Part 9

But we have improved in one respect: our old watchmen or 'Charleys' have disappeared before the modern police. Concerning these watchmen our author says: 'There are no troops or guard or watch of any kind, except during the night by some old men, chosen from the dregs of the people. Their only arms are a stick and a lantern. They walk about the streets crying the hour every time the clock strikes ... and it appears to be a point of etiquette among hare-brained youngsters to maul them on leaving their parties.'

Our Frenchman formed a correct estimate of the London watchman of his day--nay, it held good to the final extinction of the 'Charleys.' In December, 1826, a watchman was charged before the Lord Mayor with insubordination. On being asked who had appointed him watchman, the prisoner replied that he was in great distress and a burden to the parish, who therefore gave him the appointment to get rid of him. The Lord Mayor: 'I thought so; and what can be expected from such a system of choosing watchmen? I know that most of the men who are thus burdens on the parish are the vilest of wretches, and such men are appointed to guard the lives and property of others! I also know that in most cases robberies are perpetrated by the connivance of watchmen.'

But in some cases our author is really too good-naturedly credulous. Says he: 'The people of London, though proud and hasty, are good at heart, and humane, even in the lowest class. If any stoppage occurs in the streets, they are always ready to lend their assistance to remove the difficulty, instead of raising a quarrel, which might end in murder, as is often the case in Paris.' This is really too innocent! And our French visitor must have been very fortunate indeed never to have got into a London crowd of roughs or of pickpockets, who create stoppages in the streets for the only purpose of pursuing their trade, and who seldom hesitate to commit violence if they cannot rob without it. Our author's belief, indeed, in London honesty is boundless. 'In order that the pot-boys,' he says, 'may have but little trouble in collecting them [the pewter pots in which publicans send out the beer], they are placed in the open passages, and sometimes on the doorsteps of the houses. I saw them thus exposed ... and felt quite assured against all the cunning of thieves.' But more astounding is the statement that there are no poor in London! 'A consequence,' says our visitor, 'of its rich and numerous charitable establishments and the immense sums raised by the poor-rates, which impost is one which the little householders pay most cheerfully, as they consider it a fund from which, in the event of their death, their wives and children will be supported.' Fancy a little householder paying his poor-rate cheerfully! And what a mean opinion must our author have had of the spirit of the householder who calmly contemplated his family, after his death, going to the parish!

The Frenchman returns once more to our usual melancholy, 'which,' he says, 'is no doubt owing to the fogs' and to our fat meat and strong beer. 'Beef is the Englishman's ordinary diet, relished in proportion to the quantity of fat, and this, mixed in their stomachs with the beer they drink, must produce a chyle, whose viscous heaviness conveys only bilious and melancholic vapours to the brain.'

It certainly is satisfactory to have so scientific an explanation of the origin of our spleen.

Another French writer in 1784--M. La Combe--published a book, entitled 'A Picture of London,' in which, _inter alia_, he says: 'The highroads thirty or forty miles round London are filled with armed highwaymen and footpads.' This was then pretty true, though the expression 'filled' is somewhat of an exaggeration. The medical student of forty or fifty years ago seems to have been anticipated in 1784, for M. La Combe tells us that 'the brass knockers of doors, which cost from 12s. to 15s., are stolen at night if the maid forgets to unscrew them'--a precaution which seems to have gone out of fashion. 'The arrival of the mails,' our author says, 'is uncertain at all times of the year.... Persons who frequently receive letters should recommend their correspondents not to insert loose papers, nor to put the letters in covers, because the tax is sometimes treble, and always arbitrary, though in a free country. But rapacity and injustice are the deities of the English.' M. La Combe does not give us a flattering character. 'An Englishman,' he says, 'considers a foreigner as an enemy, whom he dares not offend openly, but whose society he fears; and he attaches himself to no one.' Perhaps it was so in 1784, but such feelings have nearly died out--at least, among educated people. M. La Combe, in another part of his book, exclaims: 'How are you changed, Londoners! ... Your women are become bold, imperious, and expensive. Bankrupts and beggars, coiners, spies and informers, robbers and pickpockets abound.... The baker mixes alum in his bread ... the brewer puts opium and copper filings in his beer ... the milkwoman spoils her milk with snails.'

