_London_, _June_ 17_th_, 1782.
I HAVE now been pretty nearly all over London, and, according to my own
notions, have now seen most of the things I was most anxious to see.
Hereafter, then, I propose to make an excursion into the country; and
this purpose, by the blessing of God, I hope to be able to carry into
effect in a very few days, for my curiosity is here almost satiated. I
seem to be tired and sick of the smoke of these sea-coal fires, and I
long, with almost childish impatience, once more to breathe a fresher and
clearer air.
It must, I think, be owned, that upon the whole, London is neither so
handsomely nor so well built as Berlin is; but then it certainly has far
more fine squares. Of these there are many that in real magnificence and
beautiful symmetry far surpass our Gens d’Armes Markt, our Denhoschen and
William’s Place. The squares or quadrangular places contain the best and
most beautiful buildings of London; a spacious street, next to the
houses, goes all round them, and within that there is generally a round
grass-plot, railed in with iron rails, in the centre of which, in many of
them, there is a statue, which statues most commonly are equestrian and
gilt. In Grosvenor Square, instead of this green plot or area, there is
a little circular wood, intended, no doubt, to give one the idea of _rus
in urbe_.
One of the longest and pleasantest walks I have yet taken is from
Paddington to Islington; where to the left you have a fine prospect of
the neighbouring hills, and in particular of the village of Hampstead,
which is built on one of them; and to the right the streets of London
furnish an endless variety of interesting views. It is true that it is
dangerous to walk here alone, especially in the afternoon and in an
evening, or at night, for it was only last week that a man was robbed and
murdered on this very same road. But I now hasten to another and a more
pleasing topic:
_The British Museum_.
I have had the happiness to become acquainted with the Rev. Mr. Woide;
who, though well known all over Europe to be one of the most learned men
of the age, is yet, if possible, less estimable for his learning than he
is for his unaffected goodness of heart. He holds a respectable office
in the museum, and was obliging enough to procure me permission to see
it, luckily the day before it was shut up. In general you must give in
your name a fortnight before you can he admitted. But after all, I am
sorry to say, it was the rooms, the glass cases, the shelves, or the
repository for the books in the British Museum which I saw, and not the
museum itself, we were hurried on so rapidly through the apartments. The
company, who saw it when and as I did, was various, and some of all
sorts; some, I believe, of the very lowest classes of the people, of both
sexes; for, as it is the property of the nation, every one has the same
right (I use the term of the country) to see it that another has. I had
Mr. Wendeborn’s book in my pocket, and it, at least, enabled me to take a
somewhat more particular notice of some of the principal things; such as
the Egyptian mummy, a head of Homer, &c. The rest of the company,
observing that I had some assistance which they had not, soon gathered
round me; I pointed out to them as we went along, from Mr. Wendeborn’s
German book, what there was most worth seeing here. The gentleman who
conducted us took little pains to conceal the contempt which he felt for
my communications when he found out that it was only a German description
of the British Museum I had got. The rapidly passing through this vast
suite of rooms, in a space of time little, if at all, exceeding an hour,
with leisure just to cast one poor longing look of astonishment on all
these stupendous treasures of natural curiosities, antiquities, and
literature, in the contemplation of which you could with pleasure spend
years, and a whole life might be employed in the study of them—quite
confuses, stuns, and overpowers one. In some branches this collection is
said to be far surpassed by some others; but taken altogether, and for
size, it certainly is equalled by none. The few foreign divines who
travel through England generally desire to have the Alexandrian
manuscript shewn them, in order to be convinced with their own eyes
whether the passage, “These are the three that bear record, &c.,” is to
be found there or not.
The Rev. Mr. Woide lives at a place called Lisson Street, not far from
Paddington; a very village-looking little town, at the west end of
London. It is quite a rural and pleasant situation; for here I either
do, or fancy I do, already breathe a purer and freer air than in the
midst of the town. Of his great abilities, and particularly in oriental
literature, I need not inform you; but it will give you pleasure to hear
that he is actually meditating a fac-simile edition of the Alexandrian
MS. I have already mentioned the infinite obligations I lie under to
this excellent man for his extraordinary courtesy and kindness.
_The Theatre in the Haymarket_.
