in so far,' as that it could be no worse to borrow it all. Consequently, he borrowed it all, and locked up the

cellar for good. He had always locked it, after every visit. He had carried up every separate article in the dead

of the night, and, at the best, had felt as wicked as a Resurrection Man. Every article was blue and furry when

brought into his rooms, and he had had, in a murderous and guilty sort of way, to polish it up while London

Mr. Testator lived in his furnished chambers two or three years, or more, and gradually lulled himself into the

opinion that the furniture was his own. This was his convenient state of mind when, late one night, a step

came up the stairs, and a hand passed over his door feeling for his knocker, and then one deep and solemn rap

was rapped that might have been a spring in Mr. Testator's easy chair to shoot him out of it; so promptly

With a candle in his hand, Mr. Testator went to the door, and found there, a very pale and very tall man; a

man who stooped; a man with very high shoulders, a very narrow chest, and a very red nose; a

shabbygenteel man. He was wrapped in a long threadbare black coat, fastened up the front with more pins

than buttons, and under his arm he squeezed an umbrella without a handle, as if he were playing bagpipes. He

said, 'I ask your pardon, but can you tell me ' and stopped; his eyes resting on some object within the

'Can I tell you what?' asked Mr. Testator, noting his stoppage with quick alarm.

'I ask your pardon,' said the stranger, 'but this is not the inquiry I was going to make DO I see in there,

Mr. Testator was beginning to stammer that he was not aware when the visitor slipped past him, into the

chambers. There, in a goblin way which froze Mr. Testator to the marrow, he examined, first, the

writingtable, and said, 'Mine;' then, the easychair, and said, 'Mine;' then, the bookcase, and said, 'Mine;'

then, turned up a corner of the carpet, and said, 'Mine!' in a word, inspected every item of furniture from the

cellar, in succession, and said, 'Mine!' Towards the end of this investigation, Mr. Testator perceived that he

was sodden with liquor, and that the liquor was gin. He was not unsteady with gin, either in his speech or

Mr. Testator was in a dreadful state, for (according to his making out of the story) the possible consequences

of what he had done in recklessness and hardihood, flashed upon him in their fulness for the first time. When

'Sir, I am conscious that the fullest explanation, compensation, and restitution, are your due. They shall be

yours. Allow me to entreat that, without temper, without even natural irritation on your part, we may have a

Mr. Testator had intended to say, 'a little quiet conversation,' but with great relief of mind adopted the

amendment. He produced a decanter of gin, and was bustling about for hot water and sugar, when he found

that his visitor had already drunk half of the decanter's contents. With hot water and sugar the visitor drank

the remainder before he had been an hour in the chambers by the chimes of the church of St. Mary in the

The gin gone, and Mr. Testator wondering what was to follow it, the visitor rose and said, with increased

stiffness, 'At what hour of the morning, sir, will it be convenient?' Mr. Testator hazarded, 'At ten?' 'Sir,' said

the visitor, 'at ten, to the moment, I shall be here.' He then contemplated Mr. Testator somewhat at leisure,

and said, 'God bless you! How is your wife?' Mr. Testator (who never had a wife) replied with much feeling,

'Deeply anxious, poor soul, but otherwise well.' The visitor thereupon turned and went away, and fell twice in

going downstairs. From that hour he was never heard of. Whether he was a ghost, or a spectral illusion of

conscience, or a drunken man who had no business there, or the drunken rightful owner of the furniture, with

a transitory gleam of memory; whether he got safe home, or had no time to get to; whether he died of liquor

on the way, or lived in liquor ever afterwards; he never was heard of more. This was the story, received with

the furniture and held to be as substantial, by its second possessor in an upper set of chambers in grim Lyons

It is to be remarked of chambers in general, that they must have been built for chambers, to have the right

kind of loneliness. You may make a great dwellinghouse very lonely, but isolating suites of rooms and

calling them chambers, but you cannot make the true kind of loneliness. In dwellinghouses, there have been

family festivals; children have grown in them, girls have bloomed into women in them, courtships and

marriages have taken place in them. True chambers never were young, childish, maidenly; never had dolls in

them, or rockinghorses, or christenings, or betrothals, or little coffins. Let Gray's Inn identify the child who

first touched hands and hearts with Robinson Crusoe, in any one of its many 'sets,' and that child's little

statue, in white marble with a golden inscription, shall be at its service, at my cost and charge, as a drinking

fountain for the spirit, to freshen its thirsty square. Let Lincoln's produce from all its houses, a twentieth of

the procession derivable from any dwellinghouse onetwentieth of its age, of fair young brides who married

for love and hope, not settlements, and all the ViceChancellors shall thenceforward be kept in nosegays for

nothing, on application to the writer hereof. It is not denied that on the terrace of the Adelphi, or in any of the

streets of that subterraneanstablehaunted spot, or about Bedfordrow, or Jamesstreet of that ilk (a

grewsome place), or anywhere among the neighbourhoods that have done flowering and have run to seed,

you may find Chambers replete with the accommodations of Solitude, Closeness, and Darkness, where you

may be as low spirited as in the genuine article, and might be as easily murdered, with the placid reputation

of having merely gone down to the seaside. But, the many waters of life did run musical in those dry

channels once; among the Inns, never. The only popular legend known in relation to any one of the dull

family of Inns, is a dark Old Bailey whisper concerning Clement's, and importing how the black creature who

holds the sundial there, was a negro who slew his master and built the dismal pile out of the contents of his

strong box for which architectural offence alone he ought to have been condemned to live in it. But, what

populace would waste fancy upon such a place, or on New Inn, Staple Inn, Barnard's Inn, or any of the

The genuine laundress, too, is an institution not to be had in its entirety out of and away from the genuine

Chambers. Again, it is not denied that you may be robbed elsewhere. Elsewhere you may have for money

dishonesty, drunkenness, dirt, laziness, and profound incapacity. But the veritable shiningredfaced

shameless laundress; the true Mrs. Sweeney in figure, colour, texture, and smell, like the old damp family

umbrella; the tiptop complicated abomination of stockings, spirits, bonnet, limpness, looseness, and larceny;

is only to be drawn at the fountainhead. Mrs. Sweeney is beyond the reach of individual art. It requires the

united efforts of several men to ensure that great result, and it is only developed in perfection under an

There are not many places that I find it more agreeable to revisit when I am in an idle mood, than some places

to which I have never been. For, my acquaintance with those spots is of such long standing, and has ripened

into an intimacy of so affectionate a nature, that I take a particular interest in assuring myself that they are

I never was in Robinson Crusoe's Island, yet I frequently return there. The colony he established on it soon

faded away, and it is uninhabited by any descendants of the grave and courteous Spaniards, or of Will Atkins

and the other mutineers, and has relapsed into its original condition. Not a twig of its wicker houses remains,

its goats have long run wild again, its screaming parrots would darken the sun with a cloud of many flaming

colours if a gun were fired there, no face is ever reflected in the waters of the little creek which Friday swam

across when pursued by his two brother cannibals with sharpened stomachs. After comparing notes with

other travellers who have similarly revisited the Island and conscientiously inspected it, I have satisfied

myself that it contains no vestige of Mr. Atkins's domesticity or theology, though his track on the memorable

evening of his landing to set his captain ashore, when he was decoyed about and round about until it was

dark, and his boat was stove, and his strength and spirits failed him, is yet plainly to be traced. So is the

hilltop on which Robinson was struck dumb with joy when the reinstated captain pointed to the ship, riding

within half a mile of the shore, that was to bear him away, in the nineandtwentieth year of his seclusion in

that lonely place. So is the sandy beach on which the memorable footstep was impressed, and where the

savages hauled up their canoes when they came ashore for those dreadful public dinners, which led to a

dancing worse than speechmaking. So is the cave where the flaring eyes of the old goat made such a goblin

appearance in the dark. So is the site of the hut where Robinson lived with the dog and the parrot and the cat,

and where he endured those first agonies of solitude, which strange to say never involved any ghostly

fancies; a circumstance so very remarkable, that perhaps he left out something in writing his record? Round

hundreds of such objects, hidden in the dense tropical foliage, the tropical sea breaks evermore; and over

them the tropical sky, saving in the short rainy season, shines bright and cloudless.

Neither, was I ever belated among wolves, on the borders of France and Spain; nor, did I ever, when night

was closing in and the ground was covered with snow, draw up my little company among some felled trees

which served as a breastwork, and there fire a train of gunpowder so dexterously that suddenly we had three

or four score blazing wolves illuminating the darkness around us. Nevertheless, I occasionally go back to that

dismal region and perform the feat again; when indeed to smell the singeing and the frying of the wolves

afire, and to see them setting one another alight as they rush and tumble, and to behold them rolling in the

snow vainly attempting to put themselves out, and to hear their howlings taken up by all the echoes as well as

I was never in the robbers' cave, where Gil Blas lived, but I often go back there and find the trapdoor just as

heavy to raise as it used to be, while that wicked old disabled Black lies everlastingly cursing in bed. I was

never in Don Quixote's study, where he read his books of chivalry until he rose and hacked at imaginary

giants, and then refreshed himself with great draughts of water, yet you couldn't move a book in it without

my knowledge, or with my consent. I was never (thank Heaven) in company with the little old woman who

hobbled out of the chest and told the merchant Abudah to go in search of the Talisman of Oromanes, yet I

make it my business to know that she is well preserved and as intolerable as ever. I was never at the school

where the boy Horatio Nelson got out of bed to steal the pears: not because he wanted any, but because every

other boy was afraid: yet I have several times been back to this Academy, to see him let down out of window

with a sheet. So with Damascus, and Bagdad, and Brobingnag (which has the curious fate of being usually

misspelt when written), and Lilliput, and Laputa, and the Nile, and Abyssinia, and the Ganges, and the North

Pole, and many hundreds of places I was never at them, yet it is an affair of my life to keep them intact, and

But, when I was in Dullborough one day, revisiting the associations of my childhood as recorded in previous

pages of these notes, my experience in this wise was made quite inconsiderable and of no account, by the

quantity of places and people utterly impossible places and people, but none the less alarmingly real that I

found I had been introduced to by my nurse before I was six years old, and used to be forced to go back to at

night without at all wanting to go. If we all knew our own minds (in a more enlarged sense than the popular

acceptation of that phrase), I suspect we should find our nurses responsible for most of the dark corners we

The first diabolical character who intruded himself on my peaceful youth (as I called to mind that day at

Dullborough), was a certain Captain Murderer. This wretch must have been an offshoot of the Blue Beard

family, but I had no suspicion of the consanguinity in those times. His warning name would seem to have

awakened no general prejudice against him, for he was admitted into the best society and possessed immense

wealth. Captain Murderer's mission was matrimony, and the gratification of a cannibal appetite with tender

brides. On his marriage morning, he always caused both sides of the way to church to be planted with curious

flowers; and when his bride said, 'Dear Captain Murderer, I ever saw flowers like these before: what are they

called?' he answered, 'They are called Garnish for houselamb,' and laughed at his ferocious practical joke in

a horrid manner, disquieting the minds of the noble bridal company, with a very sharp show of teeth, then

displayed for the first time. He made love in a coach and six, and married in a coach and twelve, and all his

horses were milkwhite horses with one red spot on the back which he caused to be hidden by the harness.

For, the spot WOULD come there, though every horse was milkwhite when Captain Murderer bought him.

And the spot was young bride's blood. (To this terrific point I am indebted for my first personal experience of

a shudder and cold beads on the forehead.) When Captain Murderer had made an end of feasting and revelry,

and had dismissed the noble guests, and was alone with his wife on the day month after their marriage, it was

his whimsical custom to produce a golden rollingpin and a silver pieboard. Now, there was this special

feature in the Captain's courtships, that he always asked if the young lady could make piecrust; and if she

couldn't by nature or education, she was taught. Well. When the bride saw Captain Murderer produce the

golden rollingpin and silver pieboard, she remembered this, and turned up her lacedsilk sleeves to make a

pie. The Captain brought out a silver piedish of immense capacity, and the Captain brought out flour and

butter and eggs and all things needful, except the inside of the pie; of materials for the staple of the pie itself,

the Captain brought out none. Then said the lovely bride, 'Dear Captain Murderer, what pie is this to be?' He

replied, 'A meat pie.' Then said the lovely bride, 'Dear Captain Murderer, I see no meat.' The Captain

humorously retorted, 'Look in the glass.' She looked in the glass, but still she saw no meat, and then the

Captain roared with laughter, and suddenly frowning and drawing his sword, bade her roll out the crust. So

she rolled out the crust, dropping large tears upon it all the time because he was so cross, and when she had

lined the dish with crust and had cut the crust all ready to fit the top, the Captain called out, 'I see the meat in

the glass!' And the bride looked up at the glass, just in time to see the Captain cutting her head off; and he

chopped her in pieces, and peppered her, and salted her, and put her in the pie, and sent it to the baker's, and

Captain Murderer went on in this way, prospering exceedingly, until he came to choose a bride from two twin

sisters, and at first didn't know which to choose. For, though one was fair and the other dark, they were both

equally beautiful. But the fair twin loved him, and the dark twin hated him, so he chose the fair one. The dark

twin would have prevented the marriage if she could, but she couldn't; however, on the night before it, much

suspecting Captain Murderer, she stole out and climbed his garden wall, and looked in at his window through

a chink in the shutter, and saw him having his teeth filed sharp. Next day she listened all day, and heard him

make his joke about the houselamb. And that day month, he had the paste rolled out, and cut the fair twin's

head off, and chopped her in pieces, and peppered her, and salted her, and put her in the pie, and sent it to the

Now, the dark twin had had her suspicions much increased by the filing of the Captain's teeth, and again by

the houselamb joke. Putting all things together when he gave out that her sister was dead, she divined the

truth, and determined to be revenged. So, she went up to Captain Murderer's house, and knocked at the

knocker and pulled at the bell, and when the Captain came to the door, said: 'Dear Captain Murderer, marry

me next, for I always loved you and was jealous of my sister.' The Captain took it as a compliment, and made

a polite answer, and the marriage was quickly arranged. On the night before it, the bride again climbed to his

window, and again saw him having his teeth filed sharp. At this sight she laughed such a terrible laugh at the

chink in the shutter, that the Captain's blood curdled, and he said: 'I hope nothing has disagreed with me!' At

that, she laughed again, a still more terrible laugh, and the shutter was opened and search made, but she was

nimbly gone, and there was no one. Next day they went to church in a coach and twelve, and were married.

And that day month, she rolled the piecrust out, and Captain Murderer cut her head off, and chopped her in

pieces, and peppered her, and salted her, and put her in the pie, and sent it to the baker's, and ate it all, and

But before she began to roll out the paste she had taken a deadly poison of a most awful character, distilled

from toads' eyes and spiders' knees; and Captain Murderer had hardly picked her last bone, when he began to

swell, and to turn blue, and to be all over spots, and to scream. And he went on swelling and turning bluer,

and being more all over spots and screaming, until he reached from floor to ceiling and from wall to wall; and

then, at one o'clock in the morning, he blew up with a loud explosion. At the sound of it, all the milkwhite

horses in the stables broke their halters and went mad, and then they galloped over everybody in Captain

Murderer's house (beginning with the family blacksmith who had filed his teeth) until the whole were dead,

Hundreds of times did I hear this legend of Captain Murderer, in my early youth, and added hundreds of

times was there a mental compulsion upon me in bed, to peep in at his window as the dark twin peeped, and

to revisit his horrible house, and look at him in his blue and spotty and screaming stage, as he reached from

floor to ceiling and from wall to wall. The young woman who brought me acquainted with Captain Murderer

had a fiendish enjoyment of my terrors, and used to begin, I remember as a sort of introductory overture

by clawing the air with both hands, and uttering a long low hollow groan. So acutely did I suffer from this

ceremony in combination with this infernal Captain, that I sometimes used to plead I thought I was hardly

strong enough and old enough to hear the story again just yet. But, she never spared me one word of it, and

indeed commanded the awful chalice to my lips as the only preservative known to science against 'The Black

Cat' a weird and glaringeyed supernatural Tom, who was reputed to prowl about the world by night,

sucking the breath of infancy, and who was endowed with a special thirst (as I was given to understand) for

This female bard may she have been repaid my debt of obligation to her in the matter of nightmares and

perspirations! reappears in my memory as the daughter of a shipwright. Her name was Mercy, though she

had none on me. There was something of a shipbuilding flavour in the following story. As it always recurs to

me in a vague association with calomel pills, I believe it to have been reserved for dull nights when I was low

There was once a shipwright, and he wrought in a Government Yard, and his name was Chips. And his

father's name before him was Chips, and HIS father's name before HIM was Chips, and they were all

Chipses. And Chips the father had sold himself to the Devil for an iron pot and a bushel of tenpenny nails and

half a ton of copper and a rat that could speak; and Chips the grandfather had sold himself to the Devil for an

iron pot and a bushel of tenpenny nails and half a ton of copper and a rat that could speak; and Chips the

greatgrandfather had disposed of himself in the same direction on the same terms; and the bargain had run

in the family for a long, long time. So, one day, when young Chips was at work in the Dock Slip all alone,

down in the dark hold of an old Seventyfour that was haled up for repairs, the Devil presented himself, and

(I don't know why, but this fact of the Devil's expressing himself in rhyme was peculiarly trying to me.)

Chips looked up when he heard the words, and there he saw the Devil with saucer eyes that squinted on a

terrible great scale, and that struck out sparks of blue fire continually. And whenever he winked his eyes,

showers of blue sparks came out, and his eyelashes made a clattering like flints and steels striking lights. And

hanging over one of his arms by the handle was an iron pot, and under that arm was a bushel of tenpenny

nails, and under his other arm was half a ton of copper, and sitting on one of his shoulders was a rat that could

(The invariable effect of this alarming tautology on the part of the Evil Spirit was to deprive me of my senses

for some moments.) So, Chips answered never a word, but went on with his work. 'What are you doing,

Chips?' said the rat that could speak. 'I am putting in new planks where you and your gang have eaten old

away,' said Chips. 'But we'll eat them too,' said the rat that could speak; 'and we'll let in the water and drown

the crew, and we'll eat them too.' Chips, being only a shipwright, and not a Manof war's man, said, 'You

are welcome to it.' But he couldn't keep his eyes off the half a ton of copper or the bushel of tenpenny nails;

for nails and copper are a shipwright's sweethearts, and shipwrights will run away with them whenever they

can. So, the Devil said, 'I see what you are looking at, Chips. You had better strike the bargain. You know the

terms. Your father before you was well acquainted with them, and so were your grandfather and

greatgrandfather before him.' Says Chips, 'I like the copper, and I like the nails, and I don't mind the pot, but

I don't like the rat.' Says the Devil, fiercely, 'You can't have the metal without him and HE'S a curiosity. I'm

going.' Chips, afraid of losing the half a ton of copper and the bushel of nails, then said, 'Give us hold!' So, he

got the copper and the nails and the pot and the rat that could speak, and the Devil vanished. Chips sold the

copper, and he sold the nails, and he would have sold the pot; but whenever he offered it for sale, the rat was

in it, and the dealers dropped it, and would have nothing to say to the bargain. So, Chips resolved to kill the

rat, and, being at work in the Yard one day with a great kettle of hot pitch on one side of him and the iron pot

with the rat in it on the other, he turned the scalding pitch into the pot, and filled it full. Then, he kept his eye

upon it till it cooled and hardened, and then he let it stand for twenty days, and then he heated the pitch again

and turned it back into the kettle, and then he sank the pot in water for twenty days more, and then he got the

smelters to put it in the furnace for twenty days more, and then they gave it him out, red hot, and looking like

redhot glass instead of ironyet there was the rat in it, just the same as ever! And the moment it caught his

(For this Refrain I had waited since its last appearance, with inexpressible horror, which now culminated.)

Chips now felt certain in his own mind that the rat would stick to him; the rat, answering his thought, said, 'I

Now, as the rat leaped out of the pot when it had spoken, and made off, Chips began to hope that it wouldn't

keep its word. But, a terrible thing happened next day. For, when dinnertime came, and the Dockbell rang

to strike work, he put his rule into the long pocket at the side of his trousers, and there he found a rat not

that rat, but another rat. And in his hat, he found another; and in his pockethandkerchief, another; and in the

sleeves of his coat, when he pulled it on to go to dinner, two more. And from that time he found himself so

frightfully intimate with all the rats in the Yard, that they climbed up his legs when he was at work, and sat

on his tools while he used them. And they could all speak to one another, and he understood what they said.

And they got into his lodging, and into his bed, and into his teapot, and into his beer, and into his boots. And

he was going to be married to a cornchandler's daughter; and when he gave her a workbox he had himself

made for her, a rat jumped out of it; and when he put his arm round her waist, a rat clung about her; so the

marriage was broken off, though the banns were already twice put up which the parish clerk well

remembers, for, as he handed the book to the clergyman for the second time of asking, a large fat rat ran over

the leaf. (By this time a special cascade of rats was rolling down my back, and the whole of my small

listening person was overrun with them. At intervals ever since, I have been morbidly afraid of my own

pocket, lest my exploring hand should find a specimen or two of those vermin in it.)

You may believe that all this was very terrible to Chips; but even all this was not the worst. He knew besides,

what the rats were doing, wherever they were. So, sometimes he would cry aloud, when he was at his club at

night, 'Oh! Keep the rats out of the convicts' buryingground! Don't let them do that!' Or, 'There's one of

them at the cheese downstairs!' Or, 'There's two of them smelling at the baby in the garret!' Or, other things

of that sort. At last, he was voted mad, and lost his work in the Yard, and could get no other work. But, King

George wanted men, so before very long he got pressed for a sailor. And so he was taken off in a boat one

evening to his ship, lying at Spithead, ready to sail. And so the first thing he made out in her as he got near

her, was the figurehead of the old Seventyfour, where he had seen the Devil. She was called the Argonaut,

and they rowed right under the bowsprit where the figurehead of the Argonaut, with a sheepskin in his hand

and a blue gown on, was looking out to sea; and sitting staring on his forehead was the rat who could speak,

and his exact words were these: 'Chips ahoy! Old boy! We've pretty well eat them too, and we'll drown the

crew, and will eat them too!' (Here I always became exceedingly faint, and would have asked for water, but

The ship was bound for the Indies; and if you don't know where that is, you ought to it, and angels will never

love you. (Here I felt myself an outcast from a future state.) The ship set sail that very night, and she sailed,

and sailed, and sailed. Chips's feelings were dreadful. Nothing ever equalled his terrors. No wonder. At last,

one day he asked leave to speak to the Admiral. The Admiral giv' leave. Chips went down on his knees in the

Great State Cabin. 'Your Honour, unless your Honour, without a moment's loss of time, makes sail for the

nearest shore, this is a doomed ship, and her name is the Coffin!' 'Young man, your words are a madman's

words.' 'Your Honour no; they are nibbling us away.' 'They?' 'Your Honour, them dreadful rats. Dust and

hollowness where solid oak ought to be! Rats nibbling a grave for every man on board! Oh! Does your

Honour love your Lady and your pretty children?' 'Yes, my man, to be sure.' 'Then, for God's sake, make for

the nearest shore, for at this present moment the rats are all stopping in their work, and are all looking straight

towards you with bare teeth, and are all saying to one another that you shall never, never, never, never, see

your Lady and your children more.' 'My poor fellow, you are a case for the doctor. Sentry, take care of this

So, he was bled and he was blistered, and he was this and that, for six whole days and nights. So, then he

again asked leave to speak to the Admiral. The Admiral giv' leave. He went down on his knees in the Great

State Cabin. 'Now, Admiral, you must die! You took no warning; you must die! The rats are never wrong in

their calculations, and they make out that they'll be through, at twelve tonight. So, you must die! With me

and all the rest!' And so at twelve o'clock there was a great leak reported in the ship, and a torrent of water

rushed in and nothing could stop it, and they all went down, every living soul. And what the rats being

water rats left of Chips, at last floated to shore, and sitting on him was an immense overgrown rat,

laughing, that dived when the corpse touched the beach and never came up. And there was a deal of seaweed

on the remains. And if you get thirteen bits of seaweed, and dry them and burn them in the fire, they will go

The same female bard descended, possibly, from those terrible old Scalds who seem to have existed for the

express purpose of addling the brains of mankind when they begin to investigate languages made a

standing pretence which greatly assisted in forcing me back to a number of hideous places that I would by all

means have avoided. This pretence was, that all her ghost stories had occurred to her own relations.

Politeness towards a meritorious family, therefore, forbade my doubting them, and they acquired an air of

authentication that impaired my digestive powers for life. There was a narrative concerning an unearthly

animal foreboding death, which appeared in the open street to a parlourmaid who 'went to fetch the beer' for

supper: first (as I now recall it) assuming the likeness of a black dog, and gradually rising on its hindlegs

and swelling into the semblance of some quadruped greatly surpassing a hippopotamus: which apparition

not because I deemed it in the least improbable, but because I felt it to be really too large to bear I feebly

endeavoured to explain away. But, on Mercy's retorting with wounded dignity that the parlourmaid was her

own sisterinlaw, I perceived there was no hope, and resigned myself to this zoological phenomenon as one

of my many pursuers. There was another narrative describing the apparition of a young woman who came out

of a glasscase and haunted another young woman until the other young woman questioned it and elicited

that its bones (Lord! To think of its being so particular about its bones!) were buried under the glasscase,

whereas she required them to be interred, with every Undertaking solemnity up to twentyfour pound ten, in

another particular place. This narrative I considered I had a personal interest in disproving, because we had

glasscases at home, and how, otherwise, was I to be guaranteed from the intrusion of young women

requiring ME TO bury them up to twenty four pound ten, when I had only twopence a week? But my

remorseless nurse cut the ground from under my tender feet, by informing me that She was the other young

Such are a few of the uncommercial journeys that I was forced to make, against my will, when I was very

young and unreasoning. And really, as to the latter part of them, it is not so very long ago now I come to

think of it that I was asked to undertake them once again, with a steady countenance.

Being in a humour for complete solitude and uninterrupted meditation this autumn, I have taken a lodging for

The retreat into which I have withdrawn myself, is Bondstreet. From this lonely spot I make pilgrimages

into the surrounding wilderness, and traverse extensive tracts of the Great Desert. The first solemn feeling of

isolation overcome, the first oppressive consciousness of profound retirement conquered, I enjoy that sense of

freedom, and feel reviving within me that latent wildness of the original savage, which has been (upon the

My lodgings are at a hatter's my own hatter's. After exhibiting no articles in his window for some weeks,

but seaside wideawakes, shootingcaps, and a choice of rough waterproof headgear for the moors and

mountains, he has put upon the heads of his family as much of this stock as they could carry, and has taken

them off to the Isle of Thanet. His young man alone remains and remains alone in the shop. The young man

has let out the fire at which the irons are heated, and, saving his strong sense of duty, I see no reason why he

Happily for himself and for his country the young man is a Volunteer; most happily for himself, or I think he

would become the prey of a settled melancholy. For, to live surrounded by human hats, and alienated from

human heads to fit them on, is surely a great endurance. But, the young man, sustained by practising his

exercise, and by constantly furbishing up his regulation plume (it is unnecessary to observe that, as a hatter,

he is in a cock's feather corps), is resigned, and uncomplaining. On a Saturday, when he closes early and

gets his Knickerbockers on, he is even cheerful. I am gratefully particular in this reference to him, because he

My hatter has a desk up certain steps behind his counter, enclosed like the clerk's desk at Church. I shut

myself into this place of seclusion, after breakfast, and meditate. At such times, I observe the young man

loading an imaginary rifle with the greatest precision, and maintaining a most galling and destructive fire

upon the national enemy. I thank him publicly for his companionship and his patriotism.

The simple character of my life, and the calm nature of the scenes by which I am surrounded, occasion me to

rise early. I go forth in my slippers, and promenade the pavement. It is pastoral to feel the freshness of the air

in the uninhabited town, and to appreciate the shepherdess character of the few milkwomen who purvey so

little milk that it would be worth nobody's while to adulterate it, if anybody were left to undertake the task.

On the crowded seashore, the great demand for milk, combined with the strong local temptation of chalk,

would betray itself in the lowered quality of the article. In Arcadian London I derive it from the cow.

The Arcadian simplicity of the metropolis altogether, and the primitive ways into which it has fallen in this

autumnal Golden Age, make it entirely new to me. Within a few hundred yards of my retreat, is the house of

a friend who maintains a most sumptuous butler. I never, until yesterday, saw that butler out of superfine

black broadcloth. Until yesterday, I never saw him off duty, never saw him (he is the best of butlers) with the

appearance of having any mind for anything but the glory of his master and his master's friends. Yesterday

morning, walking in my slippers near the house of which he is the prop and ornament a house now a waste

of shutters I encountered that butler, also in his slippers, and in a shooting suit of one colour, and in a

lowcrowned strawhat, smoking an early cigar. He felt that we had formerly met in another state of

existence, and that we were translated into a new sphere. Wisely and well, he passed me without recognition.

Under his arm he carried the morning paper, and shortly afterwards I saw him sitting on a rail in the pleasant

open landscape of Regent street, perusing it at his ease under the ripening sun.

My landlord having taken his whole establishment to be salted down, I am waited on by an elderly woman

labouring under a chronic sniff, who, at the shadowy hour of halfpast nine o'clock of every evening, gives

admittance at the street door to a meagre and mouldy old man whom I have never yet seen detached from a

flat pint of beer in a pewter pot. The meagre and mouldy old man is her husband, and the pair have a dejected

consciousness that they are not justified in appearing on the surface of the earth. They come out of some hole

when London empties itself, and go in again when it fills. I saw them arrive on the evening when I myself

took possession, and they arrived with the flat pint of beer, and their bed in a bundle. The old man is a weak

old man, and appeared to me to get the bed down the kitchen stairs by tumbling down with and upon it. They

make their bed in the lowest and remotest corner of the basement, and they smell of bed, and have no

possession but bed: unless it be (which I rather infer from an undercurrent of flavour in them) cheese. I

know their name, through the chance of having called the wife's attention, at halfpast nine on the second

evening of our acquaintance, to the circumstance of there being some one at the house door; when she

apologetically explained, 'It's only Mr. Klem.' What becomes of Mr. Klem all day, or when he goes out, or

why, is a mystery I cannot penetrate; but at halfpast nine he never fails to turn up on the doorstep with the

flat pint of beer. And the pint of beer, flat as it is, is so much more important than himself, that it always

seems to my fancy as if it had found him drivelling in the street and had humanely brought him home. In

making his way below, Mr. Klem never goes down the middle of the passage, like another Christian, but

shuffles against the wall as if entreating me to take notice that he is occupying as little space as possible in the

house; and whenever I come upon him face to face, he backs from me in fascinated confusion. The most

extraordinary circumstance I have traced in connexion with this aged couple, is, that there is a Miss Klem,

their daughter, apparently ten years older than either of them, who has also a bed and smells of it, and carries

it about the earth at dusk and hides it in deserted houses. I came into this piece of knowledge through Mrs.

Klem's beseeching me to sanction the sheltering of Miss Klem under that roof for a single night, 'between her

takin' care of the upper part in Pall Mall which the family of his back, and a 'ouse in Serjamesesstreet, which

the family of leaves towng termorrer.' I gave my gracious consent (having nothing that I know of to do with

it), and in the shadowy hours Miss Klem became perceptible on the doorstep, wrestling with a bed in a

bundle. Where she made it up for the night I cannot positively state, but, I think, in a sink. I know that with

the instinct of a reptile or an insect, she stowed it and herself away in deep obscurity. In the Klem family, I

have noticed another remarkable gift of nature, and that is a power they possess of converting everything into

flue. Such broken victuals as they take by stealth, appear (whatever the nature of the viands) invariably to

generate flue; and even the nightly pint of beer, instead of assimilating naturally, strikes me as breaking out in

that form, equally on the shabby gown of Mrs. Klem, and the threadbare coat of her husband.

Mrs. Klem has no idea of my name as to Mr. Klem he has no idea of anything and only knows me as her

good gentleman. Thus, if doubtful whether I am in my room or no, Mrs. Klem taps at the door and says, 'Is

my good gentleman here?' Or, if a messenger desiring to see me were consistent with my solitude, she would

show him in with 'Here is my good gentleman.' I find this to be a generic custom. For, I meant to have

observed before now, that in its Arcadian time all my part of London is indistinctly pervaded by the Klem

species. They creep about with beds, and go to bed in miles of deserted houses. They hold no companionship

except that sometimes, after dark, two of them will emerge from opposite houses, and meet in the middle of

the road as on neutral ground, or will peep from adjoining houses over an interposing barrier of area railings,

and compare a few reserved mistrustful notes respecting their good ladies or good gentlemen. This I have

discovered in the course of various solitary rambles I have taken Northward from my retirement, along the

awful perspectives of Wimpolestreet, Harley street, and similar frowning regions. Their effect would be

scarcely distinguishable from that of the primeval forests, but for the Klem stragglers; these may be dimly

observed, when the heavy shadows fall, flitting to and fro, putting up the doorchain, taking in the pint of

beer, lowering like phantoms at the dark parlour windows, or secretly consorting underground with the dust

In the Burlington Arcade, I observe, with peculiar pleasure, a primitive state of manners to have superseded

the baneful influences of ultra civilisation. Nothing can surpass the innocence of the ladies' shoeshops, the

artificialflower repositories, and the headdress depots. They are in strange hands at this time of year

hands of unaccustomed persons, who are imperfectly acquainted with the prices of the goods, and

contemplate them with unsophisticated delight and wonder. The children of these virtuous people exchange

familiarities in the Arcade, and temper the asperity of the two tall beadles. Their youthful prattle blends in an

unwonted manner with the harmonious shade of the scene, and the general effect is, as of the voices of birds

in a grove. In this happy restoration of the golden time, it has been my privilege even to see the bigger

beadle's wife. She brought him his dinner in a basin, and he ate it in his armchair, and afterwards fell asleep

like a satiated child. At Mr. Truefitt's, the excellent hairdresser's, they are learning French to beguile the time;

and even the few solitaries left on guard at Mr. Atkinson's, the perfumer's round the corner (generally the

most inexorable gentleman in London, and the most scornful of threeand sixpence), condescend a little, as

they drowsily bide or recall their turn for chasing the ebbing Neptune on the ribbed seasand. From Messrs.

Hunt and Roskell's, the jewellers, all things are absent but the precious stones, and the gold and silver, and

the soldierly pensioner at the door with his decorated breast. I might stand night and day for a month to come,

in Savillerow, with my tongue out, yet not find a doctor to look at it for love or money. The dentists'

instruments are rusting in their drawers, and their horrible cool parlours, where people pretend to read the

EveryDay Book and not to be afraid, are doing penance for their grimness in white sheets. The lightweight

of shrewd appearance, with one eye always shut up, as if he were eating a sharp gooseberry in all seasons,

who usually stands at the gateway of the liverystables on very little legs under a very large waistcoat, has

gone to Doncaster. Of such undesigning aspect is his guileless yard now, with its gravel and scarlet beans,

and the yellow Break housed under a glass roof in a corner, that I almost believe I could not be taken in there,

if I tried. In the places of business of the great tailors, the chevalglasses are dim and dusty for lack of being

looked into. Ranges of brown paper coat and waistcoat bodies look as funereal as if they were the hatchments

of the customers with whose names they are inscribed; the measuring tapes hang idle on the wall; the

ordertaker, left on the hopeless chance of some one looking in, yawns in the last extremity over the book of

patterns, as if he were trying to read that entertaining library. The hotels in Brookstreet have no one in them,

and the staffs of servants stare disconsolately for next season out of all the windows. The very man who goes

about like an erect Turtle, between two boards recommendatory of the Sixteen Shilling Trousers, is aware of

himself as a hollow mockery, and eats filberts while he leans his hinder shell against a wall.

Among these tranquillising objects, it is my delight to walk and meditate. Soothed by the repose around me, I

wander insensibly to considerable distances, and guide myself back by the stars. Thus, I enjoy the contrast of

a few still partially inhabited and busy spots where all the lights are not fled, where all the garlands are not

dead, whence all but I have not departed. Then, does it appear to me that in this age three things are

clamorously required of Man in the miscellaneous thoroughfares of the metropolis. Firstly, that he have his

boots cleaned. Secondly, that he eat a penny ice. Thirdly, that he get himself photographed. Then do I

speculate, What have those seamworn artists been who stand at the photograph doors in Greek caps, sample

in hand, and mysteriously salute the public the female public with a pressing tenderness to come in and

be 'took'? What did they do with their greasy blandishments, before the era of cheap photography? Of what

class were their previous victims, and how victimised? And how did they get, and how did they pay for, that

large collection of likenesses, all purporting to have been taken inside, with the taking of none of which had

But, these are small oases, and I am soon back again in metropolitan Arcadia. It is my impression that much

of its serene and peaceful character is attributable to the absence of customary Talk. How do I know but there

may be subtle influences in Talk, to vex the souls of men who don't hear it? How do I know but that Talk,

five, ten, twenty miles off, may get into the air and disagree with me? If I rise from my bed, vaguely troubled

and wearied and sick of my life, in the session of Parliament, who shall say that my noble friend, my right

reverend friend, my right honourable friend, my honourable friend, my honourable and learned friend, or my

honourable and gallant friend, may not be responsible for that effect upon my nervous system? Too much

Ozone in the air, I am informed and fully believe (though I have no idea what it is), would affect me in a

marvellously disagreeable way; why may not too much Talk? I don't see or hear the Ozone; I don't see or hear

the Talk. And there is so much Talk; so much too much; such loud cry, and such scant supply of wool; such a

deal of fleecing, and so little fleece! Hence, in the Arcadian season, I find it a delicious triumph to walk down

to deserted Westminster, and see the Courts shut up; to walk a little further and see the Two Houses shut up;

to stand in the Abbey Yard, like the New Zealander of the grand English History (concerning which

unfortunate man, a whole rookery of mares' nests is generally being discovered), and gloat upon the ruins of

Talk. Returning to my primitive solitude and lying down to sleep, my grateful heart expands with the

consciousness that there is no adjourned Debate, no ministerial explanation, nobody to give notice of

intention to ask the noble Lord at the head of her Majesty's Government fiveandtwenty bootless questions

in one, no term time with legal argument, no Nisi Prius with eloquent appeal to British Jury; that the air will

tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, remain untroubled by this superabundant generating of Talk. In

a minor degree it is a delicious triumph to me to go into the club, and see the carpets up, and the Bores and

the other dust dispersed to the four winds. Again, New Zealanderlike, I stand on the cold hearth, and say in

the solitude, 'Here I watched Bore A 1, with voice always mysteriously low and head always mysteriously

drooped, whispering political secrets into the ears of Adam's confiding children. Accursed be his memory for

But, I have all this time been coming to the point, that the happy nature of my retirement is most sweetly

expressed in its being the abode of Love. It is, as it were, an inexpensive Agapemone: nobody's speculation:

everybody's profit. The one great result of the resumption of primitive habits, and (convertible terms) the not

The Klem species are incapable of the softer emotions; probably, in that low nomadic race, the softer

emotions have all degenerated into flue. But, with this exception, all the sharers of my retreat make love.

I have mentioned Savillerow. We all know the Doctor's servant. We all know what a respectable man he is,

what a hard dry man, what a firm man, what a confidential man: how he lets us into the waitingroom, like a

man who knows minutely what is the matter with us, but from whom the rack should not wring the secret. In

the prosaic "season," he has distinctly the appearance of a man conscious of money in the savings bank, and

taking his stand on his respectability with both feet. At that time it is as impossible to associate him with

relaxation, or any human weakness, as it is to meet his eye without feeling guilty of indisposition. In the blest

Arcadian time, how changed! I have seen him, in a pepperandsalt jacket jacket and drab trousers, with

his arm round the waist of a bootmaker's housemaid, smiling in open day. I have seen him at the pump by the

Albany, unsolicitedly pumping for two fair young creatures, whose figures as they bent over their cans, were

if I may be allowed an original expression a model for the sculptor. I have seen him trying the piano in

the Doctor's drawingroom with his forefinger, and have heard him humming tunes in praise of lovely

woman. I have seen him seated on a fireengine, and going (obviously in search of excitement) to a fire. I

saw him, one moonlight evening when the peace and purity of our Arcadian west were at their height, polk

with the lovely daughter of a cleaner of gloves, from the doorsteps of his own residence, across Saville

row, round by Cliffordstreet and Old Burlingtonstreet, back to Burlingtongardens. Is this the Golden Age

The Dentist's servant. Is that man no mystery to us, no type of invisible power? The tremendous individual

knows (who else does?) what is done with the extracted teeth; he knows what goes on in the little room where

something is always being washed or filed; he knows what warm spicy infusion is put into the comfortable

tumbler from which we rinse our wounded mouth, with a gap in it that feels a foot wide; he knows whether

the thing we spit into is a fixture communicating with the Thames, or could be cleared away for a dance; he

sees the horrible parlour where there are no patients in it, and he could reveal, if he would, what becomes of

the EveryDay Book then. The conviction of my coward conscience when I see that man in a professional

light, is, that he knows all the statistics of my teeth and gums, my double teeth, my single teeth, my stopped

teeth, and my sound. In this Arcadian rest, I am fearless of him as of a harmless, powerless creature in a

Scotch cap, who adores a young lady in a voluminous crinoline, at a neighbouring billiard room, and whose

passion would be uninfluenced if every one of her teeth were false. They may be. He takes them all on trust.

In secluded corners of the place of my seclusion, there are little shops withdrawn from public curiosity, and

never two together, where servants' perquisites are bought. The cook may dispose of grease at these modest

and convenient marts; the butler, of bottles; the valet and lady's maid, of clothes; most servants, indeed, of

most things they may happen to lay hold of. I have been told that in sterner times loving correspondence,

otherwise interdicted, may be maintained by letter through the agency of some of these useful establishments.

In the Arcadian autumn, no such device is necessary. Everybody loves, and openly and blamelessly loves.

My landlord's young man loves the whole of one side of the way of Old Bondstreet, and is beloved several

doors up New Bond street besides. I never look out of window but I see kissing of hands going on all

around me. It is the morning custom to glide from shop to shop and exchange tender sentiments; it is the

evening custom for couples to stand hand in hand at house doors, or roam, linked in that flowery manner,

through the unpeopled streets. There is nothing else to do but love; and what there is to do, is done.

In unison with this pursuit, a chaste simplicity obtains in the domestic habits of Arcadia. Its few scattered

people dine early, live moderately, sup socially, and sleep soundly. It is rumoured that the Beadles of the

Arcade, from being the mortal enemies of boys, have signed with tears an address to Lord Shaftesbury, and

subscribed to a ragged school. No wonder! For, they might turn their heavy maces into crooks and tend sheep

in the Arcade, to the purling of the watercarts as they give the thirsty streets much more to drink than they

A happy Golden Age, and a serene tranquillity. Charming picture, but it will fade. The iron age will return,

London will come back to town, if I show my tongue then in Savillerow for half a minute I shall be

prescribed for, the Doctor's man and the Dentist's man will then pretend that these days of unprofessional

innocence never existed. Where Mr. and Mrs. Klem and their bed will be at that time, passes human

knowledge; but my hatter hermitage will then know them no more, nor will it then know me. The desk at

which I have written these meditations will retributively assist at the making out of my account, and the

wheels of gorgeous carriages and the hoofs of highstepping horses will crush the silence out of Bondstreet

The rising of the Italian people from under their unutterable wrongs, and the tardy burst of day upon them

after the long long night of oppression that has darkened their beautiful country, have naturally caused my

mind to dwell often of late on my own small wanderings in Italy. Connected with them, is a curious little

drama, in which the character I myself sustained was so very subordinate that I may relate its story without

I am newly arrived one summer evening, in a certain small town on the Mediterranean. I have had my dinner

at the inn, and I and the mosquitoes are coming out into the streets together. It is far from Naples; but a

bright, brown, plump little womanservant at the inn, is a Neapolitan, and is so vivaciously expert in

pantomimic action, that in the single moment of answering my request to have a pair of shoes cleaned

which I have left upstairs, she plies imaginary brushes, and goes completely through the motions of

polishing the shoes up, and laying them at my feet. I smile at the brisk little woman in perfect satisfaction

with her briskness; and the brisk little woman, amiably pleased with me because I am pleased with her, claps

her hands and laughs delightfully. We are in the inn yard. As the little woman's bright eyes sparkle on the

cigarette I am smoking, I make bold to offer her one; she accepts it none the less merrily, because I touch a

most charming little dimple in her fat cheek, with its light paper end. Glancing up at the many green lattices

to assure herself that the mistress is not looking on, the little woman then puts her two little dimple arms

akimbo, and stands on tiptoe to light her cigarette at mine. 'And now, dear little sir,' says she, puffing out

smoke in a most innocent and cherubic manner, 'keep quite straight on, take the first to the right and probably

I gave a commission to 'him,' and I have been inquiring about him. I have carried the commission about Italy

several months. Before I left England, there came to me one night a certain generous and gentle English

nobleman (he is dead in these days when I relate the story, and exiles have lost their best British friend), with

this request: 'Whenever you come to such a town, will you seek out one Giovanni Carlavero, who keeps a

little wineshop there, mention my name to him suddenly, and observe how it affects him?' I accepted the

The sirocco has been blowing all day, and it is a hot unwholesome evening with no cool seabreeze.

