One asks the waterman hard by,Where may the Poet’s palace lie?At length they in the rubbish spyA thing resembling a goose-pie—A type of modern wit and styleThe rubbish of an ancient pile.
One asks the waterman hard by,Where may the Poet’s palace lie?At length they in the rubbish spyA thing resembling a goose-pie—A type of modern wit and styleThe rubbish of an ancient pile.
One asks the waterman hard by,Where may the Poet’s palace lie?At length they in the rubbish spyA thing resembling a goose-pie—A type of modern wit and styleThe rubbish of an ancient pile.
STATUE OF GENERAL GORDON IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE.
STATUE OF GENERAL GORDON IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE.
STATUE OF GENERAL GORDON IN TRAFALGAR SQUARE.
It seemed unlikely that this “goose-pie,” amid all the vicissitudes of Whitehall, could have escaped demolition. But recently the writer of these notes came on a rather minute description of the place, drawn up in the year 1815. As it then appeared, it was a low, long building in three divisions, two stories high, with arched windows, three in each compartment. Further, the brothers Adam had taken it in hand, and added two wings or vestibules, projecting forward and decorated with their own peculiar “fan-like” ornamentation. This was satisfactory for identification; though no one of our generation was likely to recall such a structure in Whitehall. But almost at the first search it was revealed. There it stood flanking the Banqueting Hall in the shape of the dilapidated, gone-to-seed museum known as the United Service Institution. This was the original Vanbrugh “goose-pie” family mansion, answering in every point to the description, encumbered with the Adam additions, effective and not without merit. It is, however, in rather a squalid state; and it is safe to prophesy that in two or three years it will have disappeared. It is curious to think of the brilliant author of “The Relapse” living here nearly two hundred years ago.
Close as it is to Charing Cross, St. Martin’s Lane and the district about it still retain an old-fashioned air. At its very entrance we note one of the most effective and effectively placed buildings in London, the fine church, St. Martin’s, with its soaring and conspicuous steeple and stately portico. The levity of our time was never better illustrated than by the proposal to cut away the steps to gain a few feet of roadway, and it was actually gravely suggested and discussed whether it would not be the best course to remove the portico wholesale, and place it at the back of the church! From every direction, almost, the spire can be seen, and from every quarter the church forms a pleasing point of view. It was built by Gibbs, and its interior is in Wren’s peculiar favourite manner—a vaulted ceiling supported on columns, which, in their turn, support galleries, their bases being covered up by the massive pews.
St. Martin’s Lane is a far more interesting street than might be supposed, being full of strange Hogarthian memories. Bishop Horsley told the antiquary so oddly named “Rainy-day Smith,” that he had often heard his father describe the time when St. Martin’s Church was literally “In the fields,” and when there was a turnpike leading into St. Martin’s Lane. Mr. Smith wrote this over sixty years ago, and there have been enormous changes since then. There are two curious little lanes or passages turning out of it on the right hand as you go up, one of which bears the name of “May’s Buildings, 1739,” in faint characters. This was built by a gentleman of that name, whose house is still to be seen at No. 43, a sausage shop, a striking and elegant piece of brick-work, though unpretending. It was thus that it struck “Rainy-day Smith,” fifty years ago, who was much praised in his day for “his attention to old houses.” He says that Mr. May’s house “consisted of two pilasters supporting a cornice; and it is, in my opinion, one of theneatest specimens of architectural brick-work in London. The site of the White Horse livery stables was originally a tea-garden; and south of it was a hop-garden, which still retains that appellation. The extensive premises, No. 60, were formerly held by Chippendale, the most famous upholsterer and cabinet-maker of his day, to whose foliowork on household furniture the trade formerly made constant reference. It contains in many instances specimens of the style of furniture so much in vogue in France in the reign of Louis XIV., but which for many years past has been discontinued in England. However, as most fashions come round again, I should not wonder if we were to see the unmeaning scroll and shell-work, with which the furniture of Louis’s reign was so profusely incumbered, revive; when Chippendale’s book will again be sought after with redoubled avidity, and, as many of the copies must have been sold as waste paper, the few remaining will probably bear rather a high price.”[1]Another house that always attracts attention is the one numbered 96, and which deserves notice for its artistic doorway—certainly one of the most effective in London for its flowing style of carving and elegant design. It is now a cloth shop, but Mr. Smith describes it as being in his day “one of the oldest colour-shops in London, and has one of the very few remaining shop-fronts where the shutters slide in grooves. The street-door frame is of the style of Queen Anne, with a spread-eagle, foliage, and flowers, curiously and deeply carved in wood, over the entrance, similar to those remaining in Carey Street and in Great Ormond Street. The late Mr. Powel, the colourman, and family inhabited it; and I have heard him say thathis mother for many years made a pipe of wine from the grapes which grew in their garden, which at that time was nearly one hundred feet in length, before the smoke of so many surrounding buildings destroyed their growth. This house has a large staircase, curiously painted, of figures viewing a procession, which was executed for the famous Dr. Misaubin, about the year 1732, by a painter of the name of Clermont, a Frenchman, who boldly charged one thousand guineas for his labour; which charge, however, was contested, and the artist was obliged to take five hundred. Behind the house there is a large room, the inside of which Hogarth has given in hisRake’s Progress, where he has introduced portraits of the doctor and his Irish wife.”
