III

I ONCE visited the Wastgagles in Boston with momma. It was a visit of

condolence, just after the demise of a grandmother of theirs. I was

going to say, that never since that occasion had I experienced anything

like the solemnity of my breakfast at the Métropole the morning after I

arrived. As a sad-faced waiter with mutton-chop whiskers marshalled me

across the room to an empty little white-and-silvery table beside one of

the big windows, I felt, for the first time in my life, that I was being

made imposing, and I objected to the feeling. The place itself did not

impress me particularly--in America we are accustomed to gorgeousness in

our hotels, and the mirrors and the gilding of the Métropole rather made

me feel at home than otherwise; but it was the demeanour of everything

that weighed upon me. My very chair lived up to its own standard of

decorum; and the table seemed laid upon a pattern of propriety that it

would never willingly depart from. There was an all-pervading sense of

order in the air I couldn't make out exactly where it came from, but it

was there, and it was fearful. The waiters spoke to each other in low

tones, as if something of deep and serious importance were going on;

and when I told one of them what I should like from the bill-of-fare, he

bent down his ear and received my order as if it had been confidential

State business I was asking him to undertake. When he came back,

carrying the tray in front of him, it was almost processional. And in

the interval, when I turned round to look out of the window, and saw

another of those respectfully-subdued waiters standing behind my chair,

quite motionless, I jumped. A great many people were getting their

breakfasts, not with the cheerful alacrity which we use at home, but

rather with a portentous deliberation and concentration which did not

admit of much talking. The silence was broken only in one corner, where

a group of Americans seemed to have got accustomed to the atmosphere.

When the English breakfasters raised their eyes from their papers and

eggs-and-toast, they regarded my talkative compatriots with a look which

must have fairly chilled their tea. I hope nobody has ever looked at me

like that in England. The Americans were from Virginia, as I could tell

by their accent, and their 'c'y'arn't' and 'sis'r' and 'honey' and 'heap

better.' But I have no doubt the English people, in their usual loftily

comprehensive fashion, set the strangers down as 'Yankees,' and no

amount of explanation could have taught them that the 'Yankees are

the New Englanders, and that the name would once have been taken as an

insult by a Southerner. But the Virginians were blissfully indifferent

to the British estimate of themselves, and they talked as freely of

their shopping and sight-seeing as they would in Delmonico's or the

Brunswick. To be perfectly honest, a conviction came to me then that

sometimes we don't care enough. But, for my part, I liked listening to

that Virginian corner.

I'm afraid it was rather a late breakfast, and the lobby was full of

people strolling in and out when I went through on my way to my room. I

stood for a moment at the dining-room door looking at the lobby--I had

heard so many Chicago people describe it--and I noticed in the seats

that run around it, against the wall, two young women. They were leaning

back nonchalantly, watching the comers and the goers. Both of them had

their knees crossed, and one had her hands in her jacket pockets. A man

in the seat next them, who might or might not have belonged to them, was

smoking a large cigar. Two English ladies came out from breakfast behind

me, stood waiting for somebody, and said one to the other: 'Look at

those disgusting American girls!'

But I had seen the young women's boots. Just to be satisfied, I walked

up to one of them, and asked her if she could kindly tell me when I

ought to post letters for New York.

'The American maiyel goes out Wednesdays an' Satuhdays, I fancy,' the

young woman replied, 'but I'm not suah; it would be saifah to ask the

clahk!'

She spoke quite distinctly, so that the English ladies must have heard

her, and I am afraid they saw in my glance as I went upstairs that I had

intended to correct their mistake.

I started to see Mrs. Portheris at eleven o'clock on the morning of the

9th of April--a lovely day, a day which augured brightly and hopefully.

I waited carefully till eleven, thinking by that time my relation would

have had her breakfast in bed and been dressed, and perhaps have been

helped downstairs to her own particular sunny window, where I thought I

might see her faded, placid, sweet old face looking up from her knitting

and out into the busy street. Words have such an inspiring effect upon

the imagination. All this had emanated from the 'dear ones,' and I felt

confident and pleased and happy beforehand to be a dear one. I wore one

of my plainest walking-dresses--I love simplicity in dress--so as to

mitigate the shock to my relation as far as I could; but it was a

New York one, and it gave me a great deal of moral support. It may be

weak-minded in me, but I simply couldn't have gone to see my relation in

a hat and gloves that didn't match. Clothes and courage have so much to

do with each other.

The porter said that I had better take 'a'ansom,' or if I walked to

Charing Cross I could get 'a 'Ammersmith 'bus' which would take me to

Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly. I asked him if there were any street-cars

running that way. 'D'ye mean growlers, miss?' he said. 'I can get ye a

growler in 'arf a minute.' But I didn't know what he meant, and I didn't

like the sound of it. A 'growler' was probably not at all a proper thing

for a young lady to ride in; and I was determined to be considerate of

the feelings of my relation. I saw ladies in hansoms, but I had never

been in one at home, and they looked very tiltuppy. Also, they went

altogether too fast, and as it was a slippery day the horses attached

to them sat down and rested a great deal oftener than I thought I should

like. And when the animals were not poor old creatures that were obliged

to sit down in this precipitate way, they danced and pranced in a manner

which did not inspire me with confidence. In America our cab-horses know

themselves to be cab-horses, and behave accordingly--they have none of

the national theories about equality whatever; but the London quadrupeds

might be the greatest Democrats going from the airs they put on. And I

saw no street-cars anywhere. So I decided upon the 'Ammersmith 'bus, and

the porter pointed out the direction of Charing Cross.