Do more recent writers judge of us more correctly? We shall see.

I have lying before me a French book, the title of which, translated into English, runs, 'Geography for Young People.' It is in its eighth edition, and written by M. Levi, Professor of Belles-Lettres, of History and Geography in Paris. The date of the book is 1850. The Professor in it describes London, and if his pupils ever have, or rather had, occasion to visit our capital, they must have been unable to recognise it from their teacher's description of it. Among the many blunders he commits, there are some which are excusable in a foreigner, because they refer to matters which are often misapprehended even by natives; but to describe London as possessing a certain architectural feature which a mere walk through the streets with his eyes open would have shown him to have no existence at all is rather unpardonable in a professor who takes on himself to teach young people geography. But what does M. Levi say? He says: 'In London you never see an umbrella, because all the streets are built with arcades, under which you find shelter when it rains, so that an umbrella, which to us Parisians is an indispensable article, is perfectly useless to a Londoner.' M. Levi evidently, if ever he was in London, visited the Quadrant only, before the arcade was pulled down, and thereupon wrote his account of London. Yet he must have looked about a bit, for he tells us of splendid cafes to be met with in every street; the nobility patronize them; 'one of them accidentally treads on the toes of another, a duel is the consequence, and to-morrow morning one of them will have ceased to live.'

M. Levi reminds us of the Frenchman who came over to England with the object of writing a book about us. He arrived in London one Saturday night, and being tired, at once went to bed. At breakfast next morning he asked for new bread; the waiter told him they only had yesterday's. Out came the Frenchman's note-book, in which he wrote: 'In London the bread is always baked the day before.' He then asked for the day's paper, but was again told they had yesterday's only. A memorandum went into the note-book: 'The London newspapers are always published yesterday.' He then thought he would present the letter of introduction he had brought with him to a private family, so having been directed to the house, he saw a lady near the window, reading. Not wishing to startle or disturb her, he gave a gentle single rap. This not being answered, he had to give a few more raps, when at last a servant partly opened the door and asked his business. He expressed his wish to see the master of the house. 'Master never sees anybody to-day, but he will perhaps to-morrow,' replied the servant, and shut the door in his face. Another memorandum was added to the previous ones: 'In London people never see anyone to-day, but always to-morrow.' Having nothing to do, he thought he would go to the theatre. He inquired for Drury Lane, and was directed to it. The doors being shut, he lounged about the neighbourhood till they should open. As it grew later and later, and there was no sign of a _queue_, he at last addressed a passer-by, and asked him when the theatre would open. 'It won't open to-day,' was the reply. This was the last straw that broke the camel's back. Our Frenchman hurried back to his hotel, wrote in his note-book, 'In London there are theatres, but they never open today,' took a cab, caught the night mail, and hastened to leave so barbarous a country.

This description of London life is about as correct as that recently given in Max O'Rell's 'John Bull and his Womankind.' What kind of people did O'Rell visit?

I look at another book before me, written in Italian, and entitled: 'Semi-serious Observations of an Exile on England.' The book was published at Lugano in 1831, but the author--Giuseppe Pecchio--dates his preface from York in 1827.

He speaks thusly of the approach to London by the Dover road: 'If the sky is gloomy, the first aspect of London is no less so. The smoky look of the houses gives them the appearance of a recent fire. If to this you add the silence prevailing amidst a population of a million and a half of inhabitants, all in motion (so that you seem to behold a stage full of Chinese shadows), and the uniformity of the houses, as if you were in a city of beavers, you will easily understand that on entering into such a beehive pleasure gives way to astonishment. This is the old country style, but since the English have substituted blue pills for suicide, or, still better, have made a journey to Paris--since, instead of Young's "Night Thoughts," they read the novels of Walter Scott, they have rendered their houses a little more pleasing in outward appearance. In the West End especially they have adopted a more cheerful style of architecture. But I do not by this mean to imply that the English themselves have become more lively; they still take delight in ghosts, witchcraft, cemeteries, and similar horrors. Woe to the author who writes a novel without some apparition to make your hair stand on end!'