Last week I went twice to an English play-house. The first time “The
Nabob” was represented, of which the late Mr. Foote was the author, and
for the entertainment, a very pleasing and laughable musical farce,
called “The Agreeable Surprise.” The second time I saw “The English
Merchant:” which piece has been translated into German, and is known
among us by the title of “The Scotchwoman,” or “The Coffee-house.” I
have not yet seen the theatres of Covent Garden and Drury Lane, because
they are not open in summer. The best actors also usually spend May and
October in the country, and only perform in winter.
A very few excepted, the comedians whom I saw were certainly nothing
extraordinary. For a seat in the boxes you pay five shillings, in the
pit three, in the first gallery two, and in the second or upper gallery,
one shilling. And it is the tenants in this upper gallery who, for their
shilling, make all that noise and uproar for which the English
play-houses are so famous. I was in the pit, which gradually rises,
amphitheatre-wise, from the orchestra, and is furnished with benches, one
above another, from the top to the bottom. Often and often, whilst I sat
there, did a rotten orange, or pieces of the peel of an orange, fly past
me, or past some of my neighbours, and once one of them actually hit my
hat, without my daring to look round, for fear another might then hit me
on my face.
All over London as one walks, one everywhere, in the season, sees oranges
to sell; and they are in general sold tolerably cheap, one and even
sometimes two for a halfpenny; or, in our money, threepence. At the
play-house, however, they charged me sixpence for one orange, and that
noways remarkably good.
Besides this perpetual pelting from the gallery, which renders an English
play-house so uncomfortable, there is no end to their calling out and
knocking with their sticks till the curtain is drawn up. I saw a
miller’s, or a baker’s boy, thus, like a huge booby, leaning over the
rails and knocking again and again on the outside, with all his might, so
that he was seen by everybody, without being in the least ashamed or
abashed. I sometimes heard, too, the people in the lower or middle
gallery quarrelling with those of the upper one. Behind me, in the pit,
sat a young fop, who, in order to display his costly stone buckles with
the utmost brilliancy, continually put his foot on my bench, and even
sometimes upon my coat, which I could avoid only by sparing him as much
space from my portion of the seat as would make him a footstool. In the
boxes, quite in a corner, sat several servants, who were said to be
placed there to keep the seats for the families they served till they
should arrive; they seemed to sit remarkably close and still, the reason
of which, I was told, was their apprehension of being pelted; for if one
of them dares but to look out of the box, he is immediately saluted with
a shower of orange peel from the gallery.
In Foote’s “Nabob” there are sundry local and personal satires which are
entirely lost to a foreigner. The character of the Nabob was performed
by a Mr. Palmer. The jett of the character is, this Nabob, with many
affected airs and constant aims at gentility, is still but a silly
fellow, unexpectedly come into the possession of immense riches, and
therefore, of course, paid much court to by a society of natural
philosophers, Quakers, and I do not know who besides. Being tempted to
become one of their members, he is elected, and in order to ridicule
these would-be philosophers, but real knaves, a fine flowery fustian
speech is put into his mouth, which he delivers with prodigious pomp and
importance, and is listened to by the philosophers with infinite
complacency. The two scenes of the Quakers and philosophers, who, with
countenances full of imaginary importance, were seated at a green table
with their president at their head while the secretary, with the utmost
care, was making an inventory of the ridiculous presents of the Nabob,
were truly laughable. One of the last scenes was best received: it is
that in which the Nabob’s friend and school-fellow visit him, and address
him without ceremony by his Christian name; but to all their questions of
“Whether he does not recollect them? Whether he does not remember such
and such a play; or such and such a scrape into which they had fallen in
their youth?” he uniformly answers with a look of ineffable contempt,
only, “No sir!” Nothing can possibly be more ludicrous, nor more comic.
The entertainment, “The Agreeable Surprise,” is really a very diverting
farce. I observed that, in England also, they represent school-masters
in ridiculous characters on the stage, which, though I am sorry for, I
own I do not wonder at, as the pedantry of school-masters in England,
they tell me, is carried at least as far as it is elsewhere. The same
person who, in the play, performed the school-fellow of the Nabob with a
great deal of nature and original humour, here acted the part of the
school-master: his name is Edwin, and he is, without doubt, one of the
best actors of all that I have seen.
This school-master is in love with a certain country girl, whose name is
Cowslip, to whom he makes a declaration of his passion in a strange
mythological, grammatical style and manner, and to whom, among other
fooleries, he sings, quite enraptured, the following air, and seems to
work himself at least up to such a transport of passion as quite
overpowers him. He begins, you will observe, with the conjugation, and
ends with the declensions and the genders; the whole is inimitably droll:
“Amo, amas,
I love a lass,
She is so sweet and tender,
It is sweet Cowslip’s Grace
In the Nominative Case.
