Real Life In London Part 74

Colonel of the Royal Regt. of Horse Guards, Blue.

Colonel of the Rifle Brigade.

The Lord Lieutenant of Hamps.h.i.+re.--And

The Governor of Plymouth.

Field Marshal of Austria, --------------------Russia, --------------------Prussia, --------------------France, --------------------England, and --------------------The Netherlands.

A Grandee of the Highest Cla.s.s.

A Captain General of Spain.

Knights of the Orders of The Garter, in England.--St. Andrew, in Russia.--The Black Eagle, in Russia.--Charles III. in Spain.--St. Ferdinand and Merit, in Spain.--The Golden Fleece, in Spain.--Maximilian Joseph, in Bavaria.--St. Maria Theresa, in Austria.--The Sword, in Spain.--St. Esprit, in France.--St. George, in Russia.--The Tower and Sword, in Portugal.

And, (to bring up the rear,) A Doctor of Civil Laws!

"Mon Dieu!" exclaimed the host, in extacy, "what a n.o.ble company!" He then began to tell them over;--"One Prince,"

he continued,--"Three Dukes--One Marquis--A Marshal General of France--An English Governor--An English Lord Lieutenant-- The Master General of the Ordnance, and Two English Colonels--Six Field Marshals--One Grandee of the Highest Cla.s.s--A Captain General of Spain--Twelve Knights, and a Doctor of Civil Laws!.'--_Mon Dieu!_ Thirty-two Great Personages!!"

All the provisions of the town, all the delicacies of the season and all the celebrated wines, were immediately put in requisition for the ill.u.s.trious company in expectancy.

At last the Duke of Wellington arrived, and was ushered into a s.p.a.cious dining-room, where a cloth was laid with thirty- two covers. The person of the Duke was unknown to the Innkeeper, who, full of important preparations for the Thirty-two Great Personages, thought not of any thing else.--"I ordered dinner here," said his Grace.--"Mon Dieu!" responded the Innkeeper, "are you one of the Thirty- two Great Personages?" presenting the list at same time. His Grace glanced his eye over it,--"they are all here!" said he, "so send up the dinner immediately." The Inn-keeper stood aghast with amazement; at last finding utterance, he ventured to express a hope that his Grace would be pleased to take into consideration, that he (the Innkeeper,) had, at great trouble and expence, provided a most sumptuous entertainment for Thirty-two Great Personages. "D----n the Thirty-two Great Personages," exclaimed the Duke, "Send up the dinner, and your bill.--Thus I must pay the penalty,"

said he, "for not having invited the old veteran to be of the party!!"

~125~~ The Squire observed, that the brilliant victories of his Grace, although acknowledged and rewarded by all the Potentates of Europe, had not procured him much popularity at home. The remark was confessed by Dashall to be correct, but whence the public indifference originated, he could not presume to explain.

Crossing Hyde Park, which a celebrated physician denominated _the lungs of the Metropolis_, our pedestrians made their egress into Oxford-road.

This fine street, with longitudinal reference the first in London, excited the admiration of the baronet; the long line of perspective indeterminable to the view, stretching from Hyde Park corner to St.

Giles's, the general uniformity of the buildings, the neatness, and in many instances the splendor of the tradesmen's shops, together with the comfortable manner of their perambulation, unjostled and unimpeded by the hurry, throng and bustle of pa.s.sengers, with which ~126~~ many other parts of the Town are annoyed, gave an additional zest of enjoyment to the trio in their excursion, while the Squire observed, that he felt in this part of the Town, always as if he had been suddenly removed to some other region of the world, far remote from the city of London, its dissonant uproar, and crowded inconveniences.

Turning into Blenheim street, Dashall apprized his companions, that if they felt inclined to take a peep into the Theatre of Anatomy, he could procure their admission.

The Squire seemed to recoil from so disgusting an exhibition; while on the other hand the baronet expressed a great desire to enter the theatre. "I have been used to murder and mutilation!" said he.

"The devil you have!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Squire, "where, how?"

"Where else should it be but in Ireland?" replied the baronet:--"and as to the how, was it not, sure, after the manner of my profession, while I was a member of a Corps of Yeoman Cavalry, during the rebellion, when we whipped, hanged, beheaded, and mutilated men, every day, by dozens! So you may guess, my good ~127~~friend, that cutting up a human carcase is nothing new to me. Only now, I should like to see if there is any difference in the mangling of human bodies by the anatomical artists of London from the ci-devant military professors, "The Loyal Troop of Doneraile."

The hesitation manifested by the Squire yielded, ultimately, to the importunity of the baronet, and they entered the human shambles, where the cutters up were at work upon a subject, securing to themselves the advantage of personal experience, in the process of dissection; the abdomen had been already cleared out, and the corpse was portioned out to the different students of anatomy for the purpose of ill.u.s.tration; the arms to one cla.s.s, the legs to another, the head to a third, &c. so that in less than a quarter of an hour, decapitation and dismemberment were completely effected; and the trunk was deserted, as an uninteresting object, from which there could not be derived any information of importance, further than that which the students had already obtained!!!

Sir Felix whispered his friends, that these adepts in human mutilation far exceeded in apathy of feeling and adroitness of execution, even the ci-devant Loyal Troop of Doneraile!--But when one of the young artists brought forward in his hands smeared with gore, a human heart for the operation of the dissecting knife, Tallyho declaring that he could bear it no longer, rushed out of the theatre, and was followed by his two companions, all disgusted with this spoliation of the dead, however conducive it might prove to the interests of the living.{1}

1 The human subjects for these Theatres of Anatomy and private dissection, are chiefly supplied by "Resurrectionists;" a cla.s.s of depraved wretches whose only employment is that of body-s.n.a.t.c.hing, or robbing the graves of their dead; from which they derive a ready and lucrative emolument. The anatomists are ready at all hours to receive, without questions asked, and with prompt remuneration, the produce of these unsanctified depredations.--Dreadful must be the feelings of the fond relatives of a departed friend, to learn that the sanctuary of the grave has been violated, and the body of perhaps a beloved wife, sister, or other revered female, exposed to the gaze, and subjected to the scalping-knife, of these butchers.