Mosquitoes and fireflies are lively enough, but most other creatures are faint. The coquettish airs of pretty

young women in the tiniest and wickedest of dolls' straw hats, who lean out at opened lattice blinds, are

almost the only airs stirring. Very ugly and haggard old women with distaffs, and with a grey tow upon them

that looks as if they were spinning out their own hair (I suppose they were once pretty, too, but it is very

difficult to believe so), sit on the footway leaning against house walls. Everybody who has come for water to

the fountain, stays there, and seems incapable of any such energetic idea as going home. Vespers are over,

though not so long but that I can smell the heavy resinous incense as I pass the church. No man seems to be at

work, save the coppersmith. In an Italian town he is always at work, and always thumping in the deadliest

I keep straight on, and come in due time to the first on the right: a narrow dull street, where I see a

wellfavoured man of good stature and military bearing, in a great cloak, standing at a door. Drawing nearer

to this threshold, I see it is the threshold of a small wineshop; and I can just make out, in the dim light, the

I touch my hat to the figure in the cloak, and pass in, and draw a stool to a little table. The lamp (just such

another as they dig out of Pompeii) is lighted, but the place is empty. The figure in the cloak has followed me

He turns to a little counter, to get it. As his striking face is pale, and his action is evidently that of an

enfeebled man, I remark that I fear he has been ill. It is not much, he courteously and gravely answers, though

As he sets the wine on the little table, to his manifest surprise I lay my hand on the back of his, look him in

the face, and say in a low voice: 'I am an Englishman, and you are acquainted with a friend of mine. Do you

Instantly, he utters a loud cry, bursts into tears, and falls on his knees at my feet, clasping my legs in both his

Some years ago, this man at my feet, whose overfraught heart is heaving as if it would burst from his breast,

and whose tears are wet upon the dress I wear, was a galleyslave in the North of Italy. He was a political

offender, having been concerned in the then last rising, and was sentenced to imprisonment for life. That he

would have died in his chains, is certain, but for the circumstance that the Englishman happened to visit his

It was one of the vile old prisons of Italy, and a part of it was below the waters of the harbour. The place of

his confinement was an arched underground and underwater gallery, with a grillgate at the entrance,

through which it received such light and air as it got. Its condition was insufferably foul, and a stranger could

hardly breathe in it, or see in it with the aid of a torch. At the upper end of this dungeon, and consequently in

the worst position, as being the furthest removed from light and air, the Englishman first beheld him, sitting

on an iron bedstead to which he was chained by a heavy chain. His countenance impressed the Englishmen as

having nothing in common with the faces of the malefactors with whom he was associated, and he talked

When the Englishman emerged from the dreadful den into the light of day, he asked his conductor, the

'He has a bad tumour in his neck, no doubt occasioned by the hardship of his miserable life. If he continues to

'Excuse me, I can do nothing. He is particularly recommended.' The Englishman was staying in that town,

and he went to his home there; but the figure of this man chained to the bedstead made it no home, and

destroyed his rest and peace. He was an Englishman of an extraordinarily tender heart, and he could not bear

the picture. He went back to the prison grate; went back again and again, and talked to the man and cheered

him. He used his utmost influence to get the man unchained from the bedstead, were it only for ever so short

a time in the day, and permitted to come to the grate. It look a long time, but the Englishman's station,

personal character, and steadiness of purpose, wore out opposition so far, and that grace was at last accorded.

Through the bars, when he could thus get light upon the tumour, the Englishman lanced it, and it did well,

and healed. His strong interest in the prisoner had greatly increased by this time, and he formed the desperate

resolution that he would exert his utmost selfdevotion and use his utmost efforts, to get Carlavero pardoned.

If the prisoner had been a brigand and a murderer, if he had committed every nonpolitical crime in the

Newgate Calendar and out of it, nothing would have been easier than for a man of any court or priestly

influence to obtain his release. As it was, nothing could have been more difficult. Italian authorities, and

English authorities who had interest with them, alike assured the Englishman that his object was hopeless. He

met with nothing but evasion, refusal, and ridicule. His political prisoner became a joke in the place. It was

especially observable that English Circumlocution, and English Society on its travels, were as humorous on

the subject as Circumlocution and Society may be on any subject without loss of caste. But, the Englishman

possessed (and proved it well in his life) a courage very uncommon among us: he had not the least fear of

being considered a bore, in a good humane cause. So he went on persistently trying, and trying, and trying, to

get Giovanni Carlavero out. That prisoner had been rigorously rechained, after the tumour operation, and it

One day, when all the town knew about the Englishman and his political prisoner, there came to the

Englishman, a certain sprightly Italian Advocate of whom he had some knowledge; and he made this strange

proposal. 'Give me a hundred pounds to obtain Carlavero's release. I think I can get him a pardon, with that

money. But I cannot tell you what I am going to do with the money, nor must you ever ask me the question if

I succeed, nor must you ever ask me for an account of the money if I fail.' The Englishman decided to hazard

the hundred pounds. He did so, and heard not another word of the matter. For half a year and more, the

Advocate made no sign, and never once 'took on' in any way, to have the subject on his mind. The

Englishman was then obliged to change his residence to another and more famous town in the North of Italy.

He parted from the poor prisoner with a sorrowful heart, as from a doomed man for whom there was no

The Englishman lived in his new place of abode another halfyear and more, and had no tidings of the

wretched prisoner. At length, one day, he received from the Advocate a cool, concise, mysterious note, to this

effect. 'If you still wish to bestow that benefit upon the man in whom you were once interested, send me fifty

pounds more, and I think it can be ensured.' Now, the Englishman had long settled in his mind that the

Advocate was a heartless sharper, who had preyed upon his credulity and his interest in an unfortunate

sufferer. So, he sat down and wrote a dry answer, giving the Advocate to understand that he was wiser now

than he had been formerly, and that no more money was extractable from his pocket.

He lived outside the city gates, some mile or two from the post office, and was accustomed to walk into the

city with his letters and post them himself. On a lovely spring day, when the sky was exquisitely blue, and the

sea Divinely beautiful, he took his usual walk, carrying this letter to the Advocate in his pocket. As he went

along, his gentle heart was much moved by the loveliness of the prospect, and by the thought of the slowly

dying prisoner chained to the bedstead, for whom the universe had no delights. As he drew nearer and nearer

to the city where he was to post the letter, he became very uneasy in his mind. He debated with himself, was

it remotely possible, after all, that this sum of fifty pounds could restore the fellowcreature whom he pitied

so much, and for whom he had striven so hard, to liberty? He was not a conventionally rich Englishman

very far from that but, he had a spare fifty pounds at the banker's. He resolved to risk it. Without doubt,

He went to the banker's, and got a bill for the amount, and enclosed it in a letter to the Advocate that I wish I

could have seen. He simply told the Advocate that he was quite a poor man, and that he was sensible it might

be a great weakness in him to part with so much money on the faith of so vague a communication; but, that

there it was, and that he prayed the Advocate to make a good use of it. If he did otherwise no good could ever

Within a week, the Englishman was sitting at his breakfast, when he heard some suppressed sounds of

agitation on the staircase, and Giovanni Carlavero leaped into the room and fell upon his breast, a free man!

Conscious of having wronged the Advocate in his own thoughts, the Englishman wrote him an earnest and

grateful letter, avowing the fact, and entreating him to confide by what means and through what agency he

had succeeded so well. The Advocate returned for answer through the post, 'There are many things, as you

know, in this Italy of ours, that are safest and best not even spoken of far less written of. We may meet

some day, and then I may tell you what you want to know; not here, and now.' But, the two never did meet

again. The Advocate was dead when the Englishman gave me my trust; and how the man had been set free,

remained as great a mystery to the Englishman, and to the man himself, as it was to me.

But, I knew this: here was the man, this sultry night, on his knees at my feet, because I was the

Englishman's friend; here were his tears upon my dress; here were his sobs choking his utterance; here were

his kisses on my hands, because they had touched the hands that had worked out his release. He had no need

to tell me it would be happiness to him to die for his benefactor; I doubt if I ever saw real, sterling, fervent

He was much watched and suspected, he said, and had had enough to do to keep himself out of trouble. This,

and his not having prospered in his worldly affairs, had led to his having failed in his usual communications

to the Englishman for as I now remember the period some two or three years. But, his prospects were

brighter, and his wife who had been very ill had recovered, and his fever had left him, and he had bought a

little vineyard, and would I carry to his benefactor the first of its wine? Ay, that I would (I told him with

He had cautiously closed the door before speaking of himself, and had talked with such excess of emotion,

and in a provincial Italian so difficult to understand, that I had more than once been obliged to stop him, and

beg him to have compassion on me and be slower and calmer. By degrees he became so, and tranquilly

walked back with me to the hotel. There, I sat down before I went to bed and wrote a faithful account of him

to the Englishman: which I concluded by saying that I would bring the wine home, against any difficulties,

Early next morning, when I came out at the hotel door to pursue my journey, I found my friend waiting with

one of those immense bottles in which the Italian peasants store their wine a bottle holding some

halfdozen gallons bound round with basketwork for greater safety on the journey. I see him now, in the

bright sunshine, tears of gratitude in his eyes, proudly inviting my attention to this corpulent bottle. (At the

streetcomer hard by, two highflavoured, ablebodied monks pretending to talk together, but keeping

How the bottle had been got there, did not appear; but the difficulty of getting it into the ramshackle vetturino

carriage in which I was departing, was so great, and it took up so much room when it was got in, that I

elected to sit outside. The last I saw of Giovanni Carlavero was his running through the town by the side of

the jingling wheels, clasping my hand as I stretched it down from the box, charging me with a thousand last

loving and dutiful messages to his dear patron, and finally looking in at the bottle as it reposed inside, with an

admiration of its honourable way of travelling that was beyond measure delightful.

And now, what disquiet of mind this dearlybeloved and highly treasured Bottle began to cost me, no man

knows. It was my precious charge through a long tour, and, for hundreds of miles, I never had it off my mind

by day or by night. Over bad roads and they were many I clung to it with affectionate desperation. Up

mountains, I looked in at it and saw it helplessly tilting over on its back, with terror. At innumerable inn

doors when the weather was bad, I was obliged to be put into my vehicle before the Bottle could be got in,

and was obliged to have the Bottle lifted out before human aid could come near me. The Imp of the same

name, except that his associations were all evil and these associations were all good, would have been a less

troublesome travelling companion. I might have served Mr. Cruikshank as a subject for a new illustration of

the miseries of the Bottle. The National Temperance Society might have made a powerful Tract of me.

The suspicions that attached to this innocent Bottle, greatly aggravated my difficulties. It was like the

applepie in the child's book. Parma pouted at it, Modena mocked it, Tuscany tackled it, Naples nibbled it,

Rome refused it, Austria accused it, Soldiers suspected it, Jesuits jobbed it. I composed a neat Oration,

developing my inoffensive intentions in connexion with this Bottle, and delivered it in an infinity of

guardhouses, at a multitude of town gates, and on every drawbridge, angle, and rampart, of a complete

system of fortifications. Fifty times a day, I got down to harangue an infuriated soldiery about the Bottle.

Through the filthy degradation of the abject and vile Roman States, I had as much difficulty in working my

way with the Bottle, as if it had bottled up a complete system of heretical theology. In the Neapolitan country,

where everybody was a spy, a soldier, a priest, or a lazzarone, the shameless beggars of all four

denominations incessantly pounced on the Bottle and made it a pretext for extorting money from me. Quires

quires do I say? Reams of forms illegibly printed on whitybrown paper were filled up about the Bottle,

and it was the subject of more stamping and sanding than I had ever seen before. In consequence of which

haze of sand, perhaps, it was always irregular, and always latent with dismal penalties of going back or not

going forward, which were only to be abated by the silver crossing of a base hand, poked shirtless out of a

ragged uniform sleeve. Under all discouragements, however, I stuck to my Bottle, and held firm to my

resolution that every drop of its contents should reach the Bottle's destination.

The latter refinement cost me a separate heap of troubles on its own separate account. What corkscrews did I

see the military power bring out against that Bottle; what gimlets, spikes, divining rods, gauges, and unknown

tests and instruments! At some places, they persisted in declaring that the wine must not be passed, without

being opened and tasted; I, pleading to the contrary, used then to argue the question seated on the Bottle lest

they should open it in spite of me. In the southern parts of Italy more violent shrieking, facemaking, and

gesticulating, greater vehemence of speech and countenance and action, went on about that Bottle than would

attend fifty murders in a northern latitude. It raised important functionaries out of their beds, in the dead of

night. I have known halfadozen military lanterns to disperse themselves at all points of a great sleeping

Piazza, each lantern summoning some official creature to get up, put on his cockedhat instantly, and come

and stop the Bottle. It was characteristic that while this innocent Bottle had such immense difficulty in getting

from little town to town, Signor Mazzini and the fiery cross were traversing Italy from end to end.

Still, I stuck to my Bottle, like any fine old English gentleman all of the olden time. The more the Bottle was

interfered with, the stauncher I became (if possible) in my first determination that my countryman should

have it delivered to him intact, as the man whom he had so nobly restored to life and liberty had delivered it

to me. If ever I had been obstinate in my days and I may have been, say, once or twice I was obstinate

about the Bottle. But, I made it a rule always to keep a pocket full of small coin at its service, and never to be

out of temper in its cause. Thus, I and the Bottle made our way. Once we had a breakdown; rather a bad

breakdown, on a steep high place with the sea below us, on a tempestuous evening when it blew great guns.

We were driving four wild horses abreast, Southern fashion, and there was some little difficulty in stopping

them. I was outside, and not thrown off; but no words can describe my feelings when I saw the Bottle

travelling inside, as usual burst the door open, and roll obesely out into the road. A blessed Bottle with a

charmed existence, he took no hurt, and we repaired damage, and went on triumphant.

A thousand representations were made to me that the Bottle must be left at this place, or that, and called for

again. I never yielded to one of them, and never parted from the Bottle, on any pretence, consideration, threat,

or entreaty. I had no faith in any official receipt for the Bottle, and nothing would induce me to accept one.

These unmanageable politics at last brought me and the Bottle, still triumphant, to Genoa. There, I took a

tender and reluctant leave of him for a few weeks, and consigned him to a trusty English captain, to be

While the Bottle was on his voyage to England, I read the Shipping Intelligence as anxiously as if I had been

an underwriter. There was some stormy weather after I myself had got to England by way of Switzerland and

France, and my mind greatly misgave me that the Bottle might be wrecked. At last to my great joy, I received

notice of his safe arrival, and immediately went down to Saint Katharine's Docks, and found him in a state of

The wine was mere vinegar when I set it down before the generous Englishman probably it had been

something like vinegar when I took it up from Giovanni Carlavero but not a drop of it was spilled or gone.

And the Englishman told me, with much emotion in his face and voice, that he had never tasted wine that

seemed to him so sweet and sound. And long afterwards, the Bottle graced his table. And the last time I saw

him in this world that misses him, he took me aside in a crowd, to say, with his amiable smile: 'We were

talking of you only today at dinner, and I wished you had been there, for I had some Claret up in Carlavero's

It is an unsettled question with me whether I shall leave Calais something handsome in my will, or whether I

shall leave it my malediction. I hate it so much, and yet I am always so very glad to see it, that I am in a state

of constant indecision on this subject. When I first made acquaintance with Calais, it was as a maundering

young wretch in a clammy perspiration and dripping saline particles, who was conscious of no extremities but

the one great extremity, seasickness who was a mere bilious torso, with a mislaid headache somewhere in

its stomach who had been put into a horrible swing in Dover Harbour, and had tumbled giddily out of it on

the French coast, or the Isle of Man, or anywhere. Times have changed, and now I enter Calais selfreliant

and rational. I know where it is beforehand, I keep a look out for it, I recognise its landmarks when I see any

of them, I am acquainted with its ways, and I know and I can bear its worst behaviour.

Malignant Calais! Lowlying alligator, evading the eyesight and discouraging hope! Dodging flat streak,

now on this bow, now on that, now anywhere, now everywhere, now nowhere! In vain Cape Grinez, coming

frankly forth into the sea, exhorts the failing to be stout of heart and stomach: sneaking Calais, prone behind

its bar, invites emetically to despair. Even when it can no longer quite conceal itself in its muddy dock, it has

an evil way of falling off, has Calais, which is more hopeless than its invisibility. The pier is all but on the

bowsprit, and you think you are there roll, roar, wash! Calais has retired miles inland, and Dover has

burst out to look for it. It has a last dip and slide in its character, has Calais, to be especially commanded to

the infernal gods. Thrice accursed be that garrisontown, when it dives under the boat's keel, and comes up a

league or two to the right, with the packet shivering and spluttering and staring about for it!

Not but what I have my animosities towards Dover. I particularly detest Dover for the selfcomplacency with

which it goes to bed. It always goes to bed (when I am going to Calais) with a more brilliant display of lamp

and candle than any other town. Mr. and Mrs. Birmingham, host and hostess of the Lord Warden Hotel, are

my much esteemed friends, but they are too conceited about the comforts of that establishment when the

Night Mail is starting. I know it is a good house to stay at, and I don't want the fact insisted upon in all its

warm bright windows at such an hour. I know the Warden is a stationary edifice that never rolls or pitches,

and I object to its big outline seeming to insist upon that circumstance, and, as it were, to come over me with

it, when I am reeling on the deck of the boat. Beshrew the Warden likewise, for obstructing that corner, and

making the wind so angry as it rushes round. Shall I not know that it blows quite soon enough, without the

As I wait here on board the night packet, for the SouthEastern Train to come down with the Mail, Dover

appears to me to be illuminated for some intensely aggravating festivity in my personal dishonour. All its

noises smack of taunting praises of the land, and dispraises of the gloomy sea, and of me for going on it. The

drums upon the heights have gone to bed, or I know they would rattle taunts against me for having my

unsteady footing on this slippery deck. The many gas eyes of the Marine Parade twinkle in an offensive

manner, as if with derision. The distant dogs of Dover bark at me in my misshapen wrappers, as if I were

A screech, a bell, and two red eyes come gliding down the Admiralty Pier with a smoothness of motion

rendered more smooth by the heaving of the boat. The sea makes noises against the pier, as if several

hippopotami were lapping at it, and were prevented by circumstances over which they had no control from

drinking peaceably. We, the boat, become violently agitated rumble, hum, scream, roar, and establish an

immense family washingday at each paddlebox. Bright patches break out in the train as the doors of the

postoffice vans are opened, and instantly stooping figures with sacks upon their backs begin to be beheld

among the piles, descending as it would seem in ghostly procession to Davy Jones's Locker. The passengers

come on board; a few shadowy Frenchmen, with hatboxes shaped like the stoppers of gigantic casebottles; a

few shadowy Germans in immense fur coats and boots; a few shadowy Englishmen prepared for the worst

and pretending not to expect it. I cannot disguise from my uncommercial mind the miserable fact that we are

a body of outcasts; that the attendants on us are as scant in number as may serve to get rid of us with the least

possible delay; that there are no nightloungers interested in us; that the unwilling lamps shiver and shudder

at us; that the sole object is to commit us to the deep and abandon us. Lo, the two red eyes glaring in

increasing distance, and then the very train itself has gone to bed before we are off!

What is the moral support derived by some seagoing amateurs from an umbrella? Why do certain voyagers

across the Channel always put up that article, and hold it up with a grim and fierce tenacity? A

fellowcreature near me whom I only know to BE a fellowcreature, because of his umbrella: without

which he might be a dark bit of cliff, pier, or bulkbead clutches that instrument with a desperate grasp, that

will not relax until he lands at Calais. Is there any analogy, in certain constitutions, between keeping an

umbrella up, and keeping the spirits up? A hawser thrown on board with a flop replies 'Stand by!' 'Stand by,

below!' 'Half a turn a head!' 'Half a turn a head!' 'Half speed!' 'Half speed!' 'Port!' 'Port!' 'Steady!' 'Steady!' 'Go

A stout wooden wedge driven in at my right temple and out at my left, a floating deposit of lukewarm oil in

my throat, and a compression of the bridge of my nose in a blunt pair of pincers, these are the personal

sensations by which I know we are off, and by which I shall continue to know it until I am on the soil of

France. My symptoms have scarcely established themselves comfortably, when two or three skating shadows

that have been trying to walk or stand, get flung together, and other two or three shadows in tarpaulin slide

with them into corners and cover them up. Then the South Foreland lights begin to hiccup at us in a way that

It is at about this period that my detestation of Calais knows no bounds. Inwardly I resolve afresh that I never

will forgive that hated town. I have done so before, many times, but that is past. Let me register a vow.

Implacable animosity to Calais everm that was an awkward sea, and the funnel seems of my opinion, for it

The wind blows stiffly from the NorEast, the sea runs high, we ship a deal of water, the night is dark and

cold, and the shapeless passengers lie about in melancholy bundles, as if they were sorted out for the

laundress; but for my own uncommercial part I cannot pretend that I am much inconvenienced by any of

these things. A general howling, whistling, flopping, gurgling, and scooping, I am aware of, and a general

knocking about of Nature; but the impressions I receive are very vague. In a sweet faint temper, something

like the smell of damaged oranges, I think I should feel languidly benevolent if I had time. I have not time,

because I am under a curious compulsion to occupy myself with the Irish melodies. 'Rich and rare were the

gems she wore,' is the particular melody to which I find myself devoted. I sing it to myself in the most

charming manner and with the greatest expression. Now and then, I raise my head (I am sitting on the hardest

of wet seats, in the most uncomfortable of wet attitudes, but I don't mind it,) and notice that I am a whirling

shuttlecock between a fiery battledore of a lighthouse on the French coast and a fiery battledore of a

lighthouse on the English coast; but I don't notice it particularly, except to feel envenomed in my hatred of

Calais. Then I go on again, 'Rich and rare were the geems she eee wore, And a bright gold ring on her

waand she boore, But O her beauty was faaaar beyond' I am particularly proud of my execution

here, when I become aware of another awkward shock from the sea, and another protest from the funnel, and

a fellowcreature at the paddlebox more audibly indisposed than I think he need be 'Her sparkling gems,

or snowwhite wand, But O her beauty was faa aaar beyond' another awkward one here, and the

fellowcreature with the umbrella down and picked up 'Her spaarkling geems, or her Port! port!

steady! steady! snowwhite fellowcreature at the paddlebox very selfishly audible, bump, roar, wash,

As my execution of the Irish melodies partakes of my imperfect perceptions of what is going on around me,

so what is going on around me becomes something else than what it is. The stokers open the furnace doors

below, to feed the fires, and I am again on the box of the old Exeter Telegraph fast coach, and that is the light

of the for ever extinguished coachlamps, and the gleam on the hatches and paddleboxes is THEIR gleam

on cottages and haystacks, and the monotonous noise of the engines is the steady jingle of the splendid team.

Anon, the intermittent funnel roar of protest at every violent roll, becomes the regular blast of a high pressure

engine, and I recognise the exceedingly explosive steamer in which I ascended the Mississippi when the

American civil war was not, and when only its causes were. A fragment of mast on which the light of a

lantern falls, an end of rope, and a jerking block or so, become suggestive of Franconi's Circus at Paris where

I shall be this very night mayhap (for it must be morning now), and they dance to the selfsame time and tune

as the trained steed, Black Raven. What may be the speciality of these waves as they come rushing on, I

cannot desert the pressing demands made upon me by the gems she wore, to inquire, but they are charged

with something about Robinson Crusoe, and I think it was in Yarmouth Roads that he first went a seafaring

and was near foundering (what a terrific sound that word had for me when I was a boy!) in his first gale of

wind. Still, through all this, I must ask her (who WAS she I wonder!) for the fiftieth time, and without ever

stopping, Does she not fear to stray, So lone and lovely through this bleak way, And are Erin's sons so good

or so cold, As not to be tempted by more fellow creatures at the paddlebox or gold? Sir Knight I feel not

the least alarm, No son of Erin will offer me harm, For though they love fellowcreature with umbrella down

again and golden store, Sir Knight they what a tremendous one love honour and virtue more: For though they

love Stewards with a bull's eye bright, they'll trouble you for your ticket, sirrough passage tonight!

I freely admit it to be a miserable piece of human weakness and inconsistency, but I no sooner become

conscious of those last words from the steward than I begin to soften towards Calais. Whereas I have been

vindictively wishing that those Calais burghers who came out of their town by a short cut into the History of

England, with those fatal ropes round their necks by which they have since been towed into so many

cartoons, had all been hanged on the spot, I now begin to regard them as highly respectable and virtuous

tradesmen. Looking about me, I see the light of Cape Grinez well astern of the boat on the davits to leeward,

and the light of Calais Harbour undeniably at its old tricks, but still ahead and shining. Sentiments of

forgiveness of Calais, not to say of attachment to Calais, begin to expand my bosom. I have weak notions that

I will stay there a day or two on my way back. A faded and recumbent stranger pausing in a profound reverie

over the rim of a basin, asks me what kind of place Calais is? I tell him (Heaven forgive me!) a very

So strangely goes the time, and on the whole so quickly though still I seem to have been on board a week

that I am bumped, rolled, gurgled, washed and pitched into Calais Harbour before her maiden smile has

finally lighted her through the Green Isle, When blest for ever is she who relied, On entering Calais at the top

of the tide. For we have not to land tonight down among those slimy timbers covered with green hair as if

it were the mermaids' favourite combingplace where one crawls to the surface of the jetty, like a stranded

shrimp, but we go steaming up the harbour to the Railway Station Quay. And as we go, the sea washes in and

out among piles and planks, with dead heavy beats and in quite a furious manner (whereof we are proud), and

the lamps shake in the wind, and the bells of Calais striking One seem to send their vibrations struggling

against troubled air, as we have come struggling against troubled water. And now, in the sudden relief and

wiping of faces, everybody on board seems to have had a prodigious doubletooth out, and to be this very

instant free of the Dentist's hands. And now we all know for the first time how wet and cold we are, and how

'Hotel Dessin!' (but in this one case it is not a vocal cry; it is but a bright lustre in the eyes of the cheery

representative of that best of inns). 'Hotel Meurice!' 'Hotel de France!' 'Hotel de Calais!' 'The Royal Hotel,

Sir, Angaishe ouse!' 'You going to Parry, Sir?' 'Your baggage, registair froo, Sir?' Bless ye, my Touters, bless

ye, my commissionaires, bless ye, my hungryeyed mysteries in caps of a military form, who are always

here, day or night, fair weather or foul, seeking inscrutable jobs which I never see you get! Bless ye, my

Custom House officers in green and grey; permit me to grasp the welcome hands that descend into my

travellingbag, one on each side, and meet at the bottom to give my change of linen a peculiar shake up, as if

it were a measure of chaff or grain! I have nothing to declare, Monsieur le Douanier, except that when I cease

to breathe, Calais will be found written on my heart. No article liable to local duty have I with me, Monsieur

l'Officier de l'Octroi, unless the overflowing of a breast devoted to your charming town should be in that wise

chargeable. Ah! see at the gangway by the twinkling lantern, my dearest brother and friend, he once of the

Passport Office, he who collects the names! May he be for ever changeless in his buttoned black surtout, with

his notebook in his hand, and his tall black hat, surmounting his round, smiling, patient face! Let us

Calais up and doing at the railway station, and Calais down and dreaming in its bed; Calais with something of

'an ancient and fish like smell' about it, and Calais blown and seawashed pure; Calais represented at the

Buffet by savoury roast fowls, hot coffee, cognac, and Bordeaux; and Calais represented everywhere by

flitting persons with a monomania for changing money though I never shall be able to understand in my

present state of existence how they live by it, but I suppose I should, if I understood the currency question

Calais EN GROS, and Calais EN DETAIL, forgive one who has deeply wronged you. I was not fully aware

Ding, ding! To the carriages, gentlemen the travellers. Ascend then, gentlemen the travellers, for

Hazebroucke, Lille, Douai, Bruxelles, Arras, Amiens, and Paris! I, humble representative of the

uncommercial interest, ascend with the rest. The train is light tonight, and I share my compartment with but

two fellow travellers; one, a compatriot in an obsolete cravat, who thinks it a quite unaccountable thing that

they don't keep 'London time' on a French railway, and who is made angry by my modestly suggesting the

possibility of Paris time being more in their way; the other, a young priest, with a very small bird in a very

small cage, who feeds the small bird with a quill, and then puts him up in the network above his head, where

he advances twittering, to his front wires, and seems to address me in an electioneering manner. The

compatriot (who crossed in the boat, and whom I judge to be some person of distinction, as he was shut up,

like a stately species of rabbit, in a private hutch on deck) and the young priest (who joined us at Calais) are

A stormy night still; a night that sweeps the wires of the electric telegraph with a wild and fitful hand; a night

so very stormy, with the added storm of the trainprogress through it, that when the Guard comes clambering

round to mark the tickets while we are at full speed (a really horrible performance in an express train, though

he holds on to the open window by his elbows in the most deliberate manner), he stands in such a whirlwind

that I grip him fast by the collar, and feel it next to manslaughter to let him go. Still, when he is gone, the

small, small bird remains at his front wires feebly twittering to me twittering and twittering, until, leaning

back in my place and looking at him in drowsy fascination, I find that he seems to jog my memory as we rush

Uncommercial travels (thus the small, small bird) have lain in their idle thriftless way through all this range

of swamp and dyke, as through many other odd places; and about here, as you very well know, are the queer

old stone farmhouses, approached by drawbridges, and the windmills that you get at by boats. Here, are the

lands where the women hoe and dig, paddling canoewise from field to field, and here are the cabarets and

other peasanthouses where the stone dovecotes in the littered yards are as strong as warders' towers in old

castles. Here, are the long monotonous miles of canal, with the great Dutchbuilt barges garishly painted, and

the towing girls, sometimes harnessed by the forehead, sometimes by the girdle and the shoulders, not a

pleasant sight to see. Scattered through this country are mighty works of VAUBAN, whom you know about,

and regiments of such corporals as you heard of once upon a time, and many a blueeyed Bebelle. Through

these flat districts, in the shining summer days, walk those long, grotesque files of young novices in

enormous shovelhats, whom you remember blackening the ground checkered by the avenues of leafy trees.

And now that Hazebroucke slumbers certain kilometres ahead, recall the summer evening when your dusty

feet strolling up from the station tended haphazard to a Fair there, where the oldest inhabitants were circling

round and round a barrelorgan on hobby horses, with the greatest gravity, and where the principal show in

the Fair was a Religious Richardson's literally, on its own announcement in great letters, THEATRE

RELIGIEUX. In which improving Temple, the dramatic representation was of 'all the interesting events in

the life of our Lord, from the Manger to the Tomb;' the principal female character, without any reservation or

exception, being at the moment of your arrival, engaged in trimming the external Moderators (as it was

growing dusk), while the next principal female character took the money, and the Young Saint John disported

Looking up at this point to confirm the small, small bird in every particular he has mentioned, I find he has

ceased to twitter, and has put his head under his wing. Therefore, in my different way I follow the good

I had parted from the small bird at somewhere about four o'clock in the morning, when he had got out at

Arras, and had been received by two shovelhats in waiting at the station, who presented an appropriately

ornithological and crowlike appearance. My compatriot and I had gone on to Paris; my compatriot

enlightening me occasionally with a long list of the enormous grievances of French railway travelling: every

one of which, as I am a sinner, was perfectly new to me, though I have as much experience of French

railways as most uncommercials. I had left him at the terminus (through his conviction, against all

explanation and remonstrance, that his baggageticket was his passengerticket), insisting in a very high

temper to the functionary on duty, that in his own personal identity he was four packages weighing so many

kilogrammes as if he had been Cassim Baba! I had bathed and breakfasted, and was strolling on the bright

quays. The subject of my meditations was the question whether it is positively in the essence and nature of

things, as a certain school of Britons would seem to think it, that a Capital must be ensnared and enslaved

before it can be made beautiful: when I lifted up my eyes and found that my feet, straying like my mind, had

That is to say, NotreDame was before me, but there was a large open space between us. A very little while

gone, I had left that space covered with buildings densely crowded; and now it was cleared for some new

wonder in the way of public Street, Place, Garden, Fountain, or all four. Only the obscene little Morgue,

slinking on the brink of the river and soon to come down, was left there, looking mortally ashamed of itself,

and supremely wicked. I had but glanced at this old acquaintance, when I beheld an airy procession coming

round in front of NotreDame, past the great hospital. It had something of a Masaniello look, with fluttering

striped curtains in the midst of it, and it came dancing round the cathedral in the liveliest manner.

I was speculating on a marriage in Blouselife, or a Christening, or some other domestic festivity which I

would see out, when I found, from the talk of a quick rush of Blouses past me, that it was a Body coming to

the Morgue. Having never before chanced upon this initiation, I constituted myself a Blouse likewise, and ran

into the Morgue with the rest. It was a very muddy day, and we took in a quantity of mire with us, and the

procession coming in upon our heels brought a quantity more. The procession was in the highest spirits, and

consisted of idlers who had come with the curtained litter from its startingplace, and of all the

reinforcements it had picked up by the way. It set the litter down in the midst of the Morgue, and then two

Custodians proclaimed aloud that we were all 'invited' to go out. This invitation was rendered the more

pressing, if not the more flattering, by our being shoved out, and the foldinggates being barred upon us.

Those who have never seen the Morgue, may see it perfectly, by presenting to themselves on indifferently

paved coachhouse accessible from the street by a pair of foldinggates; on the left of the coachhouse,

occupying its width, any large London tailor's or linendraper's plateglass window reaching to the ground;

within the window, on two rows of inclined plane, what the coachhouse has to show; hanging above, like

irregular stalactites from the roof of a cave, a quantity of clothes the clothes of the dead and buried shows

We had been excited in the highest degree by seeing the Custodians pull off their coats and tuck up their

shirtsleeves, as the procession came along. It looked so interestingly like business. Shut out in the muddy

street, we now became quite ravenous to know all about it. Was it river, pistol, knife, love, gambling,

robbery, hatred, how many stabs, how many bullets, fresh or decomposed, suicide or murder? All wedged

together, and all staring at one another with our heads thrust forward, we propounded these inquiries and a

hundred more such. Imperceptibly, it came to be known that Monsieur the tall and sallow mason yonder, was

acquainted with the facts. Would Monsieur the tall and sallow mason, surged at by a new wave of us, have

the goodness to impart? It was but a poor old man, passing along the street under one of the new buildings,

on whom a stone had fallen, and who had tumbled dead. His age? Another wave surged up against the tall

and sallow mason, and our wave swept on and broke, and he was any age from sixtyfive to ninety.

An old man was not much: moreover, we could have wished he had been killed by human agency his own,

or somebody else's: the latter, preferable but our comfort was, that he had nothing about him to lead to his

identification, and that his people must seek him here. Perhaps they were waiting dinner for him even now?

We liked that. Such of us as had pockethandkerchiefs took a slow, intense, protracted wipe at our noses, and

then crammed our handkerchiefs into the breast of our blouses. Others of us who had no handkerchiefs

administered a similar relief to our overwrought minds, by means of prolonged smears or wipes of our

mouths on our sleeves. One man with a gloomy malformation of brow a homicidal worker in whitelead, to

judge from his blue tone of colour, and a certain flavour of paralysis pervading him got his coatcollar

between his teeth, and bit at it with an appetite. Several decent women arrived upon the outskirts of the

crowd, and prepared to launch themselves into the dismal coachhouse when opportunity should come;

among them, a pretty young mother, pretending to bite the forefinger of her babyboy, kept it between her

rosy lips that it might be handy for guiding to point at the show. Meantime, all faces were turned towards the

building, and we men waited with a fixed and stern resolution: for the most part with folded arms. Surely, it

was the only public French sight these uncommercial eyes had seen, at which the expectant people did not

form EN QUEUE. But there was no such order of arrangement here; nothing but a general determination to

make a rush for it, and a disposition to object to some boys who had mounted on the two stone posts by the

hinges of the gates, with the design of swooping in when the hinges should turn.

Now, they turned, and we rushed! Great pressure, and a scream or two from the front. Then a laugh or two,

some expressions of disappointment, and a slackening of the pressure and subsidence of the struggle. Old

'But what would you have?' the Custodian reasonably argues, as he looks out at his little door. 'Patience,

patience! We make his toilette, gentlemen. He will be exposed presently. It is necessary to proceed according

to rule. His toilette is not made all at a blow. He will be exposed in good time, gentlemen, in good time.' And

so retires, smoking, with a wave of his sleeveless arm towards the window, importing, 'Entertain yourselves

in the meanwhile with the other curiosities. Fortunately the Museum is not empty today.'

Who would have thought of public fickleness even at the Morgue? But there it was, on that occasion. Three

lately popular articles that had been attracting greatly when the litter was first descried coming dancing round

the corner by the great cathedral, were so completely deposed now, that nobody save two little girls (one

showing them to a doll) would look at them. Yet the chief of the three, the article in the front row, had

received jagged injury of the left temple; and the other two in the back row, the drowned two lying side by

side with their heads very slightly turned towards each other, seemed to be comparing notes about it. Indeed,

those two of the back row were so furtive of appearance, and so (in their puffed way) assassinatingly

knowing as to the one of the front, that it was hard to think the three had never come together in their lives,

and were only chance companions after death. Whether or no this was the general, as it was the

uncommercial, fancy, it is not to be disputed that the group had drawn exceedingly within ten minutes. Yet

now, the inconstant public turned its back upon them, and even leaned its elbows carelessly against the bar

outside the window and shook off the mud from its shoes, and also lent and borrowed fire for pipes.

Custodian reenters from his door. 'Again once, gentlemen, you are invited ' No further invitation

This time, the interest was grown too hot to admit of toleration of the boys on the stone posts. The homicidal

whitelead worker made a pounce upon one boy who was hoisting himself up, and brought him to earth

amidst general commendation. Closely stowed as we were, we yet formed into groups groups of

conversation, without separation from the mass to discuss the old man. Rivals of the tall and sallow mason

sprang into being, and here again was popular inconstancy. These rivals attracted audiences, and were

greedily listened to; and whereas they had derived their information solely from the tall and sallow one,

officious members of the crowd now sought to enlighten HIM on their authority. Changed by this social

experience into an ironvisaged and inveterate misanthrope, the mason glared at mankind, and evidently

cherished in his breast the wish that the whole of the present company could change places with the deceased

old man. And now listeners became inattentive, and people made a start forward at a slight sound, and an

unholy fire kindled in the public eye, and those next the gates beat at them impatiently, as if they were of the

Again the hinges creaked, and we rushed. Disorderly pressure for some time ensued before the uncommercial

unit got figured into the front row of the sum. It was strange to see so much heat and uproar seething about

one poor spare, whitehaired old man, quiet for evermore. He was calm of feature and undisfigured, as he lay

on his back having been struck upon the hinder part of his head, and thrown forward and something like a

tear or two had started from the closed eyes, and lay wet upon the face. The uncommercial interest, sated at a

glance, directed itself upon the striving crowd on either side and behind: wondering whether one might have

guessed, from the expression of those faces merely, what kind of sight they were looking at. The differences

of expression were not many. There was a little pity, but not much, and that mostly with a selfish touch in it

as who would say, 'Shall I, poor I, look like that, when the time comes!' There was more of a secretly

brooding contemplation and curiosity, as 'That man I don't like, and have the grudge against; would such be

his appearance, if some one not to mention names by any chance gave him an knock?' There was a

wolfish stare at the object, in which homicidal white lead worker shone conspicuous. And there was a much

more general, purposeless, vacant staring at it like looking at waxwork, without a catalogue, and not

knowing what to make of it. But all these expressions concurred in possessing the one underlying expression

of LOOKING AT SOMETHING THAT COULD NOT RETURN A LOOK. The uncommercial notice had

established this as very remarkable, when a new pressure all at once coming up from the street pinioned him

ignominiously, and hurried him into the arms (now sleeved again) of the Custodian smoking at his door, and

answering questions, between puffs, with a certain placid meritorious air of not being proud, though high in

office. And mentioning pride, it may be observed, by the way, that one could not well help investing the

original sole occupant of the front row with an air depreciatory of the legitimate attraction of the poor old

man: while the two in the second row seemed to exult at this superseded popularity.

Pacing presently round the garden of the Tower of St. Jacques de la Boucherie, and presently again in front of

the Hotel de Ville, I called to mind a certain desolate openair Morgue that I happened to light upon in

London, one day in the hard winter of 1861, and which seemed as strange to me, at the time of seeing it, as if

I had found it in China. Towards that hour of a winter's afternoon when the lamplighters are beginning to

light the lamps in the streets a little before they are wanted, because the darkness thickens fast and soon, I

was walking in from the country on the northern side of the Regent's Park hard frozen and deserted when

I saw an empty Hansom cab drive up to the lodge at Gloucester gate, and the driver with great agitation call

to the man there: who quickly reached a long pole from a tree, and, deftly collared by the driver, jumped to

the step of his little seat, and so the Hansom rattled out at the gate, galloping over the ironbound road. I

followed running, though not so fast but that when I came to the righthand Canal Bridge, near the

crosspath to Chalk Farm, the Hansom was stationary, the horse was smoking hot, the long pole was idle on

the ground, and the driver and the parkkeeper were looking over the bridge parapet. Looking over too, I

saw, lying on the towingpath with her face turned up towards us, a woman, dead a day or two, and under

thirty, as I guessed, poorly dressed in black. The feet were lightly crossed at the ankles, and the dark hair, all

pushed back from the face, as though that had been the last action of her desperate hands, streamed over the

ground. Dabbled all about her, was the water and the broken ice that had dropped from her dress, and had

splashed as she was got out. The policeman who had just got her out, and the passing costermonger who had

helped him, were standing near the body; the latter with that stare at it which I have likened to being at a

waxwork exhibition without a catalogue; the former, looking over his stock, with professional stiffness and

coolness, in the direction in which the bearers he had sent for were expected. So dreadfully forlorn, so

dreadfully sad, so dreadfully mysterious, this spectacle of our dear sister here departed! A barge came up,

breaking the floating ice and the silence, and a woman steered it. The man with the horse that towed it, cared

so little for the body, that the stumbling hoofs had been among the hair, and the towrope had caught and

turned the head, before our cry of horror took him to the bridle. At which sound the steering woman looked

up at us on the bridge, with contempt unutterable, and then looking down at the body with a similar

expression as if it were made in another likeness from herself, had been informed with other passions, had

been lost by other chances, had had another nature dragged down to perdition steered a spurning streak of

A better experience, but also of the Morgue kind, in which chance happily made me useful in a slight degree,

arose to my remembrance as I took my way by the Boulevard de Sebastopol to the brighter scenes of Paris.

The thing happened, say fiveandtwenty years ago. I was a modest young uncommercial then, and timid

and inexperienced. Many suns and winds have browned me in the line, but those were my pale days. Having

newly taken the lease of a house in a certain distinguished metropolitan parish a house which then appeared

to me to be a frightfully firstclass Family Mansion, involving awful responsibilities I became the prey of a

Beadle. I think the Beadle must have seen me going in or coming out, and must have observed that I tottered

under the weight of my grandeur. Or he may have been in hiding under straw when I bought my first horse

(in the desirable stableyard attached to the firstclass Family Mansion), and when the vendor remarked to

me, in an original manner, on bringing him for approval, taking his cloth off and smacking him, 'There, Sir!

THERE'S a Orse!' And when I said gallantly, 'How much do you want for him?' and when the vendor said,

'No more than sixty guineas, from you,' and when I said smartly, 'Why not more than sixty from ME?' And

when he said crushingly, 'Because upon my soul and body he'd be considered cheap at seventy, by one who

understood the subject but you don't.' I say, the Beadle may have been in hiding under straw, when this

disgrace befell me, or he may have noted that I was too raw and young an Atlas to carry the firstclass

Family Mansion in a knowing manner. Be this as it may, the Beadle did what Melancholy did to the youth in

Gray's Elegy he marked me for his own. And the way in which the Beadle did it, was this: he summoned

In my first feverish alarm I repaired 'for safety and for succour' like those sagacious Northern shepherds

who, having had no previous reason whatever to believe in young Norval, very prudently did not originate the

hazardous idea of believing in him to a deep householder. This profound man informed me that the Beadle

counted on my buying him off; on my bribing him not to summon me; and that if I would attend an Inquest

with a cheerful countenance, and profess alacrity in that branch of my country's service, the Beadle would be

I roused my energies, and the next time the wily Beadle summoned me, I went. The Beadle was the blankest

Beadle I have ever looked on when I answered to my name; and his discomfiture gave me courage to go

We were impanelled to inquire concerning the death of a very little mite of a child. It was the old miserable

story. Whether the mother had committed the minor offence of concealing the birth, or whether she had

committed the major offence of killing the child, was the question on which we were wanted. We must

The Inquest came off in the parish workhouse, and I have yet a lively impression that I was unanimously

received by my brother Jurymen as a brother of the utmost conceivable insignificance. Also, that before we

began, a broker who had lately cheated me fearfully in the matter of a pair of cardtables, was for the utmost

rigour of the law. I remember that we sat in a sort of boardroom, on such very large square horsehair chairs

that I wondered what race of Patagonians they were made for; and further, that an undertaker gave me his

card when we were in the full moral freshness of having just been sworn, as 'an inhabitant that was newly

come into the parish, and was likely to have a young family.' The case was then stated to us by the Coroner,

and then we went downstairs led by the plotting Beadle to view the body. From that day to this, the poor

little figure, on which that sounding legal appellation was bestowed, has lain in the same place and with the

same surroundings, to my thinking. In a kind of crypt devoted to the warehousing of the parochial coffins,

and in the midst of a perfect Panorama of coffins of all sizes, it was stretched on a box; the mother had put it

in her box this box almost as soon as it was born, and it had been presently found there. It had been

opened, and neatly sewn up, and regarded from that point of view, it looked like a stuffed creature. It rested

on a clean white cloth, with a surgical instrument or so at hand, and regarded from that point of view, it

looked as if the cloth were 'laid,' and the Giant were coming to dinner. There was nothing repellent about the

poor piece of innocence, and it demanded a mere form of looking at. So, we looked at an old pauper who was

going about among the coffins with a foot rule, as if he were a case of SelfMeasurement; and we looked at

one another; and we said the place was well whitewashed anyhow; and then our conversational powers as a

British Jury flagged, and the foreman said, 'All right, gentlemen? Back again, Mr. Beadle!'

The miserable young creature who had given birth to this child within a very few days, and who had cleaned

the cold wet doorsteps immediately afterwards, was brought before us when we resumed our horsehair

chairs, and was present during the proceedings. She had a horsehair chair herself, being very weak and ill;

and I remember how she turned to the unsympathetic nurse who attended her, and who might have been the

figurehead of a paupership, and how she hid her face and sobs and tears upon that wooden shoulder. I

remember, too, how hard her mistress was upon her (she was a servantofall work), and with what a cruel

pertinacity that piece of Virtue spun her thread of evidence double, by intertwisting it with the sternest thread

of construction. Smitten hard by the terrible low wail from the utterly friendless orphan girl, which never

ceased during the whole inquiry, I took heart to ask this witness a question or two, which hopefully admitted

of an answer that might give a favourable turn to the case. She made the turn as little favourable as it could

be, but it did some good, and the Coroner, who was nobly patient and humane (he was the late Mr. Wakley),

cast a look of strong encouragement in my direction. Then, we had the doctor who had made the examination,

and the usual tests as to whether the child was born alive; but he was a timid, muddleheaded doctor, and got

confused and contradictory, and wouldn't say this, and couldn't answer for that, and the immaculate broker

was too much for him, and our side slid back again. However, I tried again, and the Coroner backed me

again, for which I ever afterwards felt grateful to him as I do now to his memory; and we got another

favourable turn, out of some other witness, some member of the family with a strong prepossession against

the sinner; and I think we had the doctor back again; and I know that the Coroner summed up for our side,

and that I and my British brothers turned round to discuss our verdict, and get ourselves into great difficulties

with our large chairs and the broker. At that stage of the case I tried hard again, being convinced that I had

cause for it; and at last we found for the minor offence of only concealing the birth; and the poor desolate

creature, who had been taken out during our deliberation, being brought in again to be told of the verdict,

then dropped upon her knees before us, with protestations that we were right protestations among the most

(In private conversation after this was all over, the Coroner showed me his reasons as a trained surgeon, for

perceiving it to be impossible that the child could, under the most favourable circumstances, have drawn

many breaths, in the very doubtful case of its having ever breathed at all; this, owing to the discovery of some

foreign matter in the windpipe, quite irreconcilable with many moments of life.)

