No stranger would ever think of entering Hyde Park without first casting

a look at Apsley House, the abode of "the" Duke; if he did, the statue

of Achilles, which seems stationed as if to point it out, would remind

him where he was. This is the very maze and centre of fashion; here the

pride and beauty of England may be seen upon their own stage; and on a

fine day, in what is called the "season" in town, no other spot in the

world can out-rival in rich display and chaste grandeur that which is

here presented. It far excels St. James's in pure rural scenery--there

is less of art and more of nature in its appearance, and this is

increased by the beauty of the Serpentine river. Then, be it remembered,

we are in the vicinity of "Tyburn Tree," the history of which has yet to

be written. We have often pictured, while wandering here in the

deepening twilight, the mouldering bodies of the stern Protector,

Ireton, and Bradshaw, dangling upon that "triple-tree" in the sunset of

a winter's evening, after they had been dragged out of their graves in

Westminster Abbey. This was indeed carrying revenge beyond the grave,

and is one of the blackest blots that stain the memory of the Merry

Monarch. Evelyn has a savage and unfeeling note in his "Diary" on the

revolting exhibition. "On the 30th of January," he says, "the carcases

of those rebels--Cromwell, Bradshaw, the judge who condemned his

Majesty, and Ireton (son-in-law to the Usurper)--were dragged out of

their superb tombs in Westminster, among the kings, to Tyburn, and

hanged on the gallows there from nine in the morning till six at night,

and then buried under that fatal and ignominious monument in a deep pit,

thousands who had seen them in all their pride being spectators."

Cromwell had a narrow escape in Hyde Park while driving his own coach;

the horses ran away, and the stern Protector was thrown off the box, and

falling on the pole, while his feet were entangled in the harness, he

was carried some distance. On this accident the old rhyming cavalier

Cleveland wrote the following lines:

"The whip again! away! 'tis too absurd

That thou should'st lash with whip-cord now, but sword.

I'm pleased to fancy how the glad compact

Of hackney-coachmen sneer at the last act.

Hark how the scoffing concourse hence derives

The proverb, 'needs must go when the devil drives.'

Yonder a whipster cries, ''Tis a plain case,

He turn'd us out to put himself i' the place;

But, God-a-mercy, horses once, for ye

Stood to 't, and turn'd him out as well as we.'

Another, not behind him with his mocks,

Cries out, 'Sir, faith you were in the wrong box;

He did presume to rule, because, forsooth,

He's been a horse-commander from his youth;

But he must know there's difference in the reins

Of horses fed with oats and fed with grains.

I wonder at his frolic, for be sure

Four hamper'd coach-horses can fling a _Brewer_:

But 'Pride will have a fall,' such the world's course is,

He who can rule three realms can't guide four horses;

See him that trampled thousands in their gore,

Dismounted by a party but of four.

But we have done with 't, and we may call

This driving Jehu, Phaeton in his fall:

I would to God for these three kingdoms' sake,

His neck, and not the whip, had given the crack."

We wonder whether Cromwell remembered the wish conveyed in the last line

when the old royalist colonel had to petition the Protector for his

deliverance from Yarmouth gaol. The letter he sent (now before us) is

headed, "To the Protector, after long and vile durance in prison. May it

please your Highness," &c.

Hyde Park is mentioned as early as the reign of Edward VI, and was no

doubt enclosed long before that period. During the time of the

Commonwealth it was put up to auction and sold in lots, the deer alone

being valued at near upon a thousand pounds. At that period it extended

to the Acton-road one way, and to Knightsbridge the other; the boundary

citywards being, as now, near Park-lane, while the distance it extended

westward is at this day unknown. The consort of George II. was allowed

to possess three hundred acres of this Park in her day, and early

writers state that Queen Anne had enclosed thirty acres within

Kensington Gardens.

Hyde Park was the great mustering-ground for the May-day holidays in the

olden time. Cleveland, who wrote and fought in the time of the first

Charles, makes mention of it in a poem entitled "May-day," which

contains many beautiful lines. He speaks of "Delight beating her silvery

wings," warbling over the "dappled lawns;" of "snow-white milk-maids

crowned with garlands;" of the youths and maidens tumbling and rolling

upon the grass, and of revelling in the luxuries of "curds and cream."

Even Cromwell, with all his gloomy Puritanism, went to witness the

wrestling in Hyde Park, little dreaming that after he had been long dead

and buried, his body would be hanged on the neighbouring gallows, which

must have loomed ominously above those merry-makings. Gossiping

good-natured old Pepys regrets, in his "Diary," that he could not be in

Hyde Park one May-day among the great gallants and fine ladies.

Regent's Park has greater attractions than its scenery, although many

portions of it are very beautiful. Here we find the Zoological Gardens

and Colosseum, both important enough to deserve a separate notice in our

Sketches of London, had we the space. On entering the Gardens you see a

beautiful terrace, which reaches from the rural lodges to some distance,

while below are placed the cages which contain the noble animals; and

these are very commodious and airy. Beyond this terrace there is a

pleasant rustic walk, hemmed in by luxuriant foliage, at the end of

which there is an opening commanding an extensive view of the Park. To

the right you have the domestic aviaries, well worth visiting, as they

contain some fine specimens of the fowls of Peru and Mexico. To the left

of the terrace there is a little morsel of real Watteau-like scenery,

with its smooth lawn and clear pond, near to which are placed the

gorgeous macaws, whose hues out-rival the colours of the rainbow.

Further on there is another "green nestling spot," adjoining a sheet of

water, which, with its fountain and variety of aquatic fowls and

beautiful beech-trees, tempted us to linger longer. Then there is the

mossy rock, where the otter is located, with its silent water, into

which live fish are thrown, when the long-bodied inhabitant plunges in

after them, compelled to wet his jacket before he can enjoy his dinner.

But were we to describe the monkeys and parrots, and every variety of

bird and beast which are here assembled, we should require the whole

space of our volume. The catalogue sold at the Gardens consists of

nearly thirty pages, and to this we refer our readers when they visit

Regent's Park.

The ground occupied by Regent's Park is not without its interest. The

old monastic house of Marylebone stood within its boundaries in former

days, and had in the time of Elizabeth its park and deer. Here also was

a famous bowling-green, which the Duke of Buckingham in his day visited.

The new Parks which are now forming around the metropolis do great

credit to Government, and will, like charity, cover a multitude of minor

transgressions; for those who legislate for the benefit of posterity

must be influenced by something more noble than narrow and selfish

views. Breathing-room has been sadly neglected of late around the

metropolis. Let any one cross over London Bridge, and turn up by St.

George's Church in the Borough, along the Old Kent Road, and as far as

New Cross, he will find it one continuous and unbroken chain of

buildings. Yet here is space ample enough, and grounds of but little

value, that might be formed into a spacious park. If this is not done,

those who twenty years hence live in this neighbourhood of railways will

be compelled to wander as far as Blackheath or Greenwich Park, to obtain

a mouthful of pure air. Kennington Common is but a name for a small

grassless square, surrounded with houses, and poisoned by the stench of

vitriol-works, and black, open, sluggish ditches; what it will be when

the promised alterations are completed we have yet to see.

Walworth Common has vanished; and the little fairy Green before the Swan

at Stockwell is now no more; while even Clapham Common seems in our eyes

to lessen every year. Wandsworth had set out in good earnest to reach

Lambeth, and would soon have been near the Nine Elms station, had not

Government stopped its career, by stepping in between at Battersea

Fields. Cross the water, and some of the miscalled Parks are like the

one named Whetstone--thrust into the corner of a square. Barnsbury Park

is in any street which the conductor of the Islington omnibus may please

to set you down at; while Islington, Highbury, Pentonville, and King's

Cross are all so jostled together, that you cannot tell which is the

beginning or the end of either the one or the other. We have heard of a

neighbourhood that stretches somewhere behind Houndsditch and

Bishopsgate, and seen something of it while gazing from the dome of St.

Paul's; but from the view thus obtained of it, we should as soon hope to

find our way out of the Cretan labyrinth, if once in it, as to extricate

ourselves from this maze of streets and alleys. We can imagine some

stranger losing his way in this perplexing maze, and ever moving on

until he grew grey, without a hope of finding his way out again. The new

Park in progress near this neighbourhood may, at last, be something like

a landmark by which we can see through such an unknown wilderness. How

the inhabitants of such localities as these must pine for

"The populous solitude of bees and birds,

And fairy-form'd and many-colour'd things,

Who worship Him with notes more sweet than words,

And innocently open their glad wings,

Fearless and full of life; the gush of springs,

And fall of lofty fountains; and the bend

Of stirring branches, and the bud that brings

The swiftest thought of beauty."--_Byron._

CHAPTER XV.

ST. GILES's.

By way of contrast, we will stride from splendour to squalour--from St.

James's to St. Giles's, whose names Douglas Jerrold has rendered

inseparable in his fearless and life-like novel.

As St. Giles's folds within its arms a portion of the fashion-frequented

neighbourhood of Oxford-street, so do the low alleys of Tothill-fields

hem in the palaces of Westminster, creeping up to the very walls of the

grey old abbey, and dipping down to the rim of the river; while,

eastward, the city of merchants is bounded by the wretchedness of

Whitechapel on the one hand, and deep behind again by the

thickly-inhabited parish of Shoreditch. Wealth cannot wholly seclude

itself; to wheresover it moves poverty follows for companionship, for

without its dependents it is useless: riches cannot dwell apart, without

looking worse than the gold on gold in bad heraldry. The fungus and the

lichen cling to the sound gigantic oak, the same as to the trunk of the

decayed pollard. True, the wedge has been driven into the rotten heart

of the old Rookery of St. Giles's, and New Oxford-street has sprung up

from the corruption; but what has become of the inhabitants who battened

on the core of the decayed tree? Like a nest of ants, they are turned

loose to overrun other neighbourhoods. The new houses and splendid

streets which have risen above the old sites of sorrow, misery, and

wretchedness, have but driven them from their ancient haunts, and

compelled them to seek shelter in other quarters, where the

poverty-stricken populace

"Most do congregate,"

where misery clings to misery for a little warmth, and want and disease

lie down side by side, and groan together; where

"But to think is to be full of sorrow,

And leaden-eyed despair."--_Keats._

Let us look these evils steadily in the face for a moment or two without

blenching. The air which now blows through the open windows of the

emblazoned carriage in which the diamonded duchess is seated, a few

seconds ago swept over the poisonous avenues of Church-street and

Carrier-street, and is laden with odours from the sink and sewerage of

St. Giles's. Yes, the self-same breeze which now uplifts those dark

ringlets, a minute ago filled the lungs of Wiggins; those parted lips

inhaled the poison that arose from the rotten garbage of these streets,

the gases arising from the churchyard, and every other smell that is

born of death and decay. How essential is it, then, fair lady, for thy

own sake, to aid us in cleansing these Augean stables, in purifying

these pest-houses of poor humanity. You may build yourself a fine house,

my lady, and hem it round with a lofty wall; but you must, while in

town, still breathe the poisonous air which they breathe, until these

grievous evils are remedied.

We will enter these streets and peep into those dark, close, unhealthy,

and forbidding-looking rooms. In this narrow alley a dusky twilight

reigns throughout the sunny noon of day. We have to feel for the noisome

staircases which open on either hand; and now we have found one, we will

grope our way through this land of gloom and shadows. What a dead smell

floats around us! a close noisome air, such as arises from an

over-crowded vault, even more death-smelling than many a vault we have

in our day visited. The staircase is encrusted with dirt, a kind of

black greasy mud, which has been trampled into toughness, not unlike

what covers the City streets after rain or snow in winter; but "that" is

"clean" dirt in comparison to this, for here we tread upon old filth,

the accumulation, it may be, of years; for by the side of the staircase,

where it is least trodden, it is mildewy and mouldy. The smoke of our

cigar is the only wholesome aroma that rises amid these stifling rooms.