Passing on beyond St. Martin’s Lane, we enter that curious street dedicated to bird and dog fanciers and frame makers, Great St. Andrew Street, but which in truth popularly ranges itself under the designation of “The Dials.” We stop before a mouldy shop, No. 42, whose window is filled with as disagreeable a category of objects as was found in the establishment of the apothecary inRomeo and Juliet—skulls, jaw and thigh bones, skeletons of monkeys, stuffed birds, horns of all kinds, prepared skins, and everything unpleasant in the anatomical line. When Dickens was busy with hisMutual Friend, aconfrère—Mr. Wilkie Collins, I think—described to him a strange character, a bird-stuffer—and “articulator” of bones and skeletons—and theidea so “tickled” the writer that he at once put in “Mr. Venus,” the intimate of Wegg. This original character excited much attention; and a friend of the great writer, as well as of the present chronicler, Mr. C. Kent, passing through this street, was irresistibly attracted by this shop and its contents—kept by one J. Willis. When he next saw Mr. Dickens he said, “I am convinced I have found the original of ‘Venus’;” on which said Mr. Dickens, “You are right.” Anyone who visits the place will recognize the dingy gloomy interior, the articulated skeleton in the corner, the general air of thick grime and dirt.
In full view of St. Martin’s Lane, and next to where the old Northumberland House stood, stood the house that was remarkable as having been the first that was numbered in London. Readers of old letters will notice with surprise how readily a person’s residence was found by the post; “To Mr. Sterne, in ye Pall Mall,” was sufficient. This seems almost a mystery.
In the London churchyards there is plenty to interest the explorer, but it may be doubted if anything could be more tragically romantic than is offered by two memorials, found in two old churchyards—separated by one easy half-hour’s walk. The moralist will find profit, and a curious meditationover the instability of things, in his visit to these two interesting spots. Standing on that ill-shaped openplace, the former Regent’s Circus, and looking along the bend of the new Shaftesbury Avenue, we can see the blackened and ungainly steeple of old St. Anne’s Church in Soho, now unexpectedly revealed by the clearances and “demolitions.” This clumsy, eccentric object seems to take the shape of a vintner’s cask perched airily on a spire, and must be pardoned to the memory of Wren, as one of those architectural freaks in which he occasionally indulged when invention failed him. To the same class belonged those extraordinary obelisks and other devices which he has placed on some of his towers. The church is a very old and interesting one, dating from 1686, and looks out on Dean Street. It has attained a sort of celebrity from its musical services; and the Princess of Wales and other distinguished persons are often found in the congregation. The old rectory, where, up to the present incumbency of Dr. Wade, the rector used to reside, stands where it did, beside the church, its rows of ancient windows having a cheerful prospect of the churchyard; but the actual rectory is in the quaint Soho Square. The churchyard is a very large forlorn piece of ground opening upon Wardour Street, and it was taken in hand some years ago by the improvers and spoilers. The tombstones were all collected together and laid down neatly as a sort of pavement, the rest planted with grass. It is now given over to a large colony of fowls, which pick up a livelihood and enjoy a sort ofrus in urbethere. One would have thought these measures were preparatory to throwing open the place as a recreation ground; but the gates remain fast locked, and the public may not enter now.
On the outside wall of the church are seen two tablets, which arrest the attention; one to the memory of Hazlitt, of an extraordinary kind, setting forth his peculiar opinions; the other to an actual genuine king, who, after his abdication, died in England. The king’s coffin was placed in the vaults beneath, where the clerk recollects seeing it many years ago. But among the other bizarre proceedings which marked the course of the “improvements,” the vaults were completely filled up with sand, and the contents, as it were, obliterated. The inscription, which is the work of Horace Walpole, runs:—
Near this place is interredTheodore, King of Corsica, who died in this parish, Dec. 11, 1756, immediately after leaving the King’s Bench Prison, by the benefit of the Act of Insolvency, in conveyance of which he registered his kingdom of Corsica, for the benefit of his creditors.The grave, great teacher, to a level bringsHeroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings;But Theodore this moral learned ere dead—Fate poured its lessons o’er his living head,Bestowed a kingdom and denied him bread.
Near this place is interredTheodore, King of Corsica, who died in this parish, Dec. 11, 1756, immediately after leaving the King’s Bench Prison, by the benefit of the Act of Insolvency, in conveyance of which he registered his kingdom of Corsica, for the benefit of his creditors.
The grave, great teacher, to a level bringsHeroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings;But Theodore this moral learned ere dead—Fate poured its lessons o’er his living head,Bestowed a kingdom and denied him bread.
The grave, great teacher, to a level bringsHeroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings;But Theodore this moral learned ere dead—Fate poured its lessons o’er his living head,Bestowed a kingdom and denied him bread.
The grave, great teacher, to a level bringsHeroes and beggars, galley-slaves and kings;But Theodore this moral learned ere dead—Fate poured its lessons o’er his living head,Bestowed a kingdom and denied him bread.
His story is sad, romantic, and perfectly true; for he was a real crowned king and adventurer. His name was Newhoff, and he had figured in many capitals in many countries, making himself useful to the smaller potentates, and had finally succeeded in impressing the Corsican insurgents with the idea that he was a personage of power, and could find them assistance. They were tempted by his offers to lead them. One morning he arrived in a ship laden with cannon and other stores, and landed arrayed in Eastern dress and attended by black servants. Received with acclamations, he was duly crowned, lived in a palace, put himself at the head of an army, and fought battles.