It seems to me now that I was what you would call 'uncommonly' stupid

about it, but I hadn't gone very far before I realised that I did not

quite know what Charing Cross was. I had come, you see, from a city

where the streets are mostly numbered, and run pretty much in rows. The

more I thought about it, the less it seemed to mean anything. So I

asked a large policeman--the largest and straightest policeman, with

the reddest face I had ever seen: 'Mr. Officer,' I said, knowing your

fondness for titles in this country, what is Charing Cross?'

He smiled very kindly. 'Wy, miss,' he said, 'there's Charing Cross

Station, and there's Charing Cross 'Otel, and there's Charing Cross. Wot

were you wanting pertickeler?'

'Charing Cross!' said I.

'There it lies, in front of you!' the policeman said, waving his arm so

as to take in the whole of Trafalgar Square. 'It ain't possible for

you to miss it, Miss. And as three other people were waiting to ask

him something else, I thought I ought not to occupy his attention any

further. I kept straight on, in and out among the crowd, comparing it

in my mind with a New York or Chicago crowd. I found a great many more

kinds of people in it than there would be at home.

You are remarkably different in this country. We are a good deal the

same. I was not at all prepared then to make a comparison of averages,

but I noticed that life seemed to mean something more serious for most

of the people I met than it does with us. Hardly anybody was laughing,

and very few people were making unseemly haste about their business.

There was no eagerness and no enthusiasm. Neither was there any

hustling. In a crowd like that in Chicago everybody would have hustled,

and nobody would have minded it.

'Where is Charing Cross?' I asked one of the flower-women sitting by

the big iron entrances to the station. 'Right'ere, miss, ware you be

a-standin'! Buy a flower, miss? Only a penny! an' lovely they are! Do

buy one, laidy!' It was dreadfully pathetic, the way she said it, and

she had frightful holes in her shawl, and no hat or bonnet on. I had

never seen a woman selling things out of doors with nothing on her head

before, and it hurt me somehow. But I couldn't possibly have bought

her flowers--they were too much like her. So I gave her a sixpence,

and asked her where I could find an 'Ammersmith' bus. She thanked me so

volubly that I couldn't possibly understand her, but I made out that

if I stayed where I was an 'Ammersmith' bus would presently arrive. She

went on asking me to buy flowers though, so I walked a little farther

off. I waited a long time, and not a single 'bus appeared with

'Ammersmith on it. Finally, I asked another policeman. 'There!' he said,

as one of the great lumbering concerns rolled up--'that's one of 'em

now! You'll get it!' I didn't like to dispute with an officer of the

law, but I had seen plenty of that particular red variety of 'bus go

past, and to be quite certain I said: 'But isn't that a Hammersmith

one?' The policeman looked quite cross. 'Well, isn't that what you're

a-askin' for? 'Ammersmith an' 'Ammersmith--it's all the saime, dependin'

on 'ow you pernounces it. Some people calls it 'Ammersmith, an' some

people calls it 'Ammersmith!' and he turned a broad and indignant back

upon me. I flew for the 'bus, and the conductor, in a friendly way,

helped me on by my elbow.

I did not think, before, that anything could wobble like an Atlantic

steamer, but I experienced nothing more trying coming over than that

Hammersmith 'bus. And there were no straps from the roof to hold on

by--nothing but a very high and inconvenient handrail; and the vehicle

seemed quite full of stout old gentlemen with white whiskers, who looked

deeply annoyed when I upset their umbrellas and unintentionally plunged

upon their feet. 'More room houtside, miss!' the conductor said--which

I considered impertinent, thinking that he meant in the road. 'Is there

any room on top?' I asked him, because I had walked on so many of the

old gentlemen's feet that I felt uncomfortable about it. 'Yes, miss;

that's wot I'm a-sayin'--lots o' room houtside!' So I took advantage of

a lame man's getting off to mount the spiral staircase at the back of

the'bus and take a seat on top. It is a pity, isn't it, that Noah didn't

think of an outside spiral staircase like that to his ark. He might have

accommodated so many more of the animals, providing them, of course,

with oilskin covers to keep off the wet, as you do. But even coming from

a bran new and irreverent country, where nobody thinks of consulting the

Old Testament for models of public conveyances, anybody can see that in

many respects you have improved immensely upon Noah.