In speaking of the thinness of the walls and floors of London houses, he says: 'I could hear the murmur of the conversation of the tenant of the room above and of that of the one below me; from time to time the words "very fine weather," "indeed," "very fine," "comfort," "comfortable," "great comfort," reached my ears. In fact, the houses are ventriloquous. As already mentioned, they are all alike. In a three-storied house there are three perpendicular bedrooms, one above the other, and three parlours, equally so superposed.' We know how much of this description is true.

'Why are the English,' he asks, 'not expert dancers? Because they cannot practise dancing in their slightly-built houses, in which a lively caper would at once send the third-floor down into the kitchen. This is the reason why the English gesticulate so little, and have their arms always glued to their sides. The rooms are so small that you cannot move about rapidly without smashing some object,' or, as we should say, you cannot swing a cat in them.

'Strangers are astounded,' continues our author, 'at the silence prevailing among the inhabitants of London. But how could a million and a half of people live together without silence? The noise of men, horses, and carriages between the Strand and the Exchange is so great that it is said that in winter there are two degrees of difference in the thermometers of the City and of the West End. I have not verified it,' our author is candid enough to admit, 'but considering the great number of chimneys in the Strand, it is probable enough. From Chering [_sic_] Cross to the Exchange is the cyclopedia of the world. Anarchy seems to prevail, but it is only apparent. The rules which Gray gives (in his "Trivia; or, the Art of Walking the Streets of London") seem to me unnecessary.'

Signor Pecchio pretty well describes the movements of 'City men':

'The great monster of the capital,' he says, 'similar to a huge giant, waking up, begins by giving signs of life at its extremities. The movement begins at the circumference, gradually extending to the centre, until about ten o'clock the uproar begins, increasing till four o'clock, which is the hour for going on 'Change. The population seems to follow the law of the tides. Up to that hour the tide rises from the periphery to the Exchange. At half-past four, when the Exchange closes, the ebb sets in, and currents of men, horses, and carriages flow from the Exchange to the periphery.'

Like all foreigners, he has something to say about the dulness of an English Sunday. 'This country, all in motion, all alive on other days of the week,' he observes, 'seems struck with an attack of apoplexy on the Lord's day.' Foreigners pass the day at Greenwich or Richmond, where 'they pay dearly for a dinner, seasoned with the bows of a waiter in silk stockings and brown livery, just like the dress of a Turin lawyer.' But if you want to see how John Bull spends the day, it is not in Hyde Park or Kensington Gardens you must look for him. 'If you want to see that marvellous personage who is the wonder and laughing-stock of all Europe, who clothes all the world, wins battles on land and sea without much boasting, who works like three and drinks like six, who is the pawnbroker and usurer of all Kings and all Republics, whilst he is bankrupt at home, and sometimes, like Midas, dies of hunger in the midst of gold, you must look for him elsewhere. In winter you must descend into underground cellars. There, around a blazing fire, you will behold the English workman, well dressed and shod, smoking, drinking, and reading.... For this class of readers special Sunday newspapers are published.... It is in these taverns, and amidst the smoke of tobacco and the froth of their beer, the first condition of public opinion is born and formed. It is there the conduct of every citizen is discussed and appraised; there starts the road which leads to the Capitol or the Tarpeian rock; there praise or blame is awarded to a Burdett issuing triumphantly from the Tower, or to a Castlereagh descending amidst curses to the tomb.... There are no rows in these taverns ... more decency of conduct is observed in them than in our [Italian] churches. When full of spirit and beer the customers, instead of fighting, fall down on the pavement like dead men.'