The perfume of flowers could never pierce through the weight of this

dense atmosphere, but would fall back again and die amid the petals

whence it arose; even the strong sweet-smelling May-blossoms would

struggle in vain to disperse the poison of this motionless air.

Now we have reached the room, we cannot see what forms are before us, so

little light streams in through that "dirt-ditched" and cobweb-covered

casement, which appears as if it were never opened,

[Illustration: THE ROOKERY, ST. GILES'S]

as if they knew that the noisome air was better kept out than in. There

is no ventilation, no "thorough-draft" through any of these miserable

rooms; the walls are damp through so many breaths, for where the moist

air falls there doth it rest, hanging like cold beaded drops on the brow

of one who wrestles sternly with death.

It must have been many years since these apartments were either painted

or whitewashed; a black grey hue pervades every thing, as if the very

atmosphere had itself grown dark through hovering here so long and

motionless, as if it were compelled to stand and sicken between the

stench from below and the black vapours above--the one arising from the

foetid cellars, the other hurled down by the rain from the

soot-covered roofs--exhalations of the earth earthy--of the sewer

sewery--of the filth filthy--poison ever propagating poison--gutters

ever generating deadly gases, and creeping into the blood of the

inhabitants; and yet strange, in spite of its filth, this neighbourhood

was passed over lightly by the "fell destroyer," compared to others

which He ravaged during the last dreadful epidemic.

Behold! the curtain is at last uplifted, and those are living and

breathing forms that sit or stand before us, and such--however much we

may shun them here--as we shall be doomed to dwell amongst hereafter.

That poor girl is tying up her water-cresses in bunches, ready for

to-morrow's sale; she has no other place but the floor to lay them on

before she puts them into her little basket ready bunched. The green

bunches at her feet will be sold and eaten on the morrow by those who

never bestow a thought on the filthy floor on which they now lie. In

that room they will be kept all night, amid the breathing of above a

dozen sleepers. Those cabbages which the man is piling up in the corner

are the unsold remainder of to-day's stock; he will strip off the outer

leaves in the morning to give them a fresh look: they will also be eaten

on the morrow, in spite of the poisonous exhalations they are steeped

in. He will sleep beside them all night; the man with the three dogs

will share his bed, and perhaps the dogs themselves may find a couch

amongst the cabbages. The woman who has just brought in that bundle of

filthy rags (too late to be sold to-day in Monmouth-street) is also a

lodger, and will no doubt make a pillow of her dirty burden. That pile

of shavings, sacking, straw, and rags will be dragged out of the corner

when they feel disposed to sleep, and one will lie down here and another

there, and for a few hours bury their miseries in forgetfulness. How so

many manage to sleep in one apartment, especially in hot weather, is

only known to themselves. In the bleak bitterness of the chilling winter

we can picture them crowding together for warmth. But we must retreat;

for we find a difficulty in breathing, and pant like a robin that has

flown by mistake into a baker's oven while it was gradually heating.

Here we are again in the filthy street; for they have no back-yards into

which to throw their refuse, so must either keep it to putrify and decay

in the overheated rooms, or throw it out, and let their neighbours go

"share and share alike" in the sights and smells which pervade the

uncleansed neighbourhood. True, there is a man employed to clear away

the garbage; but, when this is done, they have no water, saving what

they beg, and not a drop can they spare to wash down the gutters.

Wherever a sunbeam alights, you see it steaming with the filth, and

behold the golden ray dimmed with the vapoury and deadly exhalations.

Yet these poor people are not naturally dirty. From many of the windows

you see their tattered garments hanging out to dry, though, from the

colour, you have a difficulty in persuading yourself that they have ever

been washed, and come to the conclusion that they are only hung there to

be aired. The colour is not their fault; such an atmosphere would turn a

root of milk-white daisies to the hue of parchment in a month, if it

were possible that they could live so long in those breathless and

airless alleys, where not a green leaf has grown for years.

Sometimes little Jack, or his half-clothed sister, when playing about

the room (for children play even here), catch the end of the prop on

which the rags are suspended, when down comes the whole washing into the

gutter; and, unless the poor washerwoman is pretty nimble in looking

after them, the first dishonest passer-by will be likely enough to pick

up the whole wardrobe, and to see what it weighs at the nearest

rag-shop. They have not the means of keeping themselves clean; like the

Israelites of old, they cannot complete the task without the straw; and

in many places what little water there was, has, like other

conveniences, been cut off while the new buildings were proceeding.

Baths and wash-houses will no doubt in time supply these deficiencies;

but until they are opened, we suppose the inhabitants must be left to

shift for themselves as they best can, for the "improvements" as they

are called have subjected many of the people in this poor neighbourhood

to such privations as they never before experienced.

Let us lift up the flap of this cellar, and see what is going on below;

for that gleam of fire, or candlelight, shews that these underground

regions are inhabited--that the habits of the ancient Britons are not

wholly abandoned, but that the descendants of those old burrowers of

hill and rock have but changed the twilight of their dry caverns for the

damp and darkness of these sewer-like habitations. Here we behold

another human hive busily preparing for dinner, although it is so late

in the day; for, like our wealthy merchants, they must get through

whatever business they may chance to have on hand before they have (the

means or) time to eat. Saw you ever such a medley as is now frizzling in

that capacious frying-pan? Parings of a loin of mutton, two beef

sausages, a thin rasher of pickled pork, ditto of bacon, the scrag-end

of a neck of mutton, a piece of beef-skirt, a small steak, and a kidney.

That old fellow with the wooden leg quite enjoys the job of cooking, and

has got a jug of water in readiness to make "gravy" for the whole

community, who have clubbed towards the contents of the frying-pan.

Those who sit on the unboarded and unpaved floor beside the wall, and

who look on so wistfully, have nothing to cook--nothing to eat; they

paid the last penny or twopence they possessed to be allowed to sleep on

the floor of that cellar until morning. When those dinners or suppers

are over, the broken table, the bottomless chairs, and old butter-tubs

which are used for seats, will be set aside, and the whole of the naked

cellar strewn over with straw or shavings, on which they may (if they

can)

"Look round and take their rest."

And right glad will those foodless and moneyless creatures be when all

the cooking and eating, in which they cannot become partakers, ceases,

and when, amid sound asleep on the unboarded and unpaved floor, some

kindly vision may come through the mysterious murmurs of the night, and

"Cloy the hungry edge of appetite

By bare imaginations of a feast."

In wet weather the inhabitants of these subterranean dwellings sometimes

stand peeping through the open cellar-lights at the feet which pass over

the pavement; and, while doing so, their faces are spotted like leopards

with the mud. They seem as if they were ever looking at other people's

steps instead of taking heed of their own ways. Happy might they be if,

like the long-tailed field-mouse, they could, in their burrows, store up

provisions for the winter, while in summer they nibbled the herbage or

fed on the acorns which fell from the broad hoary oak, quenching their

thirst at the woodland brook; and, like the old barbarians who first

landed on our island shore, have no care, beyond what they should eat

and drink, about the morrow. Yet even they have something to be proud

of; for they have only to issue out of their black and breathless courts

through the breezy thoroughfares which open into Oxford-street, and

there the same window, which the dandy shopman in the "white choker" and

neat black suit "dressed" to allure the wealthier classes, is open for

their inspection; and more than one merry laugh have we heard while

passing by, as some half-drunken Pat pictured his (far-from-sober) Biddy

in a long Cashmere shawl and bonnet, plumed with the bird of paradise.

Sometimes you may see one of the inhabitants halting outside the

huckster's shop, and endeavouring to squeeze a penny out of the sixpence

(which has to purchase tea, sugar, bread, butter, tobacco, and a candle)

for gin; and so accommodating are some of these shopkeepers, that they

make halfpenny-worths of every thing they sell, and are ready to cut

either a candle or a penny-loaf in two with the same knife.

We well remember passing through the Rookery of St. Giles's when the

work of demolition first commenced; when those who had found no other

residence were allowed to remain until the workmen began to pull the

houses down. Many of the inhabitants who were then old were born in

those tumble-down houses, then doomed to stand no longer. There they had

tended the sick couch, and through those dilapidated doorways carried

out their dead; smiles and tears had brightened and fallen in those

apartments, which to them bore the endearing name of home. We looked up,

and through the broken lattices saw the faces of little children--dirty

images of innocence--dear to the hearts of their poor mothers. And many

houses similar to these are still standing in St. Giles's, with leaning

door-posts and windows all awry; some propped up with beams, on which

they rest, as if they had a stitch in their sides, and had placed their

hands there to relieve the pain. Many of the door-posts are worn smooth

and bright, through the idle loungers, who have rubbed and rested

against them while smoking and looking out into the streets, hour after

hour, and day after day,--men who seem to have no business upon earth,

having to smoke and sleep, and when they awake, to smoke and lean

against the self-same doorways until it is time to sleep again. On the

steps, and on the edges of the pavement, or at the entrance of those

unexplored courts, withered old women sit with folded arms scowling at

you as you pass, and proclaiming by their looks that you are an

intruder. And fortunate may a decently-clad man consider himself if he

meets with nothing more serious than black looks while passing through

the still dangerous neighbourhood of St. Giles's.

All are not idle, be it remembered, who frequent such haunts as these;

many have seen "better days," and only fell because they possessed not

fortitude enough to struggle against unfortunate circumstances. Others

had never been taught any trade, and when they lost such situations as

ten thousands were capable of taking, they never raised their heads

again, although they went many a weary day, week, and month afterwards

in quest of employment, returning at night to sleep in such dens as we

have here described, sick and sad at heart. At length their attire

became too shabby for their admission into respectable houses only to

ask for employment, and then they sank with a kind of sullen

recklessness amid the filth and squalor of St. Giles's, and from that

wretched state never emerged again. But these are the exceptions; the

majority of the inhabitants are "to the manner born."

Glancing at the remote past, it was in St. Giles's where the criminal

stopped in ancient times, and drank his last draught of ale on his way

to Tyburn tree; and about the time when Chaucer died, the gallows was

removed from Smithfield into this parish, probably because here it was

more frequently needed. In the reign of Charles II. an attempt was made

to improve this neighbourhood by a better class of houses, and for years

some of the streets wore a look of respectability; then a change took

place, and the old primeval dirt and darkness settled down again. Our

modern improvers have commenced by rooting out the inhabitants; may we

not expect a new St. Giles's to rise up in some other corner of this

vast metropolis?

The following description of the Church of St. Giles's is quoted from

Vol. V. of the _Illustrated London News_:

"Many a reader may start at the adjunct of 'in the fields,' to the

dedicatory name of this metropolitan church; and the surprise is natural

enough when we recollect that the structure is situated on the south

side of the High-street, St. Giles's, which probably was one of the

narrowest roadways in this overgrown city. The name of the church

receives its addition from the circumstance of being formerly _in the

fields_, and to distinguish it from the Church of St. Giles's,

Cripplegate. This parish was anciently a village of the same name, and

its church is supposed to owe its origin to the chapel which belonged to

the hospital founded about 1117, by Queen Matilda, consort of Henry I.,

for the reception of leprous persons belonging to the City of London and

the county of Middlesex. In 1354, Edward III. granted this hospital to

the master and brethren of the order of Burton, St. Lazar, of Jerusalem,

in Leicestershire, for certain considerations, for which it became a

cell to that order, till the general dissolution of religious houses by

Henry VIII., who, in 1545, granted it to Lord Dudley. Soon after this

period, the chapel or church was made parochial; and on the 20th of

April, 1547, William Rawlinson was instituted rector.

