Twice round the clock; or, The hours of the day and night in LondonSala, George Augustus
General
Twice round the clock; or, The hours of the day and night in London
Sala, George Augustus
London (England) -- Social life and customs -- 19th century
analogy to the _soubriquet_ with which, in later years, Waterloo Bridge
has been qualified; for it was in Rosamond’s Pond that forsaken women
came in preference, at even-song, to drown themselves. There was the
Birdcage Walk, where Mr. Edward Storey kept his Majesty’s aviary, and
dwelt in the snug little hut recently demolished, known as Storey’s Gate.
There was the Mulberry Garden, into which the river Tyburn flows, and so
into Tothill Fields and the Thames; and there was Spring Gardens, where
the beaux went to look at the citizens’ wives; and the citizens’ wives, I
hope, to drink chocolate, but I fear to look at the beaux.
But the famous footsteps? See, see in your mind’s eye, Horatio, how the
shadows of the old frequenters of the Mall come trooping along. Here
is the founder of the feast himself, King Charles the Second, witty,
worthless, and good-humoured, tramping along the broad expanse at _eight_
o’clock in the morning, to the despair of his courtiers, who liked not
walking so fast, nor getting up so early. You can’t mistake the king’s
figure; ’tis that swarthy gentleman, with the harshly-marked countenance,
the bushy eyebrows, the lively kindling gray eye, and the black suit and
perriwig. He walks a little in advance of his suite with an easy, rapid
gait, and at his heels follow a little barking multitude of dogs, black,
black and white, or black and tan, with long silky ears and feathery
tails. We may see him again, and on the Mall, but not at eight o’clock
in the morning. It is the afternoon of a July day, and a court cavalcade
comes flaunting in feathers forth from Whitehall. Here is King Charles,
but in a laced and embroidered suit, and mounted on a gaily-caparisoned
charger. He rides with his hand in that of a lady, in a white laced
waistcoat and crimson petticoat, and who, the chroniclers say, with her
hair dressed _à la negligence_, “looks mighty pretty,” but she is very
dark, and not very well favoured, and is a poor Portuguese lady who has
the misfortune to be Queen of England, and to have the merriest and the
worst husband in Europe. Here is La Belle Stuart, with her hat cocked,
and a red plume, looking, with her sweet eye, little Roman nose, and
excellent _taille_, the greatest beauty that the Clerk of the Acts ever
did see in his life. Here is Lady Castlemaine, with a yellow plume, but
in a terrible temper that the king does not take any notice of her, and
in a rage when she finds that no gentleman presses to assist her down
from her horse. Here is “our royal brother,” James Duke of York, scowling
and sulky, on his way through the Park to Hounslow, to enjoy his prime
diversion of the chase, and escorted by a party of the guards in morions
and steel corslets. Memory be good to us! how the shadows gather around!
His Highness Oliver, Lord Protector of this realm, is being borne along
the Mall in a sedan chair. He crouches uneasily in a corner of the
gilded vehicle, as though he feared that Colonel Titus might be lying
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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