When the agonised girl had made those final protestations, I had seen her face, and it was in unison with her

distracted heartbroken voice, and it was very moving. It certainly did not impress me by any beauty that it

had, and if I ever see it again in another world I shall only know it by the help of some new sense or

intelligence. But it came to me in my sleep that night, and I selfishly dismissed it in the most efficient way I

could think of. I caused some extra care to be taken of her in the prison, and counsel to be retained for her

defence when she was tried at the Old Bailey; and her sentence was lenient, and her history and conduct

proved that it was right. In doing the little I did for her, I remember to have had the kind help of some

gentlehearted functionary to whom I addressed myself but what functionary I have long forgotten who I

I regard this as a very notable uncommercial experience, because this good came of a Beadle. And to the best

of my knowledge, information, and belief, it is the only good that ever did come of a Beadle since the first

It came into my mind that I would recall in these notes a few of the many hostelries I have rested at in the

course of my journeys; and, indeed, I had taken up my pen for the purpose, when I was baffled by an

accidental circumstance. It was the having to leave off, to wish the owner of a certain bright face that looked

in at my door, 'many happy returns of the day.' Thereupon a new thought came into my mind, driving its

predecessor out, and I began to recall instead of Inns the birthdays that I have put up at, on my way to this

I can very well remember being taken out to visit some peachfaced creature in a blue sash, and shoes to

correspond, whose life I supposed to consist entirely of birthdays. Upon seedcake, sweet wine, and shining

presents, that glorified young person seemed to me to be exclusively reared. At so early a stage of my travels

did I assist at the anniversary of her nativity (and become enamoured of her), that I had not yet acquired the

recondite knowledge that a birthday is the common property of all who are born, but supposed it to be a

special gift bestowed by the favouring Heavens on that one distinguished infant. There was no other

company, and we sat in a shady bower under a table, as my better (or worse) knowledge leads me to

believe and were regaled with saccharine substances and liquids, until it was time to part. A bitter powder

was administered to me next morning, and I was wretched. On the whole, a pretty accurate foreshadowing of

Then came the time when, inseparable from one's own birthday, was a certain sense of merit, a consciousness

of wellearned distinction. When I regarded my birthday as a graceful achievement of my own, a monument

of my perseverance, independence, and good sense, redounding greatly to my honour. This was at about the

period when Olympia Squires became involved in the anniversary. Olympia was most beautiful (of course),

and I loved her to that degree, that I used to be obliged to get out of my little bed in the night, expressly to

exclaim to Solitude, 'O, Olympia Squires!' Visions of Olympia, clothed entirely in sagegreen, from which I

infer a defectively educated taste on the part of her respected parents, who were necessarily unacquainted

with the South Kensington Museum, still arise before me. Truth is sacred, and the visions are crowned by a

shining white beaver bonnet, impossibly suggestive of a little feminine postboy. My memory presents a

birthday when Olympia and I were taken by an unfeeling relative some cruel uncle, or the like to a slow

torture called an Orrery. The terrible instrument was set up at the local Theatre, and I had expressed a profane

wish in the morning that it was a Play: for which a serious aunt had probed my conscience deep, and my

pocket deeper, by reclaiming a bestowed halfcrown. It was a venerable and a shabby Orrery, at least one

thousand stars and twentyfive comets behind the age. Nevertheless, it was awful. When the low spirited

gentleman with a wand said, 'Ladies and gentlemen' (meaning particularly Olympia and me), 'the lights are

about to be put out, but there is not the slightest cause for alarm,' it was very alarming. Then the planets and

stars began. Sometimes they wouldn't come on, sometimes they wouldn't go off, sometimes they had holes in

them, and mostly they didn't seem to be good likenesses. All this time the gentleman with the wand was

going on in the dark (tapping away at the heavenly bodies between whiles, like a wearisome woodpecker),

about a sphere revolving on its own axis eight hundred and ninetyseven thousand millions of times or

miles in two hundred and sixtythree thousand five hundred and twentyfour millions of something elses,

until I thought if this was a birthday it were better never to have been born. Olympia, also, became much

depressed, and we both slumbered and woke cross, and still the gentleman was going on in the dark

whether up in the stars, or down on the stage, it would have been hard to make out, if it had been worth trying

cyphering away about planes of orbits, to such an infamous extent that Olympia, stung to madness, actually

kicked me. A pretty birthday spectacle, when the lights were turned up again, and all the schools in the town

(including the National, who had come in for nothing, and serve them right, for they were always throwing

stones) were discovered with exhausted countenances, screwing their knuckles into their eyes, or clutching

their heads of hair. A pretty birthday speech when Dr. Sleek of the CityFree bobbed up his powdered head

in the stage box, and said that before this assembly dispersed he really must beg to express his entire

approval of a lecture as improving, as informing, as devoid of anything that could call a blush into the cheek

of youth, as any it had ever been his lot to hear delivered. A pretty birthday altogether, when Astronomy

couldn't leave poor Small Olympia Squires and me alone, but must put an end to our loves! For, we never got

over it; the threadbare Orrery outwore our mutual tenderness; the man with the wand was too much for the

When shall I disconnect the combined smells of oranges, brown paper, and straw, from those other birthdays

at school, when the coming hamper casts its shadow before, and when a week of social harmony shall I add

of admiring and affectionate popularity led up to that Institution? What noble sentiments were expressed to

me in the days before the hamper, what vows of friendship were sworn to me, what exceedingly old knives

were given me, what generous avowals of having been in the wrong emanated from else obstinate spirits once

enrolled among my enemies! The birthday of the potted game and guava jelly, is still made special to me by

the noble conduct of Bully Globson. Letters from home had mysteriously inquired whether I should be much

surprised and disappointed if among the treasures in the coming hamper I discovered potted game, and guava

jelly from the Western Indies. I had mentioned those hints in confidence to a few friends, and had promised

to give away, as I now see reason to believe, a handsome covey of partridges potted, and about a

hundredweight of guava jelly. It was now that Globson, Bully no more, sought me out in the playground. He

was a big fat boy, with a big fat head and a big fat fist, and at the beginning of that Half had raised such a

bump on my forehead that I couldn't get my hat of state on, to go to church. He said that after an interval of

cool reflection (four months) he now felt this blow to have been an error of judgment, and that he wished to

apologise for the same. Not only that, but holding down his big head between his two big hands in order that

I might reach it conveniently, he requested me, as an act of justice which would appease his awakened

conscience, to raise a retributive bump upon it, in the presence of witnesses. This handsome proposal I

modestly declined, and he then embraced me, and we walked away conversing. We conversed respecting the

West India Islands, and, in the pursuit of knowledge he asked me with much interest whether in the course of

my reading I had met with any reliable description of the mode of manufacturing guava jelly; or whether I

had ever happened to taste that conserve, which he had been given to understand was of rare excellence.

Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty; and then with the waning months came an ever augmenting sense of

the dignity of twentyone. Heaven knows I had nothing to 'come into,' save the bare birthday, and yet I

esteemed it as a great possession. I now and then paved the way to my state of dignity, by beginning a

proposition with the casual words, 'say that a man of twentyone,' or by the incidental assumption of a fact

that could not sanely be disputed, as, 'for when a fellow comes to be a man of twentyone.' I gave a party on

the occasion. She was there. It is unnecessary to name Her, more particularly; She was older than I, and had

pervaded every chink and crevice of my mind for three or four years. I had held volumes of Imaginary

Conversations with her mother on the subject of our union, and I had written letters more in number than

Horace Walpole's, to that discreet woman, soliciting her daughter's hand in marriage. I had never had the

remotest intention of sending any of those letters; but to write them, and after a few days tear them up, had

been a sublime occupation. Sometimes, I had begun 'Honoured Madam. I think that a lady gifted with those

powers of observation which I know you to possess, and endowed with those womanly sympathies with the

young and ardent which it were more than heresy to doubt, can scarcely have failed to discover that I love

your adorable daughter, deeply, devotedly.' In less buoyant states of mind I had begun, 'Bear with me, Dear

Madam, bear with a daring wretch who is about to make a surprising confession to you, wholly unanticipated

by yourself, and which he beseeches you to commit to the flames as soon as you have become aware to what

a towering height his mad ambition soars.' At other times periods of profound mental depression, when She

had gone out to balls where I was not the draft took the affecting form of a paper to be left on my table after

my departure to the confines of the globe. As thus: 'For Mrs. Onowenever, these lines when the hand that

traces them shall be far away. I could not bear the daily torture of hopelessly loving the dear one whom I will

not name. Broiling on the coast of Africa, or congealing on the shores of Greenland, I am far far better there

than here.' (In this sentiment my cooler judgment perceives that the family of the beloved object would have

most completely concurred.) 'If I ever emerge from obscurity, and my name is ever heralded by Fame, it will

be for her dear sake. If I ever amass Gold, it will be to pour it at her feet. Should I on the other hand become

the prey of Ravens ' I doubt if I ever quite made up my mind what was to be done in that affecting case; I

tried 'then it is better so;' but not feeling convinced that it would be better so, I vacillated between leaving all

This fictitious correspondence of mine is to blame for the foregoing digression. I was about to pursue the

statement that on my twentyfirst birthday I gave a party, and She was there. It was a beautiful party. There

was not a single animate or inanimate object connected with it (except the company and myself) that I had

ever seen before. Everything was hired, and the mercenaries in attendance were profound strangers to me.

Behind a door, in the crumby part of the night when wineglasses were to be found in unexpected spots, I

spoke to Her spoke out to Her. What passed, I cannot as a man of honour reveal. She was all angelical

gentleness, but a word was mentioned a short and dreadful word of three letters, beginning with a B

which, as I remarked at the moment, 'scorched my brain.' She went away soon afterwards, and when the

hollow throng (though to be sure it was no fault of theirs) dispersed, I issued forth, with a dissipated scorner,

and, as I mentioned expressly to him, 'sought oblivion.' It was found, with a dreadful headache in it, but it

didn't last; for, in the shaming light of next day's noon, I raised my heavy head in bed, looking back to the

birthdays behind me, and tracking the circle by which I had got round, after all, to the bitter powder and the

This reactionary powder (taken so largely by the human race I am inclined to regard it as the Universal

Medicine once sought for in Laboratories) is capable of being made up in another form for birthday use.

Anybody's longlost brother will do ill to turn up on a birthday. If I had a longlost brother I should know

beforehand that he would prove a tremendous fraternal failure if he appointed to rush into my arms on my

birthday. The first Magic Lantern I ever saw, was secretly and elaborately planned to be the great effect of a

very juvenile birthday; but it wouldn't act, and its images were dim. My experience of adult birthday Magic

Lanterns may possibly have been unfortunate, but has certainly been similar. I have an illustrative birthday in

my eye: a birthday of my friend Flipfield, whose birthdays had long been remarkable as social successes.

There had been nothing set or formal about them; Flipfield having been accustomed merely to say, two or

three days before, 'Don't forget to come and dine, old boy, according to custom;' I don't know what he said

to the ladies he invited, but I may safely assume it NOT to have been 'old girl.' Those were delightful

gatherings, and were enjoyed by all participators. In an evil hour, a longlost brother of Flipfield's came to

light in foreign parts. Where he had been hidden, or what he had been doing, I don't know, for Flipfield

vaguely informed me that he had turned up 'on the banks of the Ganges' speaking of him as if he had been

washed ashore. The Longlost was coming home, and Flipfield made an unfortunate calculation, based on

the wellknown regularity of the P. and O. Steamers, that matters might be so contrived as that the Longlost

should appear in the nick of time on his (Flipfield's) birthday. Delicacy commanded that I should repress the

gloomy anticipations with which my soul became fraught when I heard of this plan. The fatal day arrived,

and we assembled in force. Mrs. Flipfield senior formed an interesting feature in the group, with a

blueveined miniature of the late Mr. Flipfield round her neck, in an oval, resembling a tart from the

pastrycook's: his hair powdered, and the bright buttons on his coat, evidently very like. She was accompanied

by Miss Flipfield, the eldest of her numerous family, who held her pockethandkerchief to her bosom in a

majestic manner, and spoke to all of us (none of us had ever seen her before), in pious and condoning tones,

of all the quarrels that had taken place in the family, from her infancy which must have been a long time

ago down to that hour. The Longlost did not appear. Dinner, half an hour later than usual, was announced,

and still no Longlost. We sat down to table. The knife and fork of the Longlost made a vacuum in Nature,

and when the champagne came round for the first time, Flipfield gave him up for the day, and had them

removed. It was then that the Longlost gained the height of his popularity with the company; for my own

part, I felt convinced that I loved him dearly. Flipfield's dinners are perfect, and he is the easiest and best of

entertainers. Dinner went on brilliantly, and the more the Long lost didn't come, the more comfortable we

grew, and the more highly we thought of him. Flipfield's own man (who has a regard for me) was in the act of

struggling with an ignorant stipendiary, to wrest from him the wooden leg of a Guineafowl which he was

pressing on my acceptance, and to substitute a slice of the breast, when a ringing at the doorbell suspended

the strife. I looked round me, and perceived the sudden pallor which I knew my own visage revealed,

reflected in the faces of the company. Flipfield hurriedly excused himself, went out, was absent for about a

I beg to say distinctly that if the stranger had brought Mont Blanc with him, or had come attended by a

retinue of eternal snows, he could not have chilled the circle to the marrow in a more efficient manner.

Embodied Failure sat enthroned upon the Longlost's brow, and pervaded him to his Longlost boots. In vain

Mrs. Flipfield senior, opening her arms, exclaimed, 'My Tom!' and pressed his nose against the counterfeit

presentment of his other parent. In vain Miss Flipfield, in the first transports of this reunion, showed him a

dint upon her maidenly cheek, and asked him if he remembered when he did that with the bellows? We, the

bystanders, were overcome, but overcome by the palpable, undisguisable, utter, and total breakdown of the

Longlost. Nothing he could have done would have set him right with us but his instant return to the Ganges.

In the very same moments it became established that the feeling was reciprocal, and that the Longlost

detested us. When a friend of the family (not myself, upon my honour), wishing to set things going again,

asked him, while he partook of soup asked him with an amiability of intention beyond all praise, but with a

weakness of execution open to defeat what kind of river he considered the Ganges, the Longlost, scowling

at the friend of the family over his spoon, as one of an abhorrent race, replied, 'Why, a river of water, I

suppose,' and spooned his soup into himself with a malignancy of hand and eye that blighted the amiable

questioner. Not an opinion could be elicited from the Longlost, in unison with the sentiments of any

individual present. He contradicted Flipfield dead, before he had eaten his salmon. He had no idea or

affected to have no idea that it was his brother's birthday, and on the communication of that interesting fact

to him, merely wanted to make him out four years older than he was. He was an antipathetical being, with a

peculiar power and gift of treading on everybody's tenderest place. They talk in America of a man's

'Platform.' I should describe the Platform of the Longlost as a Platform composed of other people's corns, on

which he had stumped his way, with all his might and main, to his present position. It is needless to add that

Flipfield's great birthday went by the board, and that he was a wreck when I pretended at parting to wish him

There is another class of birthdays at which I have so frequently assisted, that I may assume such birthdays to

be pretty well known to the human race. My friend Mayday's birthday is an example. The guests have no

knowledge of one another except on that one day in the year, and are annually terrified for a week by the

prospect of meeting one another again. There is a fiction among us that we have uncommon reasons for being

particularly lively and spirited on the occasion, whereas deep despondency is no phrase for the expression of

our feelings. But the wonderful feature of the case is, that we are in tacit accordance to avoid the subject to

keep it as far off as possible, as long as possible and to talk about anything else, rather than the joyful

event. I may even go so far as to assert that there is a dumb compact among us that we will pretend that it is

NOT Mayday's birthday. A mysterious and gloomy Being, who is said to have gone to school with Mayday,

and who is so lank and lean that he seriously impugns the Dietary of the establishment at which they were

jointly educated, always leads us, as I may say, to the block, by laying his grisly hand on a decanter and

begging us to fill our glasses. The devices and pretences that I have seen put in practice to defer the fatal

moment, and to interpose between this man and his purpose, are innumerable. I have known desperate guests,

when they saw the grisly hand approaching the decanter, wildly to begin, without any antecedent whatsoever,

'That reminds me ' and to plunge into long stories. When at last the hand and the decanter come together, a

shudder, a palpable perceptible shudder, goes round the table. We receive the reminder that it is Mayday's

birthday, as if it were the anniversary of some profound disgrace he had undergone, and we sought to comfort

him. And when we have drunk Mayday's health, and wished him many happy returns, we are seized for some

moments with a ghastly blitheness, an unnatural levity, as if we were in the first flushed reaction of having

Birthdays of this species have a public as well as a private phase. My 'boyhood's home,' Dullborough,

presents a case in point. An Immortal Somebody was wanted in Dullborough, to dimple for a day the stagnant

face of the waters; he was rather wanted by Dullborough generally, and much wanted by the principal hotel

keeper. The County history was looked up for a locally Immortal Somebody, but the registered Dullborough

worthies were all Nobodies. In this state of things, it is hardly necessary to record that Dullborough did what

every man does when he wants to write a book or deliver a lecture, and is provided with all the materials

No sooner was it resolved to celebrate Shakespeare's birthday in Dullborough, than the popularity of the

immortal bard became surprising. You might have supposed the first edition of his works to have been

published last week, and enthusiastic Dullborough to have got half through them. (I doubt, by the way,

whether it had ever done half that, but that is a private opinion.) A young gentleman with a sonnet, the

retention of which for two years had enfeebled his mind and undermined his knees, got the sonnet into the

Dullborough Warden, and gained flesh. Portraits of Shakespeare broke out in the bookshop windows, and our

principal artist painted a large original portrait in oils for the decoration of the dining room. It was not in the

least like any of the other Portraits, and was exceedingly admired, the head being much swollen. At the

Institution, the Debating Society discussed the new question, Was there sufficient ground for supposing that

the Immortal Shakespeare ever stole deer? This was indignantly decided by an overwhelming majority in the

negative; indeed, there was but one vote on the Poaching side, and that was the vote of the orator who had

undertaken to advocate it, and who became quite an obnoxious character particularly to the Dullborough

'roughs,' who were about as well informed on the matter as most other people. Distinguished speakers were

invited down, and very nearly came (but not quite). Subscriptions were opened, and committees sat, and it

would have been far from a popular measure in the height of the excitement, to have told Dullborough that it

wasn't Stratfordupon Avon. Yet, after all these preparations, when the great festivity took place, and the

portrait, elevated aloft, surveyed the company as if it were in danger of springing a mine of intellect and

blowing itself up, it did undoubtedly happen, according to the inscrutable mysteries of things, that nobody

could be induced, not to say to touch upon Shakespeare, but to come within a mile of him, until the crack

speaker of Dullborough rose to propose the immortal memory. Which he did with the perplexing and

astonishing result that before he had repeated the great name halfadozen times, or had been upon his legs

'Within so many yards of this Coventgarden lodging of mine, as within so many yards of Westminster

Abbey, Saint Paul's Cathedral, the Houses of Parliament, the Prisons, the Courts of Justice, all the Institutions

that govern the land, I can find MUST find, whether I will or no in the open streets, shameful instances of

neglect of children, intolerable toleration of the engenderment of paupers, idlers, thieves, races of wretched

and destructive cripples both in body and mind, a misery to themselves, a misery to the community, a

disgrace to civilisation, and an outrage on Christianity. I know it to be a fact as easy of demonstration as

any sum in any of the elementary rules of arithmetic, that if the State would begin its work and duty at the

beginning, and would with the strong hand take those children out of the streets, while they are yet children,

and wisely train them, it would make them a part of England's glory, not its shame of England's strength,

not its weakness would raise good soldiers and sailors, and good citizens, and many great men, out of the

seeds of its criminal population. Yet I go on bearing with the enormity as if it were nothing, and I go on

reading the Parliamentary Debates as if they were something, and I concern myself far more about one

railway bridge across a public thoroughfare, than about a dozen generations of scrofula, ignorance,

wickedness, prostitution, poverty, and felony. I can slip out at my door, in the small hours after any midnight,

and, in one circuit of the purlieus of Coventgarden Market, can behold a state of infancy and youth, as vile

as if a Bourbon sat upon the English throne; a great police force looking on with authority to do no more than

worry and hunt the dreadful vermin into corners, and there leave them. Within the length of a few streets I

can find a workhouse, mismanaged with that dull shortsighted obstinacy that its greatest opportunities as to

the children it receives are lost, and yet not a farthing saved to any one. But the wheel goes round, and round,

and round; and because it goes round so I am told by the politest authorities it goes well.'

Thus I reflected, one day in the Whitsun week last past, as I floated down the Thames among the bridges,

looking not inappropriately at the drags that were hanging up at certain dirty stairs to hook the drowned

out, and at the numerous conveniences provided to facilitate their tumbling in. My object in that

'When I was at school, one of seventy boys, I wonder by what secret understanding our attention began to

wander when we had pored over our books for some hours. I wonder by what ingenuity we brought on that

confused state of mind when sense became nonsense, when figures wouldn't work, when dead languages

wouldn't construe, when live languages wouldn't be spoken, when memory wouldn't come, when dulness and

vacancy wouldn't go. I cannot remember that we ever conspired to be sleepy after dinner, or that we ever

particularly wanted to be stupid, and to have flushed faces and hot beating heads, or to find blank

hopelessness and obscurity this afternoon in what would become perfectly clear and bright in the freshness of

tomorrow morning. We suffered for these things, and they made us miserable enough. Neither do I

remember that we ever bound ourselves by any secret oath or other solemn obligation, to find the seats

getting too hard to be sat upon after a certain time; or to have intolerable twitches in our legs, rendering us

aggressive and malicious with those members; or to be troubled with a similar uneasiness in our elbows,

attended with fistic consequences to our neighbours; or to carry two pounds of lead in the chest, four pounds

in the head, and several active bluebottles in each ear. Yet, for certain, we suffered under those distresses,

and were always charged at for labouring under them, as if we had brought them on, of our own deliberate act

and deed. As to the mental portion of them being my own fault in my own case I should like to ask any

welltrained and experienced teacher, not to say psychologist. And as to the physical portion I should like

It happened that I had a small bundle of papers with me, on what is called 'The HalfTime System' in

schools. Referring to one of those papers I found that the indefatigable MR. CHADWICK had been

beforehand with me, and had already asked Professor Owen: who had handsomely replied that I was not to

blame, but that, being troubled with a skeleton, and having been constituted according to certain natural laws,

I and my skeleton were unfortunately bound by those laws even in school and had comported ourselves

accordingly. Much comforted by the good Professor's being on my side, I read on to discover whether the

indefatigable Mr. Chadwick had taken up the mental part of my afflictions. I found that he had, and that he

had gained on my behalf, SIR BENJAMIN BRODIE, SIR DAVID WILKIE, SIR WALTER SCOTT, and the

common sense of mankind. For which I beg Mr. Chadwick, if this should meet his eye, to accept my warm

Up to that time I had retained a misgiving that the seventy unfortunates of whom I was one, must have been,

without knowing it, leagued together by the spirit of evil in a sort of perpetual Guy Fawkes Plot, to grope

about in vaults with dark lanterns after a certain period of continuous study. But now the misgiving vanished,

and I floated on with a quieted mind to see the HalfTime System in action. For that was the purpose of my

journey, both by steamboat on the Thames, and by very dirty railway on the shore. To which last institution, I

beg to recommend the legal use of coke as enginefuel, rather than the illegal use of coal; the

recommendation is quite disinterested, for I was most liberally supplied with small coal on the journey, for

which no charge was made. I had not only my eyes, nose, and ears filled, but my hat, and all my pockets, and

The V.D.S.C.R.C. (or Very Dirty and Small Coal Railway Company) delivered me close to my destination,

and I soon found the Half Time System established in spacious premises, and freely placed at my

What would I see first of the HalfTime System? I chose Military Drill. 'Attention!' Instantly a hundred

boys stood forth in the paved yard as one boy; bright, quick, eager, steady, watchful for the look of command,

instant and ready for the word. Not only was there complete precision complete accord to the eye and to the

ear but an alertness in the doing of the thing which deprived it, curiously, of its monotonous or mechanical

character. There was perfect uniformity, and yet an individual spirit and emulation. No spectator could doubt

that the boys liked it. With non commissioned officers varying from a yard to a yard and a half high, the

result could not possibly have been attained otherwise. They marched, and countermarched, and formed in

line and square, and company, and single file and double file, and performed a variety of evolutions; all most

admirably. In respect of an air of enjoyable understanding of what they were about, which seems to be

forbidden to English soldiers, the boys might have been small French troops. When they were dismissed and

the broadsword exercise, limited to a much smaller number, succeeded, the boys who had no part in that new

drill, either looked on attentively, or disported themselves in a gymnasium hard by. The steadiness of the

broadsword boys on their short legs, and the firmness with which they sustained the different positions, was

The broadsword exercise over, suddenly there was great excitement and a rush. Naval Drill!

In the corner of the ground stood a decked mimic ship, with real masts, yards, and sails mainmast seventy

feet high. At the word of command from the Skipper of this ship a mahoganyfaced Old Salt, with the

indispensable quid in his cheek, the true nautical roll, and all wonderfully complete the rigging was covered

with a swarm of boys: one, the first to spring into the shrouds, outstripping all the others, and resting on the

And now we stood out to sea, in a most amazing manner; the Skipper himself, the whole crew, the

Uncommercial, and all hands present, implicitly believing that there was not a moment to lose, that the wind

had that instant chopped round and sprung up fair, and that we were away on a voyage round the world. Get

all sail upon her! With a will, my lads! Lay out upon the mainyard there! Look alive at the weather earring!

Cheery, my boys! Let go the sheet, now! Stand by at the braces, you! With a will, aloft there! Belay,

starboard watch! Fifer! Come aft, fifer, and give 'em a tune! Forthwith, springs up fifer, fife in hand

smallest boy ever seen big lump on temple, having lately fallen down on a pavingstone gives 'em a tune

with all his might and main. Hoo roar, fifer! With a will, my lads! Tip 'em a livelier one, fifer! Fifer tips 'em

a livelier one, and excitement increases. Shake 'em out, my lads! Well done! There you have her! Pretty,

pretty! Every rag upon her she can carry, wind right astarn, and ship cutting through the water fifteen knots

At this favourable moment of her voyage, I gave the alarm 'A man overboard!' (on the gravel), but he was

immediately recovered, none the worse. Presently, I observed the Skipper overboard, but forbore to mention

it, as he seemed in no wise disconcerted by the accident. Indeed, I soon came to regard the Skipper as an

amphibious creature, for he was so perpetually plunging overboard to look up at the hands aloft, that he was

oftener in the bosom of the ocean than on deck. His pride in his crew on those occasions was delightful, and

the conventional unintelligibility of his orders in the ears of uncommercial landlubbers and loblolly boys,

though they were always intelligible to the crew, was hardly less pleasant. But we couldn't expect to go on in

this way for ever; dirty weather came on, and then worse weather, and when we least expected it we got into

tremendous difficulties. Screw loose in the chart perhaps something certainly wrong somewhere but here

we were with breakers ahead, my lads, driving head on, slap on a lee shore! The Skipper broached this terrific

announcement in such great agitation, that the small fifer, not fifeing now, but standing looking on near the

wheel with his fife under his arm, seemed for the moment quite unboyed, though he speedily recovered his

presence of mind. In the trying circumstances that ensued, the Skipper and the crew proved worthy of one

another. The Skipper got dreadfully hoarse, but otherwise was master of the situation. The man at the wheel

did wonders; all hands (except the fifer) were turned up to wear ship; and I observed the fifer, when we were

at our greatest extremity, to refer to some document in his waistcoat pocket, which I conceived to be his

will. I think she struck. I was not myself conscious of any collision, but I saw the Skipper so very often

washed overboard and back again, that I could only impute it to the beating of the ship. I am not enough of a

seaman to describe the manoeuvres by which we were saved, but they made the Skipper very hot (French

polishing his mahogany face) and the crew very nimble, and succeeded to a marvel; for, within a few minutes

of the first alarm, we had wore ship and got her off, and were all atauto which I felt very grateful for: not

that I knew what it was, but that I perceived that we had not been all atauto lately. Land now appeared on

our weatherbow, and we shaped our course for it, having the wind abeam, and frequently changing the man

at the helm, in order that every man might have his spell. We worked into harbour under prosperous

circumstances, and furled our sails, and squared our yards, and made all shipshape and handsome, and so

our voyage ended. When I complimented the Skipper at parting on his exertions and those of his gallant crew,

he informed me that the latter were provided for the worst, all hands being taught to swim and dive; and he

added that the able seaman at the maintopmast truck especially, could dive as deep as he could go high.

The next adventure that befell me in my visit to the ShortTimers, was the sudden apparition of a military

band. I had been inspecting the hammocks of the crew of the good ship, when I saw with astonishment that

several musical instruments, brazen and of great size, appeared to have suddenly developed two legs each,

and to be trotting about a yard. And my astonishment was heightened when I observed a large drum, that had

previously been leaning helpless against a wall, taking up a stout position on four legs. Approaching this

drum and looking over it, I found two boys behind it (it was too much for one), and then I found that each of

the brazen instruments had brought out a boy, and was going to discourse sweet sounds. The boys not

omitting the fifer, now playing a new instrument were dressed in neat uniform, and stood up in a circle at

their musicstands, like any other Military Band. They played a march or two, and then we had Cheer boys,

Cheer, and then we had Yankee Doodle, and we finished, as in loyal duty bound, with God save the Queen.

The band's proficiency was perfectly wonderful, and it was not at all wonderful that the whole body corporate

What happened next among the ShortTimers? As if the band had blown me into a great classroom out of

their brazen tubes, IN a great classroom I found myself now, with the whole choral force of ShortTimers

singing the praises of a summer's day to the harmonium, and my small but highly respected friend the fifer

blazing away vocally, as if he had been saving up his wind for the last twelvemonth; also the whole crew of

the good ship Nameless swarming up and down the scale as if they had never swarmed up and down the

rigging. This done, we threw our whole power into God bless the Prince of Wales, and blessed his Royal

Highness to such an extent that, for my own Uncommercial part, I gasped again when it was over. The

moment this was done, we formed, with surpassing freshness, into hollow squares, and fell to work at oral

Let a veil be drawn over the selfcommittals into which the Uncommercial Traveller would have been

betrayed but for a discreet reticence, coupled with an air of absolute wisdom on the part of that artful

personage. Take the square of five, multiply it by fifteen, divide it by three, deduct eight from it, add four

dozen to it, give me the result in pence, and tell me how many eggs I could get for it at three farthings apiece.

The problem is hardly stated, when a dozen small boys pour out answers. Some wide, some very nearly right,

some worked as far as they go with such accuracy, as at once to show what link of the chain has been

dropped in the hurry. For the moment, none are quite right; but behold a labouring spirit beating the buttons

on its corporeal waistcoat, in a process of internal calculation, and knitting an accidental bump on its

corporeal forehead in a concentration of mental arithmetic! It is my honourable friend (if he will allow me to

call him so) the fifer. With right arm eagerly extended in token of being inspired with an answer, and with

right leg foremost, the fifer solves the mystery: then recalls both arm and leg, and with bump in ambush

awaits the next poser. Take the square of three, multiply it by seven, divide it by four, add fifty to it, take

thirteen from it, multiply it by two, double it, give me the result in pence, and say how many halfpence. Wise

as the serpent is the four feet of performer on the nearest approach to that instrument, whose right arm

instantly appears, and quenches this arithmetical fire. Tell me something about Great Britain, tell me

something about its principal productions, tell me something about its ports, tell me something about its seas

and rivers, tell me something about coal, iron, cotton, timber, tin, and turpentine. The hollow square bristles

with extended right arms; but ever faithful to fact is the fifer, ever wise as the serpent is the performer on that

instrument, ever prominently buoyant and brilliant are all members of the band. I observe the player of the

cymbals to dash at a sounding answer now and then rather than not cut in at all; but I take that to be in the

way of his instrument. All these questions, and many such, are put on the spur of the moment, and by one

who has never examined these boys. The Uncommercial, invited to add another, falteringly demands how

many birthdays a man born on the twentyninth of February will have had on completing his fiftieth year? A

general perception of trap and pitfall instantly arises, and the fifer is seen to retire behind the corduroys of his

next neighbours, as perceiving special necessity for collecting himself and communing with his mind.

Meanwhile, the wisdom of the serpent suggests that the man will have had only one birthday in all that time,

for how can any man have more than one, seeing that he is born once and dies once? The blushing

Uncommercial stands corrected, and amends the formula. Pondering ensues, two or three wrong answers are

offered, and Cymbals strikes up 'Six!' but doesn't know why. Then modestly emerging from his Academic

Grove of corduroys appears the fifer, right arm extended, right leg foremost, bump irradiated. 'Twelve, and

The feminine ShortTimers passed a similar examination, and very creditably too. Would have done better

perhaps, with a little more geniality on the part of their pupilteacher; for a cold eye, my young friend, and a

hard, abrupt manner, are not by any means the powerful engines that your innocence supposes them to be.

Both girls and boys wrote excellently, from copy and dictation; both could cook; both could mend their own

clothes; both could clean up everything about them in an orderly and skilful way, the girls having womanly

household knowledge superadded. Order and method began in the songs of the Infant School which I visited

likewise, and they were even in their dwarf degree to be found in the Nursery, where the Uncommercial

walkingstick was carried off with acclamations, and where 'the Doctor' a medical gentleman of two, who

took his degree on the night when he was found at an apothecary's door did the honours of the

These have long been excellent schools; long before the days of the ShortTime. I first saw them, twelve or

fifteen years ago. But since the introduction of the ShortTime system it has been proved here that eighteen

hours a week of booklearning are more profitable than thirtysix, and that the pupils are far quicker and

brighter than of yore. The good influences of music on the whole body of children have likewise been

surprisingly proved. Obviously another of the immense advantages of the ShortTime system to the cause of

good education is the great diminution of its cost, and of the period of time over which it extends. The last is

a most important consideration, as poor parents are always impatient to profit by their children's labour.

It will be objected: Firstly, that this is all very well, but special local advantages and special selection of

children must be necessary to such success. Secondly, that this is all very well, but must be very expensive.

Thirdly, that this is all very well, but we have no proof of the results, sir, no proof.

On the first head of local advantages and special selection. Would Limehouse Hole be picked out for the site

of a Children's Paradise? Or would the legitimate and illegitimate pauper children of the longshore

population of such a riverside district, be regarded as unusually favourable specimens to work with? Yet

these schools are at Limehouse, and are the Pauper Schools of the Stepney Pauper Union.

On the second head of expense. Would sixpence a week be considered a very large cost for the education of

each pupil, including all salaries of teachers and rations of teachers? But supposing the cost were not

On the third head of no proof, sir, no proof. Is there any proof in the facts that Pupil Teachers more in

number, and more highly qualified, have been produced here under the ShortTime system than under the

LongTime system? That the ShortTimers, in a writing competition, beat the LongTimers of a firstclass

National School? That the sailorboys are in such demand for merchant ships, that whereas, before they were

trained, 10L. premium used to be given with each boy too often to some greedy brute of a drunken skipper,

who disappeared before the term of apprenticeship was out, if the illused boy didn't captains of the best

character now take these boys more than willingly, with no premium at all? That they are also much esteemed

in the Royal Navy, which they prefer, 'because everything is so neat and clean and orderly'? Or, is there any

proof in Naval captains writing 'Your little fellows are all that I can desire'? Or, is there any proof in such

testimony as this: 'The owner of a vessel called at the school, and said that as his ship was going down

Channel on her last voyage, with one of the boys from the school on board, the pilot said, "It would be as

well if the royal were lowered; I wish it were down." Without waiting for any orders, and unobserved by the

pilot, the lad, whom they had taken on board from the school, instantly mounted the mast and lowered the

royal, and at the next glance of the pilot to the masthead, he perceived that the sail had been let down. He

exclaimed, "Who's done that job?" The owner, who was on board, said, "That was the little fellow whom I

put on board two days ago." The pilot immediately said, "Why, where could he have been brought up?" The

boy had never seen the sea or been on a real ship before'? Or, is there any proof in these boys being in greater

demand for Regimental Bands than the Union can meet? Or, in ninetyeight of them having gone into

Regimental Bands in three years? Or, in twelve of them being in the band of one regiment? Or, in the colonel

of that regiment writing, 'We want six more boys; they are excellent lads'? Or, in one of the boys having risen

to be bandcorporal in the same regiment? Or, in employers of all kinds chorusing, 'Give us drilled boys, for

they are prompt, obedient, and punctual'? Other proofs I have myself beheld with these Uncommercial eyes,

though I do not regard myself as having a right to relate in what social positions they have seen respected

Into what admirable soldiers others of these boys have the capabilities for being turned, I need not point out.

Many of them are always ambitious of military service; and once upon a time when an old boy came back to

see the old place, a cavalry soldier all complete, WITH HIS SPURS ON, such a yearning broke out to get into

cavalry regiments and wear those sublime appendages, that it was one of the greatest excitements ever known

in the school. The girls make excellent domestic servants, and at certain periods come back, a score or two at

a time, to see the old building, and to take tea with the old teachers, and to hear the old band, and to see the

old ship with her masts towering up above the neighbouring roofs and chimneys. As to the physical health of

these schools, it is so exceptionally remarkable (simply because the sanitary regulations are as good as the

other educational arrangements), that when Mr. TUFNELL, the Inspector, first stated it in a report, he was

supposed, in spite of his high character, to have been betrayed into some extraordinary mistake or

exaggeration. In the moral health of these schools where corporal punishment is unknown Truthfulness

stands high. When the ship was first erected, the boys were forbidden to go aloft, until the nets, which are

now always there, were stretched as a precaution against accidents. Certain boys, in their eagerness,

disobeyed the injunction, got out of window in the early daylight, and climbed to the masthead. One boy

unfortunately fell, and was killed. There was no clue to the others; but all the boys were assembled, and the

chairman of the Board addressed them. 'I promise nothing; you see what a dreadful thing has happened; you

know what a grave offence it is that has led to such a consequence; I cannot say what will be done with the

offenders; but, boys, you have been trained here, above all things, to respect the truth. I want the truth. Who

are the delinquents?' Instantly, the whole number of boys concerned, separated from the rest, and stood out.

Now, the head and heart of that gentleman (it is needless to say, a good head and a good heart) have been

deeply interested in these schools for many years, and are so still; and the establishment is very fortunate in a

most admirable master, and moreover the schools of the Stepney Union cannot have got to be what they are,

without the Stepney Board of Guardians having been earnest and humane men strongly imbued with a sense

of their responsibility. But what one set of men can do in this wise, another set of men can do; and this is a

noble example to all other Bodies and Unions, and a noble example to the State. Followed, and enlarged upon

by its enforcement on bad parents, it would clear London streets of the most terrible objects they smite the

sight with myriads of little children who awfully reverse Our Saviour's words, and are not of the Kingdom

Clear the public streets of such shame, and the public conscience of such reproach? Ah! Almost prophetic,

Behold me on my way to an Emigrant Ship, on a hot morning early in June. My road lies through that part of

London generally known to the initiated as 'Down by the Docks.' Down by the Docks, is home to a good

many people to too many, if I may judge from the overflow of local population in the streets but my nose

insinuates that the number to whom it is Sweet Home might be easily counted. Down by the Docks, is a

region I would choose as my point of embarkation aboard ship if I were an emigrant. It would present my

intention to me in such a sensible light; it would show me so many things to be run away from.

Down by the Docks, they eat the largest oysters and scatter the roughest oystershells, known to the

descendants of Saint George and the Dragon. Down by the Docks, they consume the slimiest of shellfish,

which seem to have been scraped off the copper bottoms of ships. Down by the Docks, the vegetables at

greengrocers' doors acquire a saline and a scaly look, as if they had been crossed with fish and seaweed.

Down by the Docks, they 'board seamen' at the eatinghouses, the publichouses, the slopshops, the

coffeeshops, the tallyshops, all kinds of shops mentionable and unmentionable board them, as it were, in

the piratical sense, making them bleed terribly, and giving no quarter. Down by the Docks, the seamen roam

in midstreet and midday, their pockets inside out, and their heads no better. Down by the Docks, the

daughters of waveruling Britannia also rove, clad in silken attire, with uncovered tresses streaming in the

breeze, bandanna kerchiefs floating from their shoulders, and crinoline not wanting. Down by the Docks, you

may hear the Incomparable Joe Jackson sing the Standard of England, with a hornpipe, any night; or any day

may see at the waxwork, for a penny and no waiting, him as killed the policeman at Acton and suffered for it.

Down by the Docks, you may buy polonies, saveloys, and sausage preparations various, if you are not

particular what they are made of besides seasoning. Down by the Docks, the children of Israel creep into any

gloomy cribs and entries they can hire, and hang slops there pewter watches, sou'wester hats, waterproof

overalls 'firtht rate articleth, Thjack.' Down by the Docks, such dealers exhibiting on a frame a complete

nautical suit without the refinement of a waxen visage in the hat, present the imaginary wearer as drooping at

the yardarm, with his seafaring and earthfaring troubles over. Down by the Docks, the placards in the shops

apostrophise the customer, knowing him familiarly beforehand, as, 'Look here, Jack!' 'Here's your sort, my

lad!' 'Try our seagoing mixed, at two and nine!' 'The right kit for the British tar!' 'Ship ahoy!' 'Splice the

main brace, brother!' 'Come, cheer up, my lads. We've the best liquors here, And you'll find something new

In our wonderful Beer!' Down by the Docks, the pawnbroker lends money on UnionJack pocket

handkerchiefs, on watches with little ships pitching fore and aft on the dial, on telescopes, nautical

instruments in cases, and suchlike. Down by the Docks, the apothecary sets up in business on the

wretchedest scale chiefly on lint and plaster for the strapping of wounds and with no bright bottles, and

with no little drawers. Down by the Docks, the shabby undertaker's shop will bury you for next to nothing,

after the Malay or Chinaman has stabbed you for nothing at all: so you can hardly hope to make a cheaper

end. Down by the Docks, anybody drunk will quarrel with anybody drunk or sober, and everybody else will

have a hand in it, and on the shortest notice you may revolve in a whirlpool of red shirts, shaggy beards, wild

heads of hair, bare tattooed arms, Britannia's daughters, malice, mud, maundering, and madness. Down by the

Docks, scraping fiddles go in the publichouses all day long, and, shrill above their din and all the din, rises

the screeching of innumerable parrots brought from foreign parts, who appear to be very much astonished by

what they find on these native shores of ours. Possibly the parrots don't know, possibly they do, that Down by

the Docks is the road to the Pacific Ocean, with its lovely islands, where the savage girls plait flowers, and

the savage boys carve cocoanut shells, and the grim blind idols muse in their shady groves to exactly the

same purpose as the priests and chiefs. And possibly the parrots don't know, possibly they do, that the noble

savage is a wearisome impostor wherever he is, and has five hundred thousand volumes of indifferent rhyme,

Shadwell church! Pleasant whispers of there being a fresher air down the river than down by the Docks, go

pursuing one another, playfully, in and out of the openings in its spire. Gigantic in the basin just beyond the

church, looms my Emigrant Ship: her name, the Amazon. Her figurehead is not disfigured as those

beauteous founders of the race of strongminded women are fabled to have been, for the convenience of

A flattering carver who made it his care To carve busts as they ought to be not as they were.

My Emigrant Ship lies broadsideon to the wharf. Two great gangways made of spars and planks connect her

with the wharf; and up and down these gangways, perpetually crowding to and fro and in and out, like ants,

are the Emigrants who are going to sail in my Emigrant Ship. Some with cabbages, some with loaves of

bread, some with cheese and butter, some with milk and beer, some with boxes, beds, and bundles, some with

babies nearly all with children nearly all with brannew tin cans for their daily allowance of water,

uncomfortably suggestive of a tin flavour in the drink. To and fro, up and down, aboard and ashore,

swarming here and there and everywhere, my Emigrants. And still as the DockGate swings upon its hinges,

cabs appear, and carts appear, and vans appear, bringing more of my Emigrants, with more cabbages, more

loaves, more cheese and butter, more milk and beer, more boxes, beds, and bundles, more tin cans, and on

I go aboard my Emigrant Ship. I go first to the great cabin, and find it in the usual condition of a Cabin at that

pass. Perspiring landsmen, with loose papers, and with pens and inkstands, pervade it; and the general

appearance of things is as if the late Mr. Amazon's funeral had just come home from the cemetery, and the

disconsolate Mrs. Amazon's trustees found the affairs in great disorder, and were looking high and low for

the will. I go out on the poopdeck, for air, and surveying the emigrants on the deck below (indeed they are

crowded all about me, up there too), find more pens and inkstands in action, and more papers, and

interminable complication respecting accounts with individuals for tin cans and what not. But nobody is in an

illtemper, nobody is the worse for drink, nobody swears an oath or uses a coarse word, nobody appears

depressed, nobody is weeping, and down upon the deck in every corner where it is possible to find a few

square feet to kneel, crouch, or lie in, people, in every unsuitable attitude for writing, are writing letters.

Now, I have seen emigrant ships before this day in June. And these people are so strikingly different from all

other people in like circumstances whom I have ever seen, that I wonder aloud, 'What WOULD a stranger

The vigilant, bright face of the weatherbrowned captain of the Amazon is at my shoulder, and he says,

'What, indeed! The most of these came aboard yesterday evening. They came from various parts of England

in small parties that had never seen one another before. Yet they had not been a couple of hours on board,

when they established their own police, made their own regulations, and set their own watches at all the

hatchways. Before nine o'clock, the ship was as orderly and as quiet as a manofwar.'