It was lovely up there--exactly like coming on deck after being in a

stuffy little cabin in the steamer--a good deal of motion, but lots of

fresh air. I was a little nervous at first, but as nobody fell off the

tops of any of the other 'buses, I concluded that it was not a thing you

were expected to do, and presently forgot all about it looking at

the people swarming below me. My position made me feel immeasurably

superior--at such a swinging height above them all--and I found myself

speculating about them and criticising them, as I never should have done

walking. I had never ridden on the top of anything before; it gave me

an entirely new revelation of my fellow-creatures--if your monarchical

feelings will allow that expression from a Republican. I must say I

liked it--looking down upon people who were travelling in the same

direction as I was, only on a level below. I began to understand

the agreeableness of class distinctions, and I wondered whether the

arrangement of seats on the tops of the 'buses was not, probably, a

material result of aristocratic prejudices.

Oh, I liked it through and through, that first ride on a London 'bus! To

know just how I liked it, and why, and how and why we all like it from

the other side of the Atlantic, you must be born and brought up, as most

of us have been, in a city twenty-five or fifty years old, where the

houses are all made of clean white or red brick, with clean green

lawns and geranium beds and painted iron fences; where rows of nice new

maple-trees are planted in the clean-shaved boulevards, and fresh-planed

wooden sidewalks run straight for a mile or two at a time, and all the

city blocks stand in their proper right angles--which are among our

advantages, I have no doubt; but our advantages have a way of making

your disadvantages more interesting.

Having been monarchists all your lives, however, you can't possibly

understand what it is to have been brought up in fresh paint. I ought

not to expect it of you. If you could, though, I should find it easier

to tell you, according to my experience, why we are all so devoted to

London.

There was the smell, to begin with. I write 'there was,' because I

regret to say that during the past few months I have become accustomed

to it, and for me that smell is done up in a past tense for ever;

so that I can quite understand a Londoner not believing in it. The

Hammersmith 'bus was in the Strand when I first became conscious of it,

and I noticed afterwards that it was always more pronounced down there,

in the heart of the City, than in Kensington, for instance. It was no

special odour or collection of odours that could be distinguished--it

was rather an abstract smell--and yet it gave a kind of solidity and

nutriment to the air, and made you feel as if your lungs digested it.

There was comfort and support and satisfaction in that smell, and I

often vainly try to smell it again.

We find the irregularity of London so gratifying, too. The way the

streets turn and twist and jostle each other, and lead up into nothing,

and turn around and come back again, and assume aliases, and break out

into circuses and stray into queer, dark courts, where small boys go

round on one roller skate, or little green churchyards only a few yards

from the cabs and the crowd, where there is nobody but the dead people,

who have grown tired of it all.

Original From the top of the Hammersmith 'bus, as it went through the Strand that morning, I saw funny little openings that made me long to get down and look into them; but I had my relation to think of, so I didn't.

Then there is the well-settled, well-founded look of everything, as if

it had all come ages ago, and meant to stay for ever, and just go on the

way it had before. We like that--the security and the permanence of it,

which seems to be in some way connected with the big policemen, and the

orderly crowd, and 'Keep to the Left' on the signboards, and the British

coat of arms over so many of the shops. I thought that morning that

those shops were probably the property of the Crown, but I was very soon

corrected about that. At home I am afraid we fluctuate considerably,

especially in connection with cyclones and railway interests--we are

here to-day, and there is no telling where we shall be to-morrow. So the

abiding kind of city gives us a comfortable feeling of confidence. It

was not very long before even I, on the top of the Hammersmith 'bus,

felt that I was riding an Institution, and no matter to what extent it

wobbled it might be relied upon not to come down.

I don't know whether you will like our admiring you on account of

your griminess, but we do. At home we are so monotonously clean,

architecturally, that we can't make any aesthetic pretensions whatever.

There is nothing artistic about white brick. It is clean and neat and

sanitary, but you get tired of looking at it, especially when it is made

up in patterns with red brick mixed in. And since you must be dirty,

it may gratify you to know that you are very soothing to Transatlantic

nerves suffering from patterns like that. But you are also misleading.

'I suppose,' I said to a workman in front of me as we entered Fleet

Street, 'that is some old palace? Do you know the date of it?'

'No, miss,' he answered, 'that ain't no palace. Them's the new Law

Courts, only built the last ten year!'

'The new Law Courts!' 'The Strand!' 'Fleet Street!' 'Ludgate Hill!'

'Cheapside!' and I was actually in those famous places, riding through

them on a 'bus, part of their multitude. The very names on the street

corners held fascination enough, and each of them gave me the separate

little thrill of the altogether unexpected. I had unconsciously believed

that all these names were part of the vanished past I had connected them

with, forgetting that in London names endure. But I began to feel that I

ought to be arriving. 'Conductor,' I said, as he passed, 'stop the 'bus,

and let me get down at Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly.'

'We're goin' strait awai from it, miss; you get that red 'bus standin'

over there--that'll taike you!'

So I went all the way back again, and on to my relation's, on the top

of the red 'bus, not at all regretting my mistake. But it made it almost

twelve o'clock when I rang the bell--Mrs. Portheris's bell--at the door

of her house in Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly.