residence. But I had no trouble in finding it. Unerring instinct guided
me along Berkeley Square, till I reached what I felt sure was the very
house, and since I was satisfied, what mattered it to any one else?
This being accomplished, I next proceeded in a desultory and
inconsequent fashion to explore Mayfair.
Aided, like John Gay, by the goddess Trivia, I knew I could
securely stray
Where winding alleys lead the doubtful way;
The silent court and opening square explore,
And long perplexing lanes untrod before.
And as I trod, I suddenly found myself in Curzon Street. This was a
pleasant sensation, for did I not well know the name of Curzon Street
from all the English novels I had ever read? Moreover, I knew that in
one of its houses Lord Beaconsfield died, and in another the Duke of
Marlborough lived. The detail of knowing which house was which possessed
no interest for me.
I rambled on, marvelling at the suddenness with which streets met each
other, and their calm disregard of all method or symmetry, till I began
to feel like “the crooked man who walked a crooked mile.”
Attracted by the name of Half-Moon Street, I left Curzon Street for it.
Shelley once lived in this street, and I selected three houses any one
of which might have been his home. I went back, I traversed some
delightful mewses (what _is_ the plural of mews?), crossed Berkeley
Square, and then, somehow or other, I found myself in Bond Street, and
my mood changed. At first the shops seemed unattractive and I felt
disappointment edging itself into my soul.
But like an ugly woman, possessed of charm, the crammed-full windows
began to fascinate me, and I forgot the inadequate sidewalks and
unpretentious façades in the absorbing displays of wares.
Bond Street shop-windows are hypnotic. Fifth Avenue windows stolidly
hold their exhibits up to one’s view, without a trace of invitation, but
Bond Street windows compel one to enter, by a sort of uncanny influence
impossible to resist.
Though I expected to shop in London, there was only one article that I
was really anxious to buy. This was a jade cube. For many years I had
longed for a jade cube, and American experts had contented themselves
with stating there was no such thing in existence. Time after time, I
had begged friends who were going to the ends of the earth to bring me
back a jade cube from one of the ends, but none had accomplished my
errand.
I determined therefore to use every effort to secure a jade cube for
myself, and forthwith began my quest.
A mineralogist on Bond Street showed more interest at once than any of
my personal friends had ever evinced. Though he declared there was no
such thing in existence, he further remarked his entire willingness to
cut one for me from the best quality of Chinese jade.
[Illustration: He was quite as interested.]
He was quite as interested as I was myself, and, though it seemed
inartistic to end so quickly what I had expected to be a long and
difficult quest, I left the order.
The cube turned out a perfect success, and will always be one of my
dearest and best-loved possessions. It has the same charm of perfection
that characterizes a Japanese rock-crystal ball, and the added interest
of being unique. There was, too, a charm in the interest shown in the
cube by the old mineralogist, and also by his wife.
The day I went after the completed polished cube, the elderly madame
came into the shop from a back room, to congratulate me on the
attainment of my desire.
Incidentally, the good people endeavored (and successfully) to persuade
me to buy further of their wares.
They had a bewildering assortment of semi-precious stones, curious
minerals, and wrought metals and strange bits of handiwork from foreign
countries. Beads, of course, in profusion, and fascinatingly ugly little
idols. As all these things have great charm for me, and as I am always
easily persuaded to buy, I bought largely, to the great satisfaction of
the elderly shopkeepers. But, as I had learned a little of their tricks
and their manners I offered them, a bit shamefacedly, a lower price in
each instance than they asked. To my relief, they took this proceeding
quite as a matter of course, and cheerfully accepted the smaller sum
without demur.
But to return to that first morning, after my interview with the
mild-mannered mineralogist I strolled along Old Bond Street back to
Piccadilly.
The Tennyson’s Brook of omnibuses was still going on, and I stood on the
corner to watch them again. From this point of view the effect is quite
different from that seen from an upstairs window.
You cease to generalize about the procession, and regard the individual
’bus with a new awe.
The ocean may be wider,—the Flatiron Building may be taller,—but
there’s nothing in all the world so big as a London omnibus.
