AN outcast once more! I exchange the blessing invoked on the perfidious
PLAPPER for curse of equal calibre. On--on--like the Wandering Jew, or
the Pilgrim of Love. No rest but the hotel for me! Starmouth landladies
beginning to enter into the humour of the thing--they appear now with a
broad grin, repeated on faces of accepted lodgers at windows. They
evidently do not consider me a sound investment. Meet other homeless
ones, searching--we scowl at one another jealously.
[Illustration: Sound Investment.]
Evening is getting on--which is more than I am. Sinking into a state of
maudlin self-pity. My poor Drama--and all the things I ordered to be
sent in to PLAPPER'S! He, or his lodger, will read by _my_ lamp, bathe
in _my_ bath, feed on my jam--while I ... but I cannot trust myself to
think of it--or Starmouth may lose one of its leading opticians?...
Later--_saved!_ It still seems incredible to me--but I have rooms at
last! At Mrs. SURGE'S--a widow lady, who, as she tells me herself, has
not been in a hurry to put up her card, as she likes "to pick her
lodgers." And she has picked Me--me, the Blighted, the scorned of
Starmouth! No sea-view--but plenty of horsehair. Sunflowers and
mignonette in long front garden; bow-window, and regiment of geraniums
drawn up in pots on little table. Go back, and recover luggage.
Return to Mrs. SURGE'S roof, not without nervous apprehensions--she may
repent, or I might find the house a smoking ruin. Can't get over an idea
that the Fates are pursuing me. However, they seem to be taking a rest
just now. I am free at last to study Starmouth. Hitherto I have had eyes
for nothing but little cards with "Apartments" on them.
No doubt about Starmouth being full. Streets crowded. Most of the young
men promenading in flannels and cricket "blazers," of startling
brilliancy. Children, young girls, and stout matrons in striped linen
yachting-caps. (When you are elderly, and at all stout, you do _not_
appear to advantage in this form of head-dress.) _Chars-a-bancs_, flys,
tricycles, goat-chaises. Always thought Starmouth was a picturesque
fishing-village, with windmills, wooden huts, and drying-nets along
beach. It isn't.
Still, of course, the change from all London associations, the absolute
quiet must have tendency to refresh the fagged brain. (Always rather a
gratifying reflection somehow, to think one has a fagged brain.) I
observe they are doing _Our Boys_ at the theatre. At the Aquarium are
the BUFFON Brothers with their celebrated Acrobatic Ass "from all the
London Music-Halls." Switchback Railway, too, on the beach, and
automatic machines about every five yards. Plenty of life here.
[Illustration: Is-linked-on.]
I am becoming gradually aware that Starmouth, though full, is not
exactly fashionable. I infer this, partly from the fact that already I
instinctively turn round to look curiously at the speaker, when I hear a
duly aspirated "h," _a la mode d'Islington_, partly from the prevalence
and popularity of the whelk-stalls on the Esplanade. Really good
society, even in its laxest mood, would scarcely support quite so many.
On the Pier. Military Band. View of Beach from sea very beautiful at
night, fairy-like effect of continuous line of light from whelk-stalls.
Yet one would hesitate to put a touch of description like that into a
novel--curious the prudery of fiction, your realistic French author
would describe contents of all the little saucers. That is _Art_, and I
shall see if I can work it in to my drama somehow.
Leave Pier. Back to Esplanade. Crowd round young man singing to
concertina a ditty about a certain JEMIMA who though "so fond of her
beer, was always a Mug."
Sentimental Song, to harp, at next corner. About a Stowaway, with golden
curls, and "dear baby lips," and "sweet little eyes," how a cruel Mate
found him in the hold, and was so touched that he kissed him on the
forehead for speaking the "tree-youth," and the crew wept. Most
pathetic--Singer himself compelled to retire to public-house at
conclusion.
Bed. Dream my Nautical Drama accepted by Mr. IRVING--a _waking_ dream,
too!
_Sunday._--Breakfast. My landlady evidently person of strict propriety.
My two boiled eggs come in dressed in little red-worsted petticoats. It
never occurred to me before that a bare egg was calculated to call up a
blush--but really they make me feel almost shy now--they do look so coy,
so modest in their simple attire. Possibly, though, Starmouth eggs are
not very strong, and require artificial warmth.
[Illustration: Holloway.]
Bells. Stream of people, looking good, in tall hats and best things,
going inland--unregenerate stream, in tweeds, making for sands.
Salvation Army, with fervent but tactless drum. Sunday not a day for
Nautical Drama. Beach, "Will I take a tract?" Hate being rude, so
accept.... I have gone a hundred yards, and I have fourteen
tracts--almost enough to start distributing on my own account.
_Evening._--Sacred Music. That is, I go to pier when Military Band is
playing. Band certainly broad in its views--I find them performing an
unmistakable polka. There are sacred dances, I know, in Oratorios--but
surely not _polkas_? As they follow it up with _Faust_, and the
_Jeunesse Doree_ Valse, I realise that I am on the secular, or Trafalgar
Pier--it is _Waterloo_ Pier that has the Sacred Band.
Crush tremendous; all the art, chivalry, and beauty of Holloway and Mile
End pass in dazzling procession before me. "Shouldn't you laugh if this
old pier was to come down, eh? There's a tidy lot on it," observes a
Blazer to a Yachting Cap. "I should 'ang on to you if it did," responds
the Cap, tenderly--"we'd all gow down together!"
[Illustration: My Lend.]
The pier is certainly crowded--is it strong? Don't like the idea of
going down with my Drama unwritten. Shall retire--good night's rest, and
then start fresh with Drama in morning.
* * * * *
[Illustration] NOTICE.--Rejected Communications or Contributions,
whether MS., Printed Matter, Drawings, or Pictures of any description,
will in no case be returned, not even when accompanied by a Stamped and
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* * * * *