We must now transport ourselves to the environs of London, and see what
this happy season is producing there; for to leave the very heart of the
country, and cast ourselves at once into the very heart of town, would
be likely to put us in a temper ill suited to the time.
Now, on Palm Sunday, boys and girls (youths and maidens have got much
above so "childish" a practice) may be met early in the morning, in
blithe though breakfastless companies, sallying forth towards the
pretty outlets about Hampstead and Highgate on one side of the water,
and Clapham and Camberwell on the other (all of which they innocently
imagine to be "The Country"), there to sport away the pleasant hours
till dinner-time, and then return home, with joy in their hearts,
endless appetites in their stomachs, and bunches of the Sallow Willow
with its silken bloom-buds in their hands, as trophies of their travels.
Now, at last, the Easter week is arrived, and the Poor have for once in
the year the best of it,--setting all things, but their own sovereign
will, at a wise defiance. The journeyman who works on Easter Monday
should lose his _caste_, and be sent to the Coventry of Mechanics,
wherever that may be. In fact, it cannot happen. On Easter Monday ranks
change places; Jobson is as good as Sir John; the "rude mechanical" is
"monarch of all he surveys" from the summit of Greenwich Hill, and when
he thinks fit to say "It is our royal pleasure to be drunk!" who shall
dispute the proposition? Not I, for one. When our English mechanics
accuse their betters of oppressing them, the said betters should reverse
the old appeal, and refer from Philip sober to Philip drunk; and then
nothing more could be said. But NOW, they _have_ no betters, even in
their own notion of the matter. And in the name of all that is
transitory, envy them not their brief supremacy! It will be over before
the end of the week, and they will be as eager to return to their labour
as they now are to escape from it; for the only thing that an
Englishman, whether high or low, cannot endure patiently for a week
together, is, unmingled amusement. At this time, however, he is
determined to try. Accordingly, on Easter Monday all the narrow lanes
and blind alleys of our metropolis pour forth their dingy denizens into
the suburban fields and villages, in search of the said amusement, which
is plentifully provided for them by another class, even less enviable
than the one on whose patronage they depend; for of all callings, the
most melancholy is that of Purveyor of Pleasure to the poor.
During the Monday our determined holiday maker, as in duty bound,
contrives, by the aid of a little or not a little artificial stimulus,
to be happy in a tolerably exemplary manner. On the Tuesday, he
_fancies_ himself happy to-day, because he _felt_ himself so yesterday.
On the Wednesday he cannot tell what has come to him, but every ten
minutes he wishes himself at home, where he never goes but to sleep. On
Thursday he finds out the secret, that he is heartily sick of doing
nothing; but is ashamed to confess it; and then what is the use of going
to work before his money is spent? On Friday he swears that he is a fool
for throwing away the greatest part of his quarter's savings without
having any thing to show for it, and gets gloriously drunk with the rest
to prove his words; passing the pleasantest night of all the week in a
watch-house. And on Saturday, after thanking "his Worship" for his good
advice, of which he does not remember a word, he comes to the wise
determination, that, after all, there is nothing like working all day
long in silence, and at night spending his earnings and his breath in
beer and politics!--So much for the Easter week of a London holiday
maker.
But there is a sport belonging to Easter Monday which is not confined to
the lower classes; and which fun forbid that I should pass over
silently. If the reader has not, during his boyhood, performed the
exploit of riding to the Turn-out of the Stag on Epping
Forest--following the hounds all day long at a respectful
distance--returning home in the evening with the loss of nothing but his
hat, his hunting whip, and his horse, not to mention a portion of his
nether person--and finishing the day by joining the Lady Mayoress's Ball
at the Mansion-House; if the reader has not done all this when a boy, I
will not tantalize him by expiating on the superiority of those who
have. And if he _has_ done it, I need not tell him that he has no cause
to envy his friend who escaped with a flesh wound from the fight of
Waterloo; for there is not a pin to choose between them.
* * * * *
I have little to tell the reader in regard to London exclusively, this
month; which is lucky, because I have left myself less than no space at
all to tell it in. I must mention, however, that now is heard in her
streets the prettiest of all the cries which are peculiar to
them--"Come, buy my Primroses!" and but for which the Londoners would
have no idea that Spring was at hand.
Now, too, spoiled children make "fools" of their mammas and papas; which
is but fair, seeing that the said mammas and papas return the
compliment during all the rest of the year. Now, not even a sceptical
apprentice (for such there be now-a-days, thanks to the enlightening
effects of universal education) but is religiously persuaded of the
merits of _Good_ Friday, and the propriety of its being so called, since
it procures him two Sundays in the week instead of one.
Finally,--now, Exhibitions of Paintings court the public gaze, and
obtain it, in every quarter; on the principle, I suppose, that the eye
has, at this season of the year, a natural hungering and thirsting after
the colours of the Spring leaves and flowers, and rather than not meet
with them at all, is content to find them on painted canvas!