Soon, however, his supplies failing him, he went away to raise money in Holland, but did not succeed. He then came to London, was arrested by his many creditors, and thrown into the King’s Bench. He took advantage of “the Act,” and registered his crown for the benefit of his creditors. On his liberation he did not know where to go, and went in a chair to the Portuguese Minister’s, whom he did not find at home. The fallen king, literally not possessing a sixpence in the world, was charitably taken in by a Soho tailor, fell ill the next day, and died; his coffin and interment were paid for by this worthy tradesman, who said he wished for once to have the credit of burying a king.
Another strange being was laid in the vaults, but only temporarily, in the year 1804. This was the eccentric Lord Camelford, whose adventures and intemperance were always exciting attention. He was shot in a duel by Captain Best, reputed the best shot in England, which was the odd reason given by his antagonist for meeting him. “Six quarts of blood,” we are told, were found in the cavity of his chest. All the denizens of Soho crowded round Mr. Dawes’s shop in Dean Street to see the crimson-velvet coffin, adorned with cherubim of silver and “wrought gripes,” as it lay in the St. Anne’s vaults, until the strange provision of his will could be carried out. It seems he had once passed many hours at a romantic spot by a lake in the Canton of Berne, where there were three trees. A sum of £1,000 was left to the proprietor, and he directed that his body should be transported thither and placed under one of the trees. There was to be no monument; he only wished “the surrounding scenery to smile upon my remains.”
Here also rests the beautiful maid of honour, Mary Bellenden, to whom the Prince of Wales showed his devotion, which was of an extravagant kind, by taking out his purse and counting his money. “If you go on counting your money,” said she, “I will run out of the room.” This beauty was secured by Colonel Campbell, later Duke of Argyll. Her royal admirer had made her promise that she would let him know whenever she made her selection; but she forgot, or omitted purposely, to do this. She thus incurred his bitter dislike; and whenever her duties compelled her toattend at Court, which she did with some alarm, this gracious person always took care to whisper some ill-natured speech. She did not live to share her husband’s honours, and now sleeps in the well-sanded vaults of the old Soho church.
Now taking flight across London to “the Marble Arch” and to the Queen’s Road, we reach the old Bayswater burying-ground, where it is assumed that one of our great humorists lies buried. It is not, however, generally known that there are well-founded doubts as to whether Yorick’s “dust” is to be found beneath his headstone, and whether the “mortal coil” he shuffled off in Bond Street has not been sacrilegiously transported away.
Sterne therecherché, the friend of wits and nobles in Paris as well as London, died on March 18, 1768, in mean lodgings, No. 41 Old Bond Street, a silk bag maker’s. Mr. Loftie, however, believes that the house was No. 39B, now Messrs. Agnew’s. The Shandean gave up the ghost piteously enough, abandoned by his family, and by a strange chance a footman, sent by a convivial party to inquire “how Mr. Sterne was,” arrived almost exactly at the moment of dissolution, and saw him pass away. This person was one James Macdonald, “own man” to Mr. “Fish” (so nicknamed) Crauford, a person of fashion; and he has recorded this curious incident in his valet-memoirs.
Now, this departure of poor Yorick was disastrous enough. His whole career, indeed, was one of eccentric gambadoes on his hobby-horse; but he never reckoned that after his death, yet another grimly grotesque chapter was to be added to his Shandy record. It was hard enough that so jocund a person should die so miserably—or, as he might have thought it, die at all; and there was a hideous contrast between the crowd which theviveurwas always secure of, and this sad desertion.
But the funeral was in keeping. It might have been expected that a Canon of York, one holding the curacy of Coxwold, would have had many mourners; but the English humorist was attended to the grave by—how many will it be supposed?—two mourners! One was Becket, who published the defunct’s works; the other, old Sam Salt, one of Elia’s Benchers, a Shandean in his way, though why he attended seems as mysterious as why the others stayed away. This humblecortègetook its way to the old burying-ground near Tyburn, and there, on the west side, poor Yorick’s remains were duly consigned to the earth.
More than a year passed away, when, in July, 1769, a strange report got into the papers: “It is rumoured that the body of Mr. Sterne, the ingenious author ofTristram Shandy, which was buried at Marylebone, has been taken up and anatomized by a surgeon at Oxford.” Thismust have astounded Hall-Stevenson and other jovial Shandeans. It was likely enough to be true. The meanness of his burial, the beggarly account of mourners, was a plain hint to the resurrection-men that here was a subject not likely to be watched or inquired after. The remains were certainly “lifted” and disposed of, like the late Mr. Gamp’s, “for the benefit of science.”
Mr. Edmund Malone, who had much of his friend Boswell’s taste for small gossip, tells us that he had heard that the body was sent to Cambridge, and sold to a surgeon there for dissection. He adds, that a friend of Sterne’s, coming in during the operations, told him that he at once recognized the features. This was the last outrage that poor Yorick could have dreamed of—worse than what befell his own Slawkenbergius, or the sufferers by the famous Tagliacotian operation. Yet there seems little reason for doubting Malone’s account.
There is a third version, which supplies even the name of the anatomist—one Mr. Charles Collignon, B.M. of Trinity, who died in 1785, and who on this occasion had invited some amateur anatomists to see him operate on “a subject” just received from London. After the recognition it was too late to suspend the dissection, which had nearly been completed. It is added that the friend of Mr. Sterne fainted away.