I looked about me again, and saw the letterwriting going on with the most curious composure. Perfectly

abstracted in the midst of the crowd; while great casks were swinging aloft, and being lowered into the hold;

while hot agents were hurrying up and down, adjusting the interminable accounts; while two hundred

strangers were searching everywhere for two hundred other strangers, and were asking questions about them

of two hundred more; while the children played up and down all the steps, and in and out among all the

people's legs, and were beheld, to the general dismay, toppling over all the dangerous places; the

letterwriters wrote on calmly. On the starboard side of the ship, a grizzled man dictated a long letter to

another grizzled man in an immense fur cap: which letter was of so profound a quality, that it became

necessary for the amanuensis at intervals to take off his fur cap in both his hands, for the ventilation of his

brain, and stare at him who dictated, as a man of many mysteries who was worth looking at. On the larboard

side, a woman had covered a belayingpin with a white cloth to make a neat desk of it, and was sitting on a

little box, writing with the deliberation of a bookkeeper. Down, upon her breast on the planks of the deck at

this woman's feet, with her head diving in under a beam of the bulwarks on that side, as an eligible place of

refuge for her sheet of paper, a neat and pretty girl wrote for a good hour (she fainted at last), only rising to

the surface occasionally for a dip of ink. Alongside the boat, close to me on the poopdeck, another girl, a

fresh, wellgrown country girl, was writing another letter on the bare deck. Later in the day, when this

selfsame boat was filled with a choir who sang glees and catches for a long time, one of the singers, a girl,

sang her part mechanically all the while, and wrote a letter in the bottom of the boat while doing so.

'A stranger would be puzzled to guess the right name for these people, Mr. Uncommercial,' says the captain.

'How could I! I should have said they were in their degree, the pick and flower of England.'

I went betweendecks, where the families with children swarmed in the dark, where unavoidable confusion

had been caused by the last arrivals, and where the confusion was increased by the little preparations for

dinner that were going on in each group. A few women here and there, had got lost, and were laughing at it,

and asking their way to their own people, or out on deck again. A few of the poor children were crying; but

otherwise the universal cheerfulness was amazing. 'We shall shake down by tomorrow.' 'We shall come all

right in a day or so.' 'We shall have more light at sea.' Such phrases I heard everywhere, as I groped my way

among chests and barrels and beams and unstowed cargo and ringbolts and Emigrants, down to the

Surely, an extraordinary people in their power of selfabstraction! All the former letterwriters were still

writing calmly, and many more letterwriters had broken out in my absence. A boy with a bag of books in his

hand and a slate under his arm, emerged from below, concentrated himself in my neighbourhood (espying a

convenient skylight for his purpose), and went to work at a sum as if he were stone deaf. A father and mother

and several young children, on the main deck below me, had formed a family circle close to the foot of the

crowded restless gangway, where the children made a nest for themselves in a coil of rope, and the father and

mother, she suckling the youngest, discussed family affairs as peaceably as if they were in perfect retirement.

I think the most noticeable characteristic in the eight hundred as a mass, was their exemption from hurry.

Eight hundred what? 'Geese, villain?' EIGHT HUNDRED MORMONS. I, Uncommercial Traveller for the

firm of Human Interest Brothers, had come aboard this Emigrant Ship to see what Eight hundred Latterday

Saints were like, and I found them (to the rout and overthrow of all my expectations) like what I now describe

The Mormon Agent who had been active in getting them together, and in making the contract with my friends

the owners of the ship to take them as far as New York on their way to the Great Salt Lake, was pointed out

to me. A compactlymade handsome man in black, rather short, with rich brown hair and beard, and clear

bright eyes. From his speech, I should set him down as American. Probably, a man who had 'knocked about

the world' pretty much. A man with a frank open manner, and unshrinking look; withal a man of great

quickness. I believe he was wholly ignorant of my Uncommercial individuality, and consequently of my

UNCOMMERCIAL. These are a very fine set of people you have brought together here.

UNCOMMERCIAL (looking about). Indeed, I think it would be difficult to find Eight hundred people

together anywhere else, and find so much beauty and so much strength and capacity for work among them.

MORMON AGENT (not looking about, but looking steadily at Uncommercial). I think so. We sent out

UNCOMMERCIAL. It is surprising to me that these people are all so cheery, and make so little of the

MORMON AGENT. Well, you see; many of 'em have friends out at Utah, and many of 'em look forward to

MORMON AGENT. This way 'tis. This ship lands 'em in New York City. Then they go on by rail right away

beyond St. Louis, to that part of the Banks of the Missouri where they strike the Plains. There, waggons from

the settlement meet 'em to bear 'em company on their journey 'crosstwelve hundred miles about. Industrious

people who come out to the settlement soon get waggons of their own, and so the friends of some of these

will come down in their own waggons to meet 'em. They look forward to that, greatly.

MORMON AGENT. Mostly you would find they have arms of some kind or another already with them.

Such as had not arms we should arm across the Plains, for the general protection and defence.

MORMON AGENT. Well, since the war broke out, we've taken to growing cotton, and they'll likely bring

down cotton to be exchanged for machinery. We want machinery. Also we have taken to growing indigo,

which is a fine commodity for profit. It has been found that the climate on the further side of the Great Salt

UNCOMMERCIAL. I am told that these people now on board are principally from the South of England?

MORMON AGENT. No, not Highlanders. They ain't interested enough in universal brotherhood and peace

UNCOMMERCIAL (who has been burning to get at the Prophet Joe Smith, and seems to discover an

Similarly on this same head, the Uncommercial underwent discomfiture from a Wiltshire labourer: a simple,

freshcoloured farmlabourer, of eightandthirty, who at one time stood beside him looking on at new

UNCOMMERCIAL. Would you mind my asking you what part of the country you come from?

WILTSHIRE. Not a bit. Theer! (exultingly) I've worked all my life o' Salisbury Plain, right under the shadder

WILTSHIRE. Two children, boy and gal. I am a widderer, I am, and I'm going out alonger my boy and gal.

That's my gal, and she's a fine gal o' sixteen (pointing out the girl who is writing by the boat). I'll go and fetch

my boy. I'd like to show you my boy. (Here Wiltshire disappears, and presently comes back with a big, shy

boy of twelve, in a superabundance of boots, who is not at all glad to be presented.) He is a fine boy too, and

UNCOMMERCIAL. It must cost you a great deal of money to go so far, three strong.

WILTSHIRE. A power of money. Theer! Eight shillen a week, eight shillen a week, eight shillen a week, put

WILTSHIRE (recognising in this a kindred spirit). See theer now! I wonder how I done it! But what with a

bit o' subscription heer, and what with a bit o' help theer, it were done at last, though I don't hardly know

how. Then it were unfort'net for us, you see, as we got kep' in Bristol so long nigh a fortnight, it were on

accounts of a mistake wi' Brother Halliday. Swaller'd up money, it did, when we might have come straight

UNCOMMERCIAL (delicately approaching Joe Smith). You are of the Mormon religion, of course?

WILTSHIRE (confidently). O yes, I'm a Mormon. (Then reflectively.) I'm a Mormon. (Then, looking round

the ship, feigns to descry a particular friend in an empty spot, and evades the Uncommercial for evermore.)

After a noontide pause for dinner, during which my Emigrants were nearly all betweendecks, and the

Amazon looked deserted, a general muster took place. The muster was for the ceremony of passing the

Government Inspector and the Doctor. Those authorities held their temporary state amidships, by a cask or

two; and, knowing that the whole Eight hundred emigrants must come face to face with them, I took my

station behind the two. They knew nothing whatever of me, I believe, and my testimony to the unpretending

gentleness and good nature with which they discharged their duty, may be of the greater worth. There was not

The emigrants were now all on deck. They were densely crowded aft, and swarmed upon the poopdeck like

bees. Two or three Mormon agents stood ready to hand them on to the Inspector, and to hand them forward

when they had passed. By what successful means, a special aptitude for organisation had been infused into

these people, I am, of course, unable to report. But I know that, even now, there was no disorder, hurry, or

All being ready, the first group are handed on. That member of the party who is entrusted with the

passengerticket for the whole, has been warned by one of the agents to have it ready, and here it is in his

hand. In every instance through the whole eight hundred, without an exception, this paper is always ready.

INSPECTOR (reading the ticket). Jessie Jobson, Sophronia Jobson, Jessie Jobson again, Matilda Jobson,

William Jobson, Jane Jobson, Matilda Jobson again, Brigham Jobson, Leonardo Jobson, and Orson Jobson.

This group is composed of an old grandfather and grandmother, their married son and his wife, and THEIR

family of children. Orson Jobson is a little child asleep in his mother's arms. The Doctor, with a kind word or

so, lifts up the corner of the mother's shawl, looks at the child's face, and touches the little clenched hand. If

And away they go. Mormon agent, skilful and quiet, hands them on. Mormon agent, skilful and quiet, hands

INSPECTOR (reading ticket again). Susannah Cleverly and William Cleverly. Brother and sister, eh?

INSPECTOR. Very good, Susannah Cleverly. Take your ticket, Susannah, and take care of it.

INSPECTOR (taking ticket again). Sampson Dibble and Dorothy Dibble (surveying a very old couple over

INSPECTOR. That's a bad job. Take your ticket, Mrs. Dibble, and don't lose it, and pass on.

ANASTATIA (a pretty girl, in a bright Garibaldi, this morning elected by universal suffrage the Beauty of

ANASTATIA (shaking her curls). I am with Mrs. Jobson, sir, but I've got separated for the moment.

INSPECTOR. Oh! You are with the Jobsons? Quite right. That'll do, Miss Weedle. Don't lose your ticket.

Away she goes, and joins the Jobsons who are waiting for her, and stoops and kisses Brigham Jobson who

appears to be considered too young for the purpose, by several Mormons rising twenty, who are looking on.

Before her extensive skirts have departed from the casks, a decent widow stands there with four children, and

The faces of some of the Welsh people, among whom there were many old persons, were certainly the least

intelligent. Some of these emigrants would have bungled sorely, but for the directing hand that was always

ready. The intelligence here was unquestionably of a low order, and the heads were of a poor type. Generally

the case was the reverse. There were many worn faces bearing traces of patient poverty and hard work, and

there was great steadiness of purpose and much undemonstrative selfrespect among this class. A few young

men were going singly. Several girls were going, two or three together. These latter I found it very difficult to

refer back, in my mind, to their relinquished homes and pursuits. Perhaps they were more like country

milliners, and pupil teachers rather tawdrily dressed, than any other classes of young women. I noticed,

among many little ornaments worn, more than one photographbrooch of the Princess of Wales, and also of

the late Prince Consort. Some single women of from thirty to forty, whom one might suppose to be

embroiderers, or strawbonnetmakers, were obviously going out in quest of husbands, as finer ladies go to

India. That they had any distinct notions of a plurality of husbands or wives, I do not believe. To suppose the

family groups of whom the majority of emigrants were composed, polygamically possessed, would be to

I should say (I had no means of ascertaining the fact) that most familiar kinds of handicraft trades were

represented here. Farm labourers, shepherds, and the like, had their full share of representation, but I doubt

if they preponderated. It was interesting to see how the leading spirit in the family circle never failed to show

itself, even in the simple process of answering to the names as they were called, and checking off the owners

of the names. Sometimes it was the father, much oftener the mother, sometimes a quick little girl second or

third in order of seniority. It seemed to occur for the first time to some heavy fathers, what large families they

had; and their eyes rolled about, during the calling of the list, as if they half misdoubted some other family to

have been smuggled into their own. Among all the fine handsome children, I observed but two with marks

upon their necks that were probably scrofulous. Out of the whole number of emigrants, but one old woman

was temporarily set aside by the doctor, on suspicion of fever; but even she afterwards obtained a clean bill of

When all had 'passed,' and the afternoon began to wear on, a black box became visible on deck, which box

was in charge of certain personages also in black, of whom only one had the conventional air of an itinerant

preacher. This box contained a supply of hymn books, neatly printed and got up, published at Liverpool,

and also in London at the 'LatterDay Saints' Book Depot, 30, Florence street.' Some copies were

handsomely bound; the plainer were the more in request, and many were bought. The title ran: 'Sacred

Hymns and Spiritual Songs for the Church of Jesus Church of Latter Day Saints.' The Preface, dated

Manchester, 1840, ran thus: 'The Saints in this country have been very desirous for a Hymn Book adapted to

their faith and worship, that they might sing the truth with an understanding heart, and express their praise,

joy, and gratitude in songs adapted to the New and Everlasting Covenant. In accordance with their wishes, we

have selected the following volume, which we hope will prove acceptable until a greater variety can be

added. With sentiments of high consideration and esteem, we subscribe ourselves your brethren in the New

and Everlasting Covenant, BRIGHAM YOUNG, PARLEY P. PRATT, JOHN TAYLOR.' From this book

by no means explanatory to myself of the New and Everlasting Covenant, and not at all making my heart an

understanding one on the subject of that mystery a hymn was sung, which did not attract any great amount

of attention, and was supported by a rather select circle. But the choir in the boat was very popular and

pleasant; and there was to have been a Band, only the Cornet was late in coming on board. In the course of

the afternoon, a mother appeared from shore, in search of her daughter, 'who had run away with the

Mormons.' She received every assistance from the Inspector, but her daughter was not found to be on board.

Towards five o'clock, the galley became full of teakettles, and an agreeable fragrance of tea pervaded the

ship. There was no scrambling or jostling for the hot water, no ill humour, no quarrelling. As the Amazon

was to sail with the next tide, and as it would not be high water before two o'clock in the morning, I left her

with her tea in full action, and her idle Steam Tug lying by, deputing steam and smoke for the time being to

I afterwards learned that a Despatch was sent home by the captain before he struck out into the wide Atlantic,

highly extolling the behaviour of these Emigrants, and the perfect order and propriety of all their social

arrangements. What is in store for the poor people on the shores of the Great Salt Lake, what happy delusions

they are labouring under now, on what miserable blindness their eyes may be opened then, I do not pretend to

say. But I went on board their ship to bear testimony against them if they deserved it, as I fully believed they

would; to my great astonishment they did not deserve it; and my predispositions and tendencies must not

affect me as an honest witness. I went over the Amazon's side, feeling it impossible to deny that, so far, some

remarkable influence had produced a remarkable result, which better known influences have often missed. *

* After this Uncommercial Journey was printed, I happened to mention the experience it describes to Lord

Houghton. That gentleman then showed me an article of his writing, in THE EDINBURGH REVIEW for

January, 1862, which is highly remarkable for its philosophical and literary research concerning these

LatterDay Saints. I find in it the following sentences: 'The Select Committee of the House of Commons on

emigrant ships for 1854 summoned the Mormon agent and passengerbroker before it, and came to the

conclusion that no ships under the provisions of the "Passengers Act" could be depended upon for comfort

and security in the same degree as those under his administration. The Mormon ship is a Family under strong

and accepted discipline, with every provision for comfort, decorum and internal peace.'

When I think I deserve particularly well of myself, and have earned the right to enjoy a little treat, I stroll

from Coventgarden into the City of London, after businesshours there, on a Saturday, or better yet on a

Sunday, and roam about its deserted nooks and corners. It is necessary to the full enjoyment of these journeys

that they should be made in summertime, for then the retired spots that I love to haunt, are at their idlest and

dullest. A gentle fall of rain is not objectionable, and a warm mist sets off my favourite retreats to decided

Among these, City Churchyards hold a high place. Such strange churchyards hide in the City of London;

churchyards sometimes so entirely detached from churches, always so pressed upon by houses; so small, so

rank, so silent, so forgotten, except by the few people who ever look down into them from their smoky

windows. As I stand peeping in through the iron gates and rails, I can peel the rusty metal off, like bark from

an old tree. The illegible tombstones are all lopsided, the gravemounds lost their shape in the rains of a

hundred years ago, the Lombardy Poplar or PlaneTree that was once a drysalter's daughter and several

commoncouncilmen, has withered like those worthies, and its departed leaves are dust beneath it. Contagion

of slow ruin overhangs the place. The discoloured tiled roofs of the environing buildings stand so awry, that

they can hardly be proof against any stress of weather. Old crazy stacks of chimneys seem to look down as

they overhang, dubiously calculating how far they will have to fall. In an angle of the walls, what was once

the toolhouse of the gravedigger rots away, encrusted with toadstools. Pipes and spouts for carrying off the

rain from the encompassing gables, broken or feloniously cut for old lead long ago, now let the rain drip and

splash as it list, upon the weedy earth. Sometimes there is a rusty pump somewhere near, and, as I look in at

the rails and meditate, I hear it working under an unknown hand with a creaking protest: as though the

departed in the churchyard urged, 'Let us lie here in peace; don't suck us up and drink us!'

One of my best beloved churchyards, I call the churchyard of Saint Ghastly Grim; touching what men in

general call it, I have no information. It lies at the heart of the City, and the Blackwall Railway shrieks at it

daily. It is a small small churchyard, with a ferocious, strong, spiked iron gate, like a jail. This gate is

ornamented with skulls and crossbones, larger than the life, wrought in stone; but it likewise came into the

mind of Saint Ghastly Grim, that to stick iron spikes atop of the stone skulls, as though they were impaled,

would be a pleasant device. Therefore the skulls grin aloft horribly, thrust through and through with iron

spears. Hence, there is attraction of repulsion for me in Saint Ghastly Grim, and, having often contemplated it

in the daylight and the dark, I once felt drawn towards it in a thunderstorm at midnight. 'Why not?' I said, in

selfexcuse. 'I have been to see the Colosseum by the light of the moon; is it worse to go to see Saint Ghastly

Grim by the light of the lightning?' I repaired to the Saint in a hackney cab, and found the skulls most

effective, having the air of a public execution, and seeming, as the lightning flashed, to wink and grin with

the pain of the spikes. Having no other person to whom to impart my satisfaction, I communicated it to the

driver. So far from being responsive, he surveyed me he was naturally a bottlednosed, red faced man

with a blanched countenance. And as he drove me back, he ever and again glanced in over his shoulder

through the little front window of his carriage, as mistrusting that I was a fare originally from a grave in the

churchyard of Saint Ghastly Grim, who might have flitted home again without paying.

Sometimes, the queer Hall of some queer Company gives upon a churchyard such as this, and, when the

Livery dine, you may hear them (if you are looking in through the iron rails, which you never are when I am)

toasting their own Worshipful prosperity. Sometimes, a wholesale house of business, requiring much room

for stowage, will occupy one or two or even all three sides of the enclosing space, and the backs of bales of

goods will lumber up the windows, as if they were holding some crowded trademeeting of themselves

within. Sometimes, the commanding windows are all blank, and show no more sign of life than the graves

below not so much, for THEY tell of what once upon a time was life undoubtedly. Such was the

surrounding of one City churchyard that I saw last summer, on a Volunteering Saturday evening towards

eight of the clock, when with astonishment I beheld an old old man and an old old woman in it, making hay.

Yes, of all occupations in this world, making hay! It was a very confined patch of churchyard lying between

Gracechurchstreet and the Tower, capable of yielding, say an apronful of hay. By what means the old old

man and woman had got into it, with an almost toothless haymaking rake, I could not fathom. No open

window was within view; no window at all was within view, sufficiently near the ground to have enabled

their old legs to descend from it; the rusty churchyard gate was locked, the mouldy church was locked.

Gravely among the graves, they made hay, all alone by themselves. They looked like Time and his wife.

There was but the one rake between them, and they both had hold of it in a pastorallyloving manner, and

there was hay on the old woman's black bonnet, as if the old man had recently been playful. The old man was

quite an obsolete old man, in kneebreeches and coarse grey stockings, and the old woman wore mittens like

unto his stockings in texture and in colour. They took no heed of me as I looked on, unable to account for

them. The old woman was much too bright for a pewopener, the old man much too meek for a beadle. On

an old tombstone in the foreground between me and them, were two cherubim; but for those celestial

embellishments being represented as having no possible use for kneebreeches, stockings, or mittens, I

should have compared them with the haymakers, and sought a likeness. I coughed and awoke the echoes,

but the haymakers never looked at me. They used the rake with a measured action, drawing the scanty crop

towards them; and so I was fain to leave them under three yards and a half of darkening sky, gravely making

hay among the graves, all alone by themselves. Perhaps they were Spectres, and I wanted a Medium.

In another City churchyard of similar cramped dimensions, I saw, that selfsame summer, two comfortable

charity children. They were making love tremendous proof of the vigour of that immortal article, for they

were in the graceful uniform under which English Charity delights to hide herself and they were

overgrown, and their legs (his legs at least, for I am modestly incompetent to speak of hers) were as much in

the wrong as mere passive weakness of character can render legs. O it was a leaden churchyard, but no doubt

a golden ground to those young persons! I first saw them on a Saturday evening, and, perceiving from their

occupation that Saturday evening was their trystingtime, I returned that evening se'nnight, and renewed the

contemplation of them. They came there to shake the bits of matting which were spread in the church aisles,

and they afterwards rolled them up, he rolling his end, she rolling hers, until they met, and over the two once

divided now united rolls sweet emblem! gave and received a chaste salute. It was so refreshing to find

one of my faded churchyards blooming into flower thus, that I returned a second time, and a third, and

ultimately this befell: They had left the church door open, in their dusting and arranging. Walking in to look

at the church, I became aware, by the dim light, of him in the pulpit, of her in the readingdesk, of him

looking down, of her looking up, exchanging tender discourse. Immediately both dived, and became as it

were nonexistent on this sphere. With an assumption of innocence I turned to leave the sacred edifice, when

an obese form stood in the portal, puffily demanding Joseph, or in default of Joseph, Celia. Taking this

monster by the sleeve, and luring him forth on pretence of showing him whom he sought, I gave time for the

emergence of Joseph and Celia, who presently came towards us in the churchyard, bending under dusty

matting, a picture of thriving and unconscious industry. It would be superfluous to hint that I have ever since

But such instances, or any tokens of vitality, are rare indeed in my City churchyards. A few sparrows

occasionally try to raise a lively chirrup in their solitary tree perhaps, as taking a different view of worms

from that entertained by humanity but they are flat and hoarse of voice, like the clerk, the organ, the bell,

the clergyman, and all the rest of the Churchworks when they are wound up for Sunday. Caged larks,

thrushes, or blackbirds, hanging in neighbouring courts, pour forth their strains passionately, as scenting the

tree, trying to break out, and see leaves again before they die, but their song is Willow, Willow of a

churchyard cast. So little light lives inside the churches of my churchyards, when the two are coexistent,

that it is often only by an accident and after long acquaintance that I discover their having stained glass in

some odd window. The westering sun slants into the churchyard by some unwonted entry, a few prismatic

tears drop on an old tombstone, and a window that I thought was only dirty, is for the moment all bejewelled.

Then the light passes and the colours die. Though even then, if there be room enough for me to fall back so

far as that I can gaze up to the top of the Church Tower, I see the rusty vane new burnished, and seeming to

look out with a joyful flash over the sea of smoke at the distant shore of country.

Blinking old men who are let out of workhouses by the hour, have a tendency to sit on bits of coping stone in

these churchyards, leaning with both hands on their sticks and asthmatically gasping. The more depressed

class of beggars too, bring hither broken meats, and munch. I am on nodding terms with a meditative

turncock who lingers in one of them, and whom I suspect of a turn for poetry; the rather, as he looks out of

temper when he gives the fireplug a disparaging wrench with that large tuningfork of his which would

wear out the shoulder of his coat, but for a precautionary piece of inlaid leather. Fireladders, which I am

satisfied nobody knows anything about, and the keys of which were lost in ancient times, moulder away in

the larger churchyards, under eaves like wooden eyebrows; and so removed are those corners from the haunts

of men and boys, that once on a fifth of November I found a 'Guy' trusted to take care of himself there, while

his proprietors had gone to dinner. Of the expression of his face I cannot report, because it was turned to the

wall; but his shrugged shoulders and his ten extended fingers, appeared to denote that he had moralised in his

little straw chair on the mystery of mortality until he gave it up as a bad job.

You do not come upon these churchyards violently; there are shapes of transition in the neighbourhood. An

antiquated news shop, or barber's shop, apparently bereft of customers in the earlier days of George the Third,

would warn me to look out for one, if any discoveries in this respect were left for me to make. A very quiet

court, in combination with an unaccountable dyer's and scourer's, would prepare me for a churchyard. An

exceedingly retiring public house, with a bagatelleboard shadily visible in a sawdusty parlour shaped like

an omnibus, and with a shelf of punchbowls in the bar, would apprise me that I stood near consecrated

ground. A 'Dairy,' exhibiting in its modest window one very little milkcan and three eggs, would suggest to

me the certainty of finding the poultry hard by, pecking at my forefathers. I first inferred the vicinity of Saint

Ghastly Grim, from a certain air of extra repose and gloom pervading a vast stack of warehouses.

From the hush of these places, it is congenial to pass into the hushed resorts of business. Down the lanes I

like to see the carts and waggons huddled together in repose, the cranes idle, and the warehouses shut.

Pausing in the alleys behind the closed Banks of mighty Lombardstreet, it gives one as good as a rich

feeling to think of the broad counters with a rim along the edge, made for telling money out on, the scales for

weighing precious metals, the ponderous ledgers, and, above all, the bright copper shovels for shovelling

gold. When I draw money, it never seems so much money as when it is shovelled at me out of a bright copper

shovel. I like to say, 'In gold,' and to see seven pounds musically pouring out of the shovel, like seventy; the

Bank appearing to remark to me I italicise APPEARING 'if you want more of this yellow earth, we keep

it in barrows at your service.' To think of the banker's clerk with his deft finger turning the crisp edges of the

Hundred Pound Notes he has taken in a fat roll out of a drawer, is again to hear the rustling of that delicious

southcash wind. 'How will you have it?' I once heard this usual question asked at a Bank Counter of an

elderly female, habited in mourning and steeped in simplicity, who answered, openeyed, crookfingered,

laughing with expectation, 'Anyhow!' Calling these things to mind as I stroll among the Banks, I wonder

whether the other solitary Sunday man I pass, has designs upon the Banks. For the interest and mystery of the

matter, I almost hope he may have, and that his confederate may be at this moment taking impressions of the

keys of the iron closets in wax, and that a delightful robbery may be in course of transaction. About

Collegehill, Marklane, and so on towards the Tower, and Dockward, the deserted winemerchants' cellars

are fine subjects for consideration; but the deserted moneycellars of the Bankers, and their platecellars, and

their jewelcellars, what subterranean regions of the Wonderful Lamp are these! And again: possibly some

shoeless boy in rags, passed through this street yesterday, for whom it is reserved to be a Banker in the

fulness of time, and to be surpassing rich. Such reverses have been, since the days of Whittington; and were,

long before. I want to know whether the boy has any foreglittering of that glittering fortune now, when he

treads these stones, hungry. Much as I also want to know whether the next man to be hanged at Newgate

yonder, had any suspicion upon him that he was moving steadily towards that fate, when he talked so much

about the last man who paid the same great debt at the same small Debtors' Door.

Where are all the people who on busy workingdays pervade these scenes? The locomotive banker's clerk,

who carries a black portfolio chained to him by a chain of steel, where is he? Does he go to bed with his

chain on to church with his chain on or does he lay it by? And if he lays it by, what becomes of his

portfolio when he is unchained for a holiday? The wastepaper baskets of these closed countinghouses would

let me into many hints of business matters if I had the exploration of them; and what secrets of the heart

should I discover on the 'pads' of the young clerks the sheets of cartridgepaper and blottingpaper

interposed between their writing and their desks! Pads are taken into confidence on the tenderest occasions,

and oftentimes when I have made a business visit, and have sent in my name from the outer office, have I had

it forced on my discursive notice that the officiating young gentleman has over and over again inscribed

AMELIA, in ink of various dates, on corners of his pad. Indeed, the pad may be regarded as the legitimate

modern successor of the old foresttree: whereon these young knights (having no attainable forest nearer than

Epping) engrave the names of their mistresses. After all, it is a more satisfactory process than carving, and

can be oftener repeated. So these courts in their Sunday rest are courts of Love Omnipotent (I rejoice to

bethink myself), dry as they look. And here is Garraway's, bolted and shuttered hard and fast! It is possible to

imagine the man who cuts the sandwiches, on his back in a hayfield; it is possible to imagine his desk, like

the desk of a clerk at church, without him; but imagination is unable to pursue the men who wait at

Garraway's all the week for the men who never come. When they are forcibly put out of Garraway's on

Saturday night which they must be, for they never would go out of their own accord where do they vanish

until Monday morning? On the first Sunday that I ever strayed here, I expected to find them hovering about

these lanes, like restless ghosts, and trying to peep into Garraway's through chinks in the shutters, if not

endeavouring to turn the lock of the door with false keys, picks, and screwdrivers. But the wonder is, that

they go clean away! And now I think of it, the wonder is, that every workingday pervader of these scenes

goes clean away. The man who sells the dogs' collars and the little toy coalscuttles, feels under as great an

obligation to go afar off, as Glyn and Co., or Smith, Payne, and Smith. There is an old monasterycrypt

under Garraway's (I have been in it among the port wine), and perhaps Garraway's, taking pity on the mouldy

men who wait in its publicroom all their lives, gives them cool houseroom down there over Sundays; but

the catacombs of Paris would not be large enough to hold the rest of the missing. This characteristic of

London City greatly helps its being the quaint place it is in the weekly pause of business, and greatly helps

my Sunday sensation in it of being the Last Man. In my solitude, the ticketporters being all gone with the

rest, I venture to breathe to the quiet bricks and stones my confidential wonderment why a ticketporter, who

never does any work with his hands, is bound to wear a white apron, and why a great Ecclesiastical

Dignitary, who never does any work with his hands either, is equally bound to wear a black one.

Before the waitress had shut the door, I had forgotten how many stagecoaches she said used to change

horses in the town every day. But it was of little moment; any high number would do as well as another. It

had been a great stagecoaching town in the great stagecoaching times, and the ruthless railways had killed

The sign of the house was the Dolphin's Head. Why only head, I don't know; for the Dolphin's effigy at full

length, and upside down as a Dolphin is always bound to be when artistically treated, though I suppose he

is sometimes right side upward in his natural condition graced the signboard. The signboard chafed its

rusty hooks outside the bowwindow of my room, and was a shabby work. No visitor could have denied that

the Dolphin was dying by inches, but he showed no bright colours. He had once served another master; there

was a newer streak of paint below him, displaying with inconsistent freshness the legend, By J. MELLOWS.

My door opened again, and J. Mellows's representative came back. I had asked her what I could have for

dinner, and she now returned with the counter question, what would I like? As the Dolphin stood possessed

of nothing that I do like, I was fain to yield to the suggestion of a duck, which I don't like. J. Mellows's

representative was a mournful young woman with eye susceptible of guidance, and one uncontrollable eye;

which latter, seeming to wander in quest of stagecoaches, deepened the melancholy in which the Dolphin

This young woman had but shut the door on retiring again when I bethought me of adding to my order, the

words, 'with nice vegetables.' Looking out at the door to give them emphatic utterance, I found her already in

a state of pensive catalepsy in the deserted gallery, picking her teeth with a pin.

At the Railway Station seven miles off, I had been the subject of wonder when I ordered a fly in which to

come here. And when I gave the direction 'To the Dolphin's Head,' I had observed an ominous stare on the

countenance of the strong young man in velveteen, who was the platform servant of the Company. He had

also called to my driver at parting, 'All riight! Don't hang yourself when you get there, Geoorge!' in a

sarcastic tone, for which I had entertained some transitory thoughts of reporting him to the General Manager.

I had no business in the town I never have any business in any town but I had been caught by the fancy

that I would come and look at it in its degeneracy. My purpose was fitly inaugurated by the Dolphin's Head,

which everywhere expressed past coachfulness and present coachlessness. Coloured prints of coaches,

starting, arriving, changing horses, coaches in the sunshine, coaches in the snow, coaches in the wind,

coaches in the mist and rain, coaches on the King's birthday, coaches in all circumstances compatible with

their triumph and victory, but never in the act of breaking down or overturning, pervaded the house. Of these

works of art, some, framed and not glazed, had holes in them; the varnish of others had become so brown and

cracked, that they looked like overdone pie crust; the designs of others were almost obliterated by the flies

of many summers. Broken glasses, damaged frames, lopsided hanging, and consignment of incurable

cripples to places of refuge in dark corners, attested the desolation of the rest. The old room on the ground

floor where the passengers of the Highflyer used to dine, had nothing in it but a wretched show of twigs and

flower pots in the broad window to hide the nakedness of the land, and in a corner little Mellows's

perambulator, with even its parasolhead turned despondently to the wall. The other room, where posthorse

company used to wait while relays were getting ready down the yard, still held its ground, but was as airless

as I conceive a hearse to be: insomuch that Mr. Pitt, hanging high against the partition (with spots on him like

port wine, though it is mysterious how port wine ever got squirted up there), had good reason for perking his

nose and sniffing. The stopperless cruets on the spindleshanked sideboard were in a miserably dejected

state: the anchovy sauce having turned blue some years ago, and the cayenne pepper (with a scoop in it like a

small model of a wooden leg) having turned solid. The old fraudulent candles which were always being paid

for and never used, were burnt out at last; but their tall stilts of candlesticks still lingered, and still outraged

the human intellect by pretending to be silver. The mouldy old unreformed Borough Member, with his right

hand buttoned up in the breast of his coat, and his back characteristically turned on bales of petitions from his

constituents, was there too; and the poker which never had been among the fireirons, lest posthorse

Pursuing my researches in the Dolphin's Head, I found it sorely shrunken. When J. Mellows came into

possession, he had walled off half the bar, which was now a tobaccoshop with its own entrance in the yard

the once glorious yard where the postboys, whip in hand and always buttoning their waistcoats at the last

moment, used to come running forth to mount and away. A 'Scientific Shoeing Smith and Veterinary

Surgeon,' had further encroached upon the yard; and a grimly satirical jobber, who announced himself as

having to Let 'A neat onehorse fly, and a onehorse cart,' had established his business, himself, and his

family, in a part of the extensive stables. Another part was lopped clean off from the Dolphin's Head, and

now comprised a chapel, a wheelwright's, and a Young Men's Mutual Improvement and Discussion Society

(in a loft): the whole forming a back lane. No audacious hand had plucked down the vane from the central

cupola of the stables, but it had grown rusty and stuck at NNil: while the score or two of pigeons that

remained true to their ancestral traditions and the place, had collected in a row on the roofridge of the only

outhouse retained by the Dolphin, where all the inside pigeons tried to push the outside pigeon off. This I

Sauntering forth into the town, by way of the covered and pillared entrance to the Dolphin's Yard, once

redolent of soup and stable litter, now redolent of musty disuse, I paced the street. It was a hot day, and the

little sunblinds of the shops were all drawn down, and the more enterprising tradesmen had caused their

'Prentices to trickle water on the pavement appertaining to their frontage. It looked as if they had been

shedding tears for the stagecoaches, and drying their ineffectual pockethandkerchiefs. Such weakness

would have been excusable; for business was as one dejected porkman who kept a shop which refused to

reciprocate the compliment by keeping him, informed me 'bitter bad.' Most of the harnessmakers and

corndealers were gone the way of the coaches, but it was a pleasant recognition of the eternal procession of

Children down that old original steep Incline, the Valley of the Shadow, that those tradesmen were mostly

succeeded by vendors of sweetmeats and cheap toys. The opposition house to the Dolphin, once famous as

the New White Hart, had long collapsed. In a fit of abject depression, it had cast whitewash on its windows,

and boarded up its front door, and reduced itself to a side entrance; but even that had proved a world too wide

for the Literary Institution which had been its last phase; for the Institution had collapsed too, and of the

ambitious letters of its inscription on the White Hart's front, all had fallen off but these:

suggestive of Lamentably Insolvent. As to the neighbouring marketplace, it seemed to have wholly

relinquished marketing, to the dealer in crockery whose pots and pans straggled half across it, and to the

Cheap Jack who sat with folded arms on the shafts of his cart, superciliously gazing around; his velveteen

waistcoat, evidently harbouring grave doubts whether it was worth his while to stay a night in such a place.

The church bells began to ring as I left this spot, but they by no means improved the case, for they said, in a

petulant way, and speaking with some difficulty in their irritation, WHAT'Sbecome ofTHEcoachES!'

Nor would they (I found on listening) ever vary their emphasis, save in respect of growing more sharp and

vexed, but invariably went on, 'WHAT'SbecomeofTHEcoachES!' always beginning the inquiry

with an unpolite abruptness. Perhaps from their elevation they saw the railway, and it aggravated them.

Coming upon a coachmaker's workshop, I began to look about me with a revived spirit, thinking that

perchance I might behold there some remains of the old times of the town's greatness. There was only one

man at work a dry man, grizzled, and far advanced in years, but tall and upright, who, becoming aware of

me looking on, straightened his back, pushed up his spectacles against his brown paper cap, and appeared

He seemed to consider about that, and not to agree with me. 'Was you a looking for anything?' he then

'I was wondering whether there happened to be any fragment of an old stagecoach here.'

It was now my turn to say 'Oh!' and I said it. Not another word did the dry and grizzled man say, but bent to

his work again. In the coachmaking days, the coachpainters had tried their brushes on a post beside him;

and quite a Calendar of departed glories was to be read upon it, in blue and yellow and red and green, some

Appearing to be informed with an idea, he laid down his plane (for it was a plane he was at work with),

'Would a poshay,' said the coachmaker, standing close before me, and folding his arms in the manner of a

crossexamining counsel 'would a poshay meet the views you have expressed? Yes, or no?'

'Then you keep straight along down there till you see one. YOU'LL see one if you go fur enough.'

With that, he turned me by the shoulder in the direction I was to take, and went in and resumed his work

against a background of leaves and grapes. For, although he was a soured man and a discontented, his

workshop was that agreeable mixture of town and country, street and garden, which is often to be seen in a

I went the way he had turned me, and I came to the Beershop with the sign of The First and Last, and was

out of the town on the old London road. I came to the Turnpike, and I found it, in its silent way, eloquent

respecting the change that had fallen on the road. The Turnpikehouse was all overgrown with ivy; and the

Turnpike keeper, unable to get a living out of the tolls, plied the trade of a cobbler. Not only that, but his

wife sold gingerbeer, and, in the very window of espial through which the Tolltakers of old times used

with awe to behold the grand London coaches coming on at a gallop, exhibited for sale little barber'spoles of

'How goes turnpike business, master?' said I to him, as he sat in his little porch, repairing a shoe.

'Bad?' he repeated. And he pointed to one of his sunburnt dusty children who was climbing the turnpikegate,

and said, extending his open right hand in remonstrance with Universal Nature. 'Five on 'em!'

'There's a way, master,' said he, with the air of one who had thought deeply on the subject.

'Lay a toll on everything as comes through; lay a toll on walkers. Lay another toll on everything as don't

Finding it was as impossible to argue with this financial genius as if he had been Chancellor of the

Exchequer, and consequently the right man in the right place, I passed on meekly.

My mind now began to misgive me that the disappointed coachmaker had sent me on a wildgoose errand,

and that there was no post chaise in those parts. But coming within view of certain allotmentgardens by the

roadside, I retracted the suspicion, and confessed that I had done him an injustice. For, there I saw, surely, the

It was a postchaise taken off its axletree and wheels, and plumped down on the clayey soil among a ragged

growth of vegetables. It was a postchaise not even set straight upon the ground, but tilted over, as if it had

fallen out of a balloon. It was a postchaise that had been a long time in those decayed circumstances, and

against which scarlet beans were trained. It was a postchaise patched and mended with old teatrays, or

with scraps of iron that looked like them, and boarded up as to the windows, but having A KNOCKER on the

offside door. Whether it was a postchaise used as toolhouse, summerhouse, or dwellinghouse, I could

not discover, for there was nobody at home at the postchaise when I knocked, but it was certainly used for

something, and locked up. In the wonder of this discovery, I walked round and round the postchaise many

times, and sat down by the postchaise, waiting for further elucidation. None came. At last, I made my way

back to the old London road by the further end of the allotmentgardens, and consequently at a point beyond

that from which I had diverged. I had to scramble through a hedge and down a steep bank, and I nearly came

He stayed his hammer, and said, regarding me mysteriously through his dark goggles of wire:

'I turned out of the way,' said I, in explanation, 'to look at that odd postchaise. Do you happen to know

The stonebreaker bent his brows and goggles over his heap of stones, as if he were considering whether he

should answer the question or not. Then, raising his barred eyes to my features as before, he said:

Being quite unprepared for the reply, I received it with a sufficiently awkward 'Indeed! Dear me!' Presently I

added, 'Do you ' I was going to say 'live there,' but it seemed so absurd a question, that I substituted 'live

The stonebreaker, who had not broken a fragment since we began to converse, then did as follows. He

raised himself by poising his finger on his hammer, and took his coat, on which he had been seated, over his

arm. He then backed to an easier part of the bank than that by which I had come down, keeping his dark

goggles silently upon me all the time, and then shouldered his hammer, suddenly turned, ascended, and was

gone. His face was so small, and his goggles were so large, that he left me wholly uninformed as to his

countenance; but he left me a profound impression that the curved legs I had seen from behind as he

vanished, were the legs of an old postboy. It was not until then that I noticed he had been working by a

grassgrown milestone, which looked like a tombstone erected over the grave of the London road.

My dinnerhour being close at hand, I had no leisure to pursue the goggles or the subject then, but made my

way back to the Dolphin's Head. In the gateway I found J. Mellows, looking at nothing, and apparently

'I don't care for the town,' said J. Mellows, when I complimented him on the sanitary advantages it may or

'Belong to it!' repeated Mellows. 'If I didn't belong to a better style of town than this, I'd take and drown

myself in a pail.' It then occurred to me that Mellows, having so little to do, was habitually thrown back on

'What we want,' said Mellows, pulling off his hat, and making as if he emptied it of the last load of Disgust

that had exuded from his brain, before he put it on again for another load; 'what we want, is a Branch. The

Petition for the Branch Bill is in the coffee room. Would you put your name to it? Every little helps.'

I found the document in question stretched out flat on the coffee room table by the aid of certain weights

from the kitchen, and I gave it the additional weight of my uncommercial signature. To the best of my belief,

I bound myself to the modest statement that universal traffic, happiness, prosperity, and civilisation, together

with unbounded national triumph in competition with the foreigner, would infallibly flow from the Branch.

Having achieved this constitutional feat, I asked Mr. Mellows if he could grace my dinner with a pint of good

'If I couldn't give you a pint of good wine, I'd there! I'd take and drown myself in a pail. But I was

deceived when I bought this business, and the stock was higgledypiggledy, and I haven't yet tasted my way

quite through it with a view to sorting it. Therefore, if you order one kind and get another, change till it

comes right. For what,' said Mellows, unloading his hat as before, 'what would you or any gentleman do, if

you ordered one kind of wine and was required to drink another? Why, you'd (and naturally and properly,

The shabbiness of our English capital, as compared with Paris, Bordeaux, Frankfort, Milan, Geneva almost

any important town on the continent of Europe I find very striking after an absence of any duration in

foreign parts. London is shabby in contrast with Edinburgh, with Aberdeen, with Exeter, with Liverpool, with

a bright little town like Bury St. Edmunds. London is shabby in contrast with New York, with Boston, with

Philadelphia. In detail, one would say it can rarely fail to be a disappointing piece of shabbiness, to a stranger

from any of those places. There is nothing shabbier than Drurylane, in Rome itself. The meanness of

Regentstreet, set against the great line of Boulevards in Paris, is as striking as the abortive ugliness of

Trafalgarsquare, set against the gallant beauty of the Place de la Concorde. London is shabby by daylight,

and shabbier by gaslight. No Englishman knows what gaslight is, until he sees the Rue de Rivoli and the

The mass of London people are shabby. The absence of distinctive dress has, no doubt, something to do with

it. The porters of the Vintners' Company, the draymen, and the butchers, are about the only people who wear

distinctive dresses; and even these do not wear them on holidays. We have nothing which for cheapness,

cleanliness, convenience, or picturesqueness, can compare with the belted blouse. As to our women; next

Easter or Whitsuntide, look at the bonnets at the British Museum or the National Gallery, and think of the

Probably there are not more secondhand clothes sold in London than in Paris, and yet the mass of the

London population have a second hand look which is not to be detected on the mass of the Parisian

population. I think this is mainly because a Parisian workman does not in the least trouble himself about what

is worn by a Parisian idler, but dresses in the way of his own class, and for his own comfort. In London, on

the contrary, the fashions descend; and you never fully know how inconvenient or ridiculous a fashion is,

until you see it in its last descent. It was but the other day, on a racecourse, that I observed four people in a

barouche deriving great entertainment from the contemplation of four people on foot. The four people on foot

were two young men and two young women; the four people in the barouche were two young men and two

young women. The four young women were dressed in exactly the same style; the four young men were

dressed in exactly the same style. Yet the two couples on wheels were as much amused by the two couples on

foot, as if they were quite unconscious of having themselves set those fashions, or of being at that very

Is it only in the matter of clothes that fashion descends here in London and consequently in England and

thence shabbiness arises? Let us think a little, and be just. The 'Black Country' round about Birmingham, is a

very black country; but is it quite as black as it has been lately painted? An appalling accident happened at

the People's Park near Birmingham, this last July, when it was crowded with people from the Black Country

an appalling accident consequent on a shamefully dangerous exhibition. Did the shamefully dangerous

exhibition originate in the moral blackness of the Black Country, and in the Black People's peculiar love of

the excitement attendant on great personal hazard, which they looked on at, but in which they did not

participate? Light is much wanted in the Black Country. O we are all agreed on that. But, we must not quite

forget the crowds of gentlefolks who set the shamefully dangerous fashion, either. We must not quite forget

the enterprising Directors of an Institution vaunting mighty educational pretences, who made the low

sensation as strong as they possibly could make it, by hanging the Blondin rope as high as they possibly

could hang it. All this must not be eclipsed in the Blackness of the Black Country. The reserved seats high up

by the rope, the cleared space below it, so that no one should be smashed but the performer, the pretence of

slipping and falling off, the baskets for the feet and the sack for the head, the photographs everywhere, and

the virtuous indignation nowhere all this must not be wholly swallowed up in the blackness of the jetblack

Whatsoever fashion is set in England, is certain to descend. This is a text for a perpetual sermon on care in

setting fashions. When you find a fashion low down, look back for the time (it will never be far off) when it

was the fashion high up. This is the text for a perpetual sermon on social justice. From imitations of

Ethiopian Serenaders, to imitations of Prince's coats and waistcoats, you will find the original model in St.

James's Parish. When the Serenaders become tiresome, trace them beyond the Black Country; when the coats

and waistcoats become insupportable, refer them to their source in the Upper Toady Regions.

Gentlemen's clubs were once maintained for purposes of savage party warfare; working men's clubs of the

same day assumed the same character. Gentlemen's clubs became places of quiet inoffensive recreation;

working men's clubs began to follow suit. If working men have seemed rather slow to appreciate advantages

of combination which have saved the pockets of gentlemen, and enhanced their comforts, it is because

working men could scarcely, for want of capital, originate such combinations without help; and because help

has not been separable from that great impertinence, Patronage. The instinctive revolt of his spirit against

patronage, is a quality much to be respected in the English working man. It is the base of the base of his best

qualities. Nor is it surprising that he should be unduly suspicious of patronage, and sometimes resentful of it

even where it is not, seeing what a flood of washy talk has been let loose on his devoted head, or with what

complacent condescension the same devoted head has been smoothed and patted. It is a proof to me of his

selfcontrol that he never strikes out pugilistically, right and left, when addressed as one of 'My friends,' or

'My assembled friends;' that he does not become inappeasable, and run amuck like a Malay, whenever he sees

a biped in broadcloth getting on a platform to talk to him; that any pretence of improving his mind, does not

instantly drive him out of his mind, and cause him to toss his obliging patron like a mad bull.

For, how often have I heard the unfortunate working man lectured, as if he were a little charitychild, humid

as to his nasal development, strictly literal as to his Catechism, and called by Providence to walk all his days

in a station in life represented on festive occasions by a mug of warm milkandwater and a bun! What

popguns of jokes have these ears tingled to hear let off at him, what asinine sentiments, what impotent

conclusions, what spelling book moralities, what adaptations of the orator's insufferable tediousness to the

assumed level of his understanding! If his sledgehammers, his spades and pickaxes, his saws and chisels,

his paintpots and brushes, his forges, furnaces, and engines, the horses that he drove at his work, and the

machines that drove him at his work, were all toys in one little paper box, and he the baby who played with

them, he could not have been discoursed to, more impertinently and absurdly than I have heard him

discoursed to times innumerable. Consequently, not being a fool or a fawner, he has come to acknowledge his

patronage by virtually saying: 'Let me alone. If you understand me no better than THAT, sir and madam, let

me alone. You mean very well, I dare say, but I don't like it, and I won't come here again to have any more of

Whatever is done for the comfort and advancement of the working man must be so far done by himself as

that it is maintained by himself. And there must be in it no touch of condescension, no shadow of patronage.

In the great working districts, this truth is studied and understood. When the American civil war rendered it

necessary, first in Glasgow, and afterwards in Manchester, that the working people should be shown how to

avail themselves of the advantages derivable from system, and from the combination of numbers, in the

purchase and the cooking of their food, this truth was above all things borne in mind. The quick consequence

was, that suspicion and reluctance were vanquished, and that the effort resulted in an astonishing and a

Such thoughts passed through my mind on a July morning of this summer, as I walked towards Commercial

Street (not Uncommercial Street), Whitechapel. The Glasgow and Manchester system had been lately set

agoing there, by certain gentlemen who felt an interest in its diffusion, and I had been attracted by the

Commercialstreet, Whitechapel, Where Accommodation is provided for Dining comfortably 300 Persons at

Cup of Tea or Coffee One Penny Bread and Butter One Penny Bread and Cheese One Penny Slice of bread

Bowl of Scotch Broth One Penny Bowl of Soup One Penny Plate of Potatoes One Penny Plate of Minced

Beef Twopence Plate of Cold Beef Twopence Plate of Cold Ham Twopence Plate of Plum Pudding or Rice

As the Economy of Cooking depends greatly upon the simplicity of the arrangements with which a great

number of persons can be served at one time, the Upper Room of this Establishment will be especially set

Bowl of Broth, or Soup, Plate of Cold Beef or Ham, Plate of Potatoes, Plum Pudding, or Rice.

N.B. This Establishment is conducted on the strictest business principles, with the full intention of making

it selfsupporting, so that every one may frequent it with a feeling of perfect independence.

The assistance of all frequenting the Depot is confidently expected in checking anything interfering with the

Please do not destroy this Hand Bill, but hand it to some other person whom it may interest.

The SelfSupporting Cooking Depot (not a very good name, and one would rather give it an English one)

had hired a newlybuilt warehouse that it found to let; therefore it was not established in premises specially

designed for the purpose. But, at a small cost they were exceedingly well adapted to the purpose: being light,

well ventilated, clean, and cheerful. They consisted of three large rooms. That on the basement story was the

kitchen; that on the ground floor was the general diningroom; that on the floor above was the Upper Room

referred to in the handbill, where the Public Dinner at fourpencehalfpenny a head was provided every day.

The cooking was done, with much economy of space and fuel, by American cookingstoves, and by young

women not previously, brought up as cooks; the walls and pillars of the two diningrooms were agreeably

brightened with ornamental colours; the tables were capable of accommodating six or eight persons each; the

attendants were all young women, becomingly and neatly dressed, and dressed alike. I think the whole staff

My first inquiries were directed to the wages of this staff; because, if any establishment claiming to be

selfsupporting, live upon the spoliation of anybody or anything, or eke out a feeble existence by poor

mouths and beggarly resources (as too many so called Mechanics' Institutions do), I make bold to express

my Uncommercial opinion that it has no business to live, and had better die. It was made clear to me by the

account books, that every person employed was properly paid. My next inquiries were directed to the quality

of the provisions purchased, and to the terms on which they were bought. It was made equally clear to me

that the quality was the very best, and that all bills were paid weekly. My next inquiries were directed to the

balancesheet for the last two weeks only the third and fourth of the establishment's career. It was made

equally clear to me, that after everything bought was paid for, and after each week was charged with its full

share of wages, rent and taxes, depreciation of plant in use, and interest on capital at the rate of four per cent.

per annum, the last week had yielded a profit of (in round numbers) one pound ten; and the previous week a

profit of six pounds ten. By this time I felt that I had a healthy appetite for the dinners.

It had just struck twelve, and a quick succession of faces had already begun to appear at a little window in the

wall of the partitioned space where I sat looking over the books. Within this little window, like a paybox at

a theatre, a neat and brisk young woman presided to take money and issue tickets. Every one coming in must

take a ticket. Either the fourpencehalfpenny ticket for the upper room (the most popular ticket, I think), or a

penny ticket for a bowl of soup, or as many penny tickets as he or she choose to buy. For three penny tickets

one had quite a wide range of choice. A plate of cold boiled beef and potatoes; or a plate of cold ham and

potatoes; or a plate of hot minced beef and potatoes; or a bowl of soup, bread and cheese, and a plate of

plumpudding. Touching what they should have, some customers on taking their seats fell into a reverie

became mildly distracted postponed decision, and said in bewilderment, they would think of it. One old

man I noticed when I sat among the tables in the lower room, who was startled by the bill of fare, and sat

contemplating it as if it were something of a ghostly nature. The decision of the boys was as rapid as their

There were several women among the diners, and several clerks and shopmen. There were carpenters and

painters from the neighbouring buildings under repair, and there were nautical men, and there were, as one

diner observed to me, 'some of most sorts.' Some were solitary, some came two together, some dined in

parties of three or four, or six. The latter talked together, but assuredly no one was louder than at my club in

PallMall. One young fellow whistled in rather a shrill manner while he waited for his dinner, but I was

gratified to observe that he did so in evident defiance of my Uncommercial individuality. Quite agreeing with

him, on consideration, that I had no business to be there, unless I dined like the rest, 'I went in,' as the phrase

The room of the fourpencehalfpenny banquet had, like the lower room, a counter in it, on which were

ranged a great number of cold portions ready for distribution. Behind this counter, the fragrant soup was

steaming in deep cans, and the bestcooked of potatoes were fished out of similar receptacles. Nothing to eat

was touched with his hand. Every waitress had her own tables to attend to. As soon as she saw a new

customer seat himself at one of her tables, she took from the counter all his dinner his soup, potatoes, meat,

and pudding piled it up dexterously in her two hands, set it before him, and took his ticket. This serving of

the whole dinner at once, had been found greatly to simplify the business of attendance, and was also popular

with the customers: who were thus enabled to vary the meal by varying the routine of dishes: beginning with

souptoday, putting soup in the middle tomorrow, putting soup at the end the day after tomorrow, and

ringing similar changes on meat and pudding. The rapidity with which every newcomer got served, was

remarkable; and the dexterity with which the waitresses (quite new to the art a month before) discharged their

duty, was as agreeable to see, as the neat smartness with which they wore their dress and had dressed their

If I seldom saw better waiting, so I certainly never ate better meat, potatoes, or pudding. And the soup was an

honest and stout soup, with rice and barley in it, and 'little matters for the teeth to touch,' as had been

observed to me by my friend below stairs already quoted. The dinnerservice, too, was neither conspicuously

hideous for High Art nor for Low Art, but was of a pleasant and pure appearance. Concerning the viands and

their cookery, one last remark. I dined at my club in PallMall aforesaid, a few days afterwards, for exactly

The company thickened after one o'clock struck, and changed pretty quickly. Although experience of the

place had been so recently attainable, and although there was still considerable curiosity out in the street and

about the entrance, the general tone was as good as could be, and the customers fell easily into the ways of

the place. It was clear to me, however, that they were there to have what they paid for, and to be on an

independent footing. To the best of my judgment, they might be patronised out of the building in a month.

With judicious visiting, and by dint of being questioned, read to, and talked at, they might even be got rid of

This disinterested and wise movement is fraught with so many wholesome changes in the lives of the

working people, and with so much good in the way of overcoming that suspicion which our own unconscious

impertinence has engendered, that it is scarcely gracious to criticise details as yet; the rather, because it is

indisputable that the managers of the Whitechapel establishment most thoroughly feel that they are upon their

honour with the customers, as to the minutest points of administration. But, although the American stoves

cannot roast, they can surely boil one kind of meat as well as another, and need not always circumscribe their

boiling talents within the limits of ham and beef. The most enthusiastic admirer of those substantials, would

probably not object to occasional inconstancy in respect of pork and mutton: or, especially in cold weather, to

a little innocent trifling with Irish stews, meat pies, and toads in holes. Another drawback on the Whitechapel

establishment, is the absence of beer. Regarded merely as a question of policy, it is very impolitic, as having

a tendency to send the working men to the publichouse, where gin is reported to be sold. But, there is a

much higher ground on which this absence of beer is objectionable. It expresses distrust of the working man.

It is a fragment of that old mantle of patronage in which so many estimable Thugs, so darkly wandering up

and down the moral world, are sworn to muffle him. Good beer is a good thing for him, he says, and he likes

it; the Depot could give it him good, and he now gets it bad. Why does the Depot not give it him good?

Because he would get drunk. Why does the Depot not let him have a pint with his dinner, which would not

make him drunk? Because he might have had another pint, or another two pints, before he came. Now, this

distrust is an affront, is exceedingly inconsistent with the confidence the managers express in their

handbills, and is a timid stoppingshort upon the straight highway. It is unjust and unreasonable, also. It is

unjust, because it punishes the sober man for the vice of the drunken man. It is unreasonable, because any one

at all experienced in such things knows that the drunken workman does not get drunk where he goes to eat

and drink, but where he goes to drink expressly to drink. To suppose that the working man cannot state this

question to himself quite as plainly as I state it here, is to suppose that he is a baby, and is again to tell him in

the old wearisome, condescending, patronising way that he must be goodypoody, and do as he is

toldypoldy, and not be a mannypanny or a voterpoter, but fold his handypandys, and be a childypildy.

I found from the accounts of the Whitechapel SelfSupporting Cooking Depot, that every article sold in it,

even at the prices I have quoted, yields a certain small profit! Individual speculators are of course already in

the field, and are of course already appropriating the name. The classes for whose benefit the real depots are

There are some small outoftheway landing places on the Thames and the Medway, where I do much of

my summer idling. Running water is favourable to daydreams, and a strong tidal river is the best of running

water for mine. I like to watch the great ships standing out to sea or coming home richly laden, the active

little steamtugs confidently puffing with them to and from the sea horizon, the fleet of barges that seem to

have plucked their brown and russet sails from the ripe trees in the landscape, the heavy old colliers, light in

ballast, floundering down before the tide, the light screw barks and schooners imperiously holding a straight

course while the others patiently tack and go about, the yachts with their tiny hulls and great white sheets of

canvas, the little sailingboats bobbing to and fro on their errands of pleasure or business, and as it is the

nature of little people to do making a prodigious fuss about their small affairs. Watching these objects, I

still am under no obligation to think about them, or even so much as to see them, unless it perfectly suits my

humour. As little am I obliged to hear the plash and flop of the tide, the ripple at my feet, the clinking

windlass afar off, or the humming steamship paddles further away yet. These, with the creaking little jetty

on which I sit, and the gaunt highwater marks and lowwater marks in the mud, and the broken causeway,

and the broken bank, and the broken stakes and piles leaning forward as if they were vain of their personal

appearance and looking for their reflection in the water, will melt into any train of fancy. Equally adaptable to

any purpose or to none, are the posturing sheep and kine upon the marshes, the gulls that wheel and dip

around me, the crows (well out of gunshot) going home from the rich harvestfields, the heron that has been

out afishing and looks as melancholy, up there in the sky, as if it hadn't agreed with him. Everything within

the range of the senses will, by the aid of the running water, lend itself to everything beyond that range, and

work into a drowsy whole, not unlike a kind of tune, but for which there is no exact definition.

One of these landingplaces is near an old fort (I can see the Nore Light from it with my pocketglass), from

which fort mysteriously emerges a boy, to whom I am much indebted for additions to my scanty stock of

knowledge. He is a young boy, with an intelligent face burnt to a dust colour by the summer sun, and with

crisp hair of the same hue. He is a boy in whom I have perceived nothing incompatible with habits of

studious inquiry and meditation, unless an evanescent black eye (I was delicate of inquiring how occasioned)

should be so considered. To him am I indebted for ability to identify a Customhouse boat at any distance,

and for acquaintance with all the forms and ceremonies observed by a homewardbound Indiaman coming

up the river, when the Customhouse officers go aboard her. But for him, I might never have heard of 'the

dumbague,' respecting which malady I am now learned. Had I never sat at his feet, I might have finished my

mortal career and never known that when I see a white horse on a barge's sail, that barge is a lime barge. For

precious secrets in reference to beer, am I likewise beholden to him, involving warning against the beer of a

certain establishment, by reason of its having turned sour through failure in point of demand: though my

young sage is not of opinion that similar deterioration has befallen the ale. He has also enlightened me

touching the mushrooms of the marshes, and has gently reproved my ignorance in having supposed them to

be impregnated with salt. His manner of imparting information, is thoughtful, and appropriate to the scene.

As he reclines beside me, he pitches into the river, a little stone or piece of grit, and then delivers himself

oracularly, as though he spoke out of the centre of the spreading circle that it makes in the water. He never

With the wise boy whom I know by no other name than the Spirit of the Fort I recently consorted on a

breezy day when the river leaped about us and was full of life. I had seen the sheaved corn carrying in the

golden fields as I came down to the river; and the rosy farmer, watching his labouringmen in the saddle on

his cob, had told me how he had reaped his two hundred and sixty acres of longstrawed corn last week, and

how a better week's work he had never done in all his days. Peace and abundance were on the countryside in

beautiful forms and beautiful colours, and the harvest seemed even to be sailing out to grace the

It was on this occasion that the Spirit of the Fort, directing his remarks to a certain floating iron battery lately

lying in that reach of the river, enriched my mind with his opinions on naval architecture, and informed me

that he would like to be an engineer. I found him up to everything that is done in the contracting line by

Messrs. Peto and Brassey cunning in the article of concrete mellow in the matter of iron great on the

subject of gunnery. When he spoke of piledriving and sluicemaking, he left me not a leg to stand on, and I

can never sufficiently acknowledge his forbearance with me in my disabled state. While he thus discoursed,

he several times directed his eyes to one distant quarter of the landscape, and spoke with vague mysterious

awe of 'the Yard.' Pondering his lessons after we had parted, I bethought me that the Yard was one of our

large public Dockyards, and that it lay hidden among the crops down in the dip behind the windmills, as if it

modestly kept itself out of view in peaceful times, and sought to trouble no man. Taken with this modesty on

My good opinion of the Yard's retiring character was not dashed by nearer approach. It resounded with the

noise of hammers beating upon iron; and the great sheds or slips under which the mighty men ofwar are

built, loomed businesslike when contemplated from the opposite side of the river. For all that, however, the

Yard made no display, but kept itself snug under hillsides of cornfields, hopgardens, and orchards; its

great chimneys smoking with a quiet almost a lazy air, like giants smoking tobacco; and the great Shears

moored off it, looking meekly and inoffensively out of proportion, like the Giraffe of the machinery creation.

The store of cannon on the neighbouring gunwharf, had an innocent toylike appearance, and the one

redcoated sentry on duty over them was a mere toy figure, with a clockwork movement. As the hot

sunlight sparkled on him he might have passed for the identical little man who had the little gun, and whose

Crossing the river and landing at the Stairs, where a drift of chips and weed had been trying to land before me

and had not succeeded, but had got into a corner instead, I found the very street posts to be cannon, and the

architectural ornaments to be shells. And so I came to the Yard, which was shut up tight and strong with great

folded gates, like an enormous patent safe. These gates devouring me, I became digested into the Yard; and it

had, at first, a cleanswept holiday air, as if it had given over work until next wartime. Though indeed a

quantity of hemp for rope was tumbling out of storehouses, even there, which would hardly be lying like so

Ding, Clash, Dong, BANG, Boom, Rattle, Clash, BANG, Clink, BANG, Dong, BANG, Clatter, BANG

BANG BANG! What on earth is this! This is, or soon will be, the Achilles, iron armourplated ship. Twelve

hundred men are working at her now; twelve hundred men working on stages over her sides, over her bows,

over her stern, under her keel, between her decks, down in her hold, within her and without, crawling and

creeping into the finest curves of her lines wherever it is possible for men to twist. Twelve hundred

hammerers, measurers, caulkers, armourers, forgers, smiths, shipwrights; twelve hundred dingers, clashers,

dongers, rattlers, clinkers, bangers bangers bangers! Yet all this stupendous uproar around the rising Achilles

is as nothing to the reverberations with which the perfected Achilles shall resound upon the dreadful day

when the full work is in hand for which this is but note of preparation the day when the scuppers that are

now fitting like great, dry, thirsty conduitpipes, shall run red. All these busy figures between decks, dimly

seen bending at their work in smoke and fire, are as nothing to the figures that shall do work here of another

kind in smoke and fire, that day. These steamworked engines alongside, helping the ship by travelling to

and fro, and wafting tons of iron plates about, as though they were so many leaves of trees, would be rent

limb from limb if they stood by her for a minute then. To think that this Achilles, monstrous compound of

iron tank and oaken chest, can ever swim or roll! To think that any force of wind and wave could ever break

her! To think that wherever I see a glowing redhot iron point thrust out of her side from within as I do

now, there, and there, and there! and two watching men on a stage without, with bared arms and sledge

hammers, strike at it fiercely, and repeat their blows until it is black and flat, I see a rivet being driven home,

of which there are many in every iron plate, and thousands upon thousands in the ship! To think that the

difficulty I experience in appreciating the ship's size when I am on board, arises from her being a series of

iron tanks and oaken chests, so that internally she is ever finishing and ever beginning, and half of her might

be smashed, and yet the remaining half suffice and be sound. Then, to go over the side again and down

among the ooze and wet to the bottom of the dock, in the depths of the subterranean forest of dogshores and

stays that hold her up, and to see the immense mass bulging out against the upper light, and tapering down

towards me, is, with great pains and much clambering, to arrive at an impossibility of realising that this is a

ship at all, and to become possessed by the fancy that it is an enormous immovable edifice set up in an

ancient amphitheatre (say, that at Verona), and almost filling it! Yet what would even these things be, without

the tributary workshops and the mechanical powers for piercing the iron plates four inches and a half thick

for rivets, shaping them under hydraulic pressure to the finest tapering turns of the ship's lines, and paring

them away, with knives shaped like the beaks of strong and cruel birds, to the nicest requirements of the

design! These machines of tremendous force, so easily directed by one attentive face and presiding hand,

seem to me to have in them something of the retiring character of the Yard. 'Obedient monster, please to bite

this mass of iron through and through, at equal distances, where these regular chalkmarks are, all round.'

Monster looks at its work, and lifting its ponderous head, replies, 'I don't particularly want to do it; but if it

must be done !' The solid metal wriggles out, hot from the monster's crunching tooth, and it IS done.

'Dutiful monster, observe this other mass of iron. It is required to be pared away, according to this delicately

lessening and arbitrary line, which please to look at.' Monster (who has been in a reverie) brings down its

blunt head, and, much in the manner of Doctor Johnson, closely looks along the line very closely, being

somewhat nearsighted. 'I don't particularly want to do it; but if it must be done !' Monster takes another

nearsighted look, takes aim, and the tortured piece writhes off, and falls, a hot, tighttwisted snake, among

the ashes. The making of the rivets is merely a pretty round game, played by a man and a boy, who put

redhot barley sugar in a Pope Joan board, and immediately rivets fall out of window; but the tone of the

great machines is the tone of the great Yard and the great country: 'We don't particularly want to do it; but if

How such a prodigious mass as the Achilles can ever be held by such comparatively little anchors as those

intended for her and lying near her here, is a mystery of seamanship which I will refer to the wise boy. For

my own part, I should as soon have thought of tethering an elephant to a tentpeg, or the larger hippopotamus

in the Zoological Gardens to my shirtpin. Yonder in the river, alongside a hulk, lie two of this ship's hollow

iron masts. THEY are large enough for the eye, I find, and so are all her other appliances. I wonder why only

I have no present time to think about it, for I am going to see the workshops where they make all the oars

used in the British Navy. A pretty large pile of building, I opine, and a pretty long job! As to the building, I

am soon disappointed, because the work is all done in one loft. And as to a long job what is this? Two

rather large mangles with a swarm of butterflies hovering over them? What can there be in the mangles that

Drawing nearer, I discern that these are not mangles, but intricate machines, set with knives and saws and

planes, which cut smooth and straight here, and slantwise there, and now cut such a depth, and now miss

cutting altogether, according to the predestined requirements of the pieces of wood that are pushed on below

them: each of which pieces is to be an oar, and is roughly adapted to that purpose before it takes its final

leave of faroff forests, and sails for England. Likewise I discern that the butterflies are not true butterflies,

but wooden shavings, which, being spirted up from the wood by the violence of the machinery, and kept in

rapid and not equal movement by the impulse of its rotation on the air, flutter and play, and rise and fall, and

conduct themselves as like butterflies as heart could wish. Suddenly the noise and motion cease, and the

butterflies drop dead. An oar has been made since I came in, wanting the shaped handle. As quickly as I can

follow it with my eye and thought, the same oar is carried to a turning lathe. A whirl and a Nick! Handle

The exquisite beauty and efficiency of this machinery need no illustration, but happen to have a pointed

illustration today. A pair of oars of unusual size chance to be wanted for a special purpose, and they have to

be made by hand. Side by side with the subtle and facile machine, and side by side with the fastgrowing pile

of oars on the floor, a man shapes out these special oars with an axe. Attended by no butterflies, and chipping

and dinting, by comparison as leisurely as if he were a labouring Pagan getting them ready against his

decease at threescore and ten, to take with him as a present to Charon for his boat, the man (aged about thirty)

plies his task. The machine would make a regulation oar while the man wipes his forehead. The man might be

buried in a mound made of the strips of thin, broad, wooden ribbon torn from the wood whirled into oars as

the minutes fall from the clock, before he had done a forenoon's work with his axe.

Passing from this wonderful sight to the Ships again for my heart, as to the Yard, is where the ships are I

notice certain unfinished wooden walls left seasoning on the stocks, pending the solution of the merits of the

wood and iron question, and having an air of biding their time with surly confidence. The names of these

worthies are set up beside them, together with their capacity in guns a custom highly conducive to ease and

satisfaction in social intercourse, if it could be adapted to mankind. By a plank more gracefully pendulous

than substantial, I make bold to go aboard a transport ship (iron screw) just sent in from the contractor's yard

to be inspected and passed. She is a very gratifying experience, in the simplicity and humanity of her

arrangements for troops, in her provision for light and air and cleanliness, and in her care for women and

children. It occurs to me, as I explore her, that I would require a handsome sum of money to go aboard her, at

midnight by the Dockyard bell, and stay aboard alone till morning; for surely she must be haunted by a crowd

of ghosts of obstinate old martinets, mournfully flapping their cherubic epaulettes over the changed times.

Though still we may learn from the astounding ways and means in our Yards now, more highly than ever to

respect the forefathers who got to sea, and fought the sea, and held the sea, without them. This remembrance

putting me in the best of tempers with an old hulk, very green as to her copper, and generally dim and

patched, I pull off my hat to her. Which salutation a callow and downyfaced young officer of Engineers,

going by at the moment, perceiving, appropriates and to which he is most heartily welcome, I am sure.

Having been torn to pieces (in imagination) by the steam circular saws, perpendicular saws, horizontal saws,

and saws of eccentric action, I come to the sauntering part of my expedition, and consequently to the core of

Everywhere, as I saunter up and down the Yard, I meet with tokens of its quiet and retiring character. There is

a gravity upon its red brick offices and houses, a staid pretence of having nothing worth mentioning to do, an

avoidance of display, which I never saw out of England. The white stones of the pavement present no other

trace of Achilles and his twelve hundred banging men (not one of whom strikes an attitude) than a few

occasional echoes. But for a whisper in the air suggestive of sawdust and shavings, the oar making and the

saws of many movements might be miles away. Down below here, is the great reservoir of water where

timber is steeped in various temperatures, as a part of its seasoning process. Above it, on a tramroad

supported by pillars, is a Chinese Enchanter's Car, which fishes the logs up, when sufficiently steeped, and

rolls smoothly away with them to stack them. When I was a child (the Yard being then familiar to me) I used

to think that I should like to play at Chinese Enchanter, and to have that apparatus placed at my disposal for

the purpose by a beneficent country. I still think that I should rather like to try the effect of writing a book in

it. Its retirement is complete, and to go gliding to and fro among the stacks of timber would be a convenient

kind of travelling in foreign countries among the forests of North America, the sodden Honduras swamps,

the dark pine woods, the Norwegian frosts, and the tropical heats, rainy seasons, and thunderstorms. The

costly store of timber is stacked and stowed away in sequestered places, with the pervading avoidance of

flourish or effect. It makes as little of itself as possible, and calls to no one 'Come and look at me!' And yet it

is picked out from the trees of the world; picked out for length, picked out for breadth, picked out for

straightness, picked out for crookedness, chosen with an eye to every need of ship and boat. Strangely twisted

pieces lie about, precious in the sight of shipwrights. Sauntering through these groves, I come upon an open

glade where workmen are examining some timber recently delivered. Quite a pastoral scene, with a

background of river and windmill! and no more like War than the American States are at present like an

Sauntering among the ropemaking, I am spun into a state of blissful indolence, wherein my rope of life seems

to be so untwisted by the process as that I can see back to very early days indeed, when my bad dreams

they were frightful, though my more mature understanding has never made out why were of an

interminable sort of ropemaking, with long minute filaments for strands, which, when they were spun home

together close to my eyes, occasioned screaming. Next, I walk among the quiet lofts of stores of sails,

spars, rigging, ships' boats determined to believe that somebody in authority wears a girdle and bends

beneath the weight of a massive bunch of keys, and that, when such a thing is wanted, he comes telling his

keys like Blue Beard, and opens such a door. Impassive as the long lofts look, let the electric battery send

down the word, and the shutters and doors shall fly open, and such a fleet of armed ships, under steam and

under sail, shall burst forth as will charge the old Medway where the merry Stuart let the Dutch come,

while his not so merry sailors starved in the streets with something worth looking at to carry to the sea.

Thus I idle round to the Medway again, where it is now flood tide; and I find the river evincing a strong

solicitude to force a way into the dry dock where Achilles is waited on by the twelve hundred bangers, with

To the last, the Yard puts a quiet face upon it; for I make my way to the gates through a little quiet grove of

trees, shading the quaintest of Dutch landingplaces, where the leafspeckled shadow of a shipwright just

passing away at the further end might be the shadow of Russian Peter himself. So, the doors of the great

patent safe at last close upon me, and I take boat again: somehow, thinking as the oars dip, of braggart Pistol

and his brood, and of the quiet monsters of the Yard, with their 'We don't particularly want to do it; but if it

'It is neither a bold nor a diversified country,' said I to myself, 'this country which is threequarters Flemish,

and a quarter French; yet it has its attractions too. Though great lines of railway traverse it, the trains leave it

behind, and go puffing off to Paris and the South, to Belgium and Germany, to the Northern SeaCoast of

France, and to England, and merely smoke it a little in passing. Then I don't know it, and that is a good reason

for being here; and I can't pronounce half the long queer names I see inscribed over the shops, and that is

another good reason for being here, since I surely ought to learn how.' In short, I was 'here,' and I wanted an

excuse for not going away from here, and I made it to my satisfaction, and stayed here.

What part in my decision was borne by Monsieur P. Salcy, is of no moment, though I own to encountering

that gentleman's name on a red bill on the wall, before I made up my mind. Monsieur P. Salcy, 'par

permission de M. le Maire,' had established his theatre in the whitewashed Hotel de Ville, on the steps of

which illustrious edifice I stood. And Monsieur P. Salcy, privileged director of such theatre, situate in 'the

first theatrical arrondissement of the department of the North,' invited FrenchFlemish mankind to come and

partake of the intellectual banquet provided by his family of dramatic artists, fifteen subjects in number. 'La

Neither a bold nor a diversified country, I say again, and withal an untidy country, but pleasant enough to ride

in, when the paved roads over the flats and through the hollows, are not too deep in black mud. A country so

sparely inhabited, that I wonder where the peasants who till and sow and reap the ground, can possibly dwell,

and also by what invisible balloons they are conveyed from their distant homes into the fields at sunrise and

back again at sunset. The occasional few poor cottages and farms in this region, surely cannot afford shelter

to the numbers necessary to the cultivation, albeit the work is done so very deliberately, that on one long

harvest day I have seen, in twelve miles, about twice as many men and women (all told) reaping and binding.

Yet have I seen more cattle, more sheep, more pigs, and all in better case, than where there is purer French

spoken, and also better ricks round swelling pegtop ricks, well thatched; not a shapeless brown heap, like

the toast of a Giant's toastandwater, pinned to the earth with one of the skewers out of his kitchen. A good

custom they have about here, likewise, of prolonging the sloping tiled roof of farm or cottage, so that it

overhangs three or four feet, carrying off the wet, and making a good dryingplace wherein to hang up herbs,

or implements, or what not. A better custom than the popular one of keeping the refuseheap and puddle

close before the house door: which, although I paint my dwelling never so brightly blue (and it cannot be too

blue for me, hereabouts), will bring fever inside my door. Wonderful poultry of the FrenchFlemish country,

why take the trouble to BE poultry? Why not stop short at eggs in the rising generation, and die out and have

done with it? Parents of chickens have I seen this day, followed by their wretched young families, scratching

nothing out of the mud with an air tottering about on legs so scraggy and weak, that the valiant word

drumsticks becomes a mockery when applied to them, and the crow of the lord and master has been a mere

dejected case of croup. Carts have I seen, and other agricultural instruments, unwieldy, dislocated, monstrous.

Poplartrees by the thousand fringe the fields and fringe the end of the flat landscape, so that I feel, looking

straight on before me, as if, when I pass the extremest fringe on the low horizon, I shall tumble over into

space. Little whitewashed black holes of chapels, with barred doors and Flemish inscriptions, abound at

roadside corners, and often they are garnished with a sheaf of wooden crosses, like children's swords; or, in

their default, some hollow old tree with a saint roosting in it, is similarly decorated, or a pole with a very

diminutive saint enshrined aloft in a sort of sacred pigeonhouse. Not that we are deficient in such decoration

in the town here, for, over at the church yonder, outside the building, is a scenic representation of the

Crucifixion, built up with old bricks and stones, and made out with painted canvas and wooden figures: the

whole surmounting the dusty skull of some holy personage (perhaps), shut up behind a little ashy iron grate,

as if it were originally put there to be cooked, and the fire had long gone out. A windmilly country this,

though the windmills are so damp and rickety, that they nearly knock themselves off their legs at every turn

of their sails, and creak in loud complaint. A weaving country, too, for in the wayside cottages the loom goes

wearily rattle and click, rattle and click and, looking in, I see the poor weaving peasant, man or woman,

bending at the work, while the child, working too, turns a little handwheel put upon the ground to suit its

height. An unconscionable monster, the loom in a small dwelling, asserting himself ungenerously as the

breadwinner, straddling over the children's straw beds, cramping the family in space and air, and making

himself generally objectionable and tyrannical. He is tributary, too, to ugly mills and factories and

bleachinggrounds, rising out of the sluiced fields in an abrupt bare way, disdaining, like himself, to be

ornamental or accommodating. Surrounded by these things, here I stood on the steps of the Hotel de Ville,

There was a Fair besides. The double persuasion being irresistible, and my sponge being left behind at the

last Hotel, I made the tour of the little town to buy another. In the small sunny shops mercers, opticians,

and druggistgrocers, with here and there an emporium of religious images the gravest of old spectacled

Flemish husbands and wives sat contemplating one another across bare counters, while the wasps, who

seemed to have taken military possession of the town, and to have placed it under wasp martial law,

executed warlike manoeuvres in the windows. Other shops the wasps had entirely to themselves, and nobody

cared and nobody came when I beat with a fivefranc piece upon the board of custom. What I sought was no

more to be found than if I had sought a nugget of Californian gold: so I went, spongeless, to pass the evening

The members of the Family P. Salcy were so fat and so like one another fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,

uncles, and aunts that I think the local audience were much confused about the plot of the piece under

representation, and to the last expected that everybody must turn out to be the longlost relative of everybody

else. The Theatre was established on the top story of the Hotel de Ville, and was approached by a long bare

staircase, whereon, in an airy situation, one of the P. Salcy Family a stout gentleman imperfectly repressed

by a belt took the money. This occasioned the greatest excitement of the evening; for, no sooner did the

curtain rise on the introductory Vaudeville, and reveal in the person of the young lover (singing a very short

song with his eyebrows) apparently the very same identical stout gentleman imperfectly repressed by a belt,

than everybody rushed out to the payingplace, to ascertain whether he could possibly have put on that

dresscoat, that clear complexion, and those arched black vocal eyebrows, in so short a space of time. It then

became manifest that this was another stout gentleman imperfectly repressed by a belt: to whom, before the

spectators had recovered their presence of mind, entered a third stout gentleman imperfectly repressed by a

belt, exactly like him. These two 'subjects,' making with the moneytaker three of the announced fifteen, fell

into conversation touching a charming young widow: who, presently appearing, proved to be a stout lady

altogether irrepressible by any means quite a parallel case to the American Negro fourth of the fifteen

subjects, and sister of the fifth who presided over the checkdepartment. In good time the whole of the fifteen

subjects were dramatically presented, and we had the inevitable Ma Mere, Ma Mere! and also the inevitable

malediction d'un pere, and likewise the inevitable Marquis, and also the inevitable provincial young man,

weakminded but faithful, who followed Julie to Paris, and cried and laughed and choked all at once. The

story was wrought out with the help of a virtuous spinningwheel in the beginning, a vicious set of diamonds

in the middle, and a rheumatic blessing (which arrived by post) from Ma Mere towards the end; the whole

resulting in a small sword in the body of one of the stout gentlemen imperfectly repressed by a belt, fifty

thousand francs per annum and a decoration to the other stout gentleman imperfectly repressed by a belt, and

an assurance from everybody to the provincial young man that if he were not supremely happy which he

seemed to have no reason whatever for being he ought to be. This afforded him a final opportunity of

crying and laughing and choking all at once, and sent the audience home sentimentally delighted. Audience

more attentive or better behaved there could not possibly be, though the places of second rank in the Theatre

of the Family P. Salcy were sixpence each in English money, and the places of first rank a shilling. How the

What gorgeous china figures of knights and ladies, gilded till they gleamed again, I might have bought at the

Fair for the garniture of my home, if I had been a FrenchFlemish peasant, and had had the money! What

shining coffeecups and saucers I might have won at the turntables, if I had had the luck! Ravishing

perfumery also, and sweetmeats, I might have speculated in, or I might have fired for prizes at a multitude of

little dolls in niches, and might have hit the doll of dolls, and won francs and fame. Or, being a

FrenchFlemish youth, I might have been drawn in a handcart by my compeers, to tilt for municipal

rewards at the waterquintain; which, unless I sent my lance clean through the ring, emptied a full bucket

over me; to fend off which, the competitors wore grotesque old scarecrow hats. Or, being FrenchFlemish

man or woman, boy or girl, I might have circled all night on my hobby horse in a stately cavalcade of

hobbyhorses four abreast, interspersed with triumphal cars, going round and round and round and round, we

the goodly company singing a ceaseless chorus to the music of the barrelorgan, drum, and cymbals. On the

whole, not more monotonous than the Ring in Hyde Park, London, and much merrier; for when do the

circling company sing chorus, THERE, to the barrelorgan, when do the ladies embrace their horses round

the neck with both arms, when do the gentlemen fan the ladies with the tails of their gallant steeds? On all

these revolving delights, and on their own especial lamps and Chinese lanterns revolving with them, the

thoughtful weaverface brightens, and the Hotel de Ville sheds an illuminated line of gaslight: while above it,

the Eagle of France, gasoutlined and apparently afflicted with the prevailing infirmities that have lighted on

the poultry, is in a very undecided state of policy, and as a bird moulting. Flags flutter all around. Such is the

prevailing gaiety that the keeper of the prison sits on the stone steps outside the prisondoor, to have a look at

the world that is not locked up; while that agreeable retreat, the wineshop opposite to the prison in the

prisonalley (its sign La Tranquillite, because of its charming situation), resounds with the voices of the

shepherds and shepherdesses who resort there this festive night. And it reminds me that only this afternoon, I

saw a shepherd in trouble, tending this way, over the jagged stones of a neighbouring street. A magnificent

sight it was, to behold him in his blouse, a feeble little jogtrot rustic, swept along by the wind of two

immense gendarmes, in cockedhats for which the street was hardly wide enough, each carrying a bundle of

stolen property that would not have held his shoulderknot, and clanking a sabre that dwarfed the prisoner.

'Messieurs et Mesdames, I present to you at this Fair, as a mark of my confidence in the people of this

sorenowned town, and as an act of homage to their good sense and fine taste, the Ventriloquist, the

Ventriloquist! Further, Messieurs et Mesdames, I present to you the FaceMaker, the Physiognomist, the

great Changer of Countenances, who transforms the features that Heaven has bestowed upon him into an

endless succession of surprising and extraordinary visages, comprehending, Messieurs et Mesdames, all the

contortions, energetic and expressive, of which the human face is capable, and all the passions of the human

heart, as Love, Jealousy, Revenge, Hatred, Avarice, Despair! Hi hi! Ho ho! Lu lu! Come in!' To this effect,

with an occasional smite upon a sonorous kind of tambourine bestowed with a will, as if it represented the

people who won't come in holds forth a man of lofty and severe demeanour; a man in stately uniform,

gloomy with the knowledge he possesses of the inner secrets of the booth. 'Come in, come in! Your

opportunity presents itself tonight; tomorrow it will be gone for ever. Tomorrow morning by the Express

Train the railroad will reclaim the Ventriloquist and the FaceMaker! Algeria will reclaim the Ventriloquist

and the FaceMaker! Yes! For the honour of their country they have accepted propositions of a magnitude

incredible, to appear in Algeria. See them for the last time before their departure! We go to commence on the

instant. Hi hi! Ho ho! Lu lu! Come in! Take the money that now ascends, Madame; but after that, no more,

Nevertheless, the eyes both of the gloomy Speaker and of Madame receiving sous in a muslin bower, survey

the crowd pretty sharply after the ascending money has ascended, to detect any lingering sous at the

turningpoint. 'Come in, come in! Is there any more money, Madame, on the point of ascending? If so, we

wait for it. If not, we commence!' The orator looks back over his shoulder to say it, lashing the spectators

with the conviction that he beholds through the folds of the drapery into which he is about to plunge, the

Ventriloquist and the FaceMaker. Several sous burst out of pockets, and ascend. 'Come up, then, Messieurs!'

exclaims Madame in a shrill voice, and beckoning with a bejewelled finger. 'Come up! This presses.

Monsieur has commanded that they commence!' Monsieur dives into his Interior, and the last halfdozen of

us follow. His Interior is comparatively severe; his Exterior also. A true Temple of Art needs nothing but

seats, drapery, a small table with two moderator lamps hanging over it, and an ornamental lookingglass let

into the wall. Monsieur in uniform gets behind the table and surveys us with disdain, his forehead becoming

diabolically intellectual under the moderators. 'Messieurs et Mesdames, I present to you the Ventriloquist. He

will commence with the celebrated Experience of the bee in the window. The bee, apparently the veritable

bee of Nature, will hover in the window, and about the room. He will be with difficulty caught in the hand of

Monsieur the Ventriloquist he will escape he will again hover at length he will be recaptured by

Monsieur the Ventriloquist, and will be with difficulty put into a bottle. Achieve then, Monsieur!' Here the

proprietor is replaced behind the table by the Ventriloquist, who is thin and sallow, and of a weakly aspect.

While the bee is in progress, Monsieur the Proprietor sits apart on a stool, immersed in dark and remote

thought. The moment the bee is bottled, he stalks forward, eyes us gloomily as we applaud, and then

announces, sternly waving his hand: 'The magnificent Experience of the child with the whooping cough!'

The child disposed of, he starts up as before. 'The superb and extraordinary Experience of the dialogue

between Monsieur Tatambour in his diningroom, and his domestic, Jerome, in the cellar; concluding with

the songsters of the grove, and the Concert of domestic Farmyard animals.' All this done, and well done,

Monsieur the Ventriloquist withdraws, and Monsieur the Face Maker bursts in, as if his retiringroom were

a mile long instead of a yard. A corpulent little man in a large white waistcoat, with a comic countenance, and

with a wig in his hand. Irreverent disposition to laugh, instantly checked by the tremendous gravity of the

FaceMaker, who intimates in his bow that if we expect that sort of thing we are mistaken. A very little

shavingglass with a leg behind it is handed in, and placed on the table before the FaceMaker. 'Messieurs et

Mesdames, with no other assistance than this mirror and this wig, I shall have the honour of showing you a

thousand characters.' As a preparation, the FaceMaker with both hands gouges himself, and turns his mouth

inside out. He then becomes frightfully grave again, and says to the Proprietor, 'I am ready!' Proprietor stalks

forth from baleful reverie, and announces 'The Young Conscript!' FaceMaker claps his wig on, hind side

before, looks in the glass, and appears above it as a conscript so very imbecile, and squinting so extremely

hard, that I should think the State would never get any good of him. Thunders of applause. FaceMaker dips

behind the lookingglass, brings his own hair forward, is himself again, is awfully grave. 'A distinguished

inhabitant of the Faubourg St. Germain.' FaceMaker dips, rises, is supposed to be aged, bleareyed,

toothless, slightly palsied, supernaturally polite, evidently of noble birth. 'The oldest member of the Corps of

Invalides on the feteday of his master.' FaceMaker dips, rises, wears the wig on one side, has become the

feeblest military bore in existence, and (it is clear) would lie frightfully about his past achievements, if he

were not confined to pantomime. 'The Miser!' FaceMaker dips, rises, clutches a bag, and every hair of the

wig is on end to express that he lives in continual dread of thieves. 'The Genius of France!' FaceMaker dips,

rises, wig pushed back and smoothed flat, little cockedhat (artfully concealed till now) put atop of it, Face

Maker's white waistcoat much advanced, FaceMaker's left hand in bosom of white waistcoat, FaceMaker's

right hand behind his back. Thunders. This is the first of three positions of the Genius of France. In the

second position, the FaceMaker takes snuff; in the third, rolls up his fight hand, and surveys illimitable

armies through that pocketglass. The FaceMaker then, by putting out his tongue, and wearing the wig

nohow in particular, becomes the Village Idiot. The most remarkable feature in the whole of his ingenious

performance, is, that whatever he does to disguise himself, has the effect of rendering him rather more like

There were peepshows in this Fair, and I had the pleasure of recognising several fields of glory with which I

became well acquainted a year or two ago as Crimean battles, now doing duty as Mexican victories. The

change was neatly effected by some extra smoking of the Russians, and by permitting the camp followers

free range in the foreground to despoil the enemy of their uniforms. As no British troops had ever happened

to be within sight when the artist took his original sketches, it followed fortunately that none were in the way

The Fair wound up with a ball. Respecting the particular night of the week on which the ball took place, I

decline to commit myself; merely mentioning that it was held in a stableyard so very close to the railway,

that it was a mercy the locomotive did not set fire to it. (In Scotland, I suppose, it would have done so.)

There, in a tent prettily decorated with lookingglasses and a myriad of toy flags, the people danced all night.

It was not an expensive recreation, the price of a double ticket for a cavalier and lady being one and

threepence in English money, and even of that small sum fivepence was reclaimable for 'consommation:'

which word I venture to translate into refreshments of no greater strength, at the strongest, than ordinary wine

made hot, with sugar and lemon in it. It was a ball of great good humour and of great enjoyment, though very

many of the dancers must have been as poor as the fifteen subjects of the P. Salcy Family.

In short, not having taken my own pet national pint pot with me to this Fair, I was very well satisfied with the

measure of simple enjoyment that it poured into the dull FrenchFlemish country life. How dull that is, I had

an opportunity of considering when the Fair was over when the tricoloured flags were withdrawn from

the windows of the houses on the Place where the Fair was held when the windows were close shut,

apparently until next Fairtime when the Hotel de Ville had cut off its gas and put away its eagle when

the two paviours, whom I take to form the entire paving population of the town, were ramming down the

stones which had been pulled up for the erection of decorative poles when the jailer had slammed his gate,

and sulkily locked himself in with his charges. But then, as I paced the ring which marked the track of the

departed hobbyhorses on the marketplace, pondering in my mind how long some hobbyhorses do leave

their tracks in public ways, and how difficult they are to erase, my eyes were greeted with a goodly sight. I

beheld four male personages thoughtfully pacing the Place together, in the sunlight, evidently not belonging

to the town, and having upon them a certain loose cosmopolitan air of not belonging to any town. One was

clad in a suit of white canvas, another in a cap and blouse, the third in an old military frock, the fourth in a

shapeless dress that looked as if it had been made out of old umbrellas. All wore dustcoloured shoes. My

heart beat high; for, in those four male personages, although complexionless and eyebrowless, I beheld four

subjects of the Family P. Salcy. Bluebearded though they were, and bereft of the youthful smoothness of

cheek which is imparted by what is termed in Albion a 'Whitechapel shave' (and which is, in fact, whitening,

judiciously applied to the jaws with the palm of the hand), I recognised them. As I stood admiring, there

emerged from the yard of a lowly Cabaret, the excellent Ma Mere, Ma Mere, with the words, 'The soup is

served;' words which so elated the subject in the canvas suit, that when they all ran in to partake, he went last,

dancing with his hands stuck angularly into the pockets of his canvas trousers, after the Pierrot manner.

Glancing down the Yard, the last I saw of him was, that he looked in through a window (at the soup, no

Full of this pleasure, I shortly afterwards departed from the town, little dreaming of an addition to my good

fortune. But more was in reserve. I went by a train which was heavy with thirdclass carriages, full of young

fellows (well guarded) who had drawn unlucky numbers in the last conscription, and were on their way to a

famous French garrison town where much of the raw military material is worked up into soldiery. At the

station they had been sitting about, in their threadbare homespun blue garments, with their poor little bundles

under their arms, covered with dust and clay, and the various soils of France; sad enough at heart, most of

them, but putting a good face upon it, and slapping their breasts and singing choruses on the smallest

provocation; the gayest spirits shouldering half loaves of black bread speared upon their walkingsticks. As

we went along, they were audible at every station, chorusing wildly out of tune, and feigning the highest

hilarity. After a while, however, they began to leave off singing, and to laugh naturally, while at intervals

there mingled with their laughter the barking of a dog. Now, I had to alight short of their destination, and, as

that stoppage of the train was attended with a quantity of horn blowing, bell ringing, and proclamation of

what Messieurs les Voyageurs were to do, and were not to do, in order to reach their respective destinations, I

had ample leisure to go forward on the platform to take a parting look at my recruits, whose heads were all

out at window, and who were laughing like delighted children. Then I perceived that a large poodle with a

pink nose, who had been their travelling companion and the cause of their mirth, stood on his hindlegs

presenting arms on the extreme verge of the platform, ready to salute them as the train went off. This poodle

wore a military shako (it is unnecessary to add, very much on one side over one eye), a little military coat,

and the regulation white gaiters. He was armed with a little musket and a little swordbayonet, and he stood

presenting arms in perfect attitude, with his unobscured eye on his master or superior officer, who stood by

him. So admirable was his discipline, that, when the train moved, and he was greeted with the parting cheers

of the recruits, and also with a shower of centimes, several of which struck his shako, and had a tendency to

discompose him, he remained staunch on his post, until the train was gone. He then resigned his arms to his

officer, took off his shako by rubbing his paw over it, dropped on four legs, bringing his uniform coat into the

absurdest relations with the overarching skies, and ran about the platform in his white gaiters, waging his tail

to an exceeding great extent. It struck me that there was more waggery than this in the poodle, and that he

knew that the recruits would neither get through their exercises, nor get rid of their uniforms, as easily as he;

revolving which in my thoughts, and seeking in my pockets some small money to bestow upon him, I

casually directed my eyes to the face of his superior officer, and in him beheld the FaceMaker! Though it

was not the way to Algeria, but quite the reverse, the military poodle's Colonel was the FaceMaker in a dark

blouse, with a small bundle dangling over his shoulder at the end of an umbrella, and taking a pipe from his

My voyages (in paper boats) among savages often yield me matter for reflection at home. It is curious to trace

the savage in the civilised man, and to detect the hold of some savage customs on conditions of society rather

I wonder, is the Medicine Man of the North American Indians never to be got rid of, out of the North

American country? He comes into my Wigwam on all manner of occasions, and with the absurdest

'Medicine.' I always find it extremely difficult, and I often find it simply impossible, to keep him out of my

Wigwam. For his legal 'Medicine' he sticks upon his head the hair of quadrupeds, and plasters the same with

fat, and dirty white powder, and talks a gibberish quite unknown to the men and squaws of his tribe. For his

religious 'Medicine' he puts on puffy white sleeves, little black aprons, large black waistcoats of a peculiar

cut, collarless coats with Medicine buttonholes, Medicine stockings and gaiters and shoes, and tops the

whole with a highly grotesque Medicinal hat. In one respect, to be sure, I am quite free from him. On

occasions when the Medicine Men in general, together with a large number of the miscellaneous inhabitants

of his village, both male and female, are presented to the principal Chief, his native 'Medicine' is a comical

mixture of old odds and ends (hired of traders) and new things in antiquated shapes, and pieces of red cloth

(of which he is particularly fond), and white and red and blue paint for the face. The irrationality of this

particular Medicine culminates in a mock battlerush, from which many of the squaws are borne out, much

dilapidated. I need not observe how unlike this is to a Drawing Room at St. James's Palace.

The African magician I find it very difficult to exclude from my Wigwam too. This creature takes cases of

death and mourning under his supervision, and will frequently impoverish a whole family by his preposterous

enchantments. He is a great eater and drinker, and always conceals a rejoicing stomach under a grieving

exterior. His charms consist of an infinite quantity of worthless scraps, for which he charges very high. He

impresses on the poor bereaved natives, that the more of his followers they pay to exhibit such scraps on their

persons for an hour or two (though they never saw the deceased in their lives, and are put in high spirits by

his decease), the more honourably and piously they grieve for the dead. The poor people submitting

themselves to this conjurer, an expensive procession is formed, in which bits of stick, feathers of birds, and a

quantity of other unmeaning objects besmeared with black paint, are carried in a certain ghastly order of

which no one understands the meaning, if it ever had any, to the brink of the grave, and are then brought back

In the Tonga Islands everything is supposed to have a soul, so that when a hatchet is irreparably broken, they

say, 'His immortal part has departed; he is gone to the happy huntingplains.' This belief leads to the logical

sequence that when a man is buried, some of his eating and drinking vessels, and some of his warlike

implements, must be broken and buried with him. Superstitious and wrong, but surely a more respectable

superstition than the hire of antic scraps for a show that has no meaning based on any sincere belief.

Let me halt on my Uncommercial road, to throw a passing glance on some funeral solemnities that I have

seen where North American Indians, African Magicians, and Tonga Islanders, are supposed not to be.

Once, I dwelt in an Italian city, where there dwelt with me for a while, an Englishman of an amiable nature,

great enthusiasm, and no discretion. This friend discovered a desolate stranger, mourning over the unexpected

death of one very dear to him, in a solitary cottage among the vineyards of an outlying village. The

circumstances of the bereavement were unusually distressing; and the survivor, new to the peasants and the

country, sorely needed help, being alone with the remains. With some difficulty, but with the strong influence

of a purpose at once gentle, disinterested, and determined, my friend Mr. Kindheart obtained access to the

There was a small Protestant cemetery near the city walls, and as Mr. Kindheart came back to me, he turned

into it and chose the spot. He was always highly flushed when rendering a service unaided, and I knew that to

make him happy I must keep aloof from his ministration. But when at dinner he warmed with the good action

of the day, and conceived the brilliant idea of comforting the mourner with 'an English funeral,' I ventured to

intimate that I thought that institution, which was not absolutely sublime at home, might prove a failure in

Italian hands. However, Mr. Kindheart was so enraptured with his conception, that he presently wrote down

into the town requesting the attendance with tomorrow's earliest light of a certain little upholsterer. This

upholsterer was famous for speaking the unintelligible local dialect (his own) in a far more unintelligible

When from my bath next morning I overheard Mr. Kindheart and the upholsterer in conference on the top of

an echoing staircase; and when I overheard Mr. Kindheart rendering English Undertaking phrases into very

choice Italian, and the upholsterer replying in the unknown Tongues; and when I furthermore remembered

that the local funerals had no resemblance to English funerals; I became in my secret bosom apprehensive.

But Mr. Kindheart informed me at breakfast that measures had been taken to ensure a signal success.

As the funeral was to take place at sunset, and as I knew to which of the city gates it must tend, I went out at

that gate as the sun descended, and walked along the dusty, dusty road. I had not walked far, when I

2. A bright yellow coach and pair, driven by a coachman in bright red velvet kneebreeches and waistcoat.

(This was the established local idea of State.) Both coach doors kept open by the coffin, which was on its side

3. Behind the coach, the mourner, for whom the coach was intended, walking in the dust.

4. Concealed behind a roadside well for the irrigation of a garden, the unintelligible Upholsterer, admiring.

It matters little now. Coaches of all colours are alike to poor Kindheart, and he rests far North of the little

cemetery with the cypresstrees, by the city walls where the Mediterranean is so beautiful.

My first funeral, a fair representative funeral after its kind, was that of the husband of a married servant, once

my nurse. She married for money. Sally Flanders, after a year or two of matrimony, became the relict of

Flanders, a small master builder; and either she or Flanders had done me the honour to express a desire that I

should 'follow.' I may have been seven or eight years old; young enough, certainly, to feel rather alarmed

by the expression, as not knowing where the invitation was held to terminate, and how far I was expected to

follow the deceased Flanders. Consent being given by the heads of houses, I was jobbed up into what was

pronounced at home decent mourning (comprehending somebody else's shirt, unless my memory deceives

me), and was admonished that if, when the funeral was in action, I put my hands in my pockets, or took my

eyes out of my pockethandkerchief, I was personally lost, and my family disgraced. On the eventful day,

having tried to get myself into a disastrous frame of mind, and having formed a very poor opinion of myself

because I couldn't cry, I repaired to Sally's. Sally was an excellent creature, and had been a good wife to old

Flanders, but the moment I saw her I knew that she was not in her own real natural state. She formed a sort of

Coat of Arms, grouped with a smellingbottle, a handkerchief, an orange, a bottle of vinegar, Flanders's

sister, her own sister, Flanders's brother's wife, and two neighbouring gossips all in mourning, and all ready

to hold her whenever she fainted. At sight of poor little me she became much agitated (agitating me much

more), and having exclaimed, 'O here's dear Master Uncommercial!' became hysterical, and swooned as if I

had been the death of her. An affecting scene followed, during which I was handed about and poked at her by

various people, as if I were the bottle of salts. Reviving a little, she embraced me, said, 'You knew him well,

dear Master Uncommercial, and he knew you!' and fainted again: which, as the rest of the Coat of Arms

soothingly said, 'done her credit.' Now, I knew that she needn't have fainted unless she liked, and that she

wouldn't have fainted unless it had been expected of her, quite as well as I know it at this day. It made me

feel uncomfortable and hypocritical besides. I was not sure but that it might be manners in ME to faint next,

and I resolved to keep my eye on Flanders's uncle, and if I saw any signs of his going in that direction, to go

too, politely. But Flanders's uncle (who was a weak little old retail grocer) had only one idea, which was that

we all wanted tea; and he handed us cups of tea all round, incessantly, whether we refused or not. There was

a young nephew of Flanders's present, to whom Flanders, it was rumoured, had left nineteen guineas. He

drank all the tea that was offered him, this nephew amounting, I should say, to several quarts and ate as

much plumcake as he could possibly come by; but he felt it to be decent mourning that he should now and

then stop in the midst of a lump of cake, and appear to forget that his mouth was full, in the contemplation of

his uncle's memory. I felt all this to be the fault of the undertaker, who was handing us gloves on a teatray as

if they were muffins, and tying us into cloaks (mine had to be pinned up all round, it was so long for me),

because I knew that he was making game. So, when we got out into the streets, and I constantly disarranged

the procession by tumbling on the people before me because my handkerchief blinded my eyes, and tripping

up the people behind me because my cloak was so long, I felt that we were all making game. I was truly sorry

for Flanders, but I knew that it was no reason why we should be trying (the women with their heads in hoods

like coalscuttles with the black side outward) to keep step with a man in a scarf, carrying a thing like a

mourning spyglass, which he was going to open presently and sweep the horizon with. I knew that we

should not all have been speaking in one particular keynote struck by the undertaker, if we had not been

making game. Even in our faces we were every one of us as like the undertaker as if we had been his own

family, and I perceived that this could not have happened unless we had been making game. When we

returned to Sally's, it was all of a piece. The continued impossibility of getting on without plumcake; the

ceremonious apparition of a pair of decanters containing port and sherry and cork; Sally's sister at the

teatable, clinking the best crockery and shaking her head mournfully every time she looked down into the

teapot, as if it were the tomb; the Coat of Arms again, and Sally as before; lastly, the words of consolation

administered to Sally when it was considered right that she should 'come round nicely:' which were, that the

Other funerals have I seen with grownup eyes, since that day, of which the burden has been the same

childish burden. Making game. Real affliction, real grief and solemnity, have been outraged, and the funeral

has been 'performed.' The waste for which the funeral customs of many tribes of savages are conspicuous, has

attended these civilised obsequies; and once, and twice, have I wished in my soul that if the waste must be,

In France, upon the whole, these ceremonies are more sensibly regulated, because they are upon the whole

less expensively regulated. I cannot say that I have ever been much edified by the custom of tying a bib and

apron on the front of the house of mourning, or that I would myself particularly care to be driven to my grave

in a nodding and bobbing car, like an infirm fourpost bedstead, by an inky fellowcreature in a cockedhat.

But it may be that I am constitutionally insensible to the virtues of a cockedhat. In provincial France, the

solemnities are sufficiently hideous, but are few and cheap. The friends and townsmen of the departed, in

their own dresses and not masquerading under the auspices of the African Conjurer, surround the handbier,

and often carry it. It is not considered indispensable to stifle the bearers, or even to elevate the burden on their

shoulders; consequently it is easily taken up, and easily set down, and is carried through the streets without

the distressing floundering and shuffling that we see at home. A dirty priest or two, and a dirtier acolyte or

two, do not lend any especial grace to the proceedings; and I regard with personal animosity the bassoon,

which is blown at intervals by the biglegged priest (it is always a biglegged priest who blows the bassoon),

when his fellows combine in a lugubrious stalwart drawl. But there is far less of the Conjurer and the

Medicine Man in the business than under like circumstances here. The grim coaches that we reserve

expressly for such shows, are nonexistent; if the cemetery be far out of the town, the coaches that are hired

for other purposes of life are hired for this purpose; and although the honest vehicles make no pretence of

being overcome, I have never noticed that the people in them were the worse for it. In Italy, the hooded

Members of Confraternities who attend on funerals, are dismal and ugly to look upon; but the services they

render are at least voluntarily rendered, and impoverish no one, and cost nothing. Why should high

civilisation and low savagery ever come together on the point of making them a wantonly wasteful and

Once I lost a friend by death, who had been troubled in his time by the Medicine Man and the Conjurer, and

upon whose limited resources there were abundant claims. The Conjurer assured me that I must positively

'follow,' and both he and the Medicine Man entertained no doubt that I must go in a black carriage, and must

wear 'fittings.' I objected to fittings as having nothing to do with my friendship, and I objected to the black

carriage as being in more senses than one a job. So, it came into my mind to try what would happen if I

quietly walked, in my own way, from my own house to my friend's burialplace, and stood beside his open

grave in my own dress and person, reverently listening to the best of Services. It satisfied my mind, I found,

quite as well as if I had been disguised in a hired hatband and scarf both trailing to my very heels, and as if I

Can any one who ever beheld the stupendous absurdities attendant on 'A message from the Lords' in the

House of Commons, turn upon the Medicine Man of the poor Indians? Has he any 'Medicine' in that dried

skin pouch of his, so supremely ludicrous as the two Masters in Chancery holding up their black petticoats

and butting their ridiculous wigs at Mr. Speaker? Yet there are authorities innumerable to tell me as there

are authorities innumerable among the Indians to tell them that the nonsense is indispensable, and that its

abrogation would involve most awful consequences. What would any rational creature who had never heard

of judicial and forensic 'fittings,' think of the Court of Common Pleas on the first day of Term? Or with what

an awakened sense of humour would LIVINGSTONE'S account of a similar scene be perused, if the fur and

red cloth and goats' hair and horse hair and powdered chalk and black patches on the top of the head, were all

at Tala Mungongo instead of Westminster? That model missionary and good brave man found at least one

tribe of blacks with a very strong sense of the ridiculous, insomuch that although an amiable and docile

people, they never could see the Missionaries dispose of their legs in the attitude of kneeling, or hear them

begin a hymn in chorus, without bursting into roars of irrepressible laughter. It is much to be hoped that no

member of this facetious tribe may ever find his way to England and get committed for contempt of Court.

In the Tonga Island already mentioned, there are a set of personages called Mataboos or some such name

who are the masters of all the public ceremonies, and who know the exact place in which every chief must sit

down when a solemn public meeting takes place: a meeting which bears a family resemblance to our own

Public Dinner, in respect of its being a main part of the proceedings that every gentleman present is required

to drink something nasty. These Mataboos are a privileged order, so important is their avocation, and they

make the most of their high functions. A long way out of the Tonga Islands, indeed, rather near the British

Islands, was there no calling in of the Mataboos the other day to settle an earthconvulsing question of

precedence; and was there no weighty opinion delivered on the part of the Mataboos which, being interpreted

to that unlucky tribe of blacks with the sense of the ridiculous, would infallibly set the whole population

My sense of justice demands the admission, however, that this is not quite a onesided question. If we submit

ourselves meekly to the Medicine Man and the Conjurer, and are not exalted by it, the savages may retort

upon us that we act more unwisely than they in other matters wherein we fail to imitate them. It is a widely

diffused custom among savage tribes, when they meet to discuss any affair of public importance, to sit up all

night making a horrible noise, dancing, blowing shells, and (in cases where they are familiar with firearms)

flying out into open places and letting off guns. It is questionable whether our legislative assemblies might

not take a hint from this. A shell is not a melodious wind instrument, and it is monotonous; but it is as

musical as, and not more monotonous than, my Honourable friend's own trumpet, or the trumpet that he

blows so hard for the Minister. The uselessness of arguing with any supporter of a Government or of an

Opposition, is well known. Try dancing. It is a better exercise, and has the unspeakable recommendation that

it couldn't be reported. The honourable and savage member who has a loaded gun, and has grown impatient

of debate, plunges out of doors, fires in the air, and returns calm and silent to the Palaver. Let the honourable

and civilised member similarly charged with a speech, dart into the cloisters of Westminster Abbey in the

silence of night, let his speech off, and come back harmless. It is not at first sight a very rational custom to

paint a broad blue stripe across one's nose and both cheeks, and a broad red stripe from the forehead to the

chin, to attach a few pounds of wood to one's under lip, to stick fishbones in one's ears and a brass

curtainring in one's nose, and to rub one's body all over with rancid oil, as a preliminary to entering on

business. But this is a question of taste and ceremony, and so is the Windsor Uniform. The manner of

entering on the business itself is another question. A council of six hundred savage gentlemen entirely

independent of tailors, sitting on their hams in a ring, smoking, and occasionally grunting, seem to me,

according to the experience I have gathered in my voyages and travels, somehow to do what they come

together for; whereas that is not at all the general experience of a council of six hundred civilised gentlemen

very dependent on tailors and sitting on mechanical contrivances. It is better that an Assembly should do its

utmost to envelop itself in smoke, than that it should direct its endeavours to enveloping the public in smoke;

and I would rather it buried half a hundred hatchets than buried one subject demanding attention.

By the side of most railways out of London, one may see AlmsHouses and Retreats (generally with a Wing

or a Centre wanting, and ambitious of being much bigger than they are), some of which are newlyfounded

Institutions, and some old establishments transplanted. There is a tendency in these pieces of architecture to

shoot upward unexpectedly, like Jack's beanstalk, and to be ornate in spires of Chapels and lanterns of

Halls, which might lead to the embellishment of the air with many castles of questionable beauty but for the

restraining consideration of expense. However, the manners, being always of a sanguine temperament,

comfort themselves with plans and elevations of Loomings in the future, and are influenced in the present by

philanthropy towards the railway passengers. For, the question how prosperous and promising the buildings

can be made to look in their eyes, usually supersedes the lesser question how they can be turned to the best

Why none of the people who reside in these places ever look out of window, or take an airing in the piece of

ground which is going to be a garden byandby, is one of the wonders I have added to my

alwayslengthening list of the wonders of the world. I have got it into my mind that they live in a state of

chronic injury and resentment, and on that account refuse to decorate the building with a human interest. As I

have known legatees deeply injured by a bequest of five hundred pounds because it was not five thousand,

and as I was once acquainted with a pensioner on the Public to the extent of two hundred a year, who

perpetually anathematised his Country because he was not in the receipt of four, having no claim whatever to

sixpence: so perhaps it usually happens, within certain limits, that to get a little help is to get a notion of

being defrauded of more. 'How do they pass their lives in this beautiful and peaceful place!' was the subject

of my speculation with a visitor who once accompanied me to a charming rustic retreat for old men and

women: a quaint ancient foundation in a pleasant English country, behind a picturesque church and among

rich old convent gardens. There were but some dozen or so of houses, and we agreed that we would talk with

the inhabitants, as they sat in their groined rooms between the light of their fires and the light shining in at

their latticed windows, and would find out. They passed their lives in considering themselves mulcted of

certain ounces of tea by a deaf old steward who lived among them in the quadrangle. There was no reason to

suppose that any such ounces of tea had ever been in existence, or that the old steward so much as knew what

was the matter; he passed HIS life in considering himself periodically defrauded of a birchbroom by the

But it is neither to old AlmsHouses in the country, nor to new AlmsHouses by the railroad, that these

present Uncommercial notes relate. They refer back to journeys made among those commonplace,

smokyfronted London AlmsHouses, with a little paved courtyard in front enclosed by iron railings, which

have got snowed up, as it were, by bricks and mortar; which were once in a suburb, but are now in the

densely populated town; gaps in the busy life around them, parentheses in the close and blotted texts of the

Sometimes, these AlmsHouses belong to a Company or Society. Sometimes, they were established by

individuals, and are maintained out of private funds bequeathed in perpetuity long ago. My favourite among

them is Titbull's, which establishment is a picture of many. Of Titbull I know no more than that he deceased

in 1723, that his Christian name was Sampson, and his social designation Esquire, and that he founded these

AlmsHouses as Dwellings for Nine Poor Women and Six Poor Men by his Will and Testament. I should not

know even this much, but for its being inscribed on a grim stone very difficult to read, let into the front of the

centre house of Titbull's AlmsHouses, and which stone is ornamented atop with a piece of sculptured

Titbull's AlmsHouses are in the east of London, in a great highway, in a poor, busy, and thronged

neighbourhood. Old iron and fried fish, cough drops and artificial flowers, boiled pigs'feet and household

furniture that looks as if it were polished up with lipsalve, umbrellas full of vocal literature and saucers full

of shellfish in a green juice which I hope is natural to them when their health is good, garnish the paved

sideways as you go to Titbull's. I take the ground to have risen in those parts since Titbull's time, and you

drop into his domain by three stone steps. So did I first drop into it, very nearly striking my brows against

Titbull's pump, which stands with its back to the thoroughfare just inside the gate, and has a conceited air of

'And a worse one,' said a virulent old man with a pitcher, 'there isn't nowhere. A harder one to work, nor a

grudginer one to yield, there isn't nowhere!' This old man wore a long coat, such as we see Hogarth's

Chairmen represented with, and it was of that peculiar greenpea hue without the green, which seems to

come of poverty. It had also that peculiar smell of cupboard which seems to come of poverty.

'Not IT,' said the old man, regarding it with undiluted virulence in his watery eye. 'It never were fit to be

The old man, who had a working mouth which seemed to be trying to masticate his anger and to find that it

'If you mean the gentlemen who administer this place, no, I am not one of them; nor have I ever so much as

'I wish I never heard of them,' gasped the old man: 'at my time of life with the rheumatics drawing

waterfrom that thing!' Not to be deluded into calling it a Pump, the old man gave it another virulent look,

took up his pitcher, and carried it into a corner dwellinghouse, shutting the door after him.

Looking around and seeing that each little house was a house of two little rooms; and seeing that the little

oblong courtyard in front was like a graveyard for the inhabitants, saving that no word was engraven on its

flat dry stones; and seeing that the currents of life and noise ran to and fro outside, having no more to do with

the place than if it were a sort of lowwater mark on a lively beach; I say, seeing this and nothing else, I was

'No at least I pray what is the name of the elderly gentleman who lives in the corner there?'

The tidy woman stepped out to be sure of the door I indicated, and she and the pump and I stood all three in a

'Well, Mr. Battens is the oldest here that is to say, the oldest of the old gentlemen in point of residence.'

She had a way of passing her hands over and under one another as she spoke, that was not only tidy but

propitiatory; so I asked her if I might look at her little sittingroom? She willingly replied Yes, and we went

into it together: she leaving the door open, with an eye as I understood to the social proprieties. The door

opening at once into the room without any intervening entry, even scandal must have been silenced by the

It was a gloomy little chamber, but clean, and with a mug of wallflower in the window. On the

chimneypiece were two peacock's feathers, a carved ship, a few shells, and a black profile with one eyelash;

whether this portrait purported to be male or female passed my comprehension, until my hostess informed me

'No, sir,' said the widow, 'he were cast away in China.' This was said with a modest sense of its reflecting a

'If the old gentlemen here are not given to talking,' said I, 'I hope the old ladies are? not that you are one.'

'Well, whether the gentlemen really do deprive us of any little matters which ought to be ours by rights, I

cannot say for certain; but the opinion of the old ones is they do. And Mr. Battens he do even go so far as to

doubt whether credit is due to the Founder. For Mr. Battens he do say, anyhow he got his name up by it and

'It may be so,' returned the tidy widow, 'but the handle does go very hard. Still, what I say to myself is, the

gentlemen MAY not pocket the difference between a good pump and a bad one, and I would wish to think

well of them. And the dwellings,' said my hostess, glancing round her room; 'perhaps they were convenient

dwellings in the Founder's time, considered AS his time, and therefore he should not be blamed. But Mrs.

'The oldest but one. Mrs. Quinch being the oldest, and have totally lost her head.'

'I am the youngest in residence, and consequently am not looked up to. But when Mrs. Quinch makes a happy

release, there will be one below me. Nor is it to be expected that Mrs. Saggers will prove herself immortal.'

'Regarding the old gentlemen,' said my widow slightingly, 'they count among themselves. They do not count

among us. Mr. Battens is that exceptional that he have written to the gentlemen many times and have worked

the case against them. Therefore he have took a higher ground. But we do not, as a rule, greatly reckon the

Pursuing the subject, I found it to be traditionally settled among the poor ladies that the poor gentlemen,

whatever their ages, were all very old indeed, and in a state of dotage. I also discovered that the juniors and

newcomers preserved, for a time, a waning disposition to believe in Titbull and his trustees, but that as they

gained social standing they lost this faith, and disparaged Titbull and all his works.

Improving my acquaintance subsequently with this respected lady, whose name was Mrs. Mitts, and

occasionally dropping in upon her with a little offering of sound Family Hyson in my pocket, I gradually

became familiar with the inner politics and ways of Titbull's AlmsHouses. But I never could find out who

the trustees were, or where they were: it being one of the fixed ideas of the place that those authorities must

be vaguely and mysteriously mentioned as 'the gentlemen' only. The secretary of 'the gentlemen' was once

pointed out to me, evidently engaged in championing the obnoxious pump against the attacks of the

discontented Mr. Battens; but I am not in a condition to report further of him than that he had the sprightly

bearing of a lawyer's clerk. I had it from Mrs. Mitts's lips in a very confidential moment, that Mr. Battens was

once 'had up before the gentlemen' to stand or fall by his accusations, and that an old shoe was thrown after

him on his departure from the building on this dread errand; not ineffectually, for, the interview resulting in

a plumber, was considered to have encircled the temples of Mr. Battens with the wreath of victory,

In Titbull's AlmsHouses, the local society is not regarded as good society. A gentleman or lady receiving

visitors from without, or going out to tea, counts, as it were, accordingly; but visitings or teadrinkings

interchanged among Titbullians do not score. Such interchanges, however, are rare, in consequence of

internal dissensions occasioned by Mrs. Saggers's pail: which household article has split Titbull's into almost

as many parties as there are dwellings in that precinct. The extremely complicated nature of the conflicting

articles of belief on the subject prevents my stating them here with my usual perspicuity, but I think they have

all branched off from the rootandtrunk question, Has Mrs. Saggers any right to stand her pail outside her

dwelling? The question has been much refined upon, but roughly stated may be stated in those terms.

There are two old men in Titbull's AlmsHouses who, I have been given to understand, knew each other in

the world beyond its pump and iron railings, when they were both 'in trade.' They make the best of their

reverses, and are looked upon with great contempt. They are little, stooping, bleareyed old men of cheerful

countenance, and they hobble up and down the courtyard wagging their chins and talking together quite

gaily. This has given offence, and has, moreover, raised the question whether they are justified in passing any

other windows than their own. Mr. Battens, however, permitting them to pass HIS windows, on the disdainful

ground that their imbecility almost amounts to irresponsibility, they are allowed to take their walk in peace.

They live next door to one another, and take it by turns to read the newspaper aloud (that is to say, the newest

newspaper they can get), and they play cribbage at night. On warm and sunny days they have been known to

go so far as to bring out two chairs and sit by the iron railings, looking forth; but this low conduct, being

much remarked upon throughout Titbull's, they were deterred by an outraged public opinion from repeating

it. There is a rumour but it may be malicious that they hold the memory of Titbull in some weak sort of

veneration, and that they once set off together on a pilgrimage to the parish churchyard to find his tomb. To

this, perhaps, might be traced a general suspicion that they are spies of 'the gentlemen:' to which they were

supposed to have given colour in my own presence on the occasion of the weak attempt at justification of the

pump by the gentlemen's clerk; when they emerged bareheaded from the doors of their dwellings, as if their

dwellings and themselves constituted an oldfashioned weatherglass of double action with two figures of

old ladies inside, and deferentially bowed to him at intervals until he took his departure. They are understood

to be perfectly friendless and relationless. Unquestionably the two poor fellows make the very best of their

lives in Titbull's AlmsHouses, and unquestionably they are (as before mentioned) the subjects of

On Saturday nights, when there is a greater stir than usual outside, and when itinerant vendors of

miscellaneous wares even take their stations and light up their smoky lamps before the iron railings, Titbull's

becomes flurried. Mrs. Saggers has her celebrated palpitations of the heart, for the most part, on Saturday

nights. But Titbull's is unfit to strive with the uproar of the streets in any of its phases. It is religiously

believed at Titbull's that people push more than they used, and likewise that the foremost object of the

population of England and Wales is to get you down and trample on you. Even of railroads they know, at

Titbull's, little more than the shriek (which Mrs. Saggers says goes through her, and ought to be taken up by

Government); and the penny postage may even yet be unknown there, for I have never seen a letter delivered

to any inhabitant. But there is a tall, straight, sallow lady resident in Number Seven, Titbull's, who never

speaks to anybody, who is surrounded by a superstitious halo of lost wealth, who does her household work in

housemaid's gloves, and who is secretly much deferred to, though openly cavilled at; and it has obscurely

leaked out that this old lady has a son, grandson, nephew, or other relative, who is 'a Contractor,' and who

would think it nothing of a job to knock down Titbull's, pack it off into Cornwall, and knock it together again.

An immense sensation was made by a gipsyparty calling in a springvan, to take this old lady up to go for a

day's pleasure into Epping Forest, and notes were compared as to which of the company was the son,

grandson, nephew, or other relative, the Contractor. A thick set personage with a white hat and a cigar in his

mouth, was the favourite: though as Titbull's had no other reason to believe that the Contractor was there at

all, than that this man was supposed to eye the chimney stacks as if he would like to knock them down and

cart them off, the general mind was much unsettled in arriving at a conclusion. As a way out of this difficulty,

it concentrated itself on the acknowledged Beauty of the party, every stitch in whose dress was verbally

unripped by the old ladies then and there, and whose 'goings on' with another and a thinner personage in a

white hat might have suffused the pump (where they were principally discussed) with blushes, for months

afterwards. Herein Titbull's was to Titbull's true, for it has a constitutional dislike of all strangers. As

concerning innovations and improvements, it is always of opinion that what it doesn't want itself, nobody

Of the humble treasures of furniture brought into Titbull's by the inmates when they establish themselves in

that place of contemplation for the rest of their days, by far the greater and more valuable part belongs to the

ladies. I may claim the honour of having either crossed the threshold, or looked in at the door, of every one of

the nine ladies, and I have noticed that they are all particular in the article of bedsteads, and maintain

favourite and longestablished bedsteads and bedding as a regular part of their rest. Generally an antiquated

chest of drawers is among their cherished possessions; a teatray always is. I know of at least two rooms in

which a little teakettle of genuine burnished copper, vies with the cat in winking at the fire; and one old lady

has a teaurn set forth in state on the top of her chest of drawers, which urn is used as her library, and

contains four duodecimo volumes, and a blackbordered newspaper giving an account of the funeral of Her

Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte. Among the poor old gentlemen there are no such niceties. Their

furniture has the air of being contributed, like some obsolete Literary Miscellany, 'by several hands;' their few

chairs never match; old patchwork coverlets linger among them; and they have an untidy habit of keeping

their wardrobes in hatboxes. When I recall one old gentleman who is rather choice in his shoebrushes and

blackingbottle, I have summed up the domestic elegances of that side of the building.

On the occurrence of a death in Titbull's, it is invariably agreed among the survivors and it is the only

subject on which they do agree that the departed did something 'to bring it on.' Judging by Titbull's, I

should say the human race need never die, if they took care. But they don't take care, and they do die, and

when they die in Titbull's they are buried at the cost of the Foundation. Some provision has been made for the

purpose, in virtue of which (I record this on the strength of having seen the funeral of Mrs. Quinch) a lively

neighbouring undertaker dresses up four of the old men, and four of the old women, hustles them into a

procession of four couples, and leads off with a large black bow at the back of his hat, looking over his

shoulder at them airily from time to time to see that no member of the party has got lost, or has tumbled

Resignation of a dwelling is of very rare occurrence in Titbull's. A story does obtain there, how an old lady's

son once drew a prize of Thirty Thousand Pounds in the Lottery, and presently drove to the gate in his own

carriage, with French Horns playing up behind, and whisked his mother away, and left ten guineas for a

Feast. But I have been unable to substantiate it by any evidence, and regard it as an AlmsHouse Fairy Tale.

It is curious that the only proved case of resignation happened within my knowledge.

It happened on this wise. There is a sharp competition among the ladies respecting the gentility of their

visitors, and I have so often observed visitors to be dressed as for a holiday occasion, that I suppose the ladies

to have besought them to make all possible display when they come. In these circumstances much excitement

was one day occasioned by Mrs. Mitts receiving a visit from a Greenwich Pensioner. He was a Pensioner of a

bluff and warlike appearance, with an empty coatsleeve, and he was got up with unusual care; his

coatbuttons were extremely bright, he wore his empty coatsleeve in a graceful festoon, and he had a

walking stick in his hand that must have cost money. When, with the head of his walkingstick, he knocked

at Mrs. Mitts's door there are no knockers in Titbull's Mrs. Mitts was overheard by a nextdoor neighbour

to utter a cry of surprise expressing much agitation; and the same neighbour did afterwards solemnly affirm

that when he was admitted into Mrs. Mitts's room, she heard a smack. Heard a smack which was not a blow.

There was an air about this Greenwich Pensioner when he took his departure, which imbued all Titbull's with

the conviction that he was coming again. He was eagerly looked for, and Mrs. Mitts was closely watched. In

the meantime, if anything could have placed the unfortunate six old gentlemen at a greater disadvantage than

that at which they chronically stood, it would have been the apparition of this Greenwich Pensioner. They

were well shrunken already, but they shrunk to nothing in comparison with the Pensioner. Even the poor old

gentlemen themselves seemed conscious of their inferiority, and to know submissively that they could never

hope to hold their own against the Pensioner with his warlike and maritime experience in the past, and his

tobacco money in the present: his chequered career of blue water, black gunpowder, and red bloodshed for

Before three weeks were out, the Pensioner reappeared. Again he knocked at Mrs. Mitts's door with the

handle of his stick, and again was he admitted. But not again did he depart alone; for Mrs. Mitts, in a bonnet

identified as having been reembellished, went out walking with him, and stayed out till the ten o'clock beer,

There was now a truce, even as to the troubled waters of Mrs. Saggers's pail; nothing was spoken of among

the ladies but the conduct of Mrs. Mitts and its blighting influence on the reputation of Titbull's. It was agreed

that Mr. Battens 'ought to take it up,' and Mr. Battens was communicated with on the subject. That

unsatisfactory individual replied 'that he didn't see his way yet,' and it was unanimously voted by the ladies

How it came to pass, with some appearance of inconsistency, that Mrs. Mitts was cut by all the ladies and the

Pensioner admired by all the ladies, matters not. Before another week was out, Titbull's was startled by

another phenomenon. At ten o'clock in the forenoon appeared a cab, containing not only the Greenwich

Pensioner with one arm, but, to boot, a Chelsea Pensioner with one leg. Both dismounting to assist Mrs. Mitts

into the cab, the Greenwich Pensioner bore her company inside, and the Chelsea Pensioner mounted the box

by the driver: his wooden leg sticking out after the manner of a bowsprit, as if in jocular homage to his

friend's seagoing career. Thus the equipage drove away. No Mrs. Mitts returned that night.

What Mr. Battens might have done in the matter of taking it up, goaded by the infuriated state of public

feeling next morning, was anticipated by another phenomenon. A Truck, propelled by the Greenwich

Pensioner and the Chelsea Pensioner, each placidly smoking a pipe, and pushing his warrior breast against

The display on the part of the Greenwich Pensioner of his 'marriagelines,' and his announcement that

himself and friend had looked in for the furniture of Mrs. G. Pensioner, late Mitts, by no means reconciled the

ladies to the conduct of their sister; on the contrary, it is said that they appeared more than ever exasperated.

Nevertheless, my stray visits to Titbull's since the date of this occurrence, have confirmed me in an

impression that it was a wholesome fillip. The nine ladies are smarter, both in mind and dress, than they used

to be, though it must be admitted that they despise the six gentlemen to the last extent. They have a much

greater interest in the external thoroughfare too, than they had when I first knew Titbull's. And whenever I

chance to be leaning my back against the pump or the iron railings, and to be talking to one of the junior

ladies, and to see that a flush has passed over her face, I immediately know without looking round that a

I entertain so strong an objection to the euphonious softening of Ruffian into Rough, which has lately become

popular, that I restore the right word to the heading of this paper; the rather, as my object is to dwell upon the

fact that the Ruffian is tolerated among us to an extent that goes beyond all unruffianly endurance. I take the

liberty to believe that if the Ruffian besets my life, a professional Ruffian at large in the open streets of a

great city, notoriously having no other calling than that of Ruffian, and of disquieting and despoiling me as I

go peacefully about my lawful business, interfering with no one, then the Government under which I have the

great constitutional privilege, supreme honour and happiness, and all the rest of it, to exist, breaks down in

What did I read in the London daily papers, in the early days of this last September? That the Police had 'AT

INVESTED THE WATERLOO ROAD.' Is it possible? What a wonderful Police! Here is a straight, broad,

public thoroughfare of immense resort; half a mile long; gaslighted by night; with a great gaslighted

railway station in it, extra the street lamps; full of shops; traversed by two popular cross thoroughfares of

considerable traffic; itself the main road to the South of London; and the admirable Police have, after long

infestment of this dark and lonely spot by a gang of Ruffians, actually got hold of two of them. Why, can it

be doubted that any man of fair London knowledge and common resolution, armed with the powers of the

It is to the saving up of the Ruffian class by the Magistracy and Police to the conventional preserving of

them, as if they were Partridges that their number and audacity must be in great part referred. Why is a

notorious Thief and Ruffian ever left at large? He never turns his liberty to any account but violence and

plunder, he never did a day's work out of gaol, he never will do a day's work out of gaol. As a proved

notorious Thief he is always consignable to prison for three months. When he comes out, he is surely as

notorious a Thief as he was when he went in. Then send him back again. 'Just Heaven!' cries the Society for

the protection of remonstrant Ruffians. 'This is equivalent to a sentence of perpetual imprisonment!' Precisely

for that reason it has my advocacy. I demand to have the Ruffian kept out of my way, and out of the way of

all decent people. I demand to have the Ruffian employed, perforce, in hewing wood and drawing water

somewhere for the general service, instead of hewing at her Majesty's subjects and drawing their watches out

of their pockets. If this be termed an unreasonable demand, then the taxgatherer's demand on me must be far

It will be seen that I treat of the Thief and Ruffian as one. I do so, because I know the two characters to be

one, in the vast majority of cases, just as well as the Police know it. (As to the Magistracy, with a few

exceptions, they know nothing about it but what the Police choose to tell them.) There are disorderly classes

of men who are not thieves; as railwaynavigators, brickmakers, woodsawyers, costermongers. These

classes are often disorderly and troublesome; but it is mostly among themselves, and at any rate they have

their industrious avocations, they work early and late, and work hard. The generic Ruffian honourable

member for what is tenderly called the Rough Element is either a Thief, or the companion of Thieves.

When he infamously molests women coming out of chapel on Sunday evenings (for which I would have his

back scarified often and deep) it is not only for the gratification of his pleasant instincts, but that there may be

a confusion raised by which either he or his friends may profit, in the commission of highway robberies or in

picking pockets. When he gets a police constable down and kicks him helpless for life, it is because that

constable once did his duty in bringing him to justice. When he rushes into the bar of a publichouse and

scoops an eye out of one of the company there, or bites his ear off, it is because the man he maims gave

evidence against him. When he and a line of comrades extending across the footway say of that solitary

mountainspur of the Abruzzi, the Waterloo Road advance towards me 'skylarking' among themselves, my

purse or shirtpin is in predestined peril from his playfulness. Always a Ruffian, always a Thief. Always a

Now, when I, who am not paid to know these things, know them daily on the evidence of my senses and

experience; when I know that the Ruffian never jostles a lady in the streets, or knocks a hat off, but in order

that the Thief may profit, is it surprising that I should require from those who ARE paid to know these things,

Look at this group at a street corner. Number one is a shirking fellow of fiveandtwenty, in an illfavoured

and illsavoured suit, his trousers of corduroy, his coat of some indiscernible groundwork for the deposition

of grease, his neckerchief like an eel, his complexion like dirty dough, his mangy fur cap pulled low upon his

beetle brows to hide the prison cut of his hair. His hands are in his pockets. He puts them there when they are

idle, as naturally as in other people's pockets when they are busy, for he knows that they are not roughened by

work, and that they tell a tale. Hence, whenever he takes one out to draw a sleeve across his nose which is

often, for he has weak eyes and a constitutional cold in his head he restores it to its pocket immediately

afterwards. Number two is a burly brute of fiveandthirty, in a tall stiff hat; is a composite as to his clothes

of bettingman and fightingman; is whiskered; has a staring pin in his breast, along with his right hand; has

insolent and cruel eyes: large shoulders; strong legs booted and tipped for kicking. Number three is forty

years of age; is short, thickset, strong, and bowlegged; wears knee cords and white stockings, a very

longsleeved waistcoat, a very large neckerchief doubled or trebled round his throat, and a crumpled white

hat crowns his ghastly parchment face. This fellow looks like an executed postboy of other days, cut down

from the gallows too soon, and restored and preserved by express diabolical agency. Numbers five, six, and

seven, are hulking, idle, slouching young men, patched and shabby, too short in the sleeves and too tight in

the legs, slimily clothed, foulspoken, repulsive wretches inside and out. In all the party there obtains a

certain twitching character of mouth and furtiveness of eye, that hint how the coward is lurking under the

bully. The hint is quite correct, for they are a slinking sneaking set, far more prone to lie down on their backs

and kick out, when in difficulty, than to make a stand for it. (This may account for the street mud on the

backs of Numbers five, six, and seven, being much fresher than the stale splashes on their legs.)

These engaging gentry a Policeconstable stands contemplating. His Station, with a Reserve of assistance, is

very near at hand. They cannot pretend to any trade, not even to be porters or messengers. It would be idle if

they did, for he knows them, and they know that he knows them, to be nothing but professed Thieves and

Ruffians. He knows where they resort, knows by what slang names they call one another, knows how often

they have been in prison, and how long, and for what. All this is known at his Station, too, and is (or ought to

be) known at Scotland Yard, too. But does he know, or does his Station know, or does Scotland Yard know,

or does anybody know, why these fellows should be here at liberty, when, as reputed Thieves to whom a

whole Division of Police could swear, they might all be under lock and key at hard labour? Not he; truly he

would be a wise man if he did! He only knows that these are members of the 'notorious gang,' which,

according to the newspaper Police office reports of this last past September, 'have so long infested' the

awful solitudes of the Waterloo Road, and out of which almost impregnable fastnesses the Police have at

The consequences of this contemplative habit on the part of the Executive a habit to be looked for in a

hermit, but not in a Police System are familiar to us all. The Ruffian becomes one of the established orders

of the body politic. Under the playful name of Rough (as if he were merely a practical joker) his movements

and successes are recorded on public occasions. Whether he mustered in large numbers, or small; whether he

was in good spirits, or depressed; whether he turned his generous exertions to very prosperous account, or

Fortune was against him; whether he was in a sanguinary mood, or robbed with amiable horseplay and a

gracious consideration for life and limb; all this is chronicled as if he were an Institution. Is there any city in

Europe, out of England, in which these terms are held with the pests of Society? Or in which, at this day, such

The Preparatory Schools of Ruffianism are similarly borne with. The young Ruffians of London not

Thieves yet, but training for scholarships and fellowships in the Criminal Court Universities molest quiet

people and their property, to an extent that is hardly credible. The throwing of stones in the streets has

become a dangerous and destructive offence, which surely could have got to no greater height though we had

had no Police but our own riding whips and walkingsticks the Police to which I myself appeal on these

occasions. The throwing of stones at the windows of railway carriages in motion an act of wanton

wickedness with the very ArchFiend's hand in it had become a crying evil, when the railway companies

forced it on Police notice. Constabular contemplation had until then been the order of the day.

Within these twelve months, there arose among the young gentlemen of London aspiring to Ruffianism, and

cultivating that much encouraged social art, a facetious cry of 'I'll have this!' accompanied with a clutch at

some article of a passing lady's dress. I have known a lady's veil to be thus humorously torn from her face and

carried off in the open streets at noon; and I have had the honour of myself giving chase, on Westminster

Bridge, to another young Ruffian, who, in full daylight early on a summer evening, had nearly thrown a

modest young woman into a swoon of indignation and confusion, by his shameful manner of attacking her

with this cry as she harmlessly passed along before me. MR. CARLYLE, some time since, awakened a little

pleasantry by writing of his own experience of the Ruffian of the streets. I have seen the Ruffian act in exact

accordance with Mr. Carlyle's description, innumerable times, and I never saw him checked.

The blaring use of the very worst language possible, in our public thoroughfares especially in those set

apart for recreation is another disgrace to us, and another result of constabular contemplation, the like of

which I have never heard in any other country to which my uncommercial travels have extended. Years ago,

when I had a near interest in certain children who were sent with their nurses, for air and exercise, into the

Regent's Park, I found this evil to be so abhorrent and horrible there, that I called public attention to it, and

also to its contemplative reception by the Police. Looking afterwards into the newest Police Act, and finding

that the offence was punishable under it, I resolved, when striking occasion should arise, to try my hand as

The utterer of the base coin in question was a girl of seventeen or eighteen, who, with a suitable attendance of

blackguards, youths, and boys, was flaunting along the streets, returning from an Irish funeral, in a Progress

interspersed with singing and dancing. She had turned round to me and expressed herself in the most audible

manner, to the great delight of that select circle. I attended the party, on the opposite side of the way, for a

mile further, and then encountered a Policeconstable. The party had made themselves merry at my expense

until now, but seeing me speak to the constable, its male members instantly took to their heels, leaving the

girl alone. I asked the constable did he know my name? Yes, he did. 'Take that girl into custody, on my

charge, for using bad language in the streets.' He had never heard of such a charge. I had. Would he take my

word that he should get into no trouble? Yes, sir, he would do that. So he took the girl, and I went home for

With this potent instrument in my pocket, I literally as well as figuratively 'returned to the charge,' and

presented myself at the Police Station of the district. There, I found on duty a very intelligent Inspector (they

are all intelligent men), who, likewise, had never heard of such a charge. I showed him my clause, and we

went over it together twice or thrice. It was plain, and I engaged to wait upon the suburban Magistrate

In the morning I put my Police Act in my pocket again, and waited on the suburban Magistrate. I was not

quite so courteously received by him as I should have been by The Lord Chancellor or The Lord Chief

Justice, but that was a question of good breeding on the suburban Magistrate's part, and I had my clause ready

Conference took place between the Magistrate and clerk respecting the charge. During conference I was

evidently regarded as a much more objectionable person than the prisoner; one giving trouble by coming

there voluntarily, which the prisoner could not be accused of doing. The prisoner had been got up, since I last

had the pleasure of seeing her, with a great effect of white apron and straw bonnet. She reminded me of an

elder sister of Red Riding Hood, and I seemed to remind the sympathising Chimney Sweep by whom she was

The Magistrate was doubtful, Mr. Uncommercial Traveller, whether this charge could be entertained. It was

not known. Mr. Uncommercial Traveller replied that he wished it were better known, and that, if he could

afford the leisure, he would use his endeavours to make it so. There was no question about it, however, he

The clause was handed in, and more conference resulted. After which I was asked the extraordinary question:

'Mr. Uncommercial, do you really wish this girl to be sent to prison?' To which I grimly answered, staring: 'If

I didn't, why should I take the trouble to come here?' Finally, I was sworn, and gave my agreeable evidence in

detail, and White Riding Hood was fined ten shillings, under the clause, or sent to prison for so many days.

'Why, Lord bless you, sir,' said the Policeofficer, who showed me out, with a great enjoyment of the jest of

her having been got up so effectively, and caused so much hesitation: 'if she goes to prison, that will be

The Police, all things considered, are an excellent force, and I have borne my small testimony to their merits.

Constabular contemplation is the result of a bad system; a system which is administered, not invented, by the

man in constable's uniform, employed at twenty shillings a week. He has his orders, and would be marked for

discouragement if he overstepped them. That the system is bad, there needs no lengthened argument to prove,

because the fact is selfevident. If it were anything else, the results that have attended it could not possibly

have come to pass. Who will say that under a good system, our streets could have got into their present state?

The objection to the whole Police system, as concerning the Ruffian, may be stated, and its failure

exemplified, as follows. It is well known that on all great occasions, when they come together in numbers, the

mass of the English people are their own trustworthy Police. It is well known that wheresoever there is

collected together any fair general representation of the people, a respect for law and order, and a

determination to discountenance lawlessness and disorder, may be relied upon. As to one another, the people

are a very good Police, and yet are quite willing in their goodnature that the stipendiary Police should have

the credit of the people's moderation. But we are all of us powerless against the Ruffian, because we submit

to the law, and it is his only trade, by superior force and by violence, to defy it. Moreover, we are constantly

admonished from high places (like so many Sundayschool children out for a holiday of buns and milkand

water) that we are not to take the law into our own hands, but are to hand our defence over to it. It is clear that

the common enemy to be punished and exterminated first of all is the Ruffian. It is clear that he is, of all

others, THE offender for whose repressal we maintain a costly system of Police. Him, therefore, we expressly

present to the Police to deal with, conscious that, on the whole, we can, and do, deal reasonably well with one

another. Him the Police deal with so inefficiently and absurdly that he flourishes, and multiplies, and, with all

his evil deeds upon his head as notoriously as his hat is, pervades the streets with no more let or hindrance

My journeys as Uncommercial Traveller for the firm of Human Interest Brothers have not slackened since I

last reported of them, but have kept me continually on the move. I remain in the same idle employment. I

never solicit an order, I never get any commission, I am the rolling stone that gathers no moss, unless any

Some half a year ago, I found myself in my idlest, dreamiest, and least accountable condition altogether, on

board ship, in the harbour of the city of New York, in the United States of America. Of all the good ships

afloat, mine was the good steamship 'RUSSIA,' CAPT. COOK, Cunard Line, bound for Liverpool. What

I had nothing to wish for but a prosperous passage. My saladdays, when I was green of visage and seasick,

being gone with better things (and no worse), no coming event cast its shadow before.

I might but a few moments previously have imitated Sterne, and said, '"And yet, methinks, Eugenius,"

laying my forefinger wistfully on his coatsleeve, thus, "and yet, methinks, Eugenius, 'tis but sorry work to

part with thee, for what fresh fields, . . . my dear Eugenius, . . . can be fresher than thou art, and in what

pastures new shall I find Eliza, or call her, Eugenius, if thou wilt, Annie?"' I say I might have done this; but

I was resting on a skylight on the hurricanedeck, watching the working of the ship very slowly about, that

she might head for England. It was high noon on a most brilliant day in April, and the beautiful bay was

glorious and glowing. Full many a time, on shore there, had I seen the snow come down, down, down (itself

like down), until it lay deep in all the ways of men, and particularly, as it seemed, in my way, for I had not

gone dryshod many hours for months. Within two or three days last past had I watched the feathery fall

setting in with the ardour of a new idea, instead of dragging at the skirts of a wornout winter, and permitting

glimpses of a fresh young spring. But a bright sun and a clear sky had melted the snow in the great crucible of

nature; and it had been poured out again that morning over sea and land, transformed into myriads of gold

The ship was fragrant with flowers. Something of the old Mexican passion for flowers may have gradually

passed into North America, where flowers are luxuriously grown, and tastefully combined in the richest

profusion; but, be that as it may, such gorgeous farewells in flowers had come on board, that the small

officer's cabin on deck, which I tenanted, bloomed over into the adjacent scuppers, and banks of other flowers

that it couldn't hold made a garden of the unoccupied tables in the passengers' saloon. These delicious scents

of the shore, mingling with the fresh airs of the sea, made the atmosphere a dreamy, an enchanting one. And

so, with the watch aloft setting all the sails, and with the screw below revolving at a mighty rate, and

occasionally giving the ship an angry shake for resisting, I fell into my idlest ways, and lost myself.

As, for instance, whether it was I lying there, or some other entity even more mysterious, was a matter I was

far too lazy to look into. What did it signify to me if it were I? or to the more mysterious entity, if it were he?

Equally as to the remembrances that drowsily floated by me, or by him, why ask when or where the things

There was that assisting at the church service on board another steamship, one Sunday, in a stiff breeze.

Perhaps on the passage out. No matter. Pleasant to hear the ship's bells go as like churchbells as they could;

pleasant to see the watch off duty mustered and come in: best hats, best Guernseys, washed hands and faces,

smoothed heads. But then arose a set of circumstances so rampantly comical, that no check which the gravest

intentions could put upon them would hold them in hand. Thus the scene. Some seventy passengers

assembled at the saloon tables. Prayerbooks on tables. Ship rolling heavily. Pause. No minister. Rumour has

related that a modest young clergyman on board has responded to the captain's request that he will officiate.

Closed double doors suddenly burst open, and two strong stewards skate in, supporting minister between

them. General appearance as of somebody picked up drunk and incapable, and under conveyance to

stationhouse. Stoppage, pause, and particularly heavy rolling. Stewards watch their opportunity, and balance

themselves, but cannot balance minister; who, struggling with a drooping head and a backward tendency,

seems determined to return below, while they are as determined that he shall be got to the readingdesk in

mid saloon. Desk portable, sliding away down a long table, and aiming itself at the breasts of various

members of the congregation. Here the double doors, which have been carefully closed by other stewards, fly

open again, and worldly passenger tumbles in, seemingly with paleale designs: who, seeking friend, says

'Joe!' Perceiving incongruity, says, 'Hullo! Beg yer pardon!' and tumbles out again. All this time the

congregation have been breaking up into sects, as the manner of congregations often is, each sect sliding

away by itself, and all pounding the weakest sect which slid first into the corner. Utmost point of dissent soon

attained in every corner, and violent rolling. Stewards at length make a dash; conduct minister to the mast in

the centre of the saloon, which he embraces with both arms; skate out; and leave him in that condition to

There was another Sunday, when an officer of the ship read the service. It was quiet and impressive, until we

fell upon the dangerous and perfectly unnecessary experiment of striking up a hymn. After it was given out,

we all rose, but everybody left it to somebody else to begin. Silence resulting, the officer (no singer himself)

rather reproachfully gave us the first line again, upon which a rosy pippin of an old gentleman, remarkable

throughout the passage for his cheerful politeness, gave a little stamp with his boot (as if he were leading off

a country dance), and blithely warbled us into a show of joining. At the end of the first verse we became,

through these tactics, so much refreshed and encouraged, that none of us, howsoever unmelodious, would

submit to be left out of the second verse; while as to the third we lifted up our voices in a sacred howl that left

it doubtful whether we were the more boastful of the sentiments we united in professing, or of professing

'Lord bless us!' thought I, when the fresh remembrance of these things made me laugh heartily alone in the

dead watergurgling waste of the night, what time I was wedged into my berth by a wooden bar, or I must

have rolled out of it, 'what errand was I then upon, and to what Abyssinian point had public events then

marched? No matter as to me. And as to them, if the wonderful popular rage for a plaything (utterly

confounding in its inscrutable unreason) I had not then lighted on a poor young savage boy, and a poor old

screw of a horse, and hauled the first off by the hair of his princely head to "inspect" the British volunteers,

and hauled the second off by the hair of his equine tail to the Crystal Palace, why so much the better for all of

So, sticking to the ship, I was at the trouble of asking myself would I like to show the grog distribution in 'the

fiddle' at noon to the Grand United Amalgamated Total Abstinence Society? Yes, I think I should. I think it

would do them good to smell the rum, under the circumstances. Over the grog, mixed in a bucket, presides

the boatswain's mate, small tin can in hand. Enter the crew, the guilty consumers, the grownup brood of

Giant Despair, in contradistinction to the band of youthful angel Hope. Some in boots, some in leggings,

some in tarpaulin overalls, some in frocks, some in peacoats, a very few in jackets, most with sou'wester

hats, all with something rough and rugged round the throat; all, dripping salt water where they stand; all

Each man's knife in its sheath in his girdle, loosened for dinner. As the first man, with a knowingly kindled

eye, watches the filling of the poisoned chalice (truly but a very small tin mug, to be prosaic), and, tossing

back his head, tosses the contents into himself, and passes the empty chalice and passes on, so the second

man with an anticipatory wipe of his mouth on sleeve or handkerchief, bides his turn, and drinks and hands

and passes on, in whom, and in each as his turn approaches, beams a knowingly kindled eye, a brighter

temper, and a suddenly awakened tendency to be jocose with some shipmate. Nor do I even observe that the

man in charge of the ship's lamps, who in right of his office has a double allowance of poisoned chalices,

seems thereby vastly degraded, even though he empties the chalices into himself, one after the other, much as

if he were delivering their contents at some absorbent establishment in which he had no personal interest. But

vastly comforted, I note them all to be, on deck presently, even to the circulation of redder blood in their cold

blue knuckles; and when I look up at them lying out on the yards, and holding on for life among the beating

sails, I cannot for MY life see the justice of visiting on them or on me the drunken crimes of any number

Abetting myself in my idle humour, I closed my eyes, and recalled life on board of one of those

mailpackets, as I lay, part of that day, in the Bay of New York, O! The regular life began mine always did,

for I never got to sleep afterwards with the rigging of the pump while it was yet dark, and washing down of

decks. Any enormous giant at a prodigious hydropathic establishment, conscientiously undergoing the

watercure in all its departments, and extremely particular about cleaning his teeth, would make those noises.

Swash, splash, scrub, rub, toothbrush, bubble, swash, splash, bubble, toothbrush, splash, splash, bubble, rub.

Then the day would break, and, descending from my berth by a graceful ladder composed of halfopened

drawers beneath it, I would reopen my outer deadlight and my inner sliding window (closed by a watchman

during the watercure), and would look out at the longrolling, lead coloured, white topped waves over

which the dawn, on a cold winter morning, cast a level, lonely glance, and through which the ship fought her

melancholy way at a terrific rate. And now, lying down again, awaiting the season for broiled ham and tea, I

It might be, in some cases, no more than the voice of stomach; but I called it in my fancy by the higher name.

Because it seemed to me that we were all of us, all day long, endeavouring to stifle the voice. Because it was

under everybody's pillow, everybody's plate, everybody's campstool, everybody's book, everybody's

occupation. Because we pretended not to hear it, especially at mealtimes, evening whist, and morning

conversation on deck; but it was always among us in an under monotone, not to be drowned in peasoup, not

to be shuffled with cards, not to be diverted by books, not to be knitted into any pattern, not to be walked

away from. It was smoked in the weediest cigar, and drunk in the strongest cocktail; it was conveyed on deck

at noon with limp ladies, who lay there in their wrappers until the stars shone; it waited at table with the

stewards; nobody could put it out with the lights. It was considered (as on shore) illbred to acknowledge the

voice of conscience. It was not polite to mention it. One squally day an amiable gentleman in love gave much

offence to a surrounding circle, including the object of his attachment, by saying of it, after it had goaded him

Sometimes it would appear subdued. In fleeting moments, when bubbles of champagne pervaded the nose, or

when there was 'hot pot' in the bill of fare, or when an old dish we had had regularly every day was described

in that official document by a new name, under such excitements, one would almost believe it hushed. The

ceremony of washing plates on deck, performed after every meal by a circle as of ringers of crockery

triplebob majors for a prize, would keep it down. Hauling the reel, taking the sun at noon, posting the

twentyfour hours' run, altering the ship's time by the meridian, casting the waste food overboard, and

attracting the eager gulls that followed in our wake, these events would suppress it for a while. But the

instant any break or pause took place in any such diversion, the voice would be at it again, importuning us to

the last extent. A newly married young pair, who walked the deck affectionately some twenty miles per day,

would, in the full flush of their exercise, suddenly become stricken by it, and stand trembling, but otherwise

When this terrible monitor was most severe with us was when the time approached for our retiring to our

dens for the night; when the lighted candles in the saloon grew fewer and fewer; when the deserted glasses

with spoons in them grew more and more numerous; when waifs of toasted cheese and strays of sardines

fried in batter slid languidly to and fro in the tableracks; when the man who always read had shut up his

book, and blown out his candle; when the man who always talked had ceased from troubling; when the man

who was always medically reported as going to have delirium tremens had put it off till tomorrow; when the

man who every night devoted himself to a midnight smoke on deck two hours in length, and who every night

was in bed within ten minutes afterwards, was buttoning himself up in his third coat for his hardy vigil: for

then, as we fell off one by one, and, entering our several hutches, came into a peculiar atmosphere of

bilgewater and Windsor soap, the voice would shake us to the centre. Woe to us when we sat down on our

sofa, watching the swinging candle for ever trying and retrying to stand upon his head! or our coat upon its

peg, imitating us as we appeared in our gymnastic days by sustaining itself horizontally from the wall, in

emulation of the lighter and more facile towels! Then would the voice especially claim us for its prey, and

Lights out, we in our berths, and the wind rising, the voice grows angrier and deeper. Under the mattress and

under the pillow, under the sofa and under the washingstand, under the ship and under the sea, seeming to

rise from the foundations under the earth with every scoop of the great Atlantic (and oh! why scoop so?),

always the voice. Vain to deny its existence in the night season; impossible to be hard of hearing; screw,

screw, screw! Sometimes it lifts out of the water, and revolves with a whirr, like a ferocious firework,

except that it never expends itself, but is always ready to go off again; sometimes it seems to be in anguish,

and shivers; sometimes it seems to be terrified by its last plunge, and has a fit which causes it to struggle,

quiver, and for an instant stop. And now the ship sets in rolling, as only ships so fiercely screwed through

Did she ever take a roll before like that last? Did she ever take a roll before like this worse one that is coming

now? Here is the partition at my ear down in the deep on the lee side. Are we ever coming up again together?

I think not; the partition and I are so long about it that I really do believe we have overdone it this time.

Heavens, what a scoop! What a deep scoop, what a hollow scoop, what a long scoop! Will it ever end, and

can we bear the heavy mass of water we have taken on board, and which has let loose all the table furniture in

the officers' mess, and has beaten open the door of the little passage between the purser and me, and is

swashing about, even there and even here? The purser snores reassuringly, and the ship's bells striking, I hear

the cheerful 'All's well!' of the watch musically given back the length of the deck, as the lately diving

partition, now high in air, tries (unsoftened by what we have gone through together) to force me out of bed

'All's well!' Comforting to know, though surely all might be better. Put aside the rolling and the rush of water,

and think of darting through such darkness with such velocity. Think of any other similar object coming in

Whether there may be an attraction in two such moving bodies out at sea, which may help accident to bring

them into collision? Thoughts, too, arise (the voice never silent all the while, but marvellously suggestive) of

the gulf below; of the strange, unfruitful mountain ranges and deep valleys over which we are passing; of

monstrous fish midway; of the ship's suddenly altering her course on her own account, and with a wild

plunge settling down, and making THAT voyage with a crew of dead discoverers. Now, too, one recalls an

almost universal tendency on the part of passengers to stumble, at some time or other in the day, on the topic

of a certain large steamer making this same run, which was lost at sea, and never heard of more. Everybody

has seemed under a spell, compelling approach to the threshold of the grim subject, stoppage, discomfiture,

and pretence of never having been near it. The boatswain's whistle sounds! A change in the wind, hoarse

orders issuing, and the watch very busy. Sails come crashing home overhead, ropes (that seem all knot) ditto;

every man engaged appears to have twenty feet, with twenty times the average amount of stamping power in

each. Gradually the noise slackens, the hoarse cries die away, the boatswain's whistle softens into the

soothing and contented notes, which rather reluctantly admit that the job is done for the time, and the voice

Thus come unintelligible dreams of up hill and down, and swinging and swaying, until consciousness revives

of atmospherical Windsor soap and bilgewater, and the voice announces that the giant has come for the

Such were my fanciful reminiscences as I lay, part of that day, in the Bay of New York, O! Also as we passed

clear of the Narrows, and got out to sea; also in many an idle hour at sea in sunny weather! At length the

observations and computations showed that we should make the coast of Ireland tonight. So I stood watch

Very dark, and the sea most brilliantly phosphorescent. Great way on the ship, and double lookout kept.

Vigilant captain on the bridge, vigilant first officer looking over the port side, vigilant second officer standing

by the quartermaster at the compass, vigilant third officer posted at the stern rail with a lantern. No

passengers on the quiet decks, but expectation everywhere nevertheless. The two men at the wheel very

steady, very serious, and very prompt to answer orders. An order issued sharply now and then, and echoed

All of a sudden, at the blank hour of two in the morning, a vague movement of relief from a long strain

expresses itself in all hands; the third officer's lantern tinkles, and he fires a rocket, and another rocket. A

sullen solitary light is pointed out to me in the black sky yonder. A change is expected in the light, but none

takes place. 'Give them two more rockets, Mr. Vigilant.' Two more, and a bluelight burnt. All eyes watch

the light again. At last a little toy skyrocket is flashed up from it; and, even as that small streak in the

darkness dies away, we are telegraphed to Queenstown, Liverpool, and London, and back again under the

Then up come the halfdozen passengers who are going ashore at Queenstown and up comes the mailagent

in charge of the bags, and up come the men who are to carry the bags into the mailtender that will come off

for them out of the harbour. Lamps and lanterns gleam here and there about the decks, and impeding bulks

are knocked away with handspikes; and the portside bulwark, barren but a moment ago, bursts into a crop of

The light begins to be gained upon, begins to be alongside, begins to be left astern. More rockets, and,

between us and the land, steams beautifully the Inman steamship City of Paris, for New York, outward

bound. We observe with complacency that the wind is dead against her (it being WITH us), and that she rolls

and pitches. (The sickest passenger on board is the most delighted by this circumstance.) Time rushes by as

we rush on; and now we see the light in Queenstown Harbour, and now the lights of the mailtender coming

out to us. What vagaries the mailtender performs on the way, in every point of the compass, especially in

those where she has no business, and why she performs them, Heaven only knows! At length she is seen

plunging within a cable's length of our port broadside, and is being roared at through our speakingtrumpets

to do this thing, and not to do that, and to stand by the other, as if she were a very demented tender indeed.

Then, we slackening amidst a deafening roar of steam, this muchabused tender is made fast to us by

hawsers, and the men in readiness carry the bags aboard, and return for more, bending under their burdens,

and looking just like the pasteboard figures of the miller and his men in the theatre of our boyhood, and

comporting themselves almost as unsteadily. All the while the unfortunate tender plunges high and low, and

is roared at. Then the Queenstown passengers are put on board of her, with infinite plunging and roaring, and

the tender gets heaved up on the sea to that surprising extent that she looks within an ace of washing aboard

of us, high and dry. Roared at with contumely to the last, this wretched tender is at length let go, with a final

The voice of conscience resumed its dominion as the day climbed up the sky, and kept by all of us passengers

into port; kept by us as we passed other lighthouses, and dangerous islands off the coast, where some of the

officers, with whom I stood my watch, had gone ashore in sailingships in fogs (and of which by that token

they seemed to have quite an affectionate remembrance), and past the Welsh coast, and past the Cheshire

coast, and past everything and everywhere lying between our ship and her own special dock in the Mersey.

Off which, at last, at nine of the clock, on a fair evening early in May, we stopped, and the voice ceased. A

very curious sensation, not unlike having my own ears stopped, ensued upon that silence; and it was with a

no less curious sensation that I went over the side of the good Cunard ship 'Russia' (whom prosperity attend

through all her voyages!) and surveyed the outer hull of the gracious monster that the voice had inhabited. So,

perhaps, shall we all, in the spirit, one day survey the frame that held the busier voice from which my vagrant

I had been looking, yesternight, through the famous 'Dance of Death,' and today the grim old woodcuts

arose in my mind with the new significance of a ghastly monotony not to be found in the original. The weird

skeleton rattled along the streets before me, and struck fiercely; but it was never at the pains of assuming a

disguise. It played on no dulcimer here, was crowned with no flowers, waved no plume, minced in no

flowing robe or train, lifted no winecup, sat at no feast, cast no dice, counted no gold. It was simply a bare,

The borders of Ratcliff and Stepney, eastward of London, and giving on the impure river, were the scene of

this uncompromising dance of death, upon a drizzling November day. A squalid maze of streets, courts, and

alleys of miserable houses let out in single rooms. A wilderness of dirt, rags, and hunger. A muddesert,

chiefly inhabited by a tribe from whom employment has departed, or to whom it comes but fitfully and

rarely. They are not skilled mechanics in any wise. They are but labourers, docklabourers, waterside

labourers, coalporters, ballastheavers, suchlike hewers of wood and drawers of water. But they have

One grisly joke alone, methought, the skeleton seemed to play off here. It had stuck electionbills on the

walls, which the wind and rain had deteriorated into suitable rags. It had even summed up the state of the

poll, in chalk, on the shutters of one ruined house. It adjured the free and independent starvers to vote for

Thisman and vote for Thatman; not to plump, as they valued the state of parties and the national prosperity

(both of great importance to them, I think); but, by returning Thisman and Thatman, each naught without the

other, to compound a glorious and immortal whole. Surely the skeleton is nowhere more cruelly ironical in

Pondering in my mind the farseeing schemes of Thisman and Thatman, and of the public blessing called

Party, for staying the degeneracy, physical and moral, of many thousands (who shall say how many?) of the

English race; for devising employment useful to the community for those who want but to work and live; for

equalising rates, cultivating waste lands, facilitating emigration, and, above all things, saving and utilising the

oncoming generations, and thereby changing evergrowing national weakness into strength: pondering in my

mind, I say, these hopeful exertions, I turned down a narrow street to look into a house or two.

It was a dark street with a dead wall on one side. Nearly all the outer doors of the houses stood open. I took

the first entry, and knocked at a parlourdoor. Might I come in? I might, if I plased, sur.

The woman of the room (Irish) had picked up some long strips of wood, about some wharf or barge; and they

had just now been thrust into the otherwise empty grate to make two iron pots boil. There was some fish in

one, and there were some potatoes in the other. The flare of the burning wood enabled me to see a table, and a

broken chair or so, and some old cheap crockery ornaments about the chimneypiece. It was not until I had

spoken with the woman a few minutes, that I saw a horrible brown heap on the floor in a corner, which, but

for previous experience in this dismal wise, I might not have suspected to be 'the bed.' There was something

''Tis the poor craythur that stays here, sur; and 'tis very bad she is, and 'tis very bad she's been this long time,

and 'tis better she'll never be, and 'tis slape she does all day, and 'tis wake she does all night, and 'tis the lead,

'The lead, sur. Sure 'tis the leadmills, where the women gets took on at eighteenpence a day, sur, when

they makes application early enough, and is lucky and wanted; and 'tis leadpisoned she is, sur, and some of

them gets leadpisoned soon, and some of them gets leadpisoned later, and some, but not many, niver; and

'tis all according to the constitooshun, sur, and some constitooshuns is strong, and some is weak; and her

constitooshun is leadpisoned, bad as can be, sur; and her brain is coming out at her ear, and it hurts her

The sick young woman moaning here, the speaker bent over her, took a bandage from her head, and threw

open a back door to let in the daylight upon it, from the smallest and most miserable backyard I ever saw.

'That's what cooms from her, sur, being leadpisoned; and it cooms from her night and day, the poor, sick

craythur; and the pain of it is dreadful; and God he knows that my husband has walked the sthreets these four

days, being a labourer, and is walking them now, and is ready to work, and no work for him, and no fire and

no food but the bit in the pot, and no more than ten shillings in a fortnight; God be good to us! and it is poor

Knowing that I could compensate myself thereafter for my self denial, if I saw fit, I had resolved that I

would give nothing in the course of these visits. I did this to try the people. I may state at once that my closest

observation could not detect any indication whatever of an expectation that I would give money: they were

grateful to be talked to about their miserable affairs, and sympathy was plainly a comfort to them; but they

neither asked for money in any case, nor showed the least trace of surprise or disappointment or resentment at

The woman's married daughter had by this time come down from her room on the floor above, to join in the

conversation. She herself had been to the leadmills very early that morning to be 'took on,' but had not

succeeded. She had four children; and her husband, also a waterside labourer, and then out seeking work,

seemed in no better case as to finding it than her father. She was English, and by nature, of a buxom figure

and cheerful. Both in her poor dress and in her mother's there was an effort to keep up some appearance of

neatness. She knew all about the sufferings of the unfortunate invalid, and all about the leadpoisoning, and

how the symptoms came on, and how they grew, having often seen them. The very smell when you stood

inside the door of the works was enough to knock you down, she said: yet she was going back again to get

'took on.' What could she do? Better be ulcerated and paralysed for eighteenpence a day, while it lasted,

A dark and squalid cupboard in this room, touching the back door and all manner of offence, had been for

some time the sleeping place of the sick young woman. But the nights being now wintry, and the blankets

and coverlets 'gone to the leaving shop,' she lay all night where she lay all day, and was lying then. The

woman of the room, her husband, this most miserable patient, and two others, lay on the one brown heap

'God bless you, sir, and thank you!' were the parting words from these people, gratefully spoken too, with

Some streets away, I tapped at another parlourdoor on another groundfloor. Looking in, I found a man, his

wife, and four children, sitting at a washingstool by way of table, at their dinner of bread and infused

tealeaves. There was a very scanty cinderous fire in the grate by which they sat; and there was a tent

bedstead in the room with a bed upon it and a coverlet. The man did not rise when I went in, nor during my

stay, but civilly inclined his head on my pulling off my hat, and, in answer to my inquiry whether I might ask

him a question or two, said, 'Certainly.' There being a window at each end of this room, back and front, it

might have been ventilated; but it was shut up tight, to keep the cold out, and was very sickening.

The wife, an intelligent, quick woman, rose and stood at her husband's elbow; and he glanced up at her as if

for help. It soon appeared that he was rather deaf. He was a slow, simple fellow of about thirty.

'I am a boilermaker;' looking about him with an exceedingly perplexed air, as if for a boiler that had

'He ain't a mechanic, you understand, sir,' the wife put in: 'he's only a labourer.'

'In work!' cried this forlorn boilermaker, staring aghast at his wife, and then working his vision's way very

'Ah, he ain't indeed!' said the poor woman, shaking her head, as she looked at the four children in succession,

'Work!' said the boilermaker, still seeking that evaporated boiler, first in my countenance, then in the air, and

then in the features of his second son at his knee: 'I wish I WAS in work! I haven't had more than a day's

A faint gleam of admiration lighted up the face of the wouldbe boilermaker, as he stretched out the short

sleeve of his thread bare canvas jacket, and replied, pointing her out, 'On the work of the wife.'

I forget where boilermaking had gone to, or where he supposed it had gone to; but he added some resigned

information on that head, coupled with an expression of his belief that it was never coming back.

The cheery helpfulness of the wife was very remarkable. She did slopwork; made peajackets. She

produced the peajacket then in hand, and spread it out upon the bed, the only piece of furniture in the

room on which to spread it. She showed how much of it she made, and how much was afterwards finished off

by the machine. According to her calculation at the moment, deducting what her trimming cost her, she got

for making a peajacket tenpence half penny, and she could make one in something less than two days.

But, you see, it come to her through two hands, and of course it didn't come through the second hand for

nothing. Why did it come through the second hand at all? Why, this way. The second hand took the risk of

the givenout work, you see. If she had money enough to pay the security deposit, call it two pound, she

could get the work from the first hand, and so the second would not have to be deducted for. But, having no

money at all, the second hand come in and took its profit, and so the whole worked down to tenpence

halfpenny. Having explained all this with great intelligence, even with some little pride, and without a

whine or murmur, she folded her work again, sat down by her husband's side at the washingstool, and

resumed her dinner of dry bread. Mean as the meal was, on the bare board, with its old gallipots for cups, and

what not other sordid makeshifts; shabby as the woman was in dress, and toning done towards the Bosjesman

colour, with want of nutriment and washing, there was positively a dignity in her, as the family anchor just

holding the poor shipwrecked boilermaker's bark. When I left the room, the boilermaker's eyes were

slowly turned towards her, as if his last hope of ever again seeing that vanished boiler lay in her direction.

These people had never applied for parish relief but once; and that was when the husband met with a

Not many doors from here, I went into a room on the first floor. The woman apologised for its being in 'an

untidy mess.' The day was Saturday, and she was boiling the children's clothes in a saucepan on the hearth.

There was nothing else into which she could have put them. There was no crockery, or tinware, or tub, or

bucket. There was an old gallipot or two, and there was a broken bottle or so, and there were some broken

boxes for seats. The last small scraping of coals left was raked together in a corner of the floor. There were

some rags in an open cupboard, also on the floor. In a corner of the room was a crazy old French bedstead,

with a man lying on his back upon it in a ragged pilot jacket, and rough oilskin fantail hat. The room was

perfectly black. It was difficult to believe, at first, that it was not purposely coloured black, the walls were so

As I stood opposite the woman boiling the children's clothes, she had not even a piece of soap to wash them

with, and apologising for her occupation, I could take in all these things without appearing to notice them,

and could even correct my inventory. I had missed, at the first glance, some half a pound of bread in the

otherwise empty safe, an old red ragged crinoline hanging on the handle of the door by which I had entered,

and certain fragments of rusty iron scattered on the floor, which looked like broken tools and a piece of

stovepipe. A child stood looking on. On the box nearest to the fire sat two younger children; one a delicate

This woman, like the last, was wofully shabby, and was degenerating to the Bosjesman complexion. But her

figure, and the ghost of a certain vivacity about her, and the spectre of a dimple in her cheek, carried my

memory strangely back to the old days of the Adelphi Theatre, London, when Mrs. Fitzwilliam was the friend

'Oh, yes, sir! and work's at all times very, very scanty with him; and now he's laid up.'

'It's my legs,' said the man upon the bed. 'I'll unroll 'em.' And immediately began.

'I have a daughter that does the needlework, and I have a son that does what he can. She's at her work now,

'They sleep here. They can't afford to pay more rent, and so they come here at night. The rent is very hard

upon us. It's rose upon us too, now, sixpence a week, on account of these new changes in the law, about

the rates. We are a week behind; the landlord's been shaking and rattling at that door frightfully; he says he'll

The man upon the bed ruefully interposed, 'Here's my legs. The skin's broke, besides the swelling. I have had

He looked at his legs (which were much discoloured and misshapen) for a while, and then appearing to

remember that they were not popular with his family, rolled them up again, as if they were something in the

nature of maps or plans that were not wanted to be referred to, lay hopelessly down on his back once more

'Nothing. And we had the rest of the loaf for our breakfast, with water. I don't know what's to come of it.'

'If my eldest son earns anything today, he'll bring it home. Then we shall have something to eat tonight,

and may be able to do something towards the rent. If not, I don't know what's to come of it.'

'Yes, sir; it's a hard, hard life. Take care of the stairs as you go, sir, they're broken, and good day, sir!'

These people had a mortal dread of entering the workhouse, and received no outofdoor relief.

In another room, in still another tenement, I found a very decent woman with five children, the last a baby,

and she herself a patient of the parish doctor, to whom, her husband being in the hospital, the Union

allowed for the support of herself and family, four shillings a week and five loaves. I suppose when Thisman,

M.P., and Thatman, M.P., and the Publicblessing Party, lay their heads together in course of time, and come

to an equalization of rating, she may go down to the dance of death to the tune of sixpence more.

I could enter no other houses for that one while, for I could not bear the contemplation of the children. Such

heart as I had summoned to sustain me against the miseries of the adults failed me when I looked at the

children. I saw how young they were, how hungry, how serious and still. I thought of them, sick and dying in

those lairs. I think of them dead without anguish; but to think of them so suffering and so dying quite

Down by the river's bank in Ratcliff, I was turning upward by a sidestreet, therefore, to regain the railway,

when my eyes rested on the inscription across the road, 'East London Children's Hospital.' I could scarcely

have seen an inscription better suited to my frame of mind; and I went across and went straight in.

I found the children's hospital established in an old sailloft or storehouse, of the roughest nature, and on the

simplest means. There were trapdoors in the floors, where goods had been hoisted up and down; heavy feet

and heavy weights had started every knot in the welltrodden planking: inconvenient bulks and beams and

awkward staircases perplexed my passage through the wards. But I found it airy, sweet, and clean. In its

seven and thirty beds I saw but little beauty; for starvation in the second or third generation takes a pinched

look: but I saw the sufferings both of infancy and childhood tenderly assuaged; I heard the little patients

answering to pet playful names, the light touch of a delicate lady laid bare the wasted sticks of arms for me to

pity; and the clawlike little hands, as she did so, twined themselves lovingly around her weddingring.

One baby mite there was as pretty as any of Raphael's angels. The tiny head was bandaged for water on the

brain; and it was suffering with acute bronchitis too, and made from time to time a plaintive, though not

impatient or complaining, little sound. The smooth curve of the cheeks and of the chin was faultless in its

condensation of infantine beauty, and the large bright eyes were most lovely. It happened as I stopped at the

foot of the bed, that these eyes rested upon mine with that wistful expression of wondering thoughtfulness

which we all know sometimes in very little children. They remained fixed on mine, and never turned from me

while I stood there. When the utterance of that plaintive sound shook the little form, the gaze still remained

unchanged. I felt as though the child implored me to tell the story of the little hospital in which it was

sheltered to any gentle heart I could address. Laying my worldworn hand upon the little unmarked clasped

A gentleman and lady, a young husband and wife, have bought and fitted up this building for its present

noble use, and have quietly settled themselves in it as its medical officers and directors. Both have had

considerable practical experience of medicine and surgery; he as housesurgeon of a great London hospital;

she as a very earnest student, tested by severe examination, and also as a nurse of the sick poor during the

With every qualification to lure them away, with youth and accomplishments and tastes and habits that can

have no response in any breast near them, close begirt by every repulsive circumstance inseparable from such

a neighbourhood, there they dwell. They live in the hospital itself, and their rooms are on its first floor.

Sitting at their dinnertable, they could hear the cry of one of the children in pain. The lady's piano,

drawingmaterials, books, and other such evidences of refinement are as much a part of the rough place as

the iron bedsteads of the little patients. They are put to shifts for room, like passengers on board ship. The

dispenser of medicines (attracted to them not by selfinterest, but by their own magnetism and that of their

cause) sleeps in a recess in the diningroom, and has his washing apparatus in the sideboard.

Their contented manner of making the best of the things around them, I found so pleasantly inseparable from

their usefulness! Their pride in this partition that we put up ourselves, or in that partition that we took down,

or in that other partition that we moved, or in the stove that was given us for the waitingroom, or in our

nightly conversion of the little consultingroom into a smokingroom! Their admiration of the situation, if

we could only get rid of its one objectionable incident, the coalyard at the back! 'Our hospital carriage,

presented by a friend, and very useful.' That was my presentation to a perambulator, for which a coachhouse

had been discovered in a corner downstairs, just large enough to hold it. Coloured prints, in all stages of

preparation for being added to those already decorating the wards, were plentiful; a charming wooden

phenomenon of a bird, with an impossible topknot, who ducked his head when you set a counter weight

going, had been inaugurated as a public statue that very morning; and trotting about among the beds, on

familiar terms with all the patients, was a comical mongrel dog, called Poodles. This comical dog (quite a

tonic in himself) was found characteristically starving at the door of the institution, and was taken in and fed,

and has lived here ever since. An admirer of his mental endowments has presented him with a collar bearing

the legend, 'Judge not Poodles by external appearances.' He was merrily wagging his tail on a boy's pillow

When this hospital was first opened, in January of the present year, the people could not possibly conceive

but that somebody paid for the services rendered there; and were disposed to claim them as a right, and to

find fault if out of temper. They soon came to understand the case better, and have much increased in

gratitude. The mothers of the patients avail themselves very freely of the visiting rules; the fathers often on

Sundays. There is an unreasonable (but still, I think, touching and intelligible) tendency in the parents to take

a child away to its wretched home, if on the point of death. One boy who had been thus carried off on a rainy

night, when in a violent state of inflammation, and who had been afterwards brought back, had been

recovered with exceeding difficulty; but he was a jolly boy, with a specially strong interest in his dinner,

Insufficient food and unwholesome living are the main causes of disease among these small patients. So

nourishment, cleanliness, and ventilation are the main remedies. Discharged patients are looked after, and

invited to come and dine now and then; so are certain famishing creatures who were never patients. Both the

lady and the gentleman are well acquainted, not only with the histories of the patients and their families, but

with the characters and circumstances of great numbers of their neighbours of these they keep a register. It

is their common experience, that people, sinking down by inches into deeper and deeper poverty, will conceal

The nurses of this hospital are all young, ranging, say, from nineteen to four and twenty. They have even

within these narrow limits, what many wellendowed hospitals would not give them, a comfortable room of

their own in which to take their meals. It is a beautiful truth, that interest in the children and sympathy with

their sorrows bind these young women to their places far more strongly than any other consideration could.

The best skilled of the nurses came originally from a kindred neighbourhood, almost as poor; and she knew

how much the work was needed. She is a fair dressmaker. The hospital cannot pay her as many pounds in the

year as there are months in it; and one day the lady regarded it as a duty to speak to her about her improving

her prospects and following her trade. 'No,' she said: she could never be so useful or so happy elsewhere any

And she stays. One of the nurses, as I passed her, was washing a babyboy. Liking her pleasant face, I

stopped to speak to her charge, a common, bulletheaded, frowning charge enough, laying hold of his own

nose with a slippery grasp, and staring very solemnly out of a blanket. The melting of the pleasant face into

delighted smiles, as this young gentleman gave an unexpected kick, and laughed at me, was almost worth my

An affecting play was acted in Paris years ago, called 'The Children's Doctor.' As I parted from my children's

doctor, now in question, I saw in his easy black necktie, in his loose buttoned black frockcoat, in his pensive

face, in the flow of his dark hair, in his eyelashes, in the very turn of his moustache, the exact realisation of

the Paris artist's ideal as it was presented on the stage. But no romancer that I know of has had the boldness to

prefigure the life and home of this young husband and young wife in the Children's Hospital in the east of

I came away from Ratcliff by the Stepney railway station to the terminus at Fenchurch Street. Any one who

It fell out on a day in this last autumn, that I had to go down from London to a place of seaside resort, on an

hour's business, accompanied by my esteemed friend Bullfinch. Let the place of seaside resort be, for the

I had been loitering about Paris in very hot weather, pleasantly breakfasting in the open air in the garden of

the Palais Royal or the Tuileries, pleasantly dining in the open air in the Elysian Fields, pleasantly taking my

cigar and lemonade in the open air on the Italian Boulevard towards the small hours after midnight. Bullfinch

an excellent man of business has summoned me back across the Channel, to transact this said hour's

business at Namelesston; and thus it fell out that Bullfinch and I were in a railway carriage together on our

I asked Bullfinch, did he recommend the Temeraire? inasmuch as I had not been rated on the books of the

Bullfinch declined to accept the responsibility of recommending the Temeraire, but on the whole was rather

sanguine about it. He 'seemed to remember,' Bullfinch said, that he had dined well there. A plain dinner, but

good. Certainly not like a Parisian dinner (here Bullfinch obviously became the prey of want of confidence),

I appeal to Bullfinch's intimate knowledge of my wants and ways to decide whether I was usually ready to be

pleased with any dinner, or for the matter of that with anything that was fair of its kind and really what it

claimed to be. Bullfinch doing me the honour to respond in the affirmative, I agreed to ship myself as an able

'Now, our plan shall be this,' says Bullfinch, with his forefinger at his nose. 'As soon as we get to

Namelesston, we'll drive straight to the Temeraire, and order a little dinner in an hour. And as we shall not

have more than enough time in which to dispose of it comfortably, what do you say to giving the house the

What I had to say was, Certainly. Bullfinch (who is by nature of a hopeful constitution) then began to babble

of green geese. But I checked him in that Falstaffian vein, urging considerations of time and cookery.

In due sequence of events we drove up to the Temeraire, and alighted. A youth in livery received us on the

doorstep. 'Looks well,' said Bullfinch confidentially. And then aloud, 'Coffee room!'

The youth in livery (now perceived to be mouldy) conducted us to the desired haven, and was enjoined by

Bullfinch to send the waiter at once, as we wished to order a little dinner in an hour. Then Bullfinch and I

waited for the waiter, until, the waiter continuing to wait in some unknown and invisible sphere of action, we

rang for the waiter; which ring produced the waiter, who announced himself as not the waiter who ought to

So Bullfinch approached the coffeeroom door, and melodiously pitching his voice into a bar where two

young ladies were keeping the books of the Temeraire, apologetically explained that we wished to order a

little dinner in an hour, and that we were debarred from the execution of our inoffensive purpose by

Hereupon one of the young ladies ran a bell, which reproduced at the bar this time the waiter who was

not the waiter who ought to wait upon us; that extraordinary man, whose life seemed consumed in waiting

upon people to say that he wouldn't wait upon them, repeated his former protest with great indignation, and

Bullfinch, with a fallen countenance, was about to say to me, 'This won't do,' when the waiter who ought to

wait upon us left off keeping us waiting at last. 'Waiter,' said Bullfinch piteously, 'we have been a long time

waiting.' The waiter who ought to wait upon us laid the blame upon the waiter who ought not to wait upon us,

'We wish,' said Bullfinch, much depressed, 'to order a little dinner in an hour. What can we have?'

Bullfinch, with extreme mournfulness of speech and action, and with a forlorn old flyblown bill of fare in

his hand which the waiter had given him, and which was a sort of general manuscript index to any

We could have mockturtle soup, a sole, curry, and roast duck. Agreed. At this table by this window.

I had been feigning to look out of this window; but I had been taking note of the crumbs on all the tables, the

dirty table cloths, the stuffy, soupy, airless atmosphere, the stale leavings everywhere about, the deep gloom

of the waiter who ought to wait upon us, and the stomachache with which a lonely traveller at a distant table

in a corner was too evidently afflicted. I now pointed out to Bullfinch the alarming circumstance that this

traveller had DINED. We hurriedly debated whether, without infringement of good breeding, we could ask

him to disclose if he had partaken of mockturtle, sole, curry, or roast duck? We decided that the thing could

not be politely done, and we had set our own stomachs on a cast, and they must stand the hazard of the die.