After having so carefully observed the conduct of the British workman, our Italian friend watches him in the suburban tea-garden, which he visits with his family to take tea in the afternoon, or drink his nut-brown ale. 'One of the handsomest,' he says, 'is Cumberland Gardens,[#] close to Vauxhall ... there he sits smoking long pipes of the whitest clay, which the landlord supplies, filled with tobacco, at one penny each. Between his puffs of smoke he occasionally sends forth a truncated phrase, such as we read in "Tristram Sandi" [_sic_] were uttered by Trion and the captain. It being Sunday, which admits of no amusement, no music or song is heard.' Pretty much as it is at the present day!

[#] In the early part of 1825, therefore shortly after our author wrote, the tavern was burnt to the ground, and the site taken possession of by the South London Waterworks.

Having heard what both Frenchmen and an Italian had to say about London, let us listen to what a German authoress has to tell us on the subject.

Johanna Schopenhauer, in her 'Travels through England and Scotland' (third edition, 1826), says: 'The splendid shops, which offer the finest sights, are situate chiefly between the working City and the more aristocratic, enjoying Westminster,' a statement which, as every Londoner knows, is only partially correct. 'The English custom of always making way to the right greatly facilitates walking, so that there is no pushing or running against anyone.' Did our author ever take a walk in Cheapside or Fleet Street? 'Even Italians probably do not fear rain so much as a Londoner; to catch a wetting seems to them the most terrible misfortune; on the first falling of a few drops everyone not provided with an umbrella hastens to take refuge in a coach.' How well the lady has studied the habits of Londoners! What will they say to this?

'The police exercise a strict control over hackney-coaches. Woe to the driver who ventures to over-charge!' And again: 'You may safely enter, carrying with you untold wealth, a coach at any time of the night, as long as someone at the house whence you start takes the number of the coach, and lets the driver see that it is taken.'

Mrs. Schopenhauer tells us that it is customary to go for breakfast to a pastry-cook's shop, and eat a few cakes hot from the pan. Truly, we did not know it. Of course, she agrees with other writers as to the smallness of the houses, every room of which you can tell from the outside; but we were not aware that, as she informs us, all the doors are exceedingly narrow and high, and that frequently the front-doors look only like narrow slits in the wall.

'Bedrooms seldom can contain more than one bed; but English bedsteads are large enough to hold three persons. And it is a universal custom not to sleep alone; sisters, relations, and female friends share a bed without ceremony, and the mistress of the house is not ashamed to take her servant to bed with her, for English ladies are afraid of being alone in a room at night, having never been brought up to it.... The counterpane is fastened to the mattress, leaving but an opening for slipping in between the two.'

Again, we are told to our astonishment: 'The majority of Londoners, workmen and shopkeepers, who form but one category, on the whole lead sad lives. Heavy taxes, the high prices of necessaries, extravagance of dress, compel them to observe a frugality of living which, in other countries, would be called poverty.

'The shopkeeper, for ever tied to his shop and the dark parlour behind, must deny himself every amusement. Theatres are too far off and too expensive; the wife of a well-to-do tradesman seldom can visit one more than twice a year.

'During the week they cannot leave the shop between nine in the morning and twelve at night. The wife generally attends to it, while the husband sits in the parlour behind and keeps the accounts. True, on Sundays all the shops are closed, but so are the theatres, and as all domestics and other employes insist on having that day to themselves, the mistress has to stay at home to take care of the house.

'Merchants lead lives nearly as dull. They have to deny themselves social pleasures indulged in by the rich merchants of Hamburg or Leipsic. English ladies are more domesticated, and not accustomed to the bustle of public amusements. But their husbands, after business hours, occasionally seek for recreation in cafes and taverns.'

How very one-sided and imperfect a view of English middle life, even as it was seventy years ago, when these remarks were written, is presented to us by them is self-evident!

