Plutarch begins one of those biographies which in all times have been the
charm of childhood and age, by remarking that, "If things are implicated
in a dependence upon definite numbers, it is a necessity that the same
things must often happen, being effected by the same means." Thus is it,
life in all its broad aspects is everywhere the same. All over the globe
there is a wonderful uniformity in human habits. Men who work hard--as a
rule--rise early, and go to bed early. Night is the time for rest. So
far at least there is harmony between God's law and man's. The men and
women who transgress are for the most part waifs and strays. Such are
the denizens of our streets by night--such are they who crowd, not alone
the night public-houses, but night coffee-houses of our metropolis.
Here in London these houses are of all kinds. For instance, let us enter
one in the Haymarket. The rooms are as smart as gilding and ornamented
paper and plate-glass can make them. The waiters are got up regardless
of expense. The coffee is good, but dear. The men and women are of the
kind usually met with in this locality during the small hours. The
greater part are fools enough to think it worth while to buy a little
worldly wisdom at a price--it may be at the loss of their bodies and
souls--none but madmen would think of paying. In such places as these
you are as sure to be injured as if you sat all night carousing in a
public-house. These women with forced smiles on their painted cheeks are
the veritable Harpies. Theirs is the true sardonic laugh. Do you
remember one way in which that ancient phrase is accounted for?
Sardinia, it was said, was noted for a bitter herb which contracted the
features of those who tasted it. Pausanias says it is a plant like
parsley, which grows near springs, and causes people who eat it to laugh
till they die; and these women, have they not eaten a bitter plant, and
do they not laugh and die? Beware of the women. Beware of the men. See
how their cunning eyes glisten if you change a sovereign. If they can
get you into a neighbouring public-house and rob you, they will be rather
pleased than otherwise. Look at that tall dark fellow watching us. It
was only the other day he met a man here, as he might you or I, and
decoyed him into a public-house close by, where his confederates were
waiting, and robbed him of forty pounds when they thought their victim
was sufficiently "fuddled" with champagne. He and such as he are not
particular who they rob. They do not spare the women, I assure you.
Let us now turn towards Covent-garden. The debauchery of Covent-garden
is not what it was. Obscenity is banished from the Cave of Harmony, and
better hours are kept; but there are night coffee-houses about here,
dirty, shabby places, patronised by dirty, shabby people. How weary and
wayworn are the women! They have been walking the streets for
hours--they have been dancing in neighbouring saloons--they have paraded
their meretricious charms, and here they sit, hungry, tired, sleepy, and
't is three o'clock in the morning. No home have they to go to but some
wretched room for which they pay a sum equal to the entire rent of the
house. There is little gaiety here; the poor comic nigger, with his
banjo and his double entendre playing with all his might, in the hope
that some gent will stand a cup of coffee and a muffin, can scarce raise
a laugh. Timidly one asks, "Will you treat me to a cup of coffee, sir?"
Yes, forlorn one. If your sin is great, so is your punishment; once you
might have been a dainty little wife, and now what are you? I say it
sorrowfully, the scum of the streets, garbage for drunken lust.
Let us go a little further on, not into that house, there are only
thieves and pickpockets there, and we might be bullied, which is not
pleasant. Ah, here's the house we are looking for; it has done a good
trade this many a year, for is there not a cab-stand opposite, and cabby
knows the value of a cup of coffee on a cold winter's night. Never mind
the smell; as business is carried on uninterruptedly during the
twenty-four hours, and as the company belongs to that part of the
population not guilty of an inordinate attachment to soap and water, and
to whom cheap baths are a myth, it cannot be matter of surprise if there
be about the place "an ancient and fish-like smell." But here comes the
landlord. "Good morning, gents;" in an under voice, "you had better mind
your pocket; there are some strange characters here. A cup of coffee?
Yes, sir. Now then, sir, you had better wake up, it is time for you to
be off. You've had a good hour's sleep." "Why not let him sleep?"
"Why, you see, sir, such fellows would stay here all night and fill up
the house, and not spend a penny; and business is business." A curious
medley is here of sleepy, half-tipsy, sickly unfortunates. Yet even here
the line is drawn; the door opens, and we dimly discern a mass of rags;
so does our landlord, as he rushes to exclude the would-be customer.
"What, you are trying it on again, are you? you know you can't come here.
Why, you see, sir, if we let such fellows in, the place would swarm
with--," (the reader must supply the blank). But we take the hint, and
not unreluctantly depart.
The night public-house has, I confess,--and I am glad to do so,--lost
somewhat of its popularity in latter years. At one time it was common
everywhere; now it is in only a few streets that it exists and pollutes
the atmosphere. In the Strand, in the Haymarket, in Oxford-street,
night-houses were numerous; but the one to which I more immediately refer
was situated in the neighbourhood of Tottenham-court-road. Since then,
Mr Spurgeon has been preaching in that locality, but I dare say the
night-house exists nevertheless.