"The ancient church being very small, and much dilapidated, was taken

down in 1623, and a church of brick was erected in its stead. This also

became in its turn too small and inconvenient, when the inhabitants

applied for an Act of Parliament to enable them to rebuild it;

accordingly, the old fabric was taken down in 1730, and the present very

handsome edifice was erected and completed in 1733; this being the third

church built upon the site.

"Mr. Elmes, in his diligently compiled _Topographical Dictionary of

London_, attributes the design to Gibbs; but the following statement is

more circumstantial: 'It is curious that this edifice, which has given

to Flitcroft his reputation, should be attributed, in the Report of the

Church Commissioners to the House of Commons, to Hawksmoor, who, they

say, expended 8605_l._ 7_s._ 2_d._ upon it; but there is no doubt but

Walpole, and the View, published in 1753, are correct in ascribing it to

Flitcroft, who was probably employed by Gibbs, and not by the

commissioners.'--Knight's _London_.

"The church is built of Portland stone, as are also the tower and the

tall and graceful spire, which are 160 feet high to the vane. The

interior is 75 feet in length, exclusive of the recess for the altar,

and 60 feet in width: it has a wagon-headed ceiling, and is divided into

nave and aisles by fluted stone Ionic columns, which assist the main

walls in carrying the roof. The effect of the entire composition is more

than usually chaste and beautiful.

"A new entrance-gateway, of considerable beauty, has, within these forty

years, been erected from the designs of William Leverton, Esq., in which

is introduced an ancient piece of sculpture, of more curiosity than

beauty, representing the last judgment. This work was taken from 'The

Resurrection Gate' of the old church, which had also many rich

monuments, one of which, to Sir Roger L'Estrange, the well-known

loyalist and writer, still remains. Andrew Marvel was also buried here,

'a man in whose reputation the glory of the patriot has eclipsed the

finer powers of the poet.' St. Giles's also preserves the ashes of

Chapman, the translator of Homer; and Flaxman, the truly great sculptor,

was buried here on December 15, 1826, his body accompanied to the grave

by the president and council of the Royal Academy. For once, an

inscription speaks simple truth; we read here, 'John Flaxman, R.A.,

P.S., whose mortal life was a constant preparation for a blessed

immortality: his angelic spirit returned to the Divine Giver on the 7th

of December, 1826, in the 72d year of his age.'

"There is a peculiarly interesting circumstance connected with his

death, told by Allan Cunningham in his _Lives of the British Sculptors_

(p. 359), which we cannot resist the temptation of transcribing. He says

'the winter had set in, and, as he was never a very early mover, a

stranger found him rising one morning when he called about nine o'clock.

'Sir,' said the visitant, presenting a book as he spoke, 'this work was

sent to me by the author, an Italian artist, to present to you, and at

the same time to apologise for its extraordinary dedication. In truth,

sir, it was so generally believed throughout Italy that you were dead,

that my friend determined to shew the world how much he esteemed your

genius, and having this book ready for publication, he has inscribed it

_Al Ombra di Flaxman_. No sooner was the book published than the story

of your death was contradicted, and the author, affected by his mistake,

which, nevertheless, he rejoices at, begs you will receive his work and

his apology.' Flaxman smiled, and accepted the volume with unaffected

modesty, and mentioned the circumstance, as curious, to his own family

and some of his friends. This occurred on Saturday the 2d of December,

when he was well and cheerful; the next day he was taken suddenly ill

with cold, and on the 7th was dead.

"In the churchyard, too, is the tomb of the Pendrells, who aided in the

escape of Charles II.; and a few years since was revived the custom of

decorating this tomb on Restoration Day (May 29), with branches of oak,

in commemoration of Pendrell's loyalty and attachment to the

'unkingship.'

"In the tower is a clock, the dials of which are illuminated at night

with gas; this being, if we remember rightly, the first improvement of

the kind introduced into the metropolis.

"The church is a rectory, in the county and archdeaconry of Middlesex,

in the diocese of London, and the patronage of the Lord Chancellor.

"Although the church is very capacious, it is altogether inadequate to

the spiritual wants of the parish.

"It was in front of the site of St. Giles's Church that Sir John

Oldcastle, Lord Cobham, was so savagely burnt during the reign of Henry

V., his early friend. The phrase, 'St. Giles's Bowl,' will remind many

of the custom that formerly prevailed here of giving every malefactor on

his way to Tyburn a bowl of ale, as his last worldly draught. Thus is

the site associated with the fierceness and coarse spirit of bygone

ages; and probably the most grateful relics are the trees in the

churchyard, which carry the mind's eye back to 'the fields.' The

illuminated clock and the wood pavement of the roadway are

unquestionably of our own time."

Besides the church, there is a curious old bath in the neighbourhood of

St. Giles (of which we give an engraving), accompanied with the

following quotation from the _Times_:

"In the thick of the once renowned 'slums' of St. Giles's there has

existed one of the finest springs in the metropolis, which has been

'known to local fame,' and esteemed for its medicinal properties, for

the last two centuries; and, if the gossip of tradition may be relied

on, it was once the favourite _bagnio_ of Queen Anne, whose name it

still bears to this day: it is to be seen at No. 3 Old Belton-street,

between Holborn and Long-acre, in the direct line of the new street

between Holborn and the Strand; one side of the street in question has

already been pulled down, so that the bath is now once again brought to

light, though sadly shorn of its ancient splendour. It is a curious and

interesting relic of bygone days: it is a large tank, paved at the

bottom with black and white marble, and lined throughout with good Dutch

tiles, of the time apparently of William III. or Queen Anne, having a

lofty French groined dome roof. Being supplied direct from the spring,

which is perpetually running into it, so that it is always fresh, it is

much used by the inhabitants in the neighbourhood, as it is supposed to

be a good cure for rheumatism and other disorders, is a powerful tonic,

and, from its colour, evidently contains a considerable trace of iron.

The spring from which the bath is supplied has been traced, I believe,

from Highgate; and as it does not appear to be known to, or treated on

by antiquaries who have written on these matters, I have been induced to

direct your attention to it, in the hope that such a valuable spring may

be rendered available for the benefit of the poor inhabitants of this

great metropolis."

[Illustration]

[Illustration: QUEEN ANNE'S BATH.]

CHAPTER XVI.

LONDON FOG.

Such of our readers as have never been in London in November can

scarcely imagine what it is to grope their way through a downright

thorough London fog. It is something like being imbedded in a dilution

of yellow peas-pudding, just thick enough to get through it without

being wholly choked or completely suffocated. You can see through the

yard of it which, at the next stride, you are doomed to swallow, and

that is all. It is a kind of meat and drink, and very sorry sustenance

for those who are asthmatical, as you may tell by hearing one old cough

answering to another from opposite sides of the street, and which,

although you cannot see the passengers, you can tell, from their

grumbling, that they do not like the fare at all. You have the same

soft-soapy atmosphere served up at breakfast, dinner, tea, and supper;

every time you open your mouth you partake of it, and all day long you

are compelled to burn lights, and, in addition to the fog, inhale the

fumes from gas, candle, or lamp, which have no more chance of escape

than you have, so burn on dim, yellow, and sulkily, as if the very

lights needed all the warmth they could obtain, and thus confine

themselves to illuminating the smallest possible space. The whole city

seems covered with a crust, and all the light you can see beneath it

appears as if struggling through the huge yellow basin it overspreads.

You fancy that all the smoke which had ascended for years from the

thousands of London chimneys had fallen down all at once, after having

rotted somewhere above the clouds; smelling as if it had been kept too

long, and making you wheeze and sneeze as if all the colds in the world

were rushing into your head for warmth, and did not care a straw about

killing a few thousands of people, so long as they could but lodge

comfortably for a few hours any where. You blow like a grampus in a

quicksand, with the keel of a seventy-four on his back, and get about as

much fresh air as if you were in his situation: a pair of bellows with a

hole in the side, through which you might cram your double fist, would

make perfect music, when blown, compared to the noise of your own

breathing. You seem as if you had swallowed six broken-winded horses;

that they were inside of you alive and kicking; and, for the soul of

you, you cannot get rid of one.

You step gingerly along, feeling your way beside the walls, windows, and

doors, whenever you can, until at last you tumble headlong into some

cellar--perhaps on the shoulders of the little cobbler who is at work

below, and who chances to have his sharp awl uplifted at the moment; or

perhaps it is an underground coal-shed, and you alight on the back of

the black-looking woman weighing coals, and double her up in her own

scale--receiving, in return, a couple of black eyes from her husband.

After a hearty drubbing, you escape once more into the street; and, as

you cannot see a yard before you, break your shins over a milkman's can,

and upset the contents on the greasy pavement; he tries to collar you,

but your blood is now up, and you give him a "straight-armer," which

sends him into the area, upsetting the fat cook as he falls. You then

run for it, and come full butt against the "bow-window" of a respectable

old gentleman, with whom you have a roll or two in the gutter, thankful

that you did not fall on the other side, and stave in the shop-front.

You shake yourself, and are glad that you are as you are; for a foot

beyond where you fell there yawns an open grating, beneath which runs

the huge sewer that empties itself into the Thames; and you wonder how

many have slipt in during the day. You tumble into a heap of unslacked

lime; but that you think nothing of, too thankful to find it was not a

fire. You turn up what seems to be a court, to give yourself a rub-down,

and run your head against a pail of whitewash, which hangs suspended

from a ladder: the whole contents flow over you, and, before you can see

where you are, you fall over a sweep, who is tying up his blanket of

soot, roll into the midst of it, and come out a pretty picture--something

like the inside of an old chimney and the outside of a rough-cast wall,

just mortared.

Some good Samaritan in the court takes pity on you by lending you a

towel, and furnishing you with a pail of water, and you make the best of

a bad job by cleansing yourself as you can. This done, you sally out

again, more cautious than ever--the deep yellow darkness meantime

increasing; you proceed slowly, and feel every foot of your way, for

seeing is out of the question beyond arm's length. Cautiously you grope

along by the board of a fishmonger's shop, on which lie three or four

large black live lobsters; one with his claws open closes on your hand

like a vice, and you run shrieking for very life. The fishmonger catches

sight of the lobster dangling from your hand, and, believing you have

stolen it, follows with a loud cry of "Stop thief!" He is brought up,

with his head in the tar-barrel, at the front of his neighbour the

oilman's door; and the monster, by being banged against the wall, having

by this time loosed his hold, you go along writhing and groaning, and

wondering what will next befal you.

Porters with heavy burdens, women and men with fish, watercresses, &c.,

you run against every few minutes, and think nothing of. Sometimes you

are knocked down, then again it is their lot to fall; and finding that

the average runs pretty fair for and against the feller and the fallen,

you rest contented on that score--considering the running of the edges

of half a dozen umbrellas into your mouth as so many little ones in. If

you mistake a dimly-lighted shop-front for some turning, and chance to

shove your head through a pane of glass, all you can do is to walk as

quietly on as if nothing were amiss--two strides and you are in safety,

and as far out of sight as if buried in Egyptian darkness; and they are

sure to seize the first unfortunate fellow they can lay hands upon, who

might have been just as likely to have made the mistake as yourself--to

know which is some comfort. That two or three dogs have run full gallop

between your legs, and thrown you down as many times, are accidents too

common to need recording. As for your watch, that of course went before

you had walked one hundred yards: you saw the fellow's arm that dragged

it out of your pocket, and that was all; it was a jerk amid the deep

fog, a rush, in which your nose came against a dead wall, and by the

time you had rubbed the grazed tip a little, you thought that you might

as well hunt for a needle in a bottle of hay, as attempt to follow the

thief in that dusky, woolly, and deceptive light.

