Part 6

Lest I be considered frivolous, I shall mention only two; but surely there could not be more appropriate names for dentists than two whose sign-boards proudly announced Shipley Slipper, and, across the street from him, Mr. Strong-i’th’arm.

We went on, absorbed in our view of kaleidoscopic London, until Miss Anna decreed that we go down to the ground again. There was no elevator as in the Flatiron Building, so we tumbled down the back stairs, and were thrown off.

The sequence of the places we visited I do not remember, but they seemed to be mostly churches and taverns.

St. Paul’s was taken casually, as indeed it should be, being, like a corporation, without a soul.

Exteriorly, and from a goodly distance, St. Paul’s is perfection. From the river, or from Parliament Hill, it is sympathetic and responsive. But inside it is a mere vastness of mosaic and gilding, peopled with shiny marbles of heroic size. There is an impressive grandeur of art, but no message for the spirit. It is magnificent, but it is not church.

Miss Anna and I walked properly about the edifice, fortunately agreeing in our attitude toward it.

From here, I think, she led me across something, and through something and around something else, and then we were in St. Bartholomew’s church. Being the oldest church in London, St. Bartholomew’s is historically important, but it is interesting and delightful as well. The very air inside has been shut in there ever since the twelfth century, yet one breathes it normally, and enjoys the sudden backward transition. Had I the time, I could easily find an inclination to walk every day round its ancient triforium.

As we left the church, the Charter-house put itself in our way. Though other British subjects were educated at this school, it remains sacred to the memory of Thackeray. From here he wrote to his mother, “There are but three hundred and seventy boys in this school, and I wish there were only three hundred and sixty-nine.” But visitors to the Charter-house are glad that the three hundred and seventieth boy remained there, and stamped the whole place with his gentle memory. The atmosphere of the Charter-house is wonderfully calm; it does not connote _boys_, but seems tranquilly imbued with the later wisdom of the great men who spent their youthful days within its walls.

The stranger in London has a decided advantage over the resident, in that he can choose his heroes.

A friend of mine who lives in Chelsea proudly assured me that he could throw a stone from his garden into Carlyle’s! The point of his remark seemed to be not his superior marksmanship, but the proximity to the garden of a great man. Now, were I of the stone-throwing sex, there is many a dead hero at whose garden I should aim before I turned toward Carlyle’s. But of course this was because my friend lived in Chelsea. Therefore the non-resident, not being confined to a locality, can throw imaginary stones into any one’s garden.

A desultory discussion of this subject caused Miss Anna to propose that our next stone be aimed at the garden of Dr. Samuel Johnson.

So to the Cheshire Cheese we went.

The imposing personality of Dr. Johnson, and the antiquity of the famous tavern, led me to anticipate great things; and I was sorely disappointed (as probably most visitors are) at the plainly spread table, the fearfully hard seats, and the trying umbrella-rack filled with sawdust.

Of course we occupied the historic corner, where, according to the brass tablet, Dr. Johnson loved to linger; but two young American women whose tastes are not of the sanded floor and mulled ale variety cannot at a midday meal, whoop up much of the atmosphere that probably surrounded the smoke-wreathed midnights of Johnsonian revelry.

Not that we didn’t enjoy it, for we were of a mind to enjoy everything that day; but the appreciation was entirely objective. Methodically we climbed the stairs and viewed all the rooms of the old, old house, and on the top floor were duly shown by the guide the old arm-chair in which Dr. Johnson used to sit. A stout twine was tied across from arm to arm, that pilgrims might not further wear out the old cushion. When I, as an enormous jest, asked the guide to cut the string, that I might sit in the historic chair, he cheerfully did so, and I considered the fee well spent that allowed me to linger for a moment on the very dusty cushions of Dr. Johnson’s own chair.

I afterward learned that the string business was a fraud, and was renewed and cut again for each curious visitor. I accept with equanimity this clever ruse, but I’m still wondering how they renew the dust.

While we were doing Early Restaurants Miss Anna said, “We must take in Crosby Place.”

This pleased me hugely, for I remembered how Gloucester, in _Richard the Third_ was everlastingly repairing to Crosby Place, and I desired to know what was the attraction.

I found it interesting, but, lacking Gloucester, I shall not repair there often. To be sure, it is a magnificent house, Gothic, Perpendicular, and all that; the hangings and appointments are, probably, much as they used to be, but after all, I do not care greatly for eating among Emotions.

Whereupon Miss Anna cheerfully proposed that we visit the Tower.

“No,” said I, with decision; and then, my mind still on _Richard the Third_, I quoted: “I do not like the Tower, of any place.”

I’m not sure I should have been able so bravely to disclaim an interest in the Tower, had it not been that the night before I had heard a wise and prominent Londoner state the fact that he had never visited it.

“No Londoner has ever been to the Tower,” he declared. “We used to say that we intended to go some time or other, but now we don’t even say that.”

I was greatly relieved to learn this, for I’m positive that the Tower is hideous and uninteresting. As an alternative, I asked that we might visit the railway stations.

Aside from the romance that is indigenous to all railway stations, there are peculiar characteristics of the great London termini that are of absorbing interest. And so strong are the claims each puts forth for pre-eminence, it is indeed difficult to award a palm.

Euston has its columns, Charing Cross its Tribute to Queen Eleanor, St. Pancras a spacious roominess, and Victoria a wofully-crowded and limited space. Each station has its own sort of people, and, though indubitably they must mingle upon occasion, yet the type of crowd at each station is invariably the same.

And yet, after all, my heart goes back with fondest memories to Euston. Not the crowd, not even the atmosphere, but a mysterious influence which emanates from those wonderful columns. Not only the sight of them as you approach from London, but the queer, almost uncanny way in which they permeate the whole place. They follow you through the station and into the train, and not for many miles can you get out from under the presence of those perfect shapes.

Coming into London, Cannon Street is a good station to choose, if your route permit, but going out, Euston or Charing Cross should, if possible, be selected.

Before, after, or during, our station visits, we touched on a few more churches.

The Temple Church proved a delight because of the bronze Knights peacefully resting there. Miss Anna told me they were called Crusaders because they chose to lie with their legs crossed. This was probably true, for the position was maintained by all of them. Oliver Goldsmith is buried here, but I had no particular desire to throw a stone into his graveyard, and so we went on. Owing to a change of mood, we no longer rode on the ’buses, but took a hansom from one place to another. This was not as extravagant as it might seem, for, notwithstanding assertions to the contrary, one cannot ride enough in London cabs to make the bill of any considerable amount, at least as compared to a New York cab bill. And Shakespeare averred that “nothing is small or great but by comparison.”

As our cab bumpily threaded its way along the crammed Strand, the bright-colored mass of humanity and traffic seemed to me the pre-eminent London. I wanted no more sight-seeing, I wanted no more historical association, I merely wanted to continue this opportunity for feasting on real City London. I voraciously bit off large chunks of the atmosphere as we passed through it, which I am even yet digesting and assimilating.

As a complement to this view of London, we suddenly decided to call on a friend for a cup of tea. A personal, at-home tea would be a pleasant contrast to the publicity of our day.

Deciding upon the coziest and homeliest tea-dispenser, we drove to Mrs. Todd’s in Kensington.

It is a great satisfaction to know that the unpromising portal of a London house will positively lead eventually to a delightful back garden, and tea.

We were welcomed by our charming hostess in her pretty trailing summeriness, and were immediately transformed from whimsical sight-seers into sociable tea-drinkers.

Though it was by no means a special occasion, the garden was bright with flowers and people, and the tea and cakes were served under the inevitable marquee. It was Mrs. Todd’s weekly day at home, and the guests were all amiable and charming. A young woman with a phenomenal voice sang to us from the back parlor windows, and thereby gave a stimulus to the conversation. All was usual and orthodox. Everybody listened politely to everybody’s else chatter, and, apparently unhearing, answered at random, and quite often wrongly.

It seemed to me that even in this land of bright flowers the blossoming plants were of unusually brilliant hues. As I took my departure I commented on this, and my hostess responded with a superb indifference: “Really? yes, they are rather good ones. The nursery man fetched them early this afternoon, and after you are all gone, he will come and carry them away”; and, if you please, those ridiculous plants were in pots, sunk into the earth, and giving all the effect of a beautiful growing garden!

This fable teaches that our English sisters are not above the small bluffs more often ascribed to American femininity.

During the summer of which I write, it was the whim to wear huge shapes of the mushroom or butter-bowl variety. These shapes, instead of being decorated with flowers or feathers, bore skilfully contrived fruits, that looked so like real ones I was often tempted to pluck them. Cherries and grapes were not so entirely novel, but peaches, pears, and in one instance a banana, seemed, at least, mildly ludicrous. I was rejoiced to learn that these fruits, being stuffed with cotton-wool, were not so weighty as they appeared; but they were indeed bulky, and crowded on to the hat in such quantities that it seemed more sensible to turn the butter-bowl the other side up to hold them.

Owen Seaman calls the English “the misunderstood people,” but how can one understand those who put fly-nets on the tops of their cabs instead of on their horses, and wear peaches on their heads?

As difficult to understand as their own handwriting (and more than that cannot be said!), after the solution is puzzled out the Londoners are the most delightful people in the world.

But you must accept the solution, and take them at their own valuation; for they are unadaptable, and very sure of themselves.

Now, Piccadilly is not like this. It is smiling, affable, charming, and very yielding and adaptable. It will respond to any of your moods and will give you an atmosphere of any sort you desire. On one side, as you walk along, are houses, more or less lately ducal, but all of a greatly worth-while air. Citified, indeed, with a wealthy width of stone pavement, and a noble height of stone frontage.

On the other side is Green Park, with its shining, softly-waving trees, its birds, and its grass.

But, passing the Hotel Ritz, both sides suddenly give way to shops and restaurants which rank among the most pretentious in all the world.

Many of the tradesmen are “purveyors to the King,” which magic phrase adds a charm to the humblest sorts of wares.

The book shops and the fruiterers’ shops are, to me, most enticing of all. It is a delight to make inquiries concerning a book that is, perhaps, not very well known, and, instead of the blank ignorance or the substitutive impulse often found in American book-shop clerks, to receive an intelligent opinion, quickly backed, if necessary, by intelligent reference to tabulated facts.

The unostentatious, yet almost invariably trustworthy, knowledge of London booksellers is a thing to be sighed for in our own country. Not even in Boston (outside of the Athenæum) is one sure of receiving bookish information when desired. But in London the bookseller takes a personal interest in your wants, and feels a personal pride in being able to gratify them.

And the heaps of second-hand books are mines of joy.

Among them you may find, as I did, real treasures at the price of trash.

I chanced upon an early edition of Byron’s poems—four little volumes, bound in soft, shiny green, with exquisite hand-tooling, and containing steel engraved book plates of old, scrolled design, which bore the name of somebody Gordon, whom I chose to imagine a near and dear relative of the late George Noel.

Also, I found a paper-covered copy of an Indian edition of Kipling’s early tales, and many such pleasant wares.

The fruit shops, too, have treasures both new and second-hand. This seemed strange to me, at first, and I learned of it by hearing a fellow-customer ask to hire a few pines.

After her departure I inquired of the shopman the meaning of it all.

He obligingly told me that many of his finest specimens of pineapples, canteloupes, Hamburg grapes, and other spectacular fruits, could be rented out for banquets night after night, with but slight wear and tear on their beauty and bloom. One enormous bunch of black grapes, as perfect as the colour studies of fruit that used to appear as supplements to the _Art Amateur_, he caressed fondly, as he told me it had been rented out for the last nine nights, and was yet good for another week’s work.

I then remembered the architectural triumphs of fruits that had graced many of the dinner tables I had smiled at, and I marvelled afresh at the English thrift.

All shops, streets, theatres, and traffic merge and congest in a perfect orgy of noise, motion, and color at Piccadilly Circus.

The first humorous story I heard in London was of the man who, returning from a festal function, inquired of the policeman, “_Is_ this Piccadilly Circus, or is it Tuesday?” That story seems to me the epitome of London humor, and also a complete description of Piccadilly Circus.

The first few times I visited it I found it bewildering, but after I had learned to look upon it as a local habitation and a name, I learned to love it.

By day or by night, it is a great, crazy, beautiful whirl. Everybody in it is trying to get out of it, and everybody out is trying to get in. This causes a merry game of odds, and the elegant policemen send glances of mild reproof after the newsboys who hurtle through the crowd, yelling “Dily Mile!”

The rush of traffic here is considered a sure road to battle, murder, or sudden death, and the Londoner who crosses Piccadilly Circus rarely expects to get through alive.

But to me London traffic seems child’s play compared to ours in New York. I sauntered safely through Piccadilly Circus, without one tenth part of the trepidation that always seizes me when I try to scurry across Broadway. The lumbering ’buses have no such desire to run over people, as that which burns in the hearts of our trolley-cars. The pedestrians are too deliberate of speed, and the traffic too gentle of motion, to inspire fear of jostlement.

Dawdling along, I paused to look in at Swan and Edgar’s windows. Rather, I attempted to look in; for, with a peculiar sort of short-sightedness, these drapers choose to be-plaster their window panes with large posters which comment favorably upon the wares that are presumably behind them, but which cannot be seen by peeping through the small spaces left between the posters.

Then across to the Criterion for tea. All of the great restaurants present a gay scene at tea hour, and the Criterion, with its “decorative painting by eminent artists,” and its crowds of guests both eminent and decorative is among the gayest.

But it is a gayety of correct and subdued tone. The ladies, in their flashing finery of raiment, are of a cool, reserved deportment, and the men drink their tea and munch sweet cakes with a gravity born of the seriousness of the occasion.

If one notices any conspicuous action or effect in a London restaurant, one may be sure it is perpetrated by a stranger,—probably a visiting American.

I recently saw in one of our finest Fifth Avenue restaurants a most attractive young woman, who came in accompanied by a well-set-up, and moreover an exceedingly sensible looking, young man.

With absolute _savoir faire_, and no trace of self-consciousness, the girl carried in her arm a large brown “Teddy bear.”

The couple sat at a table and ordered some luncheon, and the bear was also given a seat, a napkin was tucked about his neck, and a plate placed before him. The girl’s face was sweet and refined; the man’s face was intelligent and dignified, and the bear’s face was coy and alluring. There was no attempt to attract attention, and, luncheon over, the young woman, who was at least twenty years old, tucked her pet under her arm, and they walked calmly out.

But such things are not done in London restaurants. And yet, these also have their peculiarities. At one small, but very desirable, restaurant in Old Compton Street it is the custom to steal the saltspoons as souvenirs. Not to possess one or more of these tiny pewter affairs, which are shaped like coal-shovels, is to be benighted indeed. So I stole one.

After my tea, I would, perhaps, trail along toward Trafalgar Square, by way of Regent Street and Pall Mall. After a long look at the black and white grayness of the National Gallery, I would slowly mount its steps, and from there take a long look at the wonderful façade of St. Martin’s-in-the-Field. Trafalgar Square is full of out-of-door delights, but if the mood served I would go into the National Gallery, and walk delicately, like Agag, among the pictures. I went always alone, for I did not care to look at certain pictures which I owned (by right of adoption of them into my London), in danger of hearing a companion say, “Note the delicate precision of the flesh tones,” or, “Observe the gradations of aerial perspective.” Nor did I want a “Hand-book,” that would assert, “Without a prolonged examination of this picture it is impossible to form an idea of the art with which it has been executed.”

Unhampered by mortal suggestion, I paused before the pictures that belonged to me, prolonging my examination or not, as I chose, and for my own reasons.

Some pictures I should have loved, but for an ineradicable memory of their narrowly black-framed reproductions that crowd the wall spaces of friends at home, who “just love Art.”

Other pictures I might have appropriated, but that a prolonged examination of them was impossible by reason of the massing in front of them of people who go out by the day sight-seeing.

And so I took my own where I found it, and happily wandered by _A man with Fair Hair_ or _Clouds at Twilight_ in a very bliss of art ignorance.

Then out-of-door London would call me again, and back I would go to Trafalgar Square, one of the lightest, brightest-colored bits of all England. From the asphalt to the welkin, from the Column to the Church, from the National Gallery to Morley’s Hotel, are the most beautiful blues, and greens, and whites, and reds, and grays that can be supplied by the combined efforts of Nature, Time, and modern pigments. A sudden impulse, perhaps, would make me think that I had immediate need of the Elgin Marbles, and, with a farewell nod to the northeast lion (which is my favorite of the four), I would jump into a hansom and jog over to the British Museum. But often the approach was so clogged by pompous and overbearing pigeons that I would make no attempt to enter. Instead, I would find another hansom, and take a long ride over to the Tate Gallery.

As I bounced happily along, I would note many landmarks of historic interest. Some of these were real, and others made up by myself on the spur of the moment, to fit a passing thought.

For, if I saw an old building of picturesque interest, I could make myself more decently emotional toward the antiquity of it by assuring myself that that was where Sterne died, or where Pepys “made mighty merry.”

And, after all, facts are of little importance compared with “those things which really are—the eternal inner world of the imagination.”

It was from the outlook of a hansom cab that I could get some of the best views of my London. Every turn would bring new sorts of motion, sound, and color. And, birdseyed thus, it was all so beautiful that I wondered what Shelley meant by saying “Hell is a city very much like London,”—if, indeed, he did say it.

Once in the Tate Gallery, I would fall afresh under the spell of the lonely wistfulness of G. F. Watts’ _Minotaur_.

Then I would go to gaze long on Whistler’s wonderful notion of Battersea Bridge on a blue night, and then betake myself to the Turner collection.

Here I could spend hours, floundering in unintelligent delight among the pictures, sensitive to each apotheosis of color and beauty, and not caring whether its title might be _Waves Breaking on a Flat Beach_, or _River Scene with Cattle_.

But too much Turner was apt to go to my head, and just in time I would tear myself away, hop into a hansom, and make for the Wallace Collection to be brought back to a sense of human reality by a short interview with the _Laughing Cavalier_.

What a city it is, where cabs and picture-galleries are within the reach of all who desire them!