Let us suppose it is about two in the morning, and with the exception of
one or two amiable garotters, a few sleepy police, and some three or four
women, the regular population of the neighbourhood may be safely
considered to have been long in bed. The gas-lamps shine almost
exclusively on yourself. You look up at the windows and you see no
lights save where, perhaps, poverty may be stitching for bread, or where
Death may have come an unbidden guest and borne away the fairest and the
best beloved. At this hour the young bride in all her beauty may be
struck down in mortal agony, or the wee pet lamb, whose little silver
laugh had so often dispelled the dark cloud that gathered round the home,
or the grey-haired man, having just reached the goal, and achieved an
independence, may find himself left in this bleak, dark, wide world
alone.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north wind's breath,
And stars to set; but all--
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, O Death.
And now let us forget all this, and knock at this door, above which
streams a mellow light, and from which we hear sounds of boisterous
gaiety. Is it not open yet? Then give another rap. Ah, it is all right
now. "Take care of your pockets," says Cerberus, in a low voice,--"there
are some rum blokes here." We will, my friend.
Yes, they must be rum blokes who come here into this filthy, stinking
shop, and amongst this filthy, ragged, swearing crew of reprobates. If
you wish to see a set of fellows whose mere looks would hang them, I
think they are about us now. Even the landlord seems uncomfortable in
their presence, and wisely allows as little as possible of temptation in
his house or on his person. He knows, I believe, they would as soon rob
him as any one else, and his small ferrety eyes are evidently wide awake.
Indeed, none of the party look as if they had much honest sleep, and in
the daylight, I imagine, would present a somewhat seedy appearance. We
generally think cabmen not scrupulously honest, but perhaps these cabmen,
with ancient great coats and well muffled up, are the honestest fellows
here. Then of course there is an Irish "widder," with melancholy face
and a string of ballads, such as "Mary Blane," "The Red, White, and
Blue," "Cheer, boys, cheer," all of which she is willing to dispose of on
the most reasonable terms. A decayed swell, probably a railway director
in the great year of bubbles, with extraordinary sponges--an article I
should have thought quite as unsaleable as soap to the _habitues_,--and a
jockey-like looking person with knives with most wonderful and
unaccountable blades, or with some fancy work-boxes or other articles
equally ingenious and useless. Women are here, of course, in the last
stage of their profligate career, driven out of decent houses, unfit to
associate with the well-dressed and the young--wrinkled, repulsive, red.
As you see them drink, quarrelling, screaming, and cursing, as they
always do till turned out to go God knows where, can you imagine that the
difference between them and your own mother is merely that of
circumstance, and education, and habit?--perhaps merely the difference
produced by drink. I can tell you that little hag was once a rich man's
leman, and robed herself in silk and satin, and quaffed her costly wine;
and now hark how piteously she begs a drop of gin, ere she staggers to
her wretched garret and straw to dream of a youth and gaiety now no
longer hers. Here she has warmth, light, and society, and the
night-house exists for such as she; and if, as is quite as likely as not,
she is in league with some of the men around us, here she brings her
victim, and then, stupified by drink, she has only to decoy him down some
dark passage, and he becomes an easy prey to the sneaking thief who comes
skulking up behind. But let us listen--
"Me and my pal we was a-going along the Hedgware-road, and we sor"--
"Hold your tongue," is the courteous reply.
"What do you mean by making all this row?" cries the landlord, with a
horrid oath.
"Now, then, old buffer, another quartern of gin."
"And a screw of tobacco, master, if you please."
"Well, old gal, what'll you drink?"
"Well, I don't mind, what'll you stand?"
"Suppose we has arf and arf."
"Ay, to be sure."
And so the hours pass, and the place gets hotter, and stinks more and
more every hour, for the men and women have not a very pleasant
effluvium, and the hubbub becomes more intense. You tell me you would
rather not stay here long. Well, I am quite of your opinion, for a
couple of gentlemen with pale faces have been eyeing us most attentively
ever since we have been here, and I confess their appearance is not
prepossessing. Their short hair seems to indicate an acquaintance with
one of the public establishments of the metropolis, with whose inmates it
is not well to be too familiar. They are dressed in fustian, with thick
boots well studded with nails, a kick from which on the head when a man
is down would soon settle his business; and with their close-fitting
caps, Belcher handkerchiefs, and heavy animal faces, are certainly not
very pleasant-looking young men. I should be sorry to intimate my
suspicions to them, as they may be noblemen in disguise, and might feel
hurt at my want of charity. In the mean while, as the door is being
opened and the coast is clear, I avail myself of the opportunity, and
leaving the night-house, am soon dreaming in my feverish slumber that I
have just been garotted and left for dead at the door of my domestic
establishment, to the intense agony of my wife and children,--of course,
by the two amiable young people aforesaid,--and I feel for some days
after as if I had suffered terribly from a species of night-mare. So
hideous is the life, so degraded the company, so revolting are the
scenes, at these night-houses, I know not why the law permits them to be
open. I am sure they can answer no good or moral end. Mr Norton, a few
days since, said, in deciding a case at the Lambeth police-office, he
hoped a law would soon be passed to close night-houses. On this head the
police magistrates are unanimous.