With great difficulty, and after many inquiries, you find a tavern; for

you know no more than the man in the moon what part of London you are

in. You enter a dim, cheerless room without a fire, in which the gas

burns faintly, as if unable to pierce the fleecy fog which surrounds it.

You wonder whether the peg on which you hang your hat would bear your

weight; and, as you lay hold of the bell-rope, cannot help trying the

strength of it: the height of the ceiling also catches your eye, and you

marvel that more people do not hang themselves on such a day. The very

poker in the fireless grate has a cold, clammy, and murderous look; and

when the waiter enters, you fancy that he has just been cut down. You

light a cigar, and begin to think a little better of matters, and to

reckon how many glasses of hot brandy-and-water would throw you into a

state of oblivion--that is, leave you dead drunk until the dawning of

another day. These thoughts vanish with a second glass, and you again

venture forth, resolved this time to get into an omnibus, should one be

found bold enough to venture out on such a day. After waiting for some

time, and hailing by mistake half a dozen coal-wagons and carriers'

carts, you perceive an omnibus creeping by at a snail's pace, enter, and

squeeze yourself into a seat behind the door. You cannot see to the top

of it for the fog, so have no fear of your tailor recognising you,

should he happen to be inside--one comfort out of so many evils. While

you are sitting, and congratulating yourself that you have escaped so

well, up comes a cab-horse with his head through the open door, and his

hot nostrils on your face. A few rough compliments are exchanged between

the cab-driver and the conductor, during which something is said about

the glanders, which haunts you for days after; the more so through your

nose being red and raw by grazing it against the wall when the thief ran

away with your watch. To what quarter the omnibus is going gives you no

concern, for you are glad to get any where to be out of the way on such

a day. Great, however, is your indignation, after having been carried

some three-score yards, to find that you are at the Cross Keys, in

Fleet-street, having got in at the corner of Bride-court, and that the

omnibus goes no farther. You pay your threepence with a protest, and are

thankful that you cannot see the passengers, who are laughing at you.

You have, however, the satisfaction of seeing a heavy old gentleman

plant one foot into a basket of oranges on the edge of the pavement, and

that puts you into a little better humour, especially when, at the next

step, he plunges his head into the window of a book-shop, and knocks

down the middle of three rows of richly-bound volumes, besides smashing

no end of panes of glass.

On such a day the man who milks his cow in the street is compelled to

lay hold of her tail, for fear of losing sight of her; while the

butcher-boy who carries out meat is often minus a joint or two when he

reaches the door at which his orders ought to have been delivered.

Should such a day be Smithfield market, all the cellar-flaps in the

little by-streets are left open, in the hopes of catching a few stray

sheep, and having a stock of mutton for nothing; should a prize bullock

tumble in, they make no bones of him, but salt down what is left, and

bless the fog for supplying them with so much excellent beef.

A stranger to London, when the fog sets in at night, and he looks upon

it for the first time, fancies his apartments filled with smoke, and

begins by throwing open his doors and windows; thus making bad worse, by

destroying all the warm air in the rooms. Even one well accustomed to

the ins and outs of our far-stretching city is strangely deceived in

distance, and the size objects assume, as they loom in dim and gigantic

dimensions through the heavy fog. The gas-lamps appear as if placed

three-story high, unless you stand close beneath them, for what light

they emit is nearly all thrown upward; while a cab comes heaving up (to

appearance) as large as the huge caravan which Wombwell formerly used

for the conveyance of his stupendous elephant. Once take a wrong

turning, and you may consider yourself very fortunate if you ever

discover the right road again within three hours; for the houses wear a

different appearance, and the streets appear to be all at "sixes and

sevens."

Although a real Londoner looks upon a dense December fog as a common

occurrence, and lights up his premises with as little ceremony as he

would do at the close of the day, yet, to one unused to such a scene,

there is something startling in the appearance of a vast city wrapt in a

kind of darkness which seems neither to belong to the day nor the night,

at the mid-noon hour, while the gas is burning in the windows of long

miles of streets. The greatest marvel, after all, is that so few

accidents happen in this dim, unnatural light, in the midst of which

business seems to go on as usual, and would do, we believe, were the

whole of London buried in midnight darkness at noonday, which would only

be looked upon as a further deepening of the overhanging gloom. The

number of lighted torches which are carried and waved at the corners and

crossings of the streets add greatly to the wild and picturesque effect

of the scene, as they flash redly upon the countenances of the

passengers, and, in the distance, have the effect of a city enveloped in

a dense mass of smoke, through which the smouldering flames endeavour in

vain to penetrate.

During a heavy fog many accidents occur on the river, through barges

running foul of each other, or vessels coming athwart the bridges; for

there is no seeing the opening arch from the rock-like buttress, as the

whole river looks like one huge bed of dense stagnant smoke, through

which no human eye can penetrate. If you lean over the balustrades of

the bridge, you cannot see the vessel which may at that moment be

passing beneath, so heavy is the cloudy curtain which covers the water.

At such times the steam-boats cease running, and rest quietly at their

moorings, for the man at the wheel would be unable to see half the

length of his vessel. Sometimes a steamer coming up the river takes a

fancy to a shorter cut, by trying to clear Blackwall Reach, and come

overland through the marshes below Greenwich, or by running her head

into the Isle of Dogs, where she lies aground until the next tide.

Many lives have been lost through foot-passengers mistaking the steps at

the foot of some of the bridges for the opening of the bridge itself,

and, ere they were aware of it, rolling head-foremost into the river.

Strong iron-railings have been erected during the last few years, and

have put an end to such dreadful accidents: at the foot of

Blackfriars-bridge, many, we have heard, thus lost their lives.

At this time the pavement is greasy, and, though you keep lifting up

your legs, you are hardly positive whether or not you are making any

progress. You seem to go as much backward as forward; and some old

Cockneys do aver that the surest way of reaching Temple-bar from

Charing-cross would be to start off with your face turned towards King

Charles's statue, to walk away manfully without once turning your head,

and that, by the end of three hours, you would be pretty sure of

reaching the point aimed at, should you not be run over.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XVII.

THE OLD BOROUGH OF SOUTHWARK.

The first object that still strikes the eye when we have passed over

into the Borough is the beautiful old church founded by a Saxon maiden

called Mary of the Ferry, which in time was corrupted into Mary Overy,

and is now called St. Saviour's. No young poet need wish for a finer

subject to try his hand on than this beautiful half holy old legend of

the Ferryman's Daughter, who, day after day, winter and summer, was seen

with her quaint old-fashioned Saxon boat, ready to row passengers from

the Borough to the City, and back again to the landing-place, where the

Ferry-house had stood centuries before a bridge united the two shores.

Pleasant to her ear must have been the lapping of the waves as they

washed her little freehold, and fell with a dreamy murmuring upon the

ear, while she sat revolving in her mind how she should begin to build a

house for the reception of a few poor and pious sisters, in which they

might live in content and comfort, and holy quiet; and when she was no

more, there pray for the soul of Mary of the Ferry. And thus was the

present St. Saviour's first founded. In this ancient cathedral-like

church, Gower, the contemporary of Chaucer, lies buried; his beautiful

monument still exists. Our own immortal Shakspeare was no doubt a

mourner here two hundred years ago, on the last day of December, 1607,

when in the forenoon he attended the funeral of his brother Edmund.

Perhaps the funeral took place earlier in the day, on account of the

merry-making which our forefathers held at the close of the old year,

and kept up until the new year had grown far into the day; and that this

was the cause why Edmund Shakspeare was buried in the church "with a

forenoone knell of the great bell." Edmund was himself a player, and we

can readily conjure up the images of those who witnessed his interment.

Were we to dwell upon the solemn memories which float around this hoary

pile, they would alone fill this chapter; for Fletcher is buried here,

so is Massinger; but not, as was supposed, "in a gloomy corner amid a

mass of misshapen and melancholy graves," for he is buried "within the

church."

But the spot to which the lover of poetry still directs his steps is to

the Tabard--Chaucer's old inn, still standing on the very spot, if not

the identical building itself, from which the father of English poetry

set out, when he accompanied his merry pilgrims to Canterbury. The

portion of this old hostelry still remaining dates much further back

than the period of Charles II., a proof that it escaped the terrible

fire which raged in Southwark in the year 1676. The very style of the

building needs not a second glance to proclaim its antiquity; it is

beyond doubt the very inn which the old chronicler Stowe mentions by the

name of the "Tabard," and which he himself had no doubt seen in 1598,

and called the "most ancient of the many fair inns in Southwark for

receipt of travellers." The old sign of the Tabard formerly hung

swinging and creaking across the road, and there were then no houses in

front to shut it in, as now; it lay openly and temptingly, as when

Chaucer's host, the merry "Harry Baily," stepped out in the front in the

sunny mornings of Spring and Summer, to see what the old Kent and

Newington roads were producing him, and what sort of customers were

riding up.

Even now there is something venerable in the old weather-beaten and

iron-bound posts which prop up its comparatively modern gateway; they

tell of the grazing and grinding of thousands of old wheels, while the

stones are worn away with the tramping of many a worn-out steed.

Merry doings were there in that old inn-yard, on an April morning, five

hundred years ago, for Harry Baily, the host was

"The early cock

That gather'd them together in a flock."

And you might then have seen the Wife of Bath, leaning aside and

listening as she sat in her saddle, for she could not hear very well, as

she tells us Jankin, her fifth husband, had given her such a blow,

"For that she rent out of his book a leaf,

That of the stroke her ear was always deaf."

Let those who have never read Chaucer, and who wish to become acquainted

with the most minute and beautiful painting of character which poetry

ever produced, only read the Prologue to his _Canterbury Tales_; it

scarcely occupies more than twenty moderate pages of print. If, after

reading these, they are not tempted to proceed further, it will be

because "they have no poetry in their souls." In no work can we find

such a faithful description of the dress, manners, customs, and language

of our forefathers, as in the pages of Geoffrey Chaucer.

Nor is the "Talbot," as it is now called, the only ancient inn in the

Borough. There are others which contain their surrounding galleries, and

spacious yards open to the sky. Some years ago we glanced at other

portions of this ancient Borough--especially that part called the old

Mint. This is now fast disappearing; many of the houses that escaped the

fire in 1676 have of late been pulled down. The following is a

description which we wrote seven years ago, after visiting the remains

of this dilapidated neighbourhood. Stretching from St. George's Church,

in the Borough, into the high road which leads to the cast-iron bridge

of Southwark, are no end of narrow courts, winding alleys, and ruined

houses, which a bold-hearted man would hesitate to thread after dusk.

Here stand numbers of houses which are unroofed and uninhabited. Years

ago they were doomed to be pulled down, and it was resolved that a wide,

open street should be built upon the space they now occupy: years may

still roll away before they are removed. There is no place like this in

the suburbs of London--no spot that looks so murderous, so melancholy,

and so miserable. Many of these houses, besides being old, are very

large and lofty. Many of these courts stand just as they did when

Cromwell sent out his spies to hunt up and slay the Cavaliers, just as

they again were hunted in return, after the Restoration, by the

Royalists, who threaded their intricacies, with sword and pistol in

hand, in search of the fallen Roundheads. There is a smell of past ages

about these ancient courts, like that which arises from decay--a murky

closeness--as if the old winds which blew through them in the times of

the Civil Wars had become stagnant, and all old things had fallen and

died just as they were blown together, and left to perish. So it is now.

The timber of these old houses looks bleached and dead; and the very

brick-work seems never to have been new. In them you find wide,

hollow-sounding, decayed staircases, that lead into great ruinous rooms,

whose echoes are only awakened by the shrieking and running of large

black-eyed rats, which eat through the solid floors, through the

wainscot, and live and die without being startled by a human voice. From

the Southwark-bridge Road you may see the roofs of many of these great

desolate houses; they are broken and open; and the massy oaken rafters

are exposed to the summer sun and the snow of winter. Some of the lower

floors are still inhabited; and at the ends of those courts you will

see standing, on a fine day, such characters as you will meet with

nowhere beside in the neighbourhood of London. Their very dress is

peculiar; and they frequent the dark and hidden public-houses which

abound in these close alleys,--places where the gas is burning all day

long. Excepting the courts behind Long-lane, in Smithfield, we know no

spot about London like this, which yet fronts St. George's Church, in

the Borough.

Southwark, as all remember who are at all acquainted with history,

beside containing Shakspeare's Theatre, at Bankside, was, in former

days, famous for its Bear-garden; which, we fear, was often more crowded

than the spot where the author of "Hamlet" so frequently played.

What a different feature does the Southwark entrance to London Bridge

present to what it did only a few brief years ago! Every few minutes

omnibuses are now thundering to and from the railway terminus; while

passengers think no more of journeying to Brighton and back, and

remaining eight or ten hours there, on a long summer's-day, than they

formerly did of travelling to Greenwich; for it took the old slow

stage-wagons as long to traverse the five miles to the latter as our

iron-footed and fire-fed steed can with ease drag the five hundred

passengers at his heels, and land them within sight of the wide,

refreshing sea.

Were it possible to revive again the forms of those old Canterbury

Pilgrims, and, instead of sending them out of the Tabard-yard on

horseback, to place them in an express train, then start them off with

all the quaint, queer notions which haunted their living brains, what

strange conclusions they would come to. Even the "perfect knight," who

had fought in "fifteen battles," and seen many a strange sight in

heathen lands, would, with all his wisdom, think he had at last fallen

into the hands of the evil one, while gentle Chaucer would renounce his

disbelief in fairy lore, and be ready to admit that the land was now

filled with greater wonders than

"In old days of the King Arthur,

Of which the Britons speak great wonder;

When all the land was filled full of faery--

The Elf-Queen, with her jolly company,

That danced full oft in many a green mead."

_Wife of Bath's Tale._

What a change! to look up the ascent which led to that old

London-bridge, with its Traitor's-gate and ghastly heads grinning above

the vaulted gateway, and the scene that now meets the eye! Living heads

piled high on moving omnibuses, and journeying in every direction, for

twopenny or threepenny fares; steamboats passing from east to west, and

carrying passengers for one halfpenny per head; such changes has the old

square tower of St. Saviour's overlooked--such things has the

wonder-working hand of man accomplished. And yet the world is believed

by many to be still in its infancy; that two more centuries will see

mankind as far advanced and improved as the last two have placed us in

the lead of our forefathers. That the London of the present day will

then be as great a matter of curiosity to some future antiquary as old

London-bridge and the ancient borough of Southwark is to us; that others

will follow and exclaim as we do now:

"The race of yore,

Who danced our infancy upon their knee,

And told our marvelling boyhood legends store

Of their strange ventures happ'd by land or sea,

How are they blotted from the things that be."--_Scott._

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XVIII.

STREET AMUSEMENTS.

At different times several ephemeral little treatises have appeared

professing to teach the inhabitants of London how to live upon 50_l._,

100_l._, and divers other sums a year, not one, however, pointing out

the way by which any of these incomes were to be obtained. Mrs. Glasse

went very differently to work when she attempted to throw a new light

upon the economy of cooking, by advising her readers to "first catch

their hare," thereby conveying most sensible information in one brief

unmistakable sentence, and leaving them to proceed with the receipt, or

not, just as they were or might be provided with the animal treated of.

Although this introduction is hardly to the point, it will serve to lead

us to the ways and means hundreds have recourse to of obtaining a

livelihood, by appealing to our eyes and ears, by the sights and sounds

which they produce in our busy streets; causing those within doors to

curse their deafening clamour, and those without, who are interrupted by

the assembled crowd, and prevented from passing on their way, to utter

any thing but blessings upon their "devoted heads," proving the moral of

the old fable, that what is fun to one is death to another, by one class

being amused at the expense of another's annoyance.

For our part we look on these street performers with a very lenient eye,

knowing that they are struggling to live in the best way they can, and

that their humble endeavours to please afford amusement to thousands.

Look how the little urchins run at the first sound of Punch's well-known

voice; what a pattering there is of shod and unshod feet from every

court and alley in the neighbourhood as soon as his "chuck, chuck,

churee" is heard, startling the silence of the street! They whip up

their marbles, and start off with their pegtops half wound to get a

front place; for the hardened old rogue was a favourite with their

forefathers, and they are never weary of seeing him bang Judy with his

truncheon. They have a keen relish for his rather coarse jokes--the only

objectionable point in this old exhibition. How they dance round an

Italian boy with his organ, forgetting all their poverty and hunger for

the moment, while some little rascal, the raggedest in the group, keeps

excellent time with his castanets, which are four bare bones placed

between the fingers of each hand, and rattled over his head with

laughter and delight, while he thinks himself the chief contributor to

the amusement.

But Punch and Judy are the chief characters in our sketch. Punch was a

different performance in our youthful days: then he went out, got drunk,

came home and quarrelled with his wife; from words they got to blows,

and there used to be a tremendous fight between them, and sorry we are

to say the drunken old rascal swore dreadfully. At last he struck Judy a

tremendous blow with his truncheon, and she fell down senseless, as if

dead. Then the conscience of the hump-backed villain smote him, and he

wept and wailed over her, until at last the doctor came, felt her pulse,

and pronounced her dead. Punch was inconsolable for her loss, pronounced

the doctor a quack, and then they went at it. Oh, what a fight that was

between Punch and the Doctor! but the man of physic fell beneath the

truncheon of the hooked-nosed old blackguard, and appeared as if dead.

Punch was next tried, and knocked the judge off the bench for finding

him guilty of murder, and sentencing him to be hanged. Then the gallows

was brought out, and you made sure that the old villain's career of

crime was ended; but not a bit of it; like Mat Prior's thief, he

"Now fitted the halter, now traversed the cart,

And often took leave, but was loth to depart."

He seemed willing enough to be hanged, but did not know how to place his

neck in the halter; sometimes he put his arms through the noose, then

half his body, but never by any chance did he allow the cord to touch

his neck. At length he succeeded in persuading Jack Ketch to shew him

the right way: the hangman did so, placed his own neck in the noose,

received a crack on the head with the staff and a kick behind, and there

he hung and swung to the delight of every beholder. Then came the Devil,

horned, hoofed, tailed, saucer-eyed, and black as ebony; but Punch was

game to the back-bone, and fought with all his might, causing the Devil

himself to retreat several times before he would give in. Nor did we

ever think the Devil beat him fairly; for he came behind, like a

sneaking thief as he is, pinioned both the arms of Punch, while the

latter had his face turned towards us in triumph, and bore him away on

his back: we could even hear the prominent-paunched old hero swearing,

as his horned antagonist vanished with him below the green baize.

The dog Toby is a modern innovation. He belonged not to the Punch and

Judy of our boyish days.

But our picture is not complete without the spectators. Look at that

ragged woman holding up her dirty child. The little rogue claps his tiny

hands, and crows again at every blow Judy receives; and that poor mother

is more delighted with the pleasurable expression of her dirty darling's

countenance than she is with the exhibition, for her heart and eyes are

fixed on her child. But for Punch sounding in the street, the urchin

would probably have been creeping about the house, or seated upon the

hearth crunching the cinders he picked up from under the grate. Even

that thin pale-faced girl, who holds up a baby half as big as herself,

and throws the long loose hair aside which fell over her clear blue

eyes, as she came running and panting up with her heavy burden, stands

looking on delighted. That respectable-looking old gentleman also halts,

though half ashamed of being seen in such a motley assembly; then passes

on with a smile on his face, for he remembers pausing many a time, when

going or returning from school with his books swung idly over his

shoulder, to look at Punch and Judy; and while he walks along his mind

turns back to the days of other years. Then the drum--what a

spirit-stirring sound it makes! and the shrill pandean pipes, stuck in a

stock of faded crimson velvet, how clear and shrilly they sound!--the

man's head seems as if placed on a swivel, and he hammers and blows away

as if for very life.

But whither is the crowd running? To see an organ-boy and his monkey.

What an excellent tumbler Jocko is! his long tail seems no incumbrance

to him, but head over heels he goes. What a strange language his

jabbering seems, a running of one word into another! and he looks at us

as if pitying our ignorance for not understanding him. There is

something about his countenance conducive to merriment; something so

old-manish in the expression of his face, that we cannot forbear

laughing at him. See how he cracks that nut,--how nimbly he plies his

fingers, and how knowingly he looks up at us all the time, as if

wondering whether he shall get another or not when that is eaten. What a

living caricature he is of our race; now an indignant ugly old man,

jabbering and spitting out his vexation; then a mischievous boy, playing

all kinds of tricks, and, though grumbled at, liked by every body. Poor

fellow! we almost regret that he was ever caught and shoved into that

scarlet jacket, to add to our street

[Illustration]

amusements; and when we see him looking sorrowful, we fancy that we can

read his thoughts, can imagine that his memory has wandered far away, to

where he hung upon his "old ancestral trees" by his prehensile tail,

before the days of his captivity, chattering to his brother monkeys, who

could comprehend every word he uttered, or pelting his venerable old

grandfather with nuts from the topmost bough of the highest tree that

waved amid his native forest. Heigho! The longer we look the more do we

feel convinced that we in a thousand ways resemble him, for we are all

of us more or less monkeys. Mary Howitt says that he gambolled about and

played the very devil in the ark, without bestowing a thought on the

wind and rain that blew and beat on the roof; and no one living can

contradict her.

But what have we here? A caravan, and a wonderful fat boy in it: charge

for admission, one halfpenny. What dodging they have to elude the

police--pulling up at the end of every street, if it be only for five

minutes--for the fat boy must be fed: were he to get thin, the whole

establishment would be ruined. All, saving himself, are thin, the horse

almost a skeleton. We can picture the fat fellow crying out that he is

falling off pounds if his dinner is delayed an hour behind the usual

time--and what a running about there must be to supply him with food! He

looks a lazy rascal--a human hog. Dwarfs also, in our eyes, always look

spiteful,--little morsels of humanity that would pinch and bite us, if

they dare. And well they may be: we should feel so ourselves were we

caught, imprisoned, and shewn to all comers at sixpence or threepence a

head.

Look at that little girl in the spangled frock; she is brought out like

another Samson, to make sport for the Philistines. How prettily she

dances on that board--four feet by three! Through dirt and wet she is

compelled to trudge; for she and that unsailor-like fellow, who dances

the sailor's hornpipe, have to supply the whole party with bread. He who

drums and pipes also contributes his share. The other two shout, and go

round to the crowd, hat in hand, to obtain what they can. Sometimes a

similar party is accompanied by a tumbler,--a man whose feet appear to

be of no other use to him than to kick them about in the air,--who can

walk best on his hands,--and who, we fancy, must be many years in

wearing out a pair of shoes. Into what shapes does he twist his body! He

seems lithe as a serpent--must have been born without a spine--is all

skin--all angles--the spokes of a wheel--a worm rolling in salt--a

monkey's tail that has been thrust into the fire. One would hardly be

surprised to see such a limber elf jump clean out of his skin, rattle

his bare bones like castanets for a few seconds to amuse us, then slip

into his hide again, with less trouble than we could put on our coat.