I hold phrenology, within certain limits, to be true; I am much of the same mind as to the subtler expressions

of the hand; I hold physiognomy to be infallible; though all these sciences demand rare qualities in the

student. But I also hold that there is no more certain index to personal character than the condition of a set of

casters is to the character of any hotel. Knowing, and having often tested this theory of mine, Bullfinch

resigned himself to the worst, when, laying aside any remaining veil of disguise, I held up before him in

succession the cloudy oil and furry vinegar, the clogged cayenne, the dirty salt, the obscene dregs of soy, and

We went out to transact our business. So inspiriting was the relief of passing into the clean and windy streets

of Namelesston from the heavy and vapid closeness of the coffeeroom of the Temeraire, that hope began to

revive within us. We began to consider that perhaps the lonely traveller had taken physic, or done something

injudicious to bring his complaint on. Bullfinch remarked that he thought the waiter who ought to wait upon

us had brightened a little when suggesting curry; and although I knew him to have been at that moment the

express image of despair, I allowed myself to become elevated in spirits. As we walked by the softly

lapping sea, all the notabilities of Namelesston, who are for ever going up and down with the changelessness

of the tides, passed to and fro in procession. Pretty girls on horseback, and with detested ridingmasters;

pretty girls on foot; mature ladies in hats, spectacled, strongminded, and glaring at the opposite or weaker

sex. The Stock Exchange was strongly represented, Jerusalem was strongly represented, the bores of the

prosier London clubs were strongly represented. Fortunehunters of all denominations were there, from

hirsute insolvency, in a curricle, to closely buttoned swindlery in doubtful boots, on the sharp lookout for

any likely young gentleman disposed to play a game at billiards round the corner. Masters of languages, their

lessons finished for the day, were going to their homes out of sight of the sea; mistresses of accomplishments,

carrying small portfolios, likewise tripped homeward; pairs of scholastic pupils, two and two, went languidly

along the beach, surveying the face of the waters as if waiting for some Ark to come and take them off.

Spectres of the George the Fourth days flitted unsteadily among the crowd, bearing the outward semblance of

ancient dandies, of every one of whom it might be said, not that he had one leg in the grave, or both legs, but

that he was steeped in grave to the summit of his high shirtcollar, and had nothing real about him but his

bones. Alone stationary in the midst of all the movements, the Namelesston boatmen leaned against the

railings and yawned, and looked out to sea, or looked at the moored fishingboats and at nothing. Such is the

unchanging manner of life with this nursery of our hardy seamen; and very dry nurses they are, and always

wanting something to drink. The only two nautical personages detached from the railing were the two

fortunate possessors of the celebrated monstrous unknown barking fish, just caught (frequently just caught

off Namelesston), who carried him about in a hamper, and pressed the scientific to look in at the lid.

The sands of the hour had all run out when we got back to the Temeraire. Says Bullfinch, then, to the youth in

When we arrived at the family vault with a skylight, which the youth in livery presented as the institution

sought, we had already whisked off our cravats and coats; but finding ourselves in the presence of an evil

smell, and no linen but two crumpled towels newly damp from the countenances of two somebody elses, we

There the waiter who ought to wait upon us had set forth our knives and forks and glasses, on the cloth whose

dirty acquaintance we had already had the pleasure of making, and which we were pleased to recognise by

the familiar expression of its stains. And now there occurred the truly surprising phenomenon, that the waiter

who ought not to wait upon us swooped down upon us, clutched our loaf of bread, and vanished with the

Bullfinch, with distracted eyes, was following this unaccountable figure 'out at the portal,' like the ghost in

Hamlet, when the waiter who ought to wait upon us jostled against it, carrying a tureen.

'Waiter!' said a severe diner, lately finished, perusing his bill fiercely through his eyeglass.

The waiter put down our tureen on a remote sidetable, and went to see what was amiss in this new direction.

'This is not right, you know, waiter. Look here! here's yesterday's sherry, one and eightpence, and here we are

So far from knowing what sixpence meant, the waiter protested that he didn't know what anything meant. He

wiped the perspiration from his clammy brow, and said it was impossible to do it, not particularising what,

'Take the bill to the bar, and get it altered,' said Mr. Indignation Cocker, so to call him.

The waiter took it, looked intensely at it, didn't seem to like the idea of taking it to the bar, and submitted, as

'I tell you again,' said Mr. Indignation Cocker, 'here's yesterday's sherry can't you see it? one and

eightpence, and here we are again, two shillings. What do you make of one and eightpence and two

Totally unable to make anything of one and eightpence and two shillings, the waiter went out to try if

anybody else could; merely casting a helpless backward glance at Bullfinch, in acknowledgement of his

pathetic entreaties for our souptureen. After a pause, during which Mr. Indignation Cocker read a newspaper

and coughed defiant coughs, Bullfinch arose to get the tureen, when the waiter reappeared and brought it,

dropping Mr. Indignation Cocker's altered bill on Mr. Indignation Cocker's table as he came along.

'It's quite impossible to do it, gentlemen,' murmured the waiter; 'and the kitchen is so far off.'

'Well, you don't keep the house; it's not your fault, we suppose. Bring some sherry.'

'Waiter!' from Mr. Indignation Cocker, with a new and burning sense of injury upon him.

The waiter, arrested on his way to our sherry, stopped short, and came back to see what was wrong now.

'Will you look here? This is worse than before. DO you understand? Here's yesterday's sherry, one and

eightpence, and here we are again two shillings. And what the devil does ninepence mean?'

This new portent utterly confounded the waiter. He wrung his napkin, and mutely appealed to the ceiling.

'I want to know,' persisted Mr. Indignation Cocker, 'the meaning of ninepence. I want to know the meaning of

sherry one and eightpence yesterday, and of here we are again two shillings. Send somebody.'

The distracted waiter got out of the room on pretext of sending somebody, and by that means got our wine.

But the instant he appeared with our decanter, Mr. Indignation Cocker descended on him again.

'You will now have the goodness to attend to our dinner, waiter,' said Bullfinch, sternly.

'I am very sorry, but it's quite impossible to do it, gentlemen,' pleaded the waiter; 'and the kitchen '

We were not without our fears that the waiter rushed out to hang himself; and we were much relieved by his

fetching somebody, in graceful, flowing skirts and with a waist, who very soon settled Mr. Indignation

'Oh!' said Mr. Cocker, with his fire surprisingly quenched by this apparition; 'I wished to ask about this bill of

mine, because it appears to me that there's a little mistake here. Let me show you. Here's yesterday's sherry

one and eightpence, and here we are again two shillings. And how do you explain ninepence?'

However it was explained, in tones too soft to be overheard. Mr. Cocker was heard to say nothing more than

The lonely traveller with the stomachache had all this time suffered severely, drawing up a leg now and

then, and sipping hot brandyandwater with grated ginger in it. When we tasted our (very) mockturtle

soup, and were instantly seized with symptoms of some disorder simulating apoplexy, and occasioned by the

surcharge of nose and brain with lukewarm dishwater holding in solution sour flour, poisonous condiments,

and (say) seventyfive per cent. of miscellaneous kitchen stuff rolled into balls, we were inclined to trace his

disorder to that source. On the other hand, there was a silent anguish upon him too strongly resembling the

results established within ourselves by the sherry, to be discarded from alarmed consideration. Again, we

observed him, with terror, to be much overcome by our sole's being aired in a temporary retreat close to him,

while the waiter went out (as we conceived) to see his friends. And when the curry made its appearance he

In fine, for the uneatable part of this little dinner (as contradistinguished from the undrinkable) we paid only

seven shillings and sixpence each. And Bullfinch and I agreed unanimously, that no such illserved,

illappointed, illcooked, nasty little dinner could be got for the money anywhere else under the sun. With

that comfort to our backs, we turned them on the dear old Temeraire, the charging Temeraire, and resolved

A great reader of good fiction at an unusually early age, it seems to me as though I had been born under the

superintendence of the estimable but terrific gentleman whose name stands at the head of my present

reflections. The instructive monomaniac, Mr. Barlow, will be remembered as the tutor of Master Harry

Sandford and Master Tommy Merton. He knew everything, and didactically improved all sorts of occasions,

from the consumption of a plate of cherries to the contemplation of a starlight night. What youth came to

without Mr. Barlow was displayed in the history of Sandford and Merton, by the example of a certain awful

Master Mash. This young wretch wore buckles and powder, conducted himself with insupportable levity at

the theatre, had no idea of facing a mad bull singlehanded (in which I think him less reprehensible, as

remotely reflecting my own character), and was a frightful instance of the enervating effects of luxury upon

Strange destiny on the part of Mr. Barlow, to go down to posterity as childhood's experience of a bore!

My personal indictment against Mr. Barlow is one of many counts. I will proceed to set forth a few of the

In the first place, he never made or took a joke. This insensibility on Mr. Barlow's part not only cast its own

gloom over my boyhood, but blighted even the sixpenny jestbooks of the time; for, groaning under a moral

spell constraining me to refer all things to Mr. Barlow, I could not choose but ask myself in a whisper when

tickled by a printed jest, 'What would HE think of it? What would HE see in it?' The point of the jest

immediately became a sting, and stung my conscience. For my mind's eye saw him stolid, frigid, perchance

taking from its shelf some dreary Greek book, and translating at full length what some dismal sage said (and

touched up afterwards, perhaps, for publication), when he banished some unlucky joker from Athens.

The incompatibility of Mr. Barlow with all other portions of my young life but himself, the adamantine

inadaptability of the man to my favourite fancies and amusements, is the thing for which I hate him most.

What right had he to bore his way into my Arabian Nights? Yet he did. He was always hinting doubts of the

veracity of Sindbad the Sailor. If he could have got hold of the Wonderful Lamp, I knew he would have

trimmed it and lighted it, and delivered a lecture over it on the qualities of spermoil, with a glance at the

whale fisheries. He would so soon have found out on mechanical principles the peg in the neck of the

Enchanted Horse, and would have turned it the right way in so workmanlike a manner, that the horse could

never have got any height into the air, and the story couldn't have been. He would have proved, by map and

compass, that there was no such kingdom as the delightful kingdom of Casgar, on the frontiers of Tartary. He

would have caused that hypocritical young prig Harry to make an experiment, with the aid of a temporary

building in the garden and a dummy, demonstrating that you couldn't let a choked hunchback down an

Eastern chimney with a cord, and leave him upright on the hearth to terrify the sultan's purveyor.

The golden sounds of the overture to the first metropolitan pantomime, I remember, were alloyed by Mr.

Barlow. Click click, ting ting, bang bang, weedle weedle weedle, bang! I recall the chilling air that ran across

my frame and cooled my hot delight, as the thought occurred to me, 'This would never do for Mr. Barlow!'

After the curtain drew up, dreadful doubts of Mr. Barlow's considering the costumes of the Nymphs of the

Nebula as being sufficiently opaque, obtruded themselves on my enjoyment. In the clown I perceived two

persons; one a fascinating unaccountable creature of a hectic complexion, joyous in spirits though feeble in

intellect, with flashes of brilliancy; the other a pupil for Mr. Barlow. I thought how Mr. Barlow would

secretly rise early in the morning, and butter the pavement for HIM, and, when he had brought him down,

I thought how Mr. Barlow would heat all the pokers in the house, and singe him with the whole collection, to

bring him better acquainted with the properties of incandescent iron, on which he (Barlow) would fully

expatiate. I pictured Mr. Barlow's instituting a comparison between the clown's conduct at his studies,

drinking up the ink, licking his copybook, and using his head for blottingpaper, and that of the already

mentioned young prig of prigs, Harry, sitting at the Barlovian feet, sneakingly pretending to be in a rapture of

youthful knowledge. I thought how soon Mr. Barlow would smooth the clown's hair down, instead of letting

it stand erect in three tall tufts; and how, after a couple of years or so with Mr. Barlow, he would keep his

legs close together when he walked, and would take his hands out of his big loose pockets, and wouldn't have

That I am particularly ignorant what most things in the universe are made of, and how they are made, is

another of my charges against Mr. Barlow. With the dread upon me of developing into a Harry, and with a

further dread upon me of being Barlowed if I made inquiries, by bringing down upon myself a cold

showerbath of explanations and experiments, I forbore enlightenment in my youth, and became, as they say

in melodramas, 'the wreck you now behold.' That I consorted with idlers and dunces is another of the

melancholy facts for which I hold Mr. Barlow responsible. That pragmatical prig, Harry, became so

detestable in my sight, that, he being reported studious in the South, I would have fled idle to the extremest

North. Better to learn misconduct from a Master Mash than science and statistics from a Sandford! So I took

the path, which, but for Mr. Barlow, I might never have trodden. Thought I, with a shudder, 'Mr. Barlow is a

bore, with an immense constructive power of making bores. His prize specimen is a bore. He seeks to make a

bore of me. That knowledge is power I am not prepared to gainsay; but, with Mr. Barlow, knowledge is

power to bore.' Therefore I took refuge in the caves of ignorance, wherein I have resided ever since, and

But the weightiest charge of all my charges against Mr. Barlow is, that he still walks the earth in various

disguises, seeking to make a Tommy of me, even in my maturity. Irrepressible, instructive monomaniac, Mr.

Barlow fills my life with pitfalls, and lies hiding at the bottom to burst out upon me when I least expect him.

Knowing Mr. Barlow to have invested largely in the moving panorama trade, and having on various

occasions identified him in the dark with a long wand in his hand, holding forth in his old way (made more

appalling in this connection by his sometimes cracking a piece of Mr. Carlyle's own DeadSea fruit in

mistake for a joke), I systematically shun pictorial entertainment on rollers. Similarly, I should demand

responsible bail and guaranty against the appearance of Mr. Barlow, before committing myself to attendance

at any assemblage of my fellowcreatures where a bottle of water and a notebook were conspicuous objects;

for in either of those associations, I should expressly expect him. But such is the designing nature of the man,

that he steals in where no reasoning precaution or provision could expect him. As in the following case:

Adjoining the Caves of Ignorance is a country town. In this country town the Mississippi Momuses, nine in

number, were announced to appear in the townhall, for the general delectation, this last Christmas week.

Knowing Mr. Barlow to be unconnected with the Mississippi, though holding republican opinions, and

deeming myself secure, I took a stall. My object was to hear and see the Mississippi Momuses in what the

bills described as their 'National ballads, plantation breakdowns, nigger partsongs, choice conundrums,

sparkling repartees, I found the nine dressed alike, in the black coat and trousers, white waistcoat, very large

shirtfront, very large shirtcollar, and very large white tie and wristbands, which constitute the dress of the

mass of the African race, and which has been observed by travellers to prevail over a vast number of degrees

of latitude. All the nine rolled their eyes exceedingly, and had very red lips. At the extremities of the curve

they formed, seated in their chairs, were the performers on the tambourine and bones. The centre Momus, a

black of melancholy aspect (who inspired me with a vague uneasiness for which I could not then account),

performed on a Mississippi instrument closely resembling what was once called in this island a hurdygurdy.

The Momuses on either side of him had each another instrument peculiar to the Father of Waters, which may

be likened to a stringed weatherglass held upside down. There were likewise a little flute and a violin. All

went well for awhile, and we had had several sparkling repartees exchanged between the performers on the

tambourine and bones, when the black of melancholy aspect, turning to the latter, and addressing him in a

deep and improving voice as 'Bones, sir,' delivered certain grave remarks to him concerning the juveniles

present, and the season of the year; whereon I perceived that I was in the presence of Mr. Barlow corked!

Another night and this was in London I attended the representation of a little comedy. As the characters

were lifelike (and consequently not improving), and as they went upon their several ways and designs without

personally addressing themselves to me, I felt rather confident of coming through it without being regarded as

Tommy, the more so, as we were clearly getting close to the end. But I deceived myself. All of a sudden,

Apropos of nothing, everybody concerned came to a check and halt, advanced to the footlights in a general

rally to take dead aim at me, and brought me down with a moral homily, in which I detected the dread hand

Nay, so intricate and subtle are the toils of this hunter, that on the very next night after that, I was again

entrapped, where no vestige of a spring could have been apprehended by the timidest. It was a burlesque that

I saw performed; an uncompromising burlesque, where everybody concerned, but especially the ladies,

carried on at a very considerable rate indeed. Most prominent and active among the corps of performers was

what I took to be (and she really gave me very fair opportunities of coming to a right conclusion) a young

lady of a pretty figure. She was dressed as a picturesque young gentleman, whose pantaloons had been cut off

in their infancy; and she had very neat knees and very neat satin boots. Immediately after singing a slang

song and dancing a slang dance, this engaging figure approached the fatal lamps, and, bending over them,

delivered in a thrilling voice a random eulogium on, and exhortation to pursue, the virtues. 'Great Heaven!'

There is still another aspect in which Mr. Barlow perpetually insists on my sustaining the character of

Tommy, which is more unendurable yet, on account of its extreme aggressiveness. For the purposes of a

review or newspaper, he will get up an abstruse subject with definite pains, will Barlow, utterly regardless of

the price of midnight oil, and indeed of everything else, save cramming himself to the eyes.

But mark. When Mr. Barlow blows his information off, he is not contented with having rammed it home, and

discharged it upon me, Tommy, his target, but he pretends that he was always in possession of it, and made

nothing of it, that he imbibed it with mother's milk, and that I, the wretched Tommy, am most abjectly

behindhand in not having done the same. I ask, why is Tommy to be always the foil of Mr. Barlow to this

extent? What Mr. Barlow had not the slightest notion of himself, a week ago, it surely cannot be any very

heavy backsliding in me not to have at my fingers' ends to day! And yet Mr. Barlow systematically carries it

over me with a high hand, and will tauntingly ask me, in his articles, whether it is possible that I am not

aware that every schoolboy knows that the fourteenth turning on the left in the steppes of Russia will

conduct to such and such a wandering tribe? with other disparaging questions of like nature. So, when Mr.

Barlow addresses a letter to any journal as a volunteer correspondent (which I frequently find him doing), he

will previously have gotten somebody to tell him some tremendous technicality, and will write in the coolest

manner, 'Now, sir, I may assume that every reader of your columns, possessing average information and

intelligence, knows as well as I do that' say that the draught from the touchhole of a cannon of such a

calibre bears such a proportion in the nicest fractions to the draught from the muzzle; or some equally

familiar little fact. But whatever it is, be certain that it always tends to the exaltation of Mr. Barlow, and the

Mr. Barlow's knowledge of my own pursuits I find to be so profound, that my own knowledge of them

becomes as nothing. Mr. Barlow (disguised and bearing a feigned name, but detected by me) has occasionally

taught me, in a sonorous voice, from end to end of a long dinnertable, trifles that I took the liberty of

teaching him fiveandtwenty years ago. My closing article of impeachment against Mr. Barlow is, that he

goes out to breakfast, goes out to dinner, goes out everywhere, high and low, and that he WILL preach to me,

and that I CAN'T get rid of him. He makes me a Promethean Tommy, bound; and he is the vulture that

It is one of my fancies, that even my idlest walk must always have its appointed destination. I set myself a

task before I leave my lodging in Coventgarden on a street expedition, and should no more think of altering

my route by the way, or turning back and leaving a part of it unachieved, than I should think of fraudulently

violating an agreement entered into with somebody else. The other day, finding myself under this kind of

obligation to proceed to Limehouse, I started punctually at noon, in compliance with the terms of the contract

On such an occasion, it is my habit to regard my walk as my beat, and myself as a higher sort of

policeconstable doing duty on the same. There is many a ruffian in the streets whom I mentally collar and

clear out of them, who would see mighty little of London, I can tell him, if I could deal with him physically.

Issuing forth upon this very beat, and following with my eyes three hulking garrotters on their way home,

which home I could confidently swear to be within so many yards of Drurylane, in such a narrow and

restricted direction (though they live in their lodging quite as undisturbed as I in mine), I went on duty with

a consideration which I respectfully offer to the new Chief Commissioner, in whom I thoroughly confide as

a tried and efficient public servant. How often (thought I) have I been forced to swallow, in policereports,

the intolerable stereotyped pill of nonsense, how that the policeconstable informed the worthy magistrate

how that the associates of the prisoner did, at that present speaking, dwell in a street or court which no man

dared go down, and how that the worthy magistrate had heard of the dark reputation of such street or court,

and how that our readers would doubtless remember that it was always the same street or court which was

Now, suppose that a Chief Commissioner sent round a circular to every division of police employed in

London, requiring instantly the names in all districts of all such muchpuffed streets or courts which no man

durst go down; and suppose that in such circular he gave plain warning, 'If those places really exist, they are a

proof of police inefficiency which I mean to punish; and if they do not exist, but are a conventional fiction,

then they are a proof of lazy tacit police connivance with professional crime, which I also mean to punish'

what then? Fictions or realities, could they survive the touchstone of this atom of common sense? To tell us

in open court, until it has become as trite a feature of news as the great gooseberry, that a costly

policesystem such as was never before heard of, has left in London, in the days of steam and gas and

photographs of thieves and electric telegraphs, the sanctuaries and stews of the Stuarts! Why, a parity of

practice, in all departments, would bring back the Plague in two summers, and the Druids in a century!

Walking faster under my share of this public injury, I overturned a wretched little creature, who, clutching at

the rags of a pair of trousers with one of its claws, and at its ragged hair with the other, pattered with bare feet

over the muddy stones. I stopped to raise and succour this poor weeping wretch, and fifty like it, but of both

sexes, were about me in a moment, begging, tumbling, fighting, clamouring, yelling, shivering in their

nakedness and hunger. The piece of money I had put into the claw of the child I had overturned was clawed

out of it, and was again clawed out of that wolfish gripe, and again out of that, and soon I had no notion in

what part of the obscene scuffle in the mud, of rags and legs and arms and dirt, the money might be. In

raising the child, I had drawn it aside out of the main thoroughfare, and this took place among some wooden

Unexpectedly, from among them emerged a genuine policeconstable, before whom the dreadful brood

dispersed in various directions, he making feints and darts in this direction and in that, and catching nothing.

When all were frightened away, he took off his hat, pulled out a handkerchief from it, wiped his heated brow,

and restored the handkerchief and hat to their places, with the air of a man who had discharged a great moral

duty, as indeed he had, in doing what was set down for him. I looked at him, and I looked about at the

disorderly traces in the mud, and I thought of the drops of rain and the footprints of an extinct creature, hoary

ages upon ages old, that geologists have identified on the face of a cliff; and this speculation came over me: If

this mud could petrify at this moment, and could lie concealed here for ten thousand years, I wonder whether

the race of men then to be our successors on the earth could, from these or any marks, by the utmost force of

the human intellect, unassisted by tradition, deduce such an astounding inference as the existence of a

polished state of society that bore with the public savagery of neglected children in the streets of its capital

city, and was proud of its power by sea and land, and never used its power to seize and save them!

After this, when I came to the Old Bailey and glanced up it towards Newgate, I found that the prison had an

inconsistent look. There seemed to be some unlucky inconsistency in the atmosphere that day; for though the

proportions of St. Paul's Cathedral are very beautiful, it had an air of being somewhat out of drawing, in my

eyes. I felt as though the cross were too high up, and perched upon the intervening golden ball too far away.

Facing eastward, I left behind me Smithfield and Old Bailey, fire and faggot, condemned hold, public

hanging, whipping through the city at the carttail, pillory, brandingiron, and other beautiful ancestral

landmarks, which rude hands have rooted up, without bringing the stars quite down upon us as yet, and

went my way upon my beat, noting how oddly characteristic neighbourhoods are divided from one another,

hereabout, as though by an invisible line across the way. Here shall cease the bankers and the money

changers; here shall begin the shipping interest and the nautical instrument shops; here shall follow a

scarcely perceptible flavouring of groceries and drugs; here shall come a strong infusion of butchers; now,

small hosiers shall be in the ascendant; henceforth, everything exposed for sale shall have its ticketed price

A single stride at Houndsditch Church, no wider than sufficed to cross the kennel at the bottom of the

Canongate, which the debtors in Holyrood sanctuary were wont to relieve their minds by skipping over, as

Scott relates, and standing in delightful daring of catchpoles on the free side, a single stride, and everything

is entirely changed in grain and character. West of the stride, a table, or a chest of drawers on sale, shall be of

mahogany and Frenchpolished; east of the stride, it shall be of deal, smeared with a cheap counterfeit

resembling lipsalve. West of the stride, a penny loaf or bun shall be compact and selfcontained; east of the

stride, it shall be of a sprawling and splayfooted character, as seeking to make more of itself for the money.

My beat lying round by Whitechapel Church, and the adjacent sugarrefineries, great buildings, tier upon

tier, that have the appearance of being nearly related to the dockwarehouses at Liverpool, I turned off to

my right, and, passing round the awkward corner on my left, came suddenly on an apparition familiar to

What London peripatetic of these times has not seen the woman who has fallen forward, double, through

some affection of the spine, and whose head has of late taken a turn to one side, so that it now droops over the

back of one of her arms at about the wrist? Who does not know her staff, and her shawl, and her basket, as

she gropes her way along, capable of seeing nothing but the pavement, never begging, never stopping, for

ever going somewhere on no business? How does she live, whence does she come, whither does she go, and

why? I mind the time when her yellow arms were naught but bone and parchment. Slight changes steal over

her; for there is a shadowy suggestion of human skin on them now. The Strand may be taken as the central

point about which she revolves in a half mile orbit. How comes she so far east as this? And coming back

too! Having been how much farther? She is a rare spectacle in this neighbourhood. I receive intelligent

information to this effect from a dog a lopsided mongrel with a foolish tail, plodding along with his tail

up, and his ears pricked, and displaying an amiable interest in the ways of his fellowmen, if I may be

allowed the expression. After pausing at a porkshop, he is jogging eastward like myself, with a benevolent

countenance and a watery mouth, as though musing on the many excellences of pork, when he beholds this

doubledup bundle approaching. He is not so much astonished at the bundle (though amazed by that), as the

circumstance that it has within itself the means of locomotion. He stops, pricks his ears higher, makes a slight

point, stares, utters a short, low growl, and glistens at the nose, as I conceive with terror. The bundle

continuing to approach, he barks, turns tail, and is about to fly, when, arguing with himself that flight is not

becoming in a dog, he turns, and once more faces the advancing heap of clothes. After much hesitation, it

occurs to him that there may be a face in it somewhere. Desperately resolving to undertake the adventure, and

pursue the inquiry, he goes slowly up to the bundle, goes slowly round it, and coming at length upon the

human countenance down there where never human countenance should be, gives a yelp of horror, and flies

Being now in the Commercial Road district of my beat, and bethinking myself that Stepney Station is near, I

quicken my pace that I may turn out of the road at that point, and see how my small eastern star is shining.

The Children's Hospital, to which I gave that name, is in full force. All its beds are occupied. There is a new

face on the bed where my pretty baby lay, and that sweet little child is now at rest for ever. Much kind

sympathy has been here since my former visit, and it is good to see the walls profusely garnished with dolls. I

wonder what Poodles may think of them, as they stretch out their arms above the beds, and stare, and display

their splendid dresses. Poodles has a greater interest in the patients. I find him making the round of the beds,

like a housesurgeon, attended by another dog, a friend, who appears to trot about with him in the

character of his pupil dresser. Poodles is anxious to make me known to a pretty little girl looking wonderfully

healthy, who had had a leg taken off for cancer of the knee. A difficult operation, Poodles intimates, wagging

his tail on the counterpane, but perfectly successful, as you see, dear sir! The patient, patting Poodles, adds

with a smile, 'The leg was so much trouble to me, that I am glad it's gone.' I never saw anything in doggery

finer than the deportment of Poodles, when another little girl opens her mouth to show a peculiar enlargement

of the tongue. Poodles (at that time on a table, to be on a level with the occasion) looks at the tongue (with his

own sympathetically out) so very gravely and knowingly, that I feel inclined to put my hand in my

On my beat again, and close to Limehouse Church, its termination, I found myself near to certain

'LeadMills.' Struck by the name, which was fresh in my memory, and finding, on inquiry, that these same

leadmills were identified with those same leadmills of which I made mention when I first visited the East

London Children's Hospital and its neighbourhood as Uncommercial Traveller, I resolved to have a look at

Received by two very intelligent gentlemen, brothers, and partners with their father in the concern, and who

testified every desire to show their works to me freely, I went over the leadmills. The purport of such works

is the conversion of piglead into white lead. This conversion is brought about by the slow and gradual

effecting of certain successive chemical changes in the lead itself. The processes are picturesque and

interesting, the most so, being the burying of the lead, at a certain stage of preparation, in pots, each pot

containing a certain quantity of acid besides, and all the pots being buried in vast numbers, in layers, under

Hopping up ladders, and across planks, and on elevated perches, until I was uncertain whether to liken myself

to a bird or a brick layer, I became conscious of standing on nothing particular, looking down into one of a

series of large cocklofts, with the outer day peeping in through the chinks in the tiled roof above. A number

of women were ascending to, and descending from, this cockloft, each carrying on the upward journey a pot

of prepared lead and acid, for deposition under the smoking tan. When one layer of pots was completely

filled, it was carefully covered in with planks, and those were carefully covered with tan again, and then

another layer of pots was begun above; sufficient means of ventilation being preserved through wooden

tubes. Going down into the cockloft then filling, I found the heat of the tan to be surprisingly great, and also

the odour of the lead and acid to be not absolutely exquisite, though I believe not noxious at that stage. In

other cocklofts, where the pots were being exhumed, the heat of the steaming tan was much greater, and the

smell was penetrating and peculiar. There were cocklofts in all stages; full and empty, half filled and half

emptied; strong, active women were clambering about them busily; and the whole thing had rather the air of

the upper part of the house of some immensely rich old Turk, whose faithful seraglio were hiding his money

As is the case with most pulps or pigments, so in the instance of this whitelead, processes of stirring,

separating, washing, grinding, rolling, and pressing succeed. Some of these are unquestionably inimical to

health, the danger arising from inhalation of particles of lead, or from contact between the lead and the touch,

or both. Against these dangers, I found good respirators provided (simply made of flannel and muslin, so as

to be inexpensively renewed, and in some instances washed with scented soap), and gauntlet gloves, and

loose gowns. Everywhere, there was as much fresh air as windows, well placed and opened, could possibly

admit. And it was explained that the precaution of frequently changing the women employed in the worst

parts of the work (a precaution originating in their own experience or apprehension of its ill effects) was

found salutary. They had a mysterious and singular appearance, with the mouth and nose covered, and the

loose gown on, and yet bore out the simile of the old Turk and the seraglio all the better for the disguise.

At last this vexed whitelead, having been buried and resuscitated, and heated and cooled and stirred, and

separated and washed and ground, and rolled and pressed, is subjected to the action of intense fiery heat. A

row of women, dressed as above described, stood, let us say, in a large stone bakehouse, passing on the

bakingdishes as they were given out by the cooks, from hand to hand, into the ovens. The oven, or stove,

cold as yet, looked as high as an ordinary house, and was full of men and women on temporary footholds,

briskly passing up and stowing away the dishes. The door of another oven, or stove, about to be cooled and

emptied, was opened from above, for the uncommercial countenance to peer down into. The uncommercial

countenance withdrew itself, with expedition and a sense of suffocation, from the dullglowing heat and the

overpowering smell. On the whole, perhaps the going into these stoves to work, when they are freshly

But I made it out to be indubitable that the owners of these lead mills honestly and sedulously try to reduce

A washingplace is provided for the women (I thought there might have been more towels), and a room in

which they hang their clothes, and take their meals, and where they have a good fire range and fire, and a

female attendant to help them, and to watch that they do not neglect the cleansing of their hands before

touching their food. An experienced medical attendant is provided for them, and any premonitory symptoms

of leadpoisoning are carefully treated. Their teapots and such things were set out on tables ready for their

afternoon meal, when I saw their room; and it had a homely look. It is found that they bear the work much

better than men: some few of them have been at it for years, and the great majority of those I observed were

strong and active. On the other hand, it should be remembered that most of them are very capricious and

American inventiveness would seem to indicate that before very long whitelead may be made entirely by

machinery. The sooner, the better. In the meantime, I parted from my two frank conductors over the mills, by

telling them that they had nothing there to be concealed, and nothing to be blamed for. As to the rest, the

philosophy of the matter of leadpoisoning and workpeople seems to me to have been pretty fairly summed

up by the Irishwoman whom I quoted in my former paper: 'Some of them gets leadpisoned soon, and some

of them gets leadpisoned later, and some, but not many, niver; and 'tis all according to the constitooshun,

sur; and some constitooshuns is strong and some is weak.' Retracing my footsteps over my beat, I went off

Once upon a time (no matter when), I was engaged in a pursuit (no matter what), which could be transacted

by myself alone; in which I could have no help; which imposed a constant strain on the attention, memory,

observation, and physical powers; and which involved an almost fabulous amount of change of place and

rapid railway travelling. I had followed this pursuit through an exceptionally trying winter in an always trying

climate, and had resumed it in England after but a brief repose. Thus it came to be prolonged until, at length

and, as it seemed, all of a sudden it so wore me out that I could not rely, with my usual cheerful confidence,

upon myself to achieve the constantly recurring task, and began to feel (for the first time in my life) giddy,

jarred, shaken, faint, uncertain of voice and sight and tread and touch, and dull of spirit. The medical advice I

sought within a few hours, was given in two words: 'instant rest.' Being accustomed to observe myself as

curiously as if I were another man, and knowing the advice to meet my only need, I instantly halted in the

My intention was, to interpose, as it were, a flyleaf in the book of my life, in which nothing should be

written from without for a brief season of a few weeks. But some very singular experiences recorded

themselves on this same flyleaf, and I am going to relate them literally. I repeat the word: literally.

My first odd experience was of the remarkable coincidence between my case, in the general mind, and one

Mr. Merdle's as I find it recorded in a work of fiction called LITTLE DORRIT. To be sure, Mr. Merdle was a

swindler, forger, and thief, and my calling had been of a less harmful (and less remunerative) nature; but it

'At first, he was dead of all the diseases that ever were known, and of several brannew maladies invented

with the speed of Light to meet the demand of the occasion. He had concealed a dropsy from infancy, he had

inherited a large estate of water on the chest from his grandfather, he had had an operation performed upon

him every morning of his life for eighteen years, he had been subject to the explosion of important veins in

his body after the manner of fireworks, he had had something the matter with his lungs, he had had something

the matter with his heart, he had had something the matter with his brain. Five hundred people who sat down

to breakfast entirely uninformed on the whole subject, believed before they had done breakfast, that they

privately and personally knew Physician to have said to Mr. Merdle, "You must expect to go out, some day,

like the snuff of a candle;" and that they knew Mr. Merdle to have said to Physician, "A man can die but

once." By about eleven o'clock in the forenoon, something the matter with the brain, became the favourite

theory against the field; and by twelve the something had been distinctly ascertained to be "Pressure."

'Pressure was so entirely satisfactory to the public mind, and seemed to make every one so comfortable, that

it might have lasted all day but for Bar's having taken the real state of the case into Court at halfpast nine.

Pressure, however, so far from being overthrown by the discovery, became a greater favourite than ever.

There was a general moralising upon Pressure, in every street. All the people who had tried to make money

and had not been able to do it, said, There you were! You no sooner began to devote yourself to the pursuit of

wealth, than you got Pressure. The idle people improved the occasion in a similar manner. See, said they,

what you brought yourself to by work, work, work! You persisted in working, you overdid it, Pressure came

on, and you were done for! This consideration was very potent in many quarters, but nowhere more so than

among the young clerks and partners who had never been in the slightest danger of overdoing it. These, one

and all declared, quite piously, that they hoped they would never forget the warning as long as they lived, and

that their conduct might be so regulated as to keep off Pressure, and preserve them, a comfort to their friends,

Just my case if I had only known it when I was quietly basking in the sunshine in my Kentish meadow!

But while I so rested, thankfully recovering every hour, I had experiences more odd than this. I had

experiences of spiritual conceit, for which, as giving me a new warning against that curse of mankind, I shall

always feel grateful to the supposition that I was too far gone to protest against playing sick lion to any stray

donkey with an itching hoof. All sorts of people seemed to become vicariously religious at my expense. I

received the most uncompromising warning that I was a Heathen: on the conclusive authority of a field

preacher, who, like the most of his ignorant and vain and daring class, could not construct a tolerable

sentence in his native tongue or pen a fair letter. This inspired individual called me to order roundly, and

knew in the freest and easiest way where I was going to, and what would become of me if I failed to fashion

myself on his bright example, and was on terms of blasphemous confidence with the Heavenly Host. He was

in the secrets of my heart, and in the lowest soundings of my soul he! and could read the depths of my

nature better than his A B C, and could turn me inside out, like his own clammy glove. But what is far more

extraordinary than this for such dirty water as this could alone be drawn from such a shallow and muddy

source I found from the information of a beneficed clergyman, of whom I never heard and whom I never

saw, that I had not, as I rather supposed I had, lived a life of some reading, contemplation, and inquiry; that I

had not studied, as I rather supposed I had, to inculcate some Christian lessons in books; that I had never

tried, as I rather supposed I had, to turn a child or two tenderly towards the knowledge and love of our

Saviour; that I had never had, as I rather supposed I had had, departed friends, or stood beside open graves;

but that I had lived a life of 'uninterrupted prosperity,' and that I needed this 'check, overmuch,' and that the

way to turn it to account was to read these sermons and these poems, enclosed, and written and issued by my

correspondent! I beg it may be understood that I relate facts of my own uncommercial experience, and no

Another odd entry on the flyleaf, of a more entertaining character, was the wonderful persistency with

which kind sympathisers assumed that I had injuriously coupled with the so suddenly relinquished pursuit,

those personal habits of mine most obviously incompatible with it, and most plainly impossible of being

maintained, along with it. As, all that exercise, all that cold bathing, all that wind and weather, all that uphill

training all that everything else, say, which is usually carried about by express trains in a portmanteau and

hatbox, and partaken of under a flaming row of gaslights in the company of two thousand people. This

assuming of a whole case against all fact and likelihood, struck me as particularly droll, and was an oddity of

which I certainly had had no adequate experience in life until I turned that curious flyleaf.

My old acquaintances the beggingletter writers came out on the flyleaf, very piously indeed. They were

glad, at such a serious crisis, to afford me another opportunity of sending that Post office order. I needn't

make it a pound, as previously insisted on; ten shillings might ease my mind. And Heaven forbid that they

should refuse, at such an insignificant figure, to take a weight off the memory of an erring fellowcreature!

One gentleman, of an artistic turn (and copiously illustrating the books of the Mendicity Society), thought it

might soothe my conscience, in the tender respect of gifts misused, if I would immediately cash up in aid of

his lowly talent for original design as a specimen of which he enclosed me a work of art which I recognized

as a tracing from a woodcut originally published in the late Mrs. Trollope's book on America, forty or fifty

years ago. The number of people who were prepared to live long years after me, untiring benefactors to their

species, for fifty pounds apiece down, was astonishing. Also, of those who wanted banknotes for stiff

Divers wonderful medicines and machines insinuated recommendations of themselves into the flyleaf that

was to have been so blank. It was specially observable that every prescriber, whether in a moral or physical

direction, knew me thoroughly knew me from head to heel, in and out, through and through, upside down. I

was a glass piece of general property, and everybody was on the most surprisingly intimate terms with me. A

few public institutions had complimentary perceptions of corners in my mind, of which, after considerable

selfexamination, I have not discovered any indication. Neat little printed forms were addressed to those

Will it seem exaggerative to state my belief that the most honest, the most modest, and the least

vainglorious of all the records upon this strange flyleaf, was a letter from the selfdeceived discoverer of

the recondite secret 'how to live four or five hundred years'? Doubtless it will seem so, yet the statement is

not exaggerative by any means, but is made in my serious and sincere conviction. With this, and with a laugh

One day this last Whitsuntide, at precisely eleven o'clock in the forenoon, there suddenly rode into the field

of view commanded by the windows of my lodging an equestrian phenomenon. It was a fellowcreature on

horseback, dressed in the absurdest manner. The fellowcreature wore high boots; some other (and much

larger) fellowcreature's breeches, of a slackbaked doughy colour and a baggy form; a blue shirt, whereof

the skirt, or tail, was puffily tucked into the waistband of the said breeches; no coat; a red shoulderbelt;

and a demisemimilitary scarlet hat, with a feathered ornament in front, which, to the uninstructed human

vision, had the appearance of a moulting shuttlecock. I laid down the newspaper with which I had been

occupied, and surveyed the fellowman in question with astonishment. Whether he had been sitting to any

painter as a frontispiece for a new edition of 'Sartor Resartus;' whether 'the husk or shell of him,' as the

esteemed Herr Teufelsdroch might put it, were founded on a jockey, on a circus, on General Garibaldi, on

cheap porcelain, on a toy shop, on Guy Fawkes, on waxwork, on golddigging, on Bedlam, or on all, were

doubts that greatly exercised my mind. Meanwhile, my fellowman stumbled and slided, excessively against

his will, on the slippery stones of my Coventgarden street, and elicited shrieks from several sympathetic

females, by convulsively restraining himself from pitching over his horse's head. In the very crisis of these

evolutions, and indeed at the trying moment when his charger's tail was in a tobacconist's shop, and his head

anywhere about town, this cavalier was joined by two similar portents, who, likewise stumbling and sliding,

caused him to stumble and slide the more distressingly. At length this Gilpinian triumvirate effected a halt,

and, looking northward, waved their three right hands as commanding unseen troops, to 'Up, guards! and at

'em.' Hereupon a brazen band burst forth, which caused them to be instantly bolted with to some remote spot

Judging from these appearances that a procession was under way, I threw up my window, and, craning out,

had the satisfaction of beholding it advancing along the streets. It was a Teetotal procession, as I learnt from

its banners, and was long enough to consume twenty minutes in passing. There were a great number of

children in it, some of them so very young in their mothers' arms as to be in the act of practically

exemplifying their abstinence from fermented liquors, and attachment to an unintoxicating drink, while the

procession defiled. The display was, on the whole, pleasant to see, as any goodhumoured holiday

assemblage of clean, cheerful, and wellconducted people should be. It was bright with ribbons, tinsel, and

shoulderbelts, and abounded in flowers, as if those latter trophies had come up in profusion under much

watering. The day being breezy, the insubordination of the large banners was very reprehensible. Each of

these being borne aloft on two poles and stayed with some halfdozen lines, was carried, as polite books in

the last century used to be written, by 'various hands,' and the anxiety expressed in the upturned faces of those

officers, something between the anxiety attendant on the balancing art, and that inseparable from the

pastime of kiteflying, with a touch of the angler's quality in landing his scaly prey, much impressed me.

Suddenly, too, a banner would shiver in the wind, and go about in the most inconvenient manner. This always

happened oftenest with such gorgeous standards as those representing a gentleman in black, corpulent with

tea and water, in the laudable act of summarily reforming a family, feeble and pinched with beer. The

gentleman in black distended by wind would then conduct himself with the most unbecoming levity, while

the beery family, growing beerier, would frantically try to tear themselves away from his ministration. Some

of the inscriptions accompanying the banners were of a highly determined character, as 'We never, never will

give up the temperance cause,' with similar sound resolutions rather suggestive to the profane mind of Mrs.

Micawber's 'I never will desert Mr. Micawber,' and of Mr. Micawber's retort, 'Really, my dear, I am not

aware that you were ever required by any human being to do anything of the sort.'

At intervals, a gloom would fall on the passing members of the procession, for which I was at first unable to

account. But this I discovered, after a little observation, to be occasioned by the coming on of the

executioners, the terrible official beings who were to make the speeches byandby, who were

distributed in open carriages at various points of the cavalcade. A dark cloud and a sensation of dampness, as

from many wet blankets, invariably preceded the rolling on of the dreadful cars containing these headsmen;

and I noticed that the wretched people who closely followed them, and who were in a manner forced to

contemplate their folded arms, complacent countenances, and threatening lips, were more overshadowed by

the cloud and damp than those in front. Indeed, I perceived in some of these so moody an implacability

towards the magnates of the scaffold, and so plain a desire to tear them limb from limb, that I would

respectfully suggest to the managers the expediency of conveying the executioners to the scene of their

dismal labours by unfrequented ways, and in closelytilted carts, next Whitsuntide.

The procession was composed of a series of smaller processions, which had come together, each from its own

metropolitan district. An infusion of allegory became perceptible when patriotic Peckham advanced. So I

judged, from the circumstance of Peckham's unfurling a silken banner that fanned heaven and earth with the

words, 'The Peckham Lifeboat.' No boat being in attendance, though life, in the likeness of 'a gallant, gallant

crew,' in nautical uniform, followed the flag, I was led to meditate on the fact that Peckham is described by

geographers as an inland settlement, with no larger or nearer shoreline than the towingpath of the Surrey

Canal, on which stormy station I had been given to understand no lifeboat exists. Thus I deduced an

allegorical meaning, and came to the conclusion, that if patriotic Peckham picked a peck of pickled poetry,

I have observed that the aggregate procession was on the whole pleasant to see. I made use of that qualified

expression with a direct meaning, which I will now explain. It involves the title of this paper, and a little fair

trying of teetotalism by its own tests. There were many people on foot, and many people in vehicles of

various kinds. The former were pleasant to see, and the latter were not pleasant to see; for the reason that I

never, on any occasion or under any circumstances, have beheld heavier overloading of horses than in this

public show. Unless the imposition of a great van laden with from ten to twenty people on a single horse be a

moderate tasking of the poor creature, then the temperate use of horses was immoderate and cruel. From the

smallest and lightest horse to the largest and heaviest, there were many instances in which the beast of burden

was so shamefully overladen, that the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals have frequently

Now, I have always held that there may be, and that there unquestionably is, such a thing as use without

abuse, and that therefore the total abolitionists are irrational and wrongheaded. But the procession

completely converted me. For so large a number of the people using draughthorses in it were so clearly

unable to use them without abusing them, that I perceived total abstinence from horseflesh to be the only

remedy of which the case admitted. As it is all one to teetotalers whether you take half a pint of beer or half a

gallon, so it was all one here whether the beast of burden were a pony or a carthorse. Indeed, my case had

the special strength that the halfpint quadruped underwent as much suffering as the halfgallon quadruped.

Moral: total abstinence from horseflesh through the whole length and breadth of the scale. This pledge will be

in course of administration to all teetotal processionists, not pedestrians, at the publishing office of 'All the

Observe a point for consideration. This procession comprised many persons in their gigs, broughams,

taxcarts, barouches, chaises, and what not, who were merciful to the dumb beasts that drew them, and did

not overcharge their strength. What is to be done with those unoffending persons? I will not run amuck and

vilify and defame them, as teetotal tracts and platforms would most assuredly do, if the question were one of

drinking instead of driving: I merely ask what is to be done with them! The reply admits of no dispute

whatever. Manifestly, in strict accordance with teetotal doctrines, THEY must come in too, and take the total

abstinence from horseflesh pledge. It is not pretended that those members of the procession misused certain

auxiliaries which in most countries and all ages have been bestowed upon man for his use, but it is

undeniable that other members of the procession did. Teetotal mathematics demonstrate that the less includes

the greater; that the guilty include the innocent, the blind the seeing, the deaf the hearing, the dumb the

speaking, the drunken the sober. If any of the moderate users of draughtcattle in question should deem that

there is any gentle violence done to their reason by these elements of logic, they are invited to come out of