[Illustration] _V._ _A Hostess at Home_
An English telephone is a contradiction in terms. If it is in England,
it isn’t a telephone. It is a thing that looks something like a broken
ox-yoke, that is manipulated something like a trombone, and is about as
effectual as the Keeley Motor.
A course of lessons is necessary to learn to use one, but the lessons
are wasted, as the instrument is invariably out of order, and moreover,
nobody has one, anyhow.
But one morning, before I had discovered all this, I was summoned to the
telephone booth of the Pantheon Club, and blithely grasped the
cumbersome affair, with its receiver on one end and its transmitter on
the other. I ignorantly held it wrong end to, but that made no
difference, as it wouldn’t work either way.
“Grawsp it stiffer, madame,” advised the anxious Buttons who engineered
it. At length I discovered that this meant to press firmly on a fret, as
if playing a flute, but by this time the party addressing me had been
disconnected from the other end, and all attempts to regain
communication were futile.
[Illustration: “Grawsp it stiffer, M’am.”]
The boy took the instrument, and I have never seen a finer display of
human ingenuity and patience than he showed for the next half-hour
trying to hear that chord again. Then he gave it up, and, laying the
horrid thing gently in its cradle, he nonchalantly informed me that if
the party awrsked for me again, he’d send me naotice, and then demanded
tuppence.
This I willingly paid, as I was always glad to get rid of those copper
heavy-weights; and, too, it seemed a remarkably small price even for a
telephone call,—until I suddenly remembered that I hadn’t made the
call,—nor had I received it.
The call was repeated later, and after another distracting session of
incoherent shouting, and painfully-cramped finger muscles, I learned
that I was invited to an informal dinner that evening at Mrs.
Marchbanks’s at seven-thirty.
I had not intended to plunge into the social whirl so soon, and had
declined all the many invitations which had come to me by mail.
But somehow the telephone invitation took me unawares, and, too, I was
so pleased to succeed in getting the message at all that it seemed
ungracious and ungrateful to refuse. So, I took a fresh grip on the
fretted monster, and, aiming my voice carefully at the far-away
transmitter, I shouted an acceptance. I hoped it reached the goal, but
as there was nothing but awful silence afterward, I had to take it on
faith, and I went away to look over my dinner gowns.
The invitation had been classed as “informal,” but I knew the elasticity
of that term, and so, though I did not select my very best raiment, I
chose a pretty _décolleté_ frock, that had “New York” legibly written on
its every fold and pucker.
So late is the dusk of the London spring that I easily made my toilette
by daylight, and was all ready at seven o’clock.
Carefully studying my Baedeker maps and plans to make sure of the
distance, I stepped into my hansom just in time to reach my destination
at a minute or two before half past seven, assuming that New York
customs prevailed in England.
The door was opened to me by an amazed-looking maid, who seemed so
uncertain what to do with me that I almost grew embarrassed myself.
Finally, she asked me to follow her up-stairs, and then ushered me into
a room where my hostess, in the hands of her maid, was in the earliest
stages of her toilette.
“You dear thing,” she said, “how sweet of you to come. Yes, Louise, that
_aigrette_ is right. Here is the key of my jewel case.”
“I fear I have mistaken the hour,” I said; “the telephone was a bit
difficult,—but I understood half past seven.”
“Yes,” agreed Mrs. Marchbanks, studying the back of her head in a
hand-mirror, “but in London seven-thirty means eight, you know.”
This was definite information, and I promptly stored it away for future
use. Also, it was reliable information, for it proved true, and at eight
the guests began to arrive.
Dinner was served at quarter to nine, and all was well.
Incidentally I had learned my lesson.
The half-hour in the drawing-room before dinner was an interesting
“first impression” of that indescribable combination of warmth and frost
known as a London Hostess.
Further experience taught me that Mrs. Marchbanks was a typical one.
The London hostess’s invariable mode of procedure is a sudden,
inordinate gush of welcome, followed immediately by an icy stare. By the
time you have politely responded to the welcome, your hostess has
forgotten your existence. Nay, more, she seems almost to have forgotten
her own. She is vague, self-absorbed, and quite oblivious of your
existence. I have heard of a lady with a gracious presence. The London
hostess is best described by _a gracious absence_.
But having adapted yourself to this condition, your hostess is likely to
whirl about and dart a remark or a question at you.