The next are the balancers,--from a feather to a fir-tree, nothing comes

amiss. That fellow will balance a sword on his naked chin with the point

downward; you look under his throat, and expect to see it come through

every minute, and are greatly disappointed to behold it spinning round

without making an incision. Now he takes a ladder, high enough to reach

a second-floor window, and up it goes on his chin, as if it were no

heavier than the straw he has just thrown down. Mercy on us! whatever is

he going to do with that little boy in the harlequin dress? See, the

daring child steps from the balancer's shoulder to the ladder: higher

the little fellow goes, slowly, cautiously--the ladder still on the

man's chin. It looks dangerous, and (self-preservation) you begin to

think that if the ladder were to fall, it would be much safer to stand a

few feet farther back.

The Stilt-dancers are not so common in our London streets as they were a

few years ago, when they came popping up suddenly at our first-floor

windows, and startled us in some occupation which we had no wish to be

overlooked,--perchance trying on a peruke, so well-made, that all our

friends gave us credit for wearing our own hair. Then, perhaps, they

understood not a single word of English; and if you bade them go to Old

Harry and shake themselves, they still kept smiling and smirking at you

through the window, until their immovable goodnature overcome your

slight anger, and you sent them away quite happy, and perfectly

unconscious that you had given utterance to one angry word. We also miss

the pipe and tabor, and those droll back-kneed fellows the dancing-dogs:

these the new police act have driven away, or they are only to be met

with in the far-off country.

To what different objects the telescope is now turned from what Horace

Walpole describes witnessing, when the heads of unfortunate rebels were

placed on Temple Bar: for a penny we may peep at the mountains in the

moon, or hear a poor but intelligent man describe the wonders of the

"Spacious firmament on high,"

instead of paying to peep at those mangled and goary heads--a great

improvement on those old barbarous street-sights. White mice and

guinea-pigs are still to be met with as "plentiful as blackberries" in

the yellow month of October; and from the sound of hurdy-gurdies and the

droning of bagpipes, who has not prayed to be delivered? while from our

hearts we pity those poor white-haired, pink-eyed mortals, who go

winking and blinking hand in hand along the crowded pavements, gazed at

in wonder even by the swarthy Lascars, who are ever thrusting tracts in

our faces.

Nor must we forget the "chummies," with their Jack-in-the-green, who,

instead of sooty garments, cover in May their "innocent blackness" with

spangles and tinsel. How Jack reels and staggers in the midst of his

green portable arbour towards the close of the day! lurching aside like

the massy trunk of a tree buried in ivy, which you expect every minute

to fall; reminding us of Orpheus, and the life he put into the timber

toes of the hoary old oaks when the forest trees stood bough linked with

bough as they danced a merry reel, making all their green array of

leaves to tremble again. Merrily does the "Sweepess," or "Jackess" of

the green, jingle her bright brass ladle before the doors; and freely is

the produce of that day spent in gin, until the drinking and fighting is

ended, when, disrobed of their tinselled trappings, they snore happily

on a couch of soft soot.

Guy Fawkes still forms one of our London street amusements, though we

regret to say that Guy is now oftener personated by some great hulking

gin-drinking lazy fellow, than the old, uncouth stuffed figures which

were frequently carried about, with one foot hanging down before and the

other behind.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XIX.

SPRING-TIME IN LONDON.

The cries of "All a-blowing! all a-growing!" are the first sounds with

which the spring-flowers are ushered into the streets of London; and

although not uttered by the lips of such fabled nymphs as the poets of

old clothed in the richest hues of their imagination, and sent forth as

attendants on blossom-bearing Spring, the voices still come like gentle

greetings from old friends, all the sweeter through having been so long

absent. Sometimes we see a pretty face looking out, through the homely

bonnet, and behold a light and graceful form, and hear a clear musical

voice calling out "Sweet primroses!" Another hurries along from street

to street with the little basket balanced on her head, while with one

hand she ever keeps throwing back the long silky hair that falls down

and veils her deep violet-coloured eyes; and we think how some such

figure haunted the poet's fancy when he peopled the vales of Arcady with

the "sweet spirits of the flowers."

Now windows, which have been closed throughout the long winter, are

again thrown open, and the pleasant breeze which has come from "far away

o'er the sea," again blows freshly into those close and

unhealthy-smelling rooms. Over dead walls and high houses has the

refreshing air climbed--escaping from courts in which there was no

thoroughfare. Through the steam of suffocating sewers it struggled; it

shook off the malaria that clung to its skirts, as it swept over dark

and stagnant ditches; over bone-boiling houses it hurried, and left the

old poison behind to float around the places where it was first

engendered; and, though somewhat shorn of its sweetness and its

strength, it comes like a welcome guest in at the open doors and

uplifted casements of the poor. By it the grey hairs of that thin,

pale-faced old man are uplifted; it tosses aside the long brown locks of

the little grandchild that stands between his knees, fatherless and

motherless; for the wind an hour ago blew over the empty house beside

the black putrid ditch, where so many died during the past summer, and

where that little orphan then lived. Even the imprisoned lark that hangs

by the window feels his plumes ruffled by the breeze, and fancying for a

moment that he is free, sends out his voice through the wiry cage, and

sings as if he were again shivering his wings in some silvery cloud high

above the opening daisies.

The blessed breeze and the sweet sunshine have aroused the poor children

who vegetate in courts and alleys; and these dirty images of innocence

have descended from the close, high attics, and climbed out of the low,

damp cellars, and now, bare-headed and barefooted and scantily clad,

they are chasing each other like swallows, and appear as happy as if

neither rags nor hunger existed in this great city of palaces,

poor-houses, and prisons. A drum battledore with its gilded shuttlecock

they never saw, nor would such things make them happier than those they

have manufactured out of the corks they picked up among the sweepings of

the gin-shop, and the feathers from the stall of a distant poulterer;

while the bottom of a saucepan, or the crown of a hat, even the

fire-shovel (if nothing else is to be had) furnish them with

battledores. Somewhere those little ones have been and thrust their tiny

arms through the railings where a lilac-tree was in leaf, and they have

dug up the stones in the court, and stuck the green lilac-twigs in the

ground, and made themselves a garden, which they are watering out of

oyster-shells and broken bits of pots; for the same instinct that leads

a bird to build its nest causes them to imitate the making of gardens.

They collect the leaves of the turnip-tops which the greengrocer has

thrown into the street, and, placing them on their little bare heads,

march up and down the court, crying "All a-blowing! all a-growing!"

You peep through the open doors of little houses, at the fronts of which

men and women are bartering old garments for roots or flowers, and

through those open doors you see a little sunless spot between two dead

walls, by the side of which a small portion of dark damp mould is

portioned off, somewhere about a yard in width by eight feet in length,

and those are the two garden-beds into which the "penny roots" will be

stuck. Here they grow mustard-and-cress, on which the cats fight, and

over which Cinderella shakes her doormats, while scores of little black

flies play at hide and seek amongst the leaves; nor will all the washing

in the world cleanse your salad from these little superfluities. Then,

just as the penny wallflower had struck, and the two roots of daisies,

which cost per ditto, were beginning to try to open, and the hollyhock

looked as if it might live, and the lupin had still a few leaves left,

and the Canterbury-bell had one live shoot on,--just as "the garden" was

really promising to rear at least one root, the woman that lived in the

two-pair back hung a heavy coverlet on the clothes-line (the line itself

consisting of six separate pieces), and it broke, and every root broke

too, and not one again raised its head. Then Billy was always bowling

his hoop, and could never turn it without going on the other bed; and

the dustman had placed his basket on the two scarlet runners that were

coming up; and where the nasturtiums were set earwigs were ever creeping

in and out, and long-bodied wire-worms, that looked up at Billy as if

they would like to taste of his little bare legs, and from which he

always ran in screaming. Then they had told Mrs. So-and-so to save her

soapsuds, to pour on the roots of the little bit of grape-vine which

only shewed a leaf here and there; and she, wishing to oblige her

landlady, had put the suds in the saucepan again, blown the fire, and

emptied the contents, boiling hot, into the hole she made by the

grape-vine!

"All a-blowing! all a-growing!" Saw you that poor woman turn round at

the well-known sound? Had you been nearer you might have heard the low

sigh she heaved. See, she has purchased with her last halfpenny a bunch

of bluebells and primroses, and these she will place in water on her

window-sill; and, while her face rests upon her hand, she will see miles

beyond the little back yard, with its water-butt and cinder-heap, which

her window overlooks, even as far off as the home of her childhood. The

little cottage beside the wide open common, which was yellow with gorse

and broom in summer, and purple with heath-bells in autumn, will again

rise before her. In fancy she will hear the bees murmur as they went to

and fro from her father's garden--will see the beds of flowers which she

called her own; the old apple-tree, robed in white and crimson blossoms;

hear the very chirp of the sparrows that built in the thatched roof,

under which the honeysuckle climbed. She will again picture the rustic

stile--the walk along the green lane, when the hedges were white with

May, when his arm was placed gently around her waist, who is now working

in chains in some penal settlement. He, who was so good and so kind to

her, until he was allured to London, where he met with evil companions,

and first starved, then, stupified with gin, went forth in the stilly

dark night, and returned home a housebreaker. See! her eyes are

closed--she has fallen asleep in her broken chair; a tear still lingers

in her eyelashes, and a faint sad smile rests on her wan lips--for she

fancies that she again hears the village-bells ringing, and that she is

walking between those rows of graves, beneath the avenue of elms, with

her bible and prayer-book in her hand, and about to enter the humble pew

in which her father and mother (long since dead) knelt beside her in

prayer. She awakes with a sigh; the sunshine falls on the chimney-pot

opposite. She hears the drunken dustman, who lives beneath her, again

quarrelling with his wife; the cry of "Beer!" in the street, then the

smell from the sewer ascends; and, bringing in her flowers, she closes

the window, and sits down to earn one-halfpenny per hour at the

needlework supplied to her by that heart of nether millstone, the Great

Nebuchadnezzar, through whose fiery furnace so many are compelled to

pass, and in which such numbers perish, as they yield to his stern

decree, because they know no other way by which they can obtain bread;

garments made beneath burning sighs and scalding tears, that seem hot

enough to blister the backs of those who wear them. God help thee, poor

woman! thou canst not see it, although we can; there is an angel's face

shining through every tear thou hast shed over those flowers, and

looking upon thee with mild and pitying eyes.

See those old men and women "pottering" about the bit of ground before

the almshouses; they also feel the cheering influence of spring.

Although each plot or bed would but little more than make a grave, were

a tolerable breadth of walk left between, they find a pleasure in

cultivating so small a patch of earth, every inch of which brings

something to remembrance as it is turned over: that root was given by

old William, who is dead; the other by John, who is dying; from this,

last summer, were cut the flowers he placed in a comrade's coffin; that

his wife, long dead, brought all the way from the country, when she went

to see her daughter at Croydon, and was so poor, that she had to walk

back--and that walk caused her death; for, while heated, she sat before

the door in the cool, calm April evening--it "chilled" her, and she

died. Honest old bedesman! I could kiss off the tear that fell on the

blue sleeve of thy old coat, were it not for pride or shame. "Two years

ago, sir; she was but seventy!" and thy heart still softens, and thy

tears fall when her image rises before thee, for in thy eyes she never

looked aged, but rose green and fresh through the memory of other years,

even as when thou first didst woo her, walking between the quiet woods

along the canal near Croydon, when the forget-me-not looked into the

water at its shadow, and the crimson foxglove made a red streak like

sunset in the crystal mirror, and no one then dreamed that a railway

would bare its iron back where the silver water reflected both your

images and the broad-branched oak, beneath which ye were then seated.

Spring brings with it Easter--the first holiday that brightens on the

departing gloom of winter. Then we hear mingled with the cry of "All

a-blowing! all a-growing!" the reedy notes of penny trumpets, and the

beat of tiny drums, and the shrill pipings of yellow wooden whistles:

and tired children walk home from Greenwich with little dolls on their

arms; and mothers carry their sleeping babies without murmuring; and

little feet, that "scarcely stir the dust," come plodding on, just as

their young fathers and mothers had done some three or four-and-twenty

years ago. Here, one on each side clung to her gown, there he carried

another pick-a-back, who kept grinding his organ as he rode; while the

fourth slept, covered over with the shawl, regardless of the busy crowds

that were hurrying to and fro. Surely there was no selfishness in the

enjoyment of the day on the part of the parents, shared as it was by

those dear dusty children, the eldest not five years old, the youngest

not so many months; and two of them carried every inch of the five miles

back. For days after will those children talk about what they saw in the

park at Greenwich, in the fair, and on the road; and their dreams will

be of gilt gingerbread horses, and swings high as the tall trees, and

booths, and music, the distant river, old pensioners with wooden legs

and spyglasses, donkeys on Blackheath, swarthy gipsies, drinks of beer,

and the heads and tails of shrimps. They will mimic the sights, and try

to imitate the sounds, and go sounding and drumming through the house

until the trumpet refuses to speak, and the drum is burst, and not a

wire is left inside the threepenny organ. Then their grandfathers and

grandmothers (if they were not with them) will come and ask a hundred

questions as to what they saw, and what they did, and whither they went;

and, from the answers they receive, go away convinced that there are no

other children in this huge overgrown London to be compared with their

grandchildren. May heaven shower its blessings on the conceit, and they

never have cause to think otherwise!

Besides such groups as these, the pavements were almost blocked up with

little carts, in which many a kiss and many a scratch were exchanged,

and in these children squalled and smiled as they were dragged part of

the way to the fair. And the little nurserymaid, who still wore her

workhouse dress, was compelled to turn round every few minutes and to

threaten what she would do at the impudent but good-natured boys who

would help to shove on the little chaise, and cram a portion of their

oranges or gingerbread into the children's mouths. Then one

fine-looking, dark-eyed lad, after a harmless fight with the little

maid, by some kind of freemasonry, was a minute or two after helping her

to draw the chaise, and they went on chatting and laughing together,

while he divided his fairings with her. On looking at that lad more

closely, we remembered that for a month he brought our water-cresses,

that for a fortnight he knocked at our door and called "Butcher!" then

we lost sight of him for some weeks, and when he made his appearance

again he came with our daily newspaper, followed by a dog, which he set

on our favourite cat. Times got worse, and he came with another boy; and

they swept the snow from the pavement for a penny, and as much bread and

cheese as they could eat. Then he opened and shut a shop, but had the

misfortune to break a pane of glass; and as it was on Tuesday when the

accident took place, and he was informed that the price of the pane

would be stopped out of his week's wages; and as he calculated what that

would amount to, and found that it would swallow up his whole week's

earnings, why he went to breakfast, and never returned; and, just before

Easter, he had raised a basket, and, either by money or credit, obtained

a goodly show of roots and flowers, and, instead of "Water-cresses!"

"Butcher!" or "Paper!" we heard his cheerful and well-known voice in the

street, crying "All a-blowing! all a-growing!" He is now aspiring to a

donkey and cart, and if we err not, to the little nursery-maid in the

mob-cap and workhouse dress, and sweet smiling countenance (when

pleased), which proclaims her to have come "of gentle kin."

Now bundles of rhubarb, that run all to water in the pies and puddings,

may be seen in the greengrocers' shops; and little new waxy potatoes,

that have no taste, are ticketed a shilling a pound; and small

gooseberries, that have the flavour of green-tea leaves, given to the

old charwoman, and which she has kept stewing on the hob for a full

hour, are ditto per half pint; and asparagus, that looks like

candle-wicks, is tied up in bundles; while little salads made of two

radishes, a couple of onions, a few slices of beet-root, mustard, cress,

and a halfpenny bunch of water-cresses, sit in little baskets marked

sixpence, and try to tempt the passers-by to purchase. Now men, who

smell of the aroma of old woods, stand before the doors of

public-houses, with young honeysuckles and eglantine, the roots buried

in moss; and violets and primroses, fresh and blowing in their own

native earth, just as they were dug up on the sunny banks by

Sanderstead, or in the tree-shaded lanes around Cobham.

Finally, old hats, boots, shoes, and cast-off garments of every

description are routed out at the cry of "All a-blowing! all a-growing!"

and exchanged for flowers, the bearers of which barter on the principle

of getting all they can and giving as little as possible in return.

Even the lady of the house cannot resist the entreaties of her children,

who, attracted by the well-known call, and the sight of the basket of

flowers outside the window, drag her to the door, and let her have no

peace until she has purchased the lovely heath, the beautiful Iris, the

pot of American primroses, or the gaudier group of gold and

silver-coloured crocuses. The servant-girl must also have her flower-pot

in the high attic window, and she looks at it the first thing in the

morning and the last at night, and feels thankful, in the words of

Solomon, that "the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the

flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come,

and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land."

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XX.

LONDON CEMETERIES AND THE EPIDEMIC IN 1849.

That it was customary in ancient times to bury the dead outside the

city-walls the holy Bible bears witness, even as far back as in the

early chapters of the Book of Genesis, where it is recorded how Abraham

bought the field of Macphelah of Ephron the Hittite, "and the cave which

was therein, and all the trees that were in the field, (and) that were

in all the borders round about." (Chap. xxiii.) Here we find a rural

cemetery in a green field bordered with trees, in which the venerable

patriarch buried his wife nearly four thousand years ago, while we, with

all our boasted improvements, are in the present day thrusting the dead

together in countless thousands, in the very heart of our close and

over-crowded cities--where the living have scarcely room enough to

breathe, and the dead of to-day are crammed amongst the remains which

have been disinterred to give them a short lodgment; when they again in

turn are cast out, and mysteriously consumed or pounded into the

smallest possible compass under our very eyes, in so unfeeling,

heartless, and brutal a manner, that we dare not shock our readers with

the revolting details.

The head-stone, reared by the hand of pious affection, instead of

pointing to the remains it was erected to commemorate, stands over the

graves of strangers, and we shed our tears over those whom we never

knew; while the sexton and the grave-digger grin at us behind the

neighbouring tomb-stones, chinking the silver in their pockets, and

laughing to think that the paupers whom they shoved into "our" grave on

the previous night in a "huggermugger" way should be wept over by the

broken-hearted mourner whom they have thus cheated. With these facts

dinned into our ears every day by the uplifted voice of the press, are

we not guilty of disrespect towards the dead by burying them in these

ever-changing and common lodging-houses? We know not where their remains

are to be found at the end of the year; cannot tell whether they have

been removed to lay the foundation of a new road, or sold and ground up

to manure some distant field.

Let us not forget that when the heathen Greeks and Romans brought the

remains of their heroes and poets into their ancient temples, the bodies

were first burnt, and only the ashes preserved in richly sculptured

urns, on which the achievements of the dead were pictured: their

classical minds fashioned "a thing of beauty" out of the ashes of the

departed; they gave to the dead a beautiful dwelling-place, and those

who were buried unscathed by the funeral fire were interred in

cemeteries where trees were planted over them, and marble monuments

erected; and, idolators though they were, such places were held sacred,

and were called "the silent cities of the dead," and were ever remote

from the abodes of the living.

I have before remarked, in my _Pictures of Country Life_, that, amid the

din and tumult of a populous city, the dead are sadly misplaced. I never

look upon those close unhealthy corners, crowded with graves, without

feeling that it is wrong to bury the dead there; that they ought to be

removed from such shadowy and sunless spots to where the tall trees

would make a soothing murmur above their heads, and all around them be

"gentle images of rest." Their business with this world is ended; they

have finished their long day's work; the roll of carriages, the tramp of

busy passengers, and living voices, clamorous for gain, ever in my ear

sound harshly when they come grating and jarring amongst the

resting-places of the dead. The price of corn, the state of the

money-market, or the rising and falling of the funds, are matters which

ought to be discussed far away from those we followed, and wept over,

and consigned to their silent chambers, there to sleep till the last

trumpet sounds.

In the open Cemetery, we seem to walk through a land lettered with

living affections, and strewn over with tokens of existing love. Our

sympathies are divided between the mourned and the mourners; our sorrow

is not alone for the dead; the flowers at our feet remind us that there

are those behind us somewhere who come here now and then to weep. If we

picture Grief standing there with bowed head, and hair unbound,

"refusing to be comforted," Pity seems to kneel before us at the same

time; and, while she looks up timidly into the pale face of Grief,

appears as if entreating of her to remember the mourners, who only

survive to weep; while Memory, with downcast

[Illustration: HIGHGATE CEMETERY.]

eyes and folded arms, seems musing over the flowers which Affection has

planted on their graves. In a dimly-lighted, breathless City churchyard,

such images are not seen: our affections are there fettered--the

imagination is chained down, and endeavours in vain to soar heavenward.

If we call up the dead, they seem to sit weeping with bent head and

folded wings among the dark shadows of the mouldering monuments on which

the sunlight seldom falls.

Against these unhealthy graveyards sentence has been pronounced: they

are doomed to be closed. It is useless for selfish and mercenary men to

oppose the fiat which has gone forth, for the air of this mighty city

has too long been poisoned through men who live by the dead. Let us

create a good out of this evil; and after these unhealthy churchyards

have been closed long enough to destroy the injurious exhalations which

have of late numbered so many of the living with the dead, then let the

grounds be planted with trees and flowers, and they will become sweet

breathing-places, like our squares, and amid the brick walls call up

images of the far-away country. The old monuments need not be disturbed.

To see the drooping branches of a green tree falling over them, will add

to their beauty and solemnity; and in the centre of our cities we can

wander among groves rendered sacred by the remains of our

forefathers,--can in the dim twilight-shadows which the flickering

leaves will ever make, hold communion with the spirit of John Bunyan,

while we peruse his immortal work in the burying-ground of

Bunhill-fields; for by such association would these spots become

hallowed. Nor would the records of the dead, who sleep without the walls

of the church, be held less sacred, if their names were engraven on

marble tablets, and placed within the consecrated buildings around which

their dust would repose, beneath beds of blowing flowers and

close-leaved evergreens.

The old grey weather-beaten tombs of the founders of charities would

look more venerable overtopped by the tall elm, the sable yew, or the

weeping willow, that seems ever to droop sadly above the dead. No busy

builder should ever be permitted to rear a wall within these sacred

enclosures, or disturb the robin that would pipe his sweet anthem in

autumn, or drive away the belted bee, that would come over the high

houses from some distant meadow, to make a plaintive murmur in the heart

of this vast city as he flew in and out among the flowers that waved

above these old households of the dead.

Let us not sow these places with salt, nor strew them with lime, to

destroy every trace of what they really are--spots sanctified by tears

and prayers, and the bodies of our brother men; but, if necessity

demands it, remove some of their remains tenderly to other places of

sepulture, and make gardens over the graves of those who are left

undisturbed--spots above which the blue sky might be seen, while the

sunshine slept below; amid which we could obtain glimpses of the face of

heaven, while musing over the memory of those who have long since

entered the gates of the "golden city." Let not these old burial-grounds

be closed with no more reverence than if we were shutting up a common

sewer; let us not speak of them as loathsome, disgusting, and revolting,

because they are made so by unfeeling, money-loving men--gnomes, who

feed and fatten on the dead--who look on coffins as they do on

cabbages--digging, planting, cutting down, and re-setting the ground,

and only studying how to make more money; but let us remember that the

mute and inoffensive dead contribute not unto the evils complained of

until they are dislodged with brutal violence--that they cannot defend

themselves, for

"They are very mild and meek;

Though (sextons) smite them on the cheek

And on the mouth--they cannot speak."

The inhuman vultures who prey on them injure the living, and only insult

the dead through our sensitiveness. To the dead it matters not:

"They hear not (Poor-law guardians) rave,

Nor moaning household shelter crave

(When carted from each thrice-sold grave)."

When our old churches were first built, they stood in wide, open, breezy

spaces, at the remote ends of parish boundaries: such was Bartholomew

Church, when Smithfield was really a field, and the lofty elm-trees

towered high above the ancient gallows which was erected there. We have

hemmed in the spots with streets and tall warehouses which our

forefathers left free and open between the living and the dead, until

they have become so close and breathless, that even the sparrows forsake

their "old ancestral eaves," and seek for other roosting-places.

Open cheap cemeteries, and conveyances thither, will spring up rapidly

enough; funeral omnibuses will be started at little more than the

present fares. If nothing else will do, let us be rated for burying our

dead: we do not murmur at supporting them while living, nor should we

begrudge the slight tax that would be required for interring them in

Suburban Cemeteries. There are thousands of acres of land to be sold

within five miles of the City of London; if we go to the distance of ten

miles it will be all the better for our children's children; but let no

buildings be erected within a measured mile of these Silent Cities of

the Dead, but each for ever remain a Great Garden of Graves.

Affection would often visit this Land of the Dead; the widow would take

her children by the hand, and lead them into the country, to shew them

the little freehold in which their father slept. The poor would become

more pious, and amid their troubles thank God that they had at last a

tranquil haven, in which they could for ever moor their storm-tossed

barques: to them suburban cemeteries would become spots filled with

solemn associations--homes to which they were fast hastening with

patient resignation.

To us there is no feeling of loneliness while wandering through a

beautiful cemetery. The dead seem to belong to us; they are of our

company; they have but taken their berths in the great ship, and are

sleeping until we come to join them, to be fellow-voyagers with them

into the unknown sea of eternity--trusting ourselves to the care of the

same Almighty Captain whose "ministering angels" fill the sails. Around

the cemetery we see the wide unwalled country, where we have so often

walked and talked with those who now "sleep their long sleep," and,

while gazing over the landscape, they seem to accompany us, and to live

again in our thoughts; or we stand, as it were, in a great

picture-gallery, surrounded with portraits of the dead: not a single

object rises up to shock our feelings;--the open country beyond--the

trees around--the flowers that cover the graves by which we stand--cause

us to contemplate death kindly, and, instead of becoming hideous, he is

but a gentle porter, who sits patiently without the gates of heaven, and

welcomes all who are prepared to enter.

To plant a grave with such flowers as "the poor inhabitant below" loved

whilst living, is a pious pleasure: it is a living link between us and

the dead, and keeps alive an affection which belongs not to the world;

though a "poor thing, it is our own;" for we know that the flowers are

kept alive by an invisible hand, that in the still dark night they

continue to grow, while we are wrapt in as sound a slumber as that which

falls upon the dead--the only difference being that we perchance may

again awaken. There is no such link between us and them in a cold, grey,

hard, dead tomb-stone: the tears which fall upon the flowers are not

lost, for we know not but that the perfume may be wafted to heaven.

We believe that the dead will again arise--that in some other state we

shall again meet with them; and yet there are those who make their

remains a source of profit. Perchance, the Angel of Death holds his

court beyond the grave, and they may be summoned before him to account

for their deeds. We, in our boyish days, were taught to take off our

hats when we entered a churchyard, and to walk amongst the dead as

reverentially as we did up the aisle of the church--to look upon the

grave as the gate which opened into heaven, as the only road which leads

to the realms of eternal happiness.

I have, in the work formerly alluded to, endeavoured to paint an ancient

funeral procession, from the pages of holy writ, and to shew how great

was the respect paid to the dead in the patriarchal ages. Through what a

laud of poetry and peril was the dead body of Joseph brought out of

Egypt! We marvel that no painter has been bold enough to grapple with so

sublime a subject. Amid the plagues that struck consternation into the

hearts of the old Egyptians, there stood the coffin ready to be borne

away: in the deep darkness which overshadowed the land--it stood black

and silent amid the deep gloom. When the Israelites departed they bore

it away: the pillar of fire flashed redly upon it by night, and by day

it was slowly carried behind the pillar of cloud: through the Red Sea it

was borne; below that high and terrible wall of water did the body of

that dead man pass; then the sleeping billows rolled back, and there the

haughty Egyptians found a grave. Through storm and battle, and the

perils of the wilderness, and the thunder which shook Mount Sinai, was

the body of Joseph carried; and when Moses held up his wearied arm and

conquered Amalek, it was still there. On the waves of war it was at last

washed to the Promised Land; it followed the Ark of God when Jordan was

divided, and was at length buried in the field of Shechem, in the ground

which Jacob had long before purchased of the sons of Hamor. In the whole

annals of time, there is no funeral procession that in sublimity and

grandeur approaches his, who when young was sold as a slave to the

Egyptians. That dead-march through the God-dried ocean, and over the

desert, led by Moses--the man who had spoken to his Maker, and who was a

mourner at that solemn funeral--causes the eye to quiver beneath its

gloomy and awful grandeur: we see the dead and the living pass away amid

the roar of the ocean, the thunder of the Mount, and the clashing of

battle upon battle; and while we read, we feel as if we stood trembling

in the presence of God.

I will not break the chain of the reader's thoughts while pondering over

this great and grand funeral procession, by pointing to the desecration

of the dead in the present day, further than stating that the revolting

and impious evil can only be remedied by suburban cemeteries; for around

such places there reigns a silence in keeping with the solemnity of

death: there no jarring sounds fall upon the ear, for the lulling murmur

made by the leaves is in keeping with the repose of the dead. Flowers

planted upon a grave seem like sacred objects; in our minds they somehow

appear to belong to the dead, as if hallowed by the soil in which they

have grown. There are numberless passages in our old poets abounding

with descriptions of flowers which were dedicated to the dead; and we

may, in some future work, return to the subject, and string together a

garland of funeral emblems; for

"Methinks the flowers

Have spirits far more beautiful than ours."--_Withers._

The gentle hearts of the old poets clung to the flowers with a fond

affection; in their eyes they were sweet messengers, bearing meanings

and thoughts "too deep for tears," ever hinting of love which dieth not,

but liveth on for ever in another state of existence. They traced in the

flowers fanciful resemblances of fond passions--likenesses of what they

loved and cherished all the more since the original forms which they

fancied the flowers resembled were transplanted into the gardens of

heaven.

We who sojourned during the whole of that summer in the very heart of

the district which suffered the most severely during that calamitous

visitation, almost unconsciously gathered materials for one of those

gloomy pictures which so few living witnesses survive to paint, and

which we hope may never again darken our pages. We seem like those who,

having escaped some perilous shipwreck, sit shuddering on the rock on

which they have been thrown, their faces buried in their hands, yet

unable to shut out the appalling spectacle they beheld, even after it

passed away. Fancy still calls up the phantoms, amid the white foam and

the tumbling waves, as they float by, with pale faces, uplifted and

beseeching hands; youth and beauty with her long hair unbound, and

crisped with the boiling spray, while manly vigour buffets in vain with

the billows, until darkness and destruction sweep over all; and we, like

the mournful messenger in Job, "only escaped alone to tell thee."

The Land of Death in which we dwelt was Newington, hemmed in by Lambeth,

Southwark, Bermondsey, and other gloomy parishes through which the

pestilence stalked like a Destroying Angel in the deep shadows of the

night and the open noon of day, while in every street

"There was nought but mourning weeds,

And sorrow and dismay;

Where burial met with burial still,

And jostled by the way."--_Hogg._

The "Registrar-General" but gives an account of those who died; but

marshals up the forces which have joined the ranks of Death; how and

where they fell are briefly touched upon; but a description of the

battle-ground, with all those little accessories of moving light and

shadow which enrich the picture, he leaves to other hands, for they come

not within the compass of his graver duties. Though the task is far

removed from a pleasant one, it is necessary that we should preserve

some record of this eventful season, so that in after-years, when our

pages are referred to, a faithful photograph, taken at the true moment

of time, may therein be found. All day long was that sullen bell

tolling--from morning to night, it scarcely ceased a moment; for as soon

as it had rung the knell of another departed spirit, there was a fresh

funeral at the churchyard-gate, and again that "ding-dong" pealed

mournfully through the sad and sultry atmosphere. Those who were left

behind, too ill to join the funeral procession, heard not always the

returning footsteps of the muffled mourners, for sometimes Death again

entered the house while they were absent; and when they reached home

they found another victim ready to be borne to the grave: then they sat

down and wept in very despair. Death came no longer as of old, knocking

painfully at the door of life, but strode noiselessly in, and, before

one was well aware, smote his victim--no one could tell how, for the

strong man, who appeared hale and well one hour, was weak and helpless

the next, and fell without knowing whence the blow came.

Little children were clothed suddenly in black, almost before they could

reconcile themselves to the belief that they had lost their parents.

Before they could well understand why their father slept so long, or was

placed in a dark box, and carried out at the door in such haste, the

mother had also ceased to live; and then they began to comprehend their

loss, and wept bitterly to find themselves fatherless, motherless, and

destitute. Some of these were so little, that they could but just repeat

their prayers. Never more would they kneel at the feet of that dear,

fond mother, as they had done but a night or two before; never more

would those eyes beam on them again, or that sweet voice patiently

instruct them, and, with a smile, repeat the words over and over again,

until they knew them all by rote. Alas! they were the other night borne

to a strange bed; a strange face bent over them--and, when they rose to

kiss it, it turned away. Then the little orphans pressed each other more

closely, and wept louder for the loss of their mother. At last, their

sobbing subsided, though not until long after they had fallen asleep,

perchance on the hard workhouse bed--even those who were before nursed

so delicately that the cold wind had never visited their tender cheeks.

Many such sudden changes as these have we met with; homes in which one

day happiness and comfort reigned, changed on the morrow to the abodes

of sorrow, anguish, and naked destitution; or, by the end of the week,

empty and closed!

"Life and thought have gone away side by side,

Leaving door and windows wide;

Careless tenants they!

All within is dark as night: in the windows is no light,

And no murmur at the door, so frequent on its hinge before.

Close the door--the shutters close,

Or through the windows we shall see

The nakedness and vacancy

Of the deserted house."--_Tennyson._

In some houses all died; and after the dilapidated building had been

closed a few days, other tenants took possession, and, in two or three

of these changes, the new tenants also perished--the mercenary landlords

never breathing a word about what had befallen the others. The putrid

cesspool and stagnant sewer still yawned and bubbled and steamed in the

sunshine, and poisoned all who inhaled the deadly gases; and when but

few human beings were left, an investigation took place, and the evil

was removed. In several death-engendering courts the whole of the

inhabitants were driven out, and fresh shelter found for them until

their wretched dwellings were purified.