So far the tale seems supported. But there is a further bit of evidence, such as it is. In a copy of theSentimental Journeythe owner has written a curious note to the effect that “the Rev. Mr. Green told me that, being at Cambridge a short time after, he saw the skeleton, and had the story confirmed to him by the Professor himself.” Yorick, therefore, besides suffering the original indignity, would seem to have been regularly anatomized or “articulated,” according to the science of Mr. Venus. It might be worth inquiring whether any such skeleton is preserved in the Cambridge museums, private or public.
The ghastly story is further supported by the fact that at the time the rifling of graves was a regular practice, and the Tyburn burying-ground was a favouritelocalefor such depredations; so much so that only a few months before it had been guarded by watchers and a stout mastiff-dog. “This burial-ground,” says Mr. Hutton, in his usefulLiterary Landmarks, “is situated between Albion and Stanhope Streets. Sterne’s memorial, a high but plain flat stone, stands next the centre of the west wall, under a spreading, flourishing old tree, whose lower branches and leaves almost touch it.” The explorer will find in the burying-ground a headstone and flourishing inscription set up by strangers—for the widow and daughter were left in extreme poverty, and had to be relieved by a subscription made on the York racecourse. Two Freemasons, signing themselves “W. and S.” furnished this tribute:
Near this Place lies the Body ofTHE REVEREND LAURENCE STERNE, A.M.Died September 13, 1768,Aged 53 years.Ah! molliter ossa quiescant.
If a sound head, warm heart, and breast humane,Unsullied worth and soul without a stain;If mental powers could ever justly claimThe well-known tribute of immortal fame,Sterne wasthe manwho with gigantic strideMowed down luxuriant follies far and wide, &c.
If a sound head, warm heart, and breast humane,Unsullied worth and soul without a stain;If mental powers could ever justly claimThe well-known tribute of immortal fame,Sterne wasthe manwho with gigantic strideMowed down luxuriant follies far and wide, &c.
If a sound head, warm heart, and breast humane,Unsullied worth and soul without a stain;If mental powers could ever justly claimThe well-known tribute of immortal fame,Sterne wasthe manwho with gigantic strideMowed down luxuriant follies far and wide, &c.
And they added at foot, that although he “did not live to be a member of their society, yet, as all his incomparable performances evidently prove him to have acted by rule and square, they rejoice in this opportunity of perpetuating his high and irreproachable character to after ages.”
Nearly every portion of this effusion is inaccurate or untrue. His body did not lie there; he was fifty-seven, not fifty-three; he died in March, not September, and on the 18th, not on the 13th. His head was not “sound”; his worthwas“sullied”; and acting “by rule and square” was about the last thing we would give our Shandean credit for. It will be noted that the words are “near this place,” so that it does not mark the spot of interment.
Under these circumstances there would be a certain hollowness and uncertainty attending any form of memorial in this particular spot. On the other hand, it must be said that the existing stone—a wretched thing, with its wretched inscription—would not have been set up by the two Freemasons if such painful rumours were abroad. The very preparation of the stone would have occupied some weeks or months.
Many years ago the writer suggested that a memorial should be placed in York Minster, of which cathedral Sterne was prebendary. The Dean was favourable to the project, as also was his Grace of York. A few subscriptions were obtained, notably from the late Mr. Carlyle and Lord Houghton, but beyond this there was little encouragement. This project might now be revived, as there is a taste or craze for recording monuments. It may be added that Sterne’s “Eliza” is entombed with all the honours in Bristol Cathedral, a “very elegant piece of statuary” (videlocal guide books) marking the place. It says that in this lady “genius and benevolence were united.” So they were in her less fortunate admirer, for whose cenotaph might be prepared a simple medallion on the minster wall, with the short inscription, “Alas, poor Yorick!”
WONDERFUL changes have been made at Hyde Park Corner within a few years. Many have considered that this was one of the most effective architectural bits in London. For here was the great archway with the avenue beyond, while facing it was the elegant screen or colonnade, through which was seen the Park and the procession of carriages and promenaders. A dreadful and ungainly alteration has been made. A sort of unmeaning triangular slope has been cleared, the arch has been carted away and placed at an extraordinary and unmeaning angle. The space has been cut up in roadways, with triangular or rather mutton-chop-shaped “refuges,” in one of which an equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington has been set up. The bold irregularity of the whole—barbarous almost—causes a feeling of despair, for no amount of statues or decoration will cure the original radical defect. What must be lamented most is the injury to the beautiful open colonnade, designed by Mr. Decimus Burton to stand at the side of a street, and to be faced by other buildings. Now it looks too poor and mean to flank such a vast openplace. Yet a little knowledge and care would have secured an effective arrangement. The arch should have been left where it was, even though it stood isolated. It was a monument. The mischief is now done, and seems irreparable.
Through the screen we can see among the trees the great bronze statue erected “by the ladies of England “ in honour of the conqueror of Waterloo. Since the days of its being cast there has always been irreverent jesting at the expense of the particular “ladies of England” who had chosen to offer this nude figure as a token of their admiration. Mr. Croker, however, once, reviewing a Frenchman’s account of a visit to London, thus vindicated the fair dames:—“Let it be known,” he says, “that the ladies of England had nothing to do with the selection of this brazen image. Both are the work, as we believe, of a self-elected committee, in which we doubt whether there was a single lady; and the whole affair was got up, we have heard, by the artist and half a dozendilettanti, who cared little about the ladies orWellington, or a triumphal monument, but were enraptured at the idea of erecting in London the copy of a statue which they had admired at Rome.”