And in the feminine Gender.”
Those two sentences in particular, “in the Nominative Case,” and “in the
feminine Gender,” he affects to sing in a particularly languishing air,
as if confident that it was irresistible. This Edwin, in all his comic
characters, still preserves something so inexpressibly good-tempered in
his countenance, that notwithstanding all his burlesques and even
grotesque buffoonery, you cannot but be pleased with him. I own, I felt
myself doubly interested for every character which he represented.
Nothing could equal the tone and countenance of self-satisfaction with
which he answered one who asked him whether he was a scholar? “Why, I
was a master of scholars.” A Mrs. Webb represented a cheesemonger, and
played the part of a woman of the lower class so naturally as I have
nowhere else ever seen equalled. Her huge, fat, and lusty carcase, and
the whole of her external appearance seemed quite to be cut out for it.
Poor Edwin was obliged, as school-master, to sing himself almost hoarse,
as he sometimes was called on to repeat his declension and conjugation
songs two or three times, only because it pleased the upper gallery, or
“the gods,” as the English call them, to roar out “encore.” Add to all
this, he was farther forced to thank them with a low bow for the great
honour done him by their applause.
One of the highest comic touches in the piece seemed to me to consist in
a lie, which always became more and more enormous in the mouths of those
who told it again, during the whole of the piece. This kept the audience
in almost a continual fit of laughter. This farce is not yet printed, or
I really think I should be tempted to venture to make a translation, or
rather an imitation of it.
“The English Merchant, or the Scotchwoman,” I have seen much better
performed abroad than it was here. Mr. Fleck, at Hamburg, in particular,
played the part of the English merchant with more interest, truth, and
propriety than one Aickin did here. He seemed to me to fail totally in
expressing the peculiar and original character of Freeport; instead of
which, by his measured step and deliberate, affected manner of speaking,
he converted him into a mere fine gentleman.
The trusty old servant who wishes to give up his life for his master he,
too, had the stately walk, or strut, of a minister. The character of the
newspaper writer was performed by the same Mr. Palmer who acted the part
of the Nabob, but every one said, what I thought, that he made him far
too much of a gentleman. His person, and his dress also, were too
handsome for the character.
The character of Amelia was performed by an actress, who made her first
appearance on the stage, and from a timidity natural on such an occasion,
and not unbecoming, spoke rather low, so that she could not everywhere be
heard; “Speak louder! speak louder!” cried out some rude fellow from the
upper-gallery, and she immediately, with infinite condescension, did all
she could, and not unsuccessfully, to please even an upper gallery
critic.
The persons near me, in the pit, were often extravagantly lavish of their
applause. They sometimes clapped a single solitary sentiment, that was
almost as unmeaning as it was short, if it happened to be pronounced only
with some little emphasis, or to contain some little point, some popular
doctrine, a singularly pathetic stroke, or turn of wit.
“The Agreeable Surprise” was repeated, and I saw it a second time with
unabated pleasure. It is become a favourite piece, and always announced
with the addition of the favourite musical farce. The theatre appeared
to me somewhat larger than the one at Hamburg, and the house was both
times very full. Thus much for English plays, play-houses, and players.
_English Customs and Education_.
A few words more respecting pedantry. I have seen the regulation of one
seminary of learning, here called an academy. Of these places of
education, there is a prodigious number in London, though,
notwithstanding their pompous names, they are in reality nothing more
than small schools set up by private persons, for children and young
people.
One of the Englishmen who were my travelling companions, made me
acquainted with a Dr. G— who lives near P—, and keeps an academy for the
education of twelve young people, which number is here, as well as at our
Mr. Kumpe’s, never exceeded, and the same plan has been adopted and
followed by many others, both here and elsewhere.
At the entrance I perceived over the door of the house a large board, and
written on it, Dr. G—’s Academy. Dr. G— received me with great courtesy
as a foreigner, and shewed me his school-room, which was furnished just
in the same manner as the classes in our public schools are, with benches
and a professor’s chair or pulpit.
The usher at Dr. G—’s is a young clergyman, who, seated also in a chair
or desk, instructs the boys in the Greek and Latin grammars.
Such an under-teacher is called an usher, and by what I can learn, is
commonly a tormented being, exactly answering the exquisite description
given of him in the “Vicar of Wakefield.” We went in during the hours of
attendance, and he was just hearing the boys decline their Latin, which
he did in the old jog-trot way; and I own it had an odd sound to my ears,
when instead of pronouncing, for example _viri veeree_ I heard them say
_viri_, _of the man_, exactly according to the English pronunciation, and
_viro_, _to the man_. The case was just the same afterwards with the
Greek.
Mr. G— invited us to dinner, when I became acquainted with his wife, a
very genteel young woman, whose behaviour to the children was such that
she might be said to contribute more to their education than any one
else. The children drank nothing but water. For every boarder Dr. G—
receives yearly no more than thirty pounds sterling, which however, he
complained of as being too little. From forty to fifty pounds is the
most that is generally paid in these academies.
I told him of our improvements in the manner of education, and also spoke
to him of the apparent great worth of character of his usher. He
listened very attentively, but seemed to have thought little himself on
this subject. Before and after dinner the Lord’s Prayer was repeated in
French, which is done in several places, as if they were eager not to
waste without some improvement, even this opportunity also, to practise
the French, and thus at once accomplish two points. I afterwards told
him my opinion of this species of prayer, which however, he did not take
amiss.
After dinner the boys had leave to play in a very small yard, which in
most schools or academies, in the city of London, is the _ne plus ultra_
of their playground in their hours of recreation. But Mr. G— has another
garden at the end of the town, where he sometimes takes them to walk.
After dinner Mr. G— himself instructed the children in writing,
arithmetic, and French, all which seemed to be well taught here,
especially writing, in which the young people in England far surpass, I
believe, all others. This may perhaps be owing to their having occasion
to learn only one sort of letters. As the midsummer holidays were now
approaching (at which time the children in all the academies go home for
four weeks), everyone was obliged with the utmost care to copy a written
model, in order to show it to their parents, because this article is most
particularly examined, as everybody can tell what is or is not good
writing. The boys knew all the rules of syntax by heart.
All these academies are in general called boarding-schools. Some few
retain the old name of schools only, though it is possible that in real
merit they may excel the so much-boasted of academies.
It is in general the clergy, who have small incomes, who set up these
schools both in town and country, and grown up people who are foreigners,
are also admitted here to learn the English language. Mr. G— charged for
board, lodging, and instruction in the English, two guineas a-week. He
however, who is desirous of perfecting himself in the English, will do
better to go some distance into the country, and board himself with any
clergyman who takes scholars, where he will hear nothing but English
spoken, and may at every opportunity be taught both by young and old.
There are in England, besides the two universities, but few great schools
or colleges. In London, there are only St. Paul’s and Westminster
schools; the rest are almost all private institutions, in which there
reigns a kind of family education, which is certainly the most natural,
if properly conducted. Some few grammar schools, or Latin schools, are
notwithstanding here and there to be met with, where the master receives
a fixed salary, besides the ordinary profits of the school paid by the
scholars.
You see in the streets of London, great and little boys running about in
long blue coats, which, like robes, reach quite down to the feet, and
little white bands, such as the clergy wear. These belong to a
charitable institution, or school, which hears the name of the Blue Coat
School. The singing of the choristers in the streets, so usual with us,
is not at all customary here. Indeed, there is in England, or at least
in London, such a constant walking, riding, and driving up and down in
the streets, that it would not be very practicable. Parents here in
general, nay even those of the lowest classes, seem to be kind and
indulgent to their children, and do not, like our common people, break
their spirits too much by blows and sharp language. Children should
certainly be inured early to set a proper value on themselves; whereas
with us, parents of the lower class bring up their children to the same
slavery under which they themselves groan.
Notwithstanding the constant new appetites and calls of fashion, they
here remain faithful to nature—till a certain age. What a contrast, when
I figure to myself our petted, pale-faced Berlin boys, at six years old,
with a large bag, and all the parade of grown-up persons, nay even with
laced coats; and here, on the contrary see nothing but fine, ruddy, slim,
active boys, with their bosoms open, and their hair cut on their
forehead, whilst behind it flows naturally in ringlets. It is something
uncommon here to meet a young man, and more especially a boy, with a pale
or sallow face, with deformed features, or disproportioned limbs. With
us, alas! it is not to be concealed, the case is very much otherwise; if
it were not, handsome people would hardly strike us so very much as they
do in this country.
This free, loose, and natural dress is worn till they are eighteen, or
even till they are twenty. It is then, indeed, discontinued by the
higher ranks, but with the common people it always remains the same.
They then begin to have their hair dressed, and curled with irons, to
give the head a large bushy appearance, and half their backs are covered
with powder. I am obliged to remain still longer under the hands of an
English, than I was under a German hair-dresser; and to sweat under his
hot irons with which he curls my hair all over, in order that I may
appear among Englishmen, somewhat English. I must here observe that the
English hair-dressers are also barbers, an office however, which they
perform very badly indeed; though I cannot but consider shaving as a far
more proper employment for these petit maîtres than it is for surgeons,
who you know in our country are obliged to shave us. It is incredible
how much the English at present Frenchify themselves; the only things yet
wanting are bags and swords, with which at least I have seen no one
walking publicly, but I am told they are worn at court.
In the morning it is usual to walk out in a sort of negligée or morning
dress, your hair not dressed, but merely rolled up in rollers, and in a
frock and boots. In Westminster, the morning lasts till four or five
o’clock, at which time they dine, and supper and going to bed are
regulated accordingly. They generally do not breakfast till ten o’clock.
The farther you go from the court into the city, the more regular and
domestic the people become; and there they generally dine about three
o’clock, _i.e._ as soon as the business or ‘Change is over.
Trimmed suits are not yet worn, and the most usual dress is in summer, a
short white waistcoat, black breeches, white silk stockings, and a frock,
generally of very dark blue cloth, which looks like black; and the
English seem in general to prefer dark colours. If you wish to be full
dressed, you wear black. Officers rarely wear their uniforms, but dress
like other people, and are to be known to be officers only by a cockade
in their hats.
It is a common observation, that the more solicitous any people are about
dress, the more effeminate they are. I attribute it entirely to this
idle adventitious passion for finery, that these people are become so
over and above careful of their persons; they are for ever, and on every
occasion, putting one another on their guard against catching cold;
“you’ll certainly catch cold,” they always tell you if you happen to be a
little exposed to the draught of the air, or if you be not clad, as they
think, sufficiently warm. The general topic of conversation in summer,
is on the important objects of whether such and such an acquaintance be
in town, or such a one in the country. Far from blaming it, I think it
natural and commendable, that nearly one half of the inhabitants of this
great city migrate into the country in summer. And into the country, I
too, though not a Londoner, hope soon to wander.
Electricity happens at present to be the puppet-show of the English.
Whoever at all understands electricity is sure of being noticed and
successful. This a certain Mr. Katterfelto experiences, who gives
himself out for a Prussian, speaks bad English, and understands beside
the usual electrical and philosophical experiments, some legerdemain
tricks, with which (at least according to the papers) he sets the whole
world in wonder. For in almost every newspaper that appears, there are
some verses on the great Katterfelto, which some one or other of his
hearers are said to have made extempore. Every sensible person considers
Katterfelto as a puppy, an ignoramus, a braggadocio, and an impostor;
notwithstanding which he has a number of followers. He has demonstrated
to the people, that the influenza is occasioned by a small kind of
insect, which poisons the air; and a nostrum, which he pretends to have
found out to prevent or destroy it, is eagerly bought of him. A few days
ago he put into the papers: “It is true that Mr. Katterfelto has always
wished for cold and rainy weather, in order to destroy the pernicious
insects in the air; but now, on the contrary, he wishes for nothing more
than for fair weather, as his majesty and the whole royal family have
determined, the first fine day, to be eye-witnesses of the great wonder,
which this learned philosopher will render visible to them.” Yet all
this while the royal family have not so much as even thought of seeing
the wonders of Mr. Katterfelto. This kind of rhodomontade is very finely
expressed in English by the word puff, which in its literal sense,
signifies a blowing, or violent gust of wind, and in the metaphorical
sense, a boasting or bragging.
Of such puffs the English newspapers are daily full, particularly of
quack medicines and empirics, by means of which many a one here (and
among others a German who goes by the name of the German doctor) are
become rich. An advertisement of a lottery in the papers begins with
capitals in this manner,—“Ten Thousand Pounds for a Sixpence! Yes,
however astonishing it may seem, it is nevertheless undoubtedly true,
that for the small stake of sixpence, ten thousand pounds, and other
capital prizes, may be won, etc.”—But enough for this time of the puffs
of the English.
I yesterday dined with the Rev. Mr. Schrader, son-in-law to Professor
Foster of Halle. He is chaplain to the German chapel at St. James’s; but
besides himself he has a colleague or a reader, who is also in orders,
but has only fifty pounds yearly salary. Mr. Schrader also instructs the
younger princes and princesses of the royal family in their religion. At
his house I saw the two chaplains, Mr. Lindeman and Mr. Kritter, who went
with the Hanoverian troops to Minorca, and who were returned with the
garrison. They were exposed to every danger along with the troops. The
German clergy, as well as every other person in any public station
immediately under Government, are obliged to pay a considerable tax out
of their salaries.
The English clergy (and I fear those still more particularly who live in
London) are noticeable, and lamentably conspicuous, by a very free,
secular, and irregular way of life. Since my residence in England, one
has fought a duel in Hyde Park, and shot his antagonist. He was tried
for the offence, and it was evident the judge thought him guilty of
murder; but the jury declared him guilty only of manslaughter; and on
this verdict he was burnt in the hand, if that may be called burning
which is done with a cold iron; this being a privilege which the nobility
and clergy enjoy above other murderers.
Yesterday week, after I had preached for Mr. Wendeborne, we passed an
English church in which, we understood the sermon was not yet quite
finished. On this we went in, and then I heard a young man preaching,
with a tolerable good voice, and a proper delivery; but, like the English
in general, his manner was unimpassioned, and his tone monotonous. From
the church we went to a coffee-house opposite to it, and there we dined.
We had not been long there before the same clergyman whom we had just
heard preaching, also came in. He called for pen and ink, and hastily
wrote down a few pages on a long sheet of paper, which he put into his
pocket; I suppose it was some rough sketch or memorandum that occurred to
him at that moment, and which he thus reserved for some future sermon.
He too ordered some dinner, which he had no sooner ate, than he returned
immediately to the same church. We followed him, and he again mounted
the pulpit, where he drew from his pocket a written paper, or book of
notes, and delivered in all probability those very words which he had
just before composed in our presence at the coffee-house.
In these coffee-houses, however, there generally prevails a very decorous
stillness and silence. Everyone speaks softly to those only who sit next
him. The greater part read the newspapers, and no one ever disturbs
another. The room is commonly on the ground floor, and you enter it
immediately from the street; the seats are divided by wooden wainscot
partitions. Many letters and projects are here written and planned, and
many of those that you find in the papers are dated from some of these
coffee-houses. There is, therefore, nothing incredible, nor very
extraordinary, in a person’s composing a sermon here, excepting that one
would imagine it might have been done better at home, and certainly
should not have thus been put off to the last minute.
Another long walk that I have taken pretty often, is through Hanover
Square and Cavendish Square, to Bulstrode Street, near Paddington, where
the Danish ambassador lives, and where I have often visited the Danish
_Charge d’Affaires_, M. Schornborn. He is well known in Germany, as
having attempted to translate Pindar into German. Besides this, and
besides being known to be a man of genius, he is known to be a great
proficient in most of the branches of natural philosophy. I have spent
many very pleasant hours with him.
Sublime poetry, and in particular odes, are his forte; there are indeed
few departments of learning in which he has not extensive knowledge, and
he is also well read in the Greek and Roman authors. Everything he
studies, he studies merely from the love he bears to the science itself,
and by no means for the love of fame.
One could hardly help saying it is a pity that so excellent a man should
be so little known, were it not generally the case with men of
transcendent merit. But what makes him still more valuable is his pure
and open soul, and his amiable unaffected simplicity of character, which
has gained him the love and confidence of all who know him. He has
heretofore been secretary to the ambassador at Algiers; and even here in
London, when he is not occupied by the business arising from his public
station, he lives exceedingly retired, and devotes his time almost
entirely to the study of the sciences. The more agreeable I find such an
acquaintance, the harder it will be for me to lose, as I soon must, his
learned, his instructive, and his friendly conversation.
I have seen the large Freemasons’ Hall here, at the tavern of the same
name. This hall is of an astonishing height and breadth, and to me it
looked almost like a church. The orchestra is very much raised, and from
that you have a fine view of the whole hall, which makes a majestic
appearance. The building is said to have cost an immense sum. But to
that the lodges in Germany also contributed. Freemasonry seems to be
held in but little estimation in England, perhaps because most of the
lodges are now degenerated into mere drinking clubs; though I hope there
still are some who assemble for nobler and more essential purposes. The
Duke of Cumberland is now grand master.