English ladies, according to our author, 'seldom go out, and when they do, they prefer a shopping excursion to every other kind of promenade. They also are fond of visiting pastry-cooks' shops, and as these are open to the street, ladies may safely enter them. But that is not allowable at Mr. Birch's in Cornhill, whose shop ladies cannot visit without being accompanied by gentlemen, the breakfast-room being at the back of the house, at the end of a long passage, and lit up all the year round (as daylight does not penetrate into it) with wax candles, by the light of which ladies and gentlemen--usually amidst solemn silence--swallow their turtle-soup and small hot patties. The house supplies nothing else ... but its former proprietor, Master Horton, by his patties and soup made a fortune of one hundred thousand pounds, and his successor seems in a fair way of doing the same.' We hope the assumption was verified.

According to Mrs. Schopenhauer, Londoners are not very hospitable, and 'prefer entertaining a friend they invite to dinner at a coffee-house or tavern, rather than at their own homes, where the presence of ladies is a restraint upon them. Ladies are treated with great respect, but, like all personages imposing respect, they are avoided as much as possible.'

Our traveller must have come in contact with some very ungallant Englishmen. She describes a dinner at a private house; we are told that 'there are twelve to fourteen guests, who fill the small drawing-room, the ladies sitting in armchairs, whilst the gentlemen stand about, some warming themselves by the fire, often in a not very decent manner. At the dinner-table napkins are found only in houses which have acquired foreign polish, and they are not many. The tablecloth hangs down to the floor, and every guest takes it upon his knee, and uses it as a napkin.... The lady of the house serves the dishes, and there is no end to her questions put to her guests as to the seasoning, the part of the joint, the sauce, etc., they like,' questions which are exceedingly troublesome to a foreigner who is not up to all the technical terms of English cookery. Of course, the hobnobbing and taking wine with everybody--a fashion now happily abolished--comes in for a good deal of censure, which, indeed, is richly deserved. 'Conversation on any subject of interest is out of the question during dinner; were anyone to attempt it, the master would immediately interrupt him with, "Sir, you are losing your dinner; by-and-by we will discuss these matters." The ladies from sheer modesty speak but little; foreigners must beware from saying much, lest they be considered monstrous bold.'

Whilst, after dinner, the gentlemen sit over their wine, the ladies are yawning the time away in the drawing-room, until their hostess sends word down to the dining-room that tea is ready. 'It is said,' continues our author, 'that the slow or quick attention given to this message shows who is master in the house, the husband or the wife.' Long after midnight the guests drive home 'through the streets still swarming with people. All the shops are still open, and lighted up; the street-lamps, of course, are alight, and burn till the rising of the sun.' Has any Londoner ever seen all the shops open and lighted up all night? Did our author have visions?

A London Sunday, of course, is commented on. The complaint raised quite recently by some of our bishops seems but a revival of wailings uttered long ago, for we learn from Mrs. Schopenhauer that in her time (sixty years ago) 'some of the highest families in the kingdom were called to account for desecrating the Sabbath with amateur concerts, dances, and card-playing,' so that it would indeed seem there is nothing new under the sun. 'The genuine Englishman,' says our authoress, 'divides his time on Sundays between church and the bottle; his wife spends the hours her religious duties leave her with a gossip, and abuses her neighbours and acquaintances, which is quite lawful on Sundays.'

We allow Mrs. Schopenhauer to make her bow and retire with this parting shot. Still, that lady was not singular in attributing great drinking powers to Englishmen. M. Larcher, who in 1861 published a book entitled 'Les Anglais, Londres et l'Angleterre,' says therein that in good society the ladies after dinner retire into another room, after having partaken very moderately of wine, while the gentlemen are left to empty bottles of port, madeira, claret, and champagne. 'And it is,' he adds, 'a constant habit among the ladies to empty bottles of brandy.' And he quotes from a work by General Fillet: 'Towards forty years of age every well-bred English lady goes to bed intoxicated.'