Close beside is the house of the “Iron Duke.” A few “oldest inhabitants” will recall how remorselessly, after all his windows had been broken by the mob, he kept his iron shutters down until the day of his death, a span of five-and-twenty years, once pointing to them significantly when the crowd attended him home with flattering shouts. It was a fine rebuke.
Here we come to the Byron statue, a sort of schoolboy, in jacket and trousers, sitting on a triangular lump of metal, with a poorish dog. This is surely not the ideal of the noble poet. Instead of stopping with a reverential gaze and thinking of Childe Harold, we only wonder what this queer bit of pantomime signifies. The pedestal has been likened to “a cake of Pears’ soap.” It is the work of the once famous Belt, who obtained the commission from a committee of noblemen and gentlemen of taste. At the trial it was contended that one Verheyden had furnished the design, or the drawing of the design, and there was much fury of contention, cross-examination, etc., on this point. Those who wish to see what this Verheyden could do, may study the two graceful female figures over the door of the handsome New Water-colour Exhibition building in Piccadilly, and which were actually carved “in situ,” as it is called—a difficult feat.
Towards Knightsbridge we note the two large mansions which flank the entrance to the Park. One of them, long left untenanted, obtained the sobriquet of Gibraltar, because “it was never taken.” Here the once famous speculator Hudson lived, an extraordinary instance of financial reverse and romance. The story of “the Railway King,” as he was called, illustrated the meanness of fashionable life, and there were many tales circulated of the flatteries and homage of great ladies. Forgotten now are the jests that used to circulate as to the sayings and doings of his spouse, whose extraordinary and original “derangement of epitaphs” were better even than those of her famous prototype. This millionaire’s fall was as sudden and rapid as his rise. By a curious coincidence, one of the great houses close by in Grosvenor Place, the one built for the residence of the Marquis of Westminster, but never occupied by him, was tenanted during the French war by another gigantic speculator—Dr. Strousberg, also a Railway King—the crash of whose fall resounded through Europe. The Albert Gate Mansion is now the French Embassy.
These two large houses are associated with Lady Morgan in a pleasant way. When she came to live in William Street, about the time of the Coronation, Mr. Cubitt had just taken the Belgravian district in hand, but the road presented a very different aspect from what it does now. There was no entrance to the park here, nor was it needed, as no one wanted to enter,save Lady Morgan herself—with her a good reason. There was the great Cannon Brewery, with a smoking chimney; public-houses, too, galore, as indeed there are now; such are true Tories, and never move or change. “I must have a new gate,” she declared, “where the ‘Fox and Bull’ pothouse now stands. There is a rural air over the whole that is pretty. What I want is a gate where the old sewer tap now moulders, and flanks a ditch of filth and infection. A sort of little rustic bridge should be over it, which would not be without its picturesque effect.” Lord Duncannon, of the “Woods and Forests,” was appealed to, but declined to grant the favour, on the ground of the block at Hyde Park Corner—“It would not be desirable to establish another thoroughfare near it.” What an amusing book could be written on the sapient reasons offered by public men for not undertaking schemes, commencing with Lord Palmerston’s wise prophecy as to the Suez Canal!
More interesting is it still to pass on a little beyond to Albert Terrace, one of the most charminglocalesin London as to its rearward view, though the front is dusty and noisy, and perhaps disagreeable. But in the mornings, you may look out on the park as on your own grounds. Here used to reside Charles Reade, the author of “It’s Never Too Late to Mend,” one of the men of genius of the day, though he once mystified his friends and others by the strange inscription along his garden wall—I well remember reading with astonishment the large letters on the parapet—“Naboth’s Vineyard”: a protest against the ground landlord, who coveted his tenement “hugely for the detriment thereof,” and its re-creation in the shape of Belgravian terraces. Now one of thosemonstreranges of building to hold innumerable tenants, and which are in such favour, is being erected. By-and-by the whole of the old-fashioned little terrace, with its pleasant gardens, will disappear.
Returning to the Corner, we pass Hamilton Place, recently—yet it seems long ago—acul de sac, and no vulgar thoroughfare. What a contention was raised by the invaded fashionables when it was proposed to throw it open to general traffic! Now the waggons and cabs trundle through the sacred precinct, and one hardly credits the fact that it was so lately a gloomy and deserted inclosure. Here lived the old Chancellor Eldon, who, for so august a personage, was plagued in a most amusing way during the Queen’s Trial. The Government had agreed to find her a town house in default of a palace, and her friends maliciously selected one in Hamilton Place, next door to the Chancellor. The horror and anguish of the old gentleman may be conceived, since the noble lady was always attended home by shouting mobs, and appeared at the windows while her friend, Alderman Wood, made speeches. He wrote to the Government to say that if this was allowed he would be driven from his house and his office at the same time. The Government gave directions accordingly; but the Queen’s friends seemed to be bent on his annoyance, and proposed a subscription to purchase that house and no other. The poor Chancellor had actually to buy it, as the only way to save himself from persecution, though he was lucky enough to re-sell it again without loss.
It may be noted that there are some survivals in London which almost savour of feudal times. All may notice those “bars” which are maintained in certain districts, fashionable, or formerly fashionable, and which are kept strictly select, the guardians severely refusing passage to the heavily-laden waggon or market cart that desires to pass through; none of this class are admitted but have business in the inclosure. This is like one of the nobles’ privileges on the eve of the French Revolution. More strange is it to find that on a certain day in the year His Grace of Bedford closes his “bars” altogether at Gordon Square, Gower Street, and other points of that district, and luggage-laden cabs, making for Euston and King’s Cross, have to get round by circuitous roads as best they can. This is done to keep the right “alive,” but it seems a monstrous thing. Once this private property has been turned into a public street, the privilege of private property should cease, as the inhabitants pay rates for the use of the road.[2]
A glimpse of Park Lane, of its strange fountain, is “a sorrow for ever,” painful to the eye in spite of its Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton, presided over by the flaming gilt female blowing hard at her trumpet. The last is the peccant part, and were she removed the three poets might look dignified and respectable. Of all ugly things in the metropolis, drinking fountains offer the largest variety. There our professors of deformity revel, and the more pretentious and costly the attempt, the greater hideousness is the result. The idea generally is to produce something imposing and architectural, a sort of temple or building, if possible—ridiculous when it is considered that a little cheap “squirt” of water, dribbling into a basin, is the entire aim and end. You have all the apparatus of a grand “fountain,” only without the gush of water. There is a pretty marble boy’s figure in St. James’s Park, by Jackson, close to Queen Anne’s Gate. For years, however, it has been
ACROSS THE HALL, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
ACROSS THE HALL, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
ACROSS THE HALL, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
allowed to remain in a mutilated state, the nose having dropped off. There is another by Dalou, of yet more artistic pretension, behind the Royal Exchange in the City. It represents a fleshly woman, wrought in marble, who is busy with the old maternal office of suckling her child, oddly suggestive to the wayfarer who is slaking his thirst below. As one passes it, it recalls the facetious W. S. Gilbert’s pathetic chorus in “Iolanthe”:—
“Had that refreshment been deniedThen your Strephon must have died.”
“Had that refreshment been deniedThen your Strephon must have died.”
“Had that refreshment been deniedThen your Strephon must have died.”
The ingenious artist, a refugee, I believe, in the Commune days, introduced the school of Carpeaux among us, but did not receive the full patronagehe merited. One of these most terrible combinations is that temple in the Sanctuary at Westminster—a mixture of mosaics, marble, and metal, ever grimy and slimy and squalid. There is, however, one artistic work, in Berkeley Square, well worthy the attention of amateurs. This, a graceful female figure, represented as pouring the water from a vase—the work of a well-known sculptor, Munro. But the statue is rather decayed and what marble could stand our weather? By-and-by the features, fingers, etc., will drop away.
Park Lane, with its stately mansions and choice collection of noble owners, is a charming thoroughfare, and suggests, a little, portions of the Champs Elysées. The houses on the whole are poor and old-fashioned, ingeniously altered and shaped to modern use, with a ludicrous disproportion to the enormous sums paid for them, and which is in truth paid for the situation. It will be noticed what shifts are resorted to to gain room and make the most of the precious ground, the “areas,” as they may be called, being generally covered in and turned into kitchens, over which a garden is laid out. In foreign countries, palaces, or noblemen’s “hôtels,” would be reared on each site. Here is the Earl of Dudley’s bright, smiling mansion,[3]with a colonnade and verandahs, with those of the Marquis of Londonderry, the Duke of Westminster, and other grand seigneurs. An amusing work might be made, setting out the stories of these houses and their tenants, and no doubt there is at this moment some Greville or Raikes, busy putting down notes and anecdotes.
One of the finest and most architectural mansions in London is the Italian villa of Mr. Holford, Dorchester House, to be found here. This elegantly designed structure is favoured by its situation on a “tongue” of land, and is enriched internally by some splendid monumental chimney-pieces, the work of the accomplished but ill-fated Steevens, whose story we shall relate further on.
Returning into Piccadilly, a few doors from the Duke of Cambridge’s mansion, Gloucester House, we note a curious arrangement, a sort of landing in front of a doorway, with a green door, like that of a cupboard, on a level with the street. This was associated with “Old Q,” the famous oldroué, the Duke of Queensberry, whose house it was. This disreputable person lived to a vast age, till he could not walk, when a machine was devised that let him down, Bath-chair and all, to thestreet; and this cupboard contained the apparatus.[4]Another arrangement was the keeping a servant mounted on a pony by the curbstone. At a signal from “Old Q,” when anyone passed that he wished to see and talk with, or wished to know more of, the menial cantered off in pursuit.
THE RED DRAWING ROOM, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
THE RED DRAWING ROOM, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
THE RED DRAWING ROOM, DORCHESTER HOUSE.
There are other houses hard by which illustrate curious mutations oflife. Here, for instance, is a handsome mansion, built by Mr. Beresford Hope for his private residence, and from the designs of a French architect, one of the rare specimens in town. In time it passed from his hands, and is now the Junior Athenæum Club. Further on, an imposing stone mansion, crescent-shaped in its façade, and of classical character, was, I believe, built by the late “Marquis of Steyne”—or Hertford, rather—at, of course, great cost, and equally, of course, never inhabited by him. For thirty or forty years, I believe, it remained in this ghostly condition, until his strange, eccentric course came to a close, and more rational successors arrived. Passing on, we reach Cambridge House, once the mansion of the ever-popular Palmerston. There is something dignified, yet unpretending, in this house, not to say classical; it seems suited to a prime minister. Here were those parties and receptions, where the adroit hostess was supposed to have the art of cementing political ties. It is now a club, and enormous additions have been made on the ground behind. Few know that it was in this row that the Hamiltons and Lord Nelson lodged when they came to London, and where the hero’s weakness was exhibited in most open and unbecoming manner, which has been good-naturedly glossed over by his countrymen.
The White Horse Cellar, a most interesting old place for its traditions, lingered on, bow windows and all, till a few years back. The revival of the old coaching days saved it. But now it has been fashioned into a new modern hotel. There is hardly a more exhilarating and original spectacle to be seen than occurs here in the full “swing” of the season, at the close of a summer’s day, between six and seven o’clock. At this time gather elegants in glossy hats and frock-coats with waists, ebony sticks with silver knobs, like miniature “black rods;” together with wiry elderly gentlemen, like the curious water-colour portraits that used to be seen in Sams’ old shop at the foot of St. James’s Street. A few years ago “Sams” was swept away, with all his curious water-colour noblemen in tight trousers and strange hats, and a vast Dutch house has taken its place. The coach seers are all well shaven, and wear check cravats. Some stand on the steps, others on thepavé. Less aristocratic beings cluster there too, straws in the mouth, or emerge from the cellar below. Now the clock hand is within a quarter of an inch of the hour, and hark! the faint winding of a horn from the Knightsbridge direction, then another nearer, from the Strand side. The coaches are coming up true to their time—to a minute. There they are—the bright yellow, the dark, the grey panelled: the policeman puts back the traffic; up they roll, well laden; ladies bright and cheerful; the scarlet guard; the coachman confident and secure, and bringing up his team with exquisite nicety, as a river steamer captain puts his vessel alongside. What fine horses and fine harness! Coachman, copper-coloured by the sun and the dusty roads of Dorking, flings downhis reins and strides in, as if every second was precious, to keep some appointment in the office. The metal ladder is put up, the ladies assisted down. It has been a delicious day among the velvet greens of Dorking.[5]
The large detached building near St. James’s Hall, erst the shop of Attenborough—name of good and evil omen to many—had become a haunt for exhibitions. The first was in the “old days,” that is what time the wonderful Sarah brought over all her models and pictures, and with a pleasing, harmless vanity exhibited them. The scene of her first reception there comes back on us—the wiry creature, leaning on her crutch stick, flanked by a certain lad, receiving the company. The curious specimen of the Parisian confidential man-servant—exactly like those on the stage—who took the tickets—was interesting in his way. He gave the idea that he knew secrets, and, better still, could be trusted with them. The motley nature of the crowds was also amusing; consisting of “swells,” artists, press, all in a jumble. Not undramatic was the meeting of the tall German Ambassador and the diva. There was a theatrical trickiness in the show, though there were one or two works at the most that were of extraordinary merit—the Drowned Boy, and the heads of Girardin and Busnach.
On a balmy morning there is nothing more agreeable than a walk in the Green Park, and the happy mortals, or immortals, who own the houses that look into it—Salisburys, Ellesmeres, Spencers,e tutti quanti—may be envied as you walk. There are a few trees, and there are generally some lazy mortals seated on the green chairs under their shade, and perhaps sleeping. We look up at the house that seems all bow-window, and call up “old Rogers,” who was there but yesterday, with his breakfasts, his exquisitely choice pictures, his epicurean tastes, his social life, which he may be said to have created, and his stories, which in his old age and decay he used to repeat in a strange formal way, and always in the same words.[6]After his death, when he was an enormous age, he was of course speedily forgotten; his treasures, more speedily still, were sold by auction, with his elegant house.
Nothing more piteous can be conceived than the closing years of a veteran breakfast giver. Crabb Robinson describes his final efforts in this line with a sort of dismal but doubting satisfaction. Therôleof professional breakfast and dinner giver—i.e., of one who wishes to have a reputation for these things—must be an unsatisfactory one, and bring but poor return. It is ever recurring, and the thing has to be done over again; for, alas! nothing is so true as thatthe stomach has no memory.
We may glance up Bond Street, the Rue de la Paix of London, at the house occupied by Messrs. Agnew. Bond Street is specially devoted to the craze for picture exhibitions, where there are a half-dozen, including the Grosvenor and Doré Galleries. The portico of the Grosvenor Gallery was originally that of some palace in Italy, and is admired for its elegance. It was purchased by the owner, and set up here. In the South Kensington Museum is the screen and balcony of a church, a beautiful work, which had been torn down and condemned, and was rescued in the same manner. Here is found the home of the Fine Art Society; and above, Goupil’s, a model of elegance. Note the bronze decorations of the era and the rich tone of the interior. In Bond Street, too, is Long’s Hotel, lately rebuilt, an historic house, celebrated in fashion and fiction. There is an old novel called “Six Weeks at Long’s,” and it is probably the scene of the fight between Nickleby and Sir Mulberry Hawk. Opposite, where a number of new shops stand, used to be the Clarendon, a fashionable dining place forty years ago.