On the evening under discussion, my hostess suddenly broke off her own
greeting to another guest, to say to me, “Of course you’ll be wanting to
buy some new clothes at once.”
This statement was accompanied by a deliberate survey, from _berthe_ to
hem, of my palpably American-made gown, and as the incident pleased my
sense of humor, I felt no resentment, and amiably acquiesced in her
decision.
Then, funnily enough, the conversation turned upon good-breeding.
“A well-bred Englishwoman,” my hostess dictatorially observed, “never
talks of herself. She tactfully makes the person to whom she is talking
the subject of conversation.”
“But,” said I, “if the person to whom she is talking is also well-bred,
he must reject that subject, and tactfully talk about the first speaker.
This must bring about a deadlock.” She looked at me, or rather through
me, in a pitying, uncomprehending way, and went on:
“The well-bred Englishwoman never makes an allusion or an implication
that could cause even the slightest trace of discomfiture or annoyance
to the person addressed.”
This, of itself, seemed true enough, but again she turned swiftly toward
me, and abruptly inquired, “Doesn’t the servility of the English
servants embarrass you?”
This time, too, my sense of humor saved me from embarrassment, but I
began to think serious-minded persons should not brave the slings and
arrows of a well-bred Englishwoman.
Geniality and ingenuousness are alike unknown to the English hostess. It
is a very rare thing to meet a _charming_ Englishwoman. Good traits they
have in plenty and many sterling qualities which Americans often lack,
but magnetism and responsiveness are as a rule not among these
qualities.
And I do not yet know whether it is through ignorance or with _malice
prepense_ that an English hostess greets you effusively, and then drops
you with an air of finality that gives a “lost your last friend” feeling
more than anything else in all the world.
This state of things is of course more pronouncedly noticeable at teas
than at dinners. At an afternoon reception, the hostility of the hostess
is beyond all words. Moreover, at English afternoon teas there are two
rules. One is you may not speak to a fellow-guest without an
introduction. The other is that no introduction is necessary between
guests of the house. One of these rules is always inflexibly enforced at
every tea; but the casual guest never knows which one, and so
complications ensue.
English hostesses always seem to me very much like that peculiar kind of
flowered chintz with which they cover their furniture—the kind that
looks like oilcloth, and is very cold and shiny, very beautiful, very
slippery, and decidedly uncomfortable.
But in inverse proportion to the conversational unsatisfactoriness of
the English women are the entertaining powers of the English men. They
are voluntarily delightful. They make an effort (if necessary) to be
pleasantly talkative and amusing.
And, notwithstanding the traditional slurs on British humor, the English
society man is deliciously humorous, and often as brilliantly witty as
our own Americans.
At the dinner I have mentioned above, I was seated next to a somewhat
insignificant-looking young man of true English spick-and-spanness, and
with a delightful drawl, almost like the one written as dialect in
international novels.
Perhaps in consideration of my probable American attitude toward British
humor, he good-naturedly amused me with jokes directed against his
national peculiarities.
He described graphically an Englishman who was blindly groping about in
his brain for a good story which he had heard and stored away there.
“Ah, yes,” said the supposed would-be jester; “the man was ill; and he
said his physician advised that he should every morning take a cup of
coffee and take a walk around the place.”
[Illustration: He amused me with jokes directed against his national
peculiarities.]
“He had missed the point, do you see,” explained my amusing neighbor,
“and the joke should have been ‘take a cup of coffee, and take a walk on
the grounds,’ do you see?”
So pleased was the young man with the whole story, that I laughed in
sympathy, and he went on to say:
“But you Americans make just the same mistakes about our jokes. Now only
last week _Punch_ had a ripping line asking why the Americans were
making such a fuss about Bishop Potter, and said any one would think he
was a meat-potter. Now one of your New York daily papers borrowed the
thing, and made it read, ‘What’s the matter with Bishop Potter? Any one
would think he was a meat packer.’ ’Pon my honor, Miss Emmins, I know
that for a fact!”
“Then I think,” I replied, “that we ought never again to throw stones at
the British sense of humor.”
In the pause that followed, a bulky English lord across the table was
heard denouncing the course taken by a certain political party. So
energetic were his gestures, and so forceful his speech, that he had
grown very red and belligerent-looking, and fairly hammered the table in
his indignation.
[Illustration: Denouncing the course taken by a certain political
party.]
The young man next to me looked at him, as an indulgent father might
look at a naughty child. “Isn’t he the saucy puss?” said my neighbor,
turning to me with such a roguish smile that his remark seemed the
funniest thing I had ever heard.
I frankly told my attractive dinner partner that the men of London
society were far more entertaining than the women. He did not seem
surprised at this, but seemed to look upon it as an accepted condition.
I glanced across the table at a young Englishwoman. She was an
“Honorable,” and possessed of a jointed surname. She was attired with
great wealth and unbecomingness, and, to sum her up in a general way,
she looked as if she did _not_ write poetry.
[Illustration: She was an “Honorable” and possessed of a jointed
surname.]
“Yes,” she was saying, “cabs are cheap with us, but if you ride a lot in
a day, they count up.” This is a stock remark with London women and I
was not surprised to hear it again.
I glanced at my young man. He too had heard, and he quickly caught my
mental attitude.
“Yes,” he said, “Englishwomen and girls are very fit; they’re good form,
accomplished, and all that. But, though they know a lot, somehow,
er,—their minds don’t jell.”
As this exactly expressed my own opinion, I was delighted at his clever
phrasing of it.
But if the Englishman is charming as a dinner guest, he is even more so
when he is host, as he often is at afternoon tea. And though I attended
many teas presided over by London men, all others fade into
insignificance beside the one given me at the _Punch_ office.
I was the only guest, the host was the genial and miraculously clever
Editor of _Punch_.
The tea was of the ordinary London deliciousness, the cakes and thin
bread-and-butter were, as always, over there, the best in the world; but
it was served to us on the historic _Punch_ table, the great table where
every Friday night, since the beginning of that publication, its
editorial staff has dined.
And as each diner at some time cut his monogram into the table, the
semi-polished surface shows priceless memorials of the great British
authors, artists, and illustrators.
I was informed by my kind host that I might sit at any place I chose. I
hesitated between Thackeray’s and Mark Lemon’s, but finally by a sudden
impulse I dropped into a chair in front of the monogram of George du
Maurier.
The Editor of _Punch_ smiled a little, but he only said, “You Americans
are a humorous people.”
[Illustration] _VII._ _The Light on Burns’s Brow._
My own subjective London was achieving itself. I have always remembered
pleasantly, how,
Without a bit of trouble,
Arabella blew a bubble,
and, with emulative ease, I blew a beautiful, impalpable, iridescent
sphere and called it London.
To be sure, a single interrogation point from an earnest Tourist would
have burst my bubble, for my whole London hadn’t a Tower or a British
Museum in it.
Nor was this an oversight. Calling to my aid a moral courage that was
practically a moral hardihood, I had deliberately concluded I would do
no sightseeing. Not that I objected to seeing a sight, now and then, but
the sight would have to put itself in my way, and the conditions would
have to be such that I should prefer to go through the sight rather than
around it.
Indeed, it was largely the word _sightseeing_ that I took exception to.
Such a very defective verb! Who would voluntarily put herself in a
position to say, “I sightsaw the National Gallery yesterday,” or “I have
sightseen the whole City,” and then have no proper parts of speech to
say it with?
Moreover, I was not willing to go about my London carrying a Baedeker.
In truth, my soul was possessed of conflicting emotions toward that
little red book. As a directory it was invaluable. Never did I get an
invitation to a place of mysterious sound, such as Kensington Gore, or
Bird-in-Bush Road, but I ran to my Baedeker and quickly found therein
the location, description, and directions for reaching the same. I soon
mastered the pink and gray maps, with their clever contrivance of
corresponding numbers, and with my Baedeker back of me I could have
found the most obscure and bewildering address that even a Londoner is
capable of devising.
But the pages devoted to “Sights which Should on No Account be Omitted,”
and the kindly advice on “Disposition of Time for the Hurried Visitor,”
I avoided with all the strength of my unsightseeing soul.
[Illustration: The ingenious efforts of tourists to disguise their
Baedekers.]
I was often amused at the ingenious efforts of tourists to disguise
their Baedekers. One tailor-made American girl had hers neatly covered
with bright blue paper, quite oblivious of the fact that the marbled
edges and fluttering red and black tapes are unmistakable. Another, a
pedagogic Bostonian, had hers wrapped in brown paper and tied with a
string. Another had a leather case which exactly fitted the volume. And
I thought that as the nude in art is far less suggestive than the
semi-draped figure, so the uncovered red book was really less noticeable
than these futile attempts at disguise.
Having, then, definitely decided that I should eventually return to
America without having set foot in the Tower, the Bank or the
Charter-house, I drew a long breath of content, and gave myself up to
the delight of just living in the atmosphere of my own London.
And yet, I wanted to go to the Tower, the Bank, and the Charter-house. I
wanted to go to Westminster Abbey and Saint Paul’s and the National
Gallery. But I did not want to go for the first time. I wanted to
revisit these places, and how could I do that when I had never yet
visited them?
First impressions of Piccadilly or Hyde Park are all very well, but
first impressions are incongruous in connection with Westminster Abbey.
What has crude admiration to do with experienced sublimity? How absurd
to let the gaze of surprise rest upon age-accustomed glory! What
presumption to look at solemn ancient grandeur as at a novelty! I wished
that I had been to Westminster Abbey many, many times, and that I could
drift in again some lovely summer afternoon to revive old memories and
renew old emotions.
But as this might not be, then would I keep away from it entirely, and
study it from books as I had always done.
One day a departing caller carelessly left behind her a pamphlet
entitled _The Deanery Guide to Westminster Abbey_. With a natural
curiosity I picked it up and opened it.
[Illustration: That bore an advertisement of Rowland’s Macassar Oil!]
But I got no farther than the first fly-leaf, for that bore an
advertisement of _Rowland’s Macassar Oil_! I promptly forgot the
existence of Westminster Abbey in the delight of finding that my London
contained such a desirable commodity. Not that I wished to purchase the
lotion, but I was absorbingly interested to learn that there really was
such a thing. I had never heard of it before except in connection with
the Aged, aged man, a-sitting on a gate, who manufactured Rowland’s
Macassar Oil from mountain rills which he chanced to set ablaze. The
remembrance of that dear old white-haired man, placidly going his ways,
and content with the tuppence ha’-penny that rewarded his toil, filled
my soul to the exclusion of all else, and he made a welcome addition to
the census of my own London. It was pleasant, too, to reflect on the
sound logic of the English people when they coined the word
“anti-macassar.” How much more restrictedly definite than our word
“tidy”!
Well, then next it came about that I went for a walk.
And, as was bound to happen sooner or later, I was strolling
unthinkingly along, when I found myself with the Houses of Parliament on
my right hand and Westminster Abbey on my left. I was fairly caught, and
surrendered at discretion. The only question was which way to turn. As I
had no choice in the matter, I should logically have gone, like John
Buridan’s Ass, straight ahead, and so missed both; but the Abbey, with
an almost imperceptible nod of invitation, compelled me to turn that
way, and involuntarily, though not at all unwillingly, I entered.
Whereupon I made the startling discovery that I was in the Poets’
Corner! Now, I had definitely planned that if ever I _did_ visit the
Abbey, I would enter by the North Transept, and gradually accustom
myself to the atmosphere of the place. I would go away after a short
inspection, and return several times to revisit it, before I even
approached the Poets’ Corner. And to find myself thus unexpectedly and
somewhat informally introduced to an inscription attesting the rarity of
Ben Jonson, took me unawares, and my eyes rested coldly on the words,
and then passed on, still uninterestedly, to Spencer, Milton, and Gray.
[Illustration: I took a few tentative steps, which brought me to the
bust of our own Longfellow.]
Uncertain whether to advance or retreat I took a few tentative steps,
which brought me to the bust of our own Longfellow. The dignified and
old-school New Englander is here represented as a plump-faced and jovial
gentleman with very curly hair. The marble is excessively white and
new-looking, and altogether the monument suggests the Longfellow who
wrote “There was a little girl, who had a little curl,” rather than the
author of _Evangeline_. But if not of poetic effect, the bust is
satisfactory as a fine type of American manhood, so I smiled back at it,
and passed on.
Then, by chance, I turned into the South Transept.