At the corner of Grafton Street stands a big house, unpretending and old-fashioned. Here, at “No. 22A,” resides Henry Irving, the favourite and fashionable tragedian. His rooms are rich and luxurious, as becomes so conspicuous a person. In Bond Street we find the agents who enabled the impoverished aristocrat to enjoy the pleasures of the theatre, for here has flourished time out of mind the great “Mitchell.” The annals of the Mitchell House might be about as interesting as those of the Christies. It was Mitchell who introduced the French plays, and engaged the famous Ballerinas. His shop even to this hour preserves the old tradition, and the windows are filled with the graceful lithographs, after Chalon and D’Orsay, of Mario, Grisi, Cerito, Taglioni, together with little plastic figures of Tamburini, Paganini, and other artists. It is enough to look at one of thefigurantestosee what an exquisite art dancing was in these old exploded days. It was then literally the poetry of motion. There is now motion enough, but no poetry. The ghosts of these personages must haunt this place. There are still on sale here that curious series of likenesses of his contemporaries executed by D’Orsay, a vast number. They are clever, but amateurish, and not such rigid, literal likenesses as the photographers have accustomed us to.
Returning to Piccadilly we pass into the regions that branch away, Duke Street, Bury Street, King Street, and the rest, and enter Bachelor Land, where every old house has been furbished up, and made to take the shape of apartments for gentlemen. The class of persons who lodge here are notoriouslyexigeant—old gentlemen coming to town to enjoy themselves, and requiring all their comforts to precede them. Apartment letting here, therefore, becomes almost scientific, and would astonish the rude operators elsewhere. The retired butler and retired lady’s maid, who have joined their fortunes, “work like horses.” The grandfather of Brummel, the dandy, was a retired servant of Lord Liverpool’s, and kept one of these lodging houses in Bury Street.
Here, in King Street, is Christie’s—which has been, however, more disastrous than Crockford’s to many an artistic gull. Never can be forgotten the ridiculous displays at one or two of the famous picture sales five or six years ago. Within the last twenty years there have been great days at “Christie’s,” when on the “view” days the streets were blocked with carriages, and thedilettanti, in a sort of mad fervour, gaped, and raved, and bid for works whose value is now admitted to be about a quarter of what was then paid. Not to be forgotten was the spectacle and pressure of the perspiring, enthusiastic, and ignorant dowager, with her daughters, pushing her way round and staring at the works; and the grave, subdued excitement of the courteous administrators of the place, who felt how much was at stake. There were other field days, when the noble Dudley contended for the great Sèvres jars and won them at ten thousand guineas. It would also be a history of human folly, and infatuation of cracked amateurs, who nibbled away their fortune, in confidence of their own precious judgment, when all they bought was to “fetch double hereafter.”
This rather grimed waste of brick wall on the south side of King Street is “Willis’s Rooms,” familiar enough; but it is not so well known that here used to be held the old “Almack’s” balls. They were instituted a full century ago as gambling and dancing rooms. There is a pleasant old-fashioned flavour in the term “The Rooms,” and there are “the Rooms” still at Bath, and at York. These are of a pleasing rococo pattern, rich and florid, and the design is of the good old spacious school, now extinct. “Willis’s Rooms” is the sole survival of such things in London. Someyears ago we had the Hanover Square Rooms, of the same kind, long since converted into a club. The rooms in King Street are enriched with florid old stucco, but it has been coloured, to suit the tastes of the day, with execrable feeling. Almack was originally one MacCall, a Scot, who came to “Town,” and thinking his name somewhat too provincial, reversed the syllables. Close by is the St. James’s Theatre, built by Braham, and where, till the hour of her death, his daughter, Lady Waldegrave, had her box. This pretty house has since been enlarged after the modern fashion, and a balcony added; and the observer may note that the ceiling and the portion of the auditorium nearest the stage, with the panelling of the boxes, belongs to the old theatre.
Hard by is the picturesquely-placed old Palace of St. James’s, which, however, has been sorely maimed by later improvements; witness the “skimpy” colonnade in its court. The really effective bit is the old-fashioned gateway, with its towers of fine, rubicund brick, hard as stone, as ripe in colour and crusted as old port. It is a welcome, familiar object, well proportioned, with a Dutch quaintness and effect in its belfry. How pleasant and satisfactory it is may be conceived by simply imagining it away from the bottom of St. James’s Street. Some fifty years ago it was suggested to George IV., by his Minister, that the whole Palace should be sold, and pulled down, to supply resources for building ugly Buckingham Palace! Mr. Whistler has noted the gaiety of the scene, and has done an etching of the lively, cheerful view. Every passer-by avails himself of the services of the pleasant, cheerful clock, and its agreeable unpretending chimes. Our old friend the tower is all for practical use, his cupola sheltering the bells, his gate for passage, his dial for telling time. And what a right well-proportioned, conspicuous dial it is! It is seen at once that the building was intended for it, and it for the building, whereas in numberless so-called clock towers the clock face seems to have been merely “stuck on” as an afterthought, or a hole made in which a dial was inserted. There is art in so simple a thing as this.
Few undertakings have been more ridiculed or sneered at than the quarter of Regent Street which was for a time one of the boldest and most daring schemes in the way of building that could be conceived. It has always been the fashion to speak of the plaster palaces, and the pretence of the architecture, but there can be no doubt that Waterloo Place, the Quadrant, and the houses of Regent Street are the most effective and gayest portions of London. The general design is admirable, and the Quadrant is particularly graceful and original. Waterloo Place and the terrace and steps leading into the Park are picturesque and foreign. Even the Insurance Office, with its piazza, closing the vista afar off, could not be spared. The two blocks on each side passing Carlton House Terrace are singularly effective. The