Iron Coffins have been resorted to as a safe-guard, which once closed cannot be opened. For this improvement the artist obtained a patent; but he is not likely to derive much advantage from his invention, as the parish officers within the bills of mortality have generally refused the rites of sepulture to bodies cased in iron; alleging, that the almost imperishable material would shortly compel an enlargement of burying ground, at a vast expence, which it is the duty of the parish officers to prevent, by resisting the interment of bodies in iron coffins; and this resolution has lately had the sanction of legal authority.

~128~~

Proceeding along Oxford Street, Sir Felix enquired for the _Holy Land_, informing his friends, at same time, that his servant, whom he had entrusted the preceding day with a cheque on his banker, had not been at home all night, and the probability was, that he had got amongst his Munster friends in Palestine. Sir Felix was therefore desirous of ascertaining, if possible, the sanctuary of the fugitive; and with that view requested his friends to accompany him in a perambulation of discovery, through (to him) these hitherto unexplored regions.--This application was readily a.s.sented to, and the triumvirate pa.s.sed onwards to the place of destination.

They had now reached the Church of St. Giles in the Fields, situated in Broad Street, St. Giles's; and their attention was immediately directed to that fine piece of sculpture over the iron gateway, leading into the Church-yard, representing the Resurrection and Last Judgment. The figures are in _ba.s.so relievo_, and although diminutive, are admirably grouped, and the expression of each gives to the whole a finished and impressive effect.

Two minutes more, and the three friends were on the boundaries of the Holy Land, namely, George Street, or, as formerly cognomened, Dyott Street, Bloomsbury.

At the end of this street, next to St. Giles's, were several of the Lower Irish, of both gender, who, cl.u.s.tering together, seemed to hold a close confabulation, casting occasionally, an inquisitive eye on Sir Felix O'Grady.

"By the soul of the priest!" at last exclaimed one of the Munster emigrees, "but it is him, and I would take my davy on it;--but sure enough, I will ax the jontleman himself now, whether he knows who he is, or if he is any body at all, at all!"

This real representative of the tag-rag and bob-tail of the Emerald Isle, was arrayed in the appropriate costume of his cla.s.s and country.

A nameless something that had once been a hat, covered a shock head of hair; the redundancy of which protuberated sideways and perpendicularly, ~129~~from the ci-devant castor, in many a knotty combination, impervious to wind and weather. The fragments of a loose great coat decorated his tall athletic form, which scarcely reaching his knees, exposed fully to observation his nether habiliment,--

"His galligaskins, that had long withstood The winter's fury and encroaching frost By Time subdued,--what will not Time subdue, Now horrid rents disclosed, portending agues."

His brawny legs were partially cased in worsted hose, the dilapidations of wear and tear ingeniously repaired with cloth, pieced and patched, and comprising all the prismatic colours of the rainbow; his toes, disdaining the trammels of duress, peeped through his brogues, as if anxious for freedom; and to complete the singularity of this strange figure, his vacant face was incrusted with filth, his bristly beard unshorn,--

And stuck in his mouth of capacious dimensions, That never to similar shape had pretensions, A pipe he sustain'd, short and jetty of hue, Thro' which the dense clouds of tobacco he drew.

This apparition stalking onwards to our admiring triumvirate,--"May be,"

said he, "your honor can be after telling me,--will your honor be Sir Felix O'Grady of Munster, that is, long life to it?"--"The same, by the powers of my father who begot me!" exclaimed the baronet: "sure enough I am Sir Felix O'Grady that is, not that will be!" "Erin ma vorneen!"

rejoined the enquirer,--"the pot of Saint Patrick be upon you, and may your honor live all the days of your life, and many years longer, if that's all!--Arrah, but I'm plased to my heart's content to meet wid your honor in a strange land!"

The congregated expectants now approached, and respectfully united their congratulations with those of their respectable deputy.--"The pot of Saint Patrick be upon you, and may your reverence live for ever and a day afterwards!" It was in vain that Sir Felix offered them money. "No, the devil a drap would they taste, unless it was wid his honor's own self, by the holy poker!"

There was no remedy; so Sir Felix, with his friends Dash all and Tallyho, who were much amused by this ~130~~unsophisticated manifestation of Irish recognition, accompanied the motley groupe to the blue-ruin shop.{1}

[Ill.u.s.tration: page130 Blue Ruin Shop]

Entering then, the neighbouring den, of a licensed retailer of destruction, the first object on whom the scrutinizing eye of the baronet cast a glance, was his servant, regaling himself and his blowen with a gla.s.s of the "right sort." The indignant Sir Felix raised his cane, and was about to inflict a well-merited chastis.e.m.e.nt, when the transgressor, deprecating the wrath of his master, produced the full amount of the cheque in mitigation of punishment, expressing his obligations to mother c.u.mmings for the preservation of the property.

"And who, in the devil's name," asked the baronet, "is mother c.u.mmings?"{2}

"Och! a good sowl," said the valet, "for all that, she keeps convanient lodgings. And so your honor, just having got a drap too much of the cratur last night, this girl and I took up our lodgings at mother c.u.mmings's: good luck to her any how! And if your honor will but forgive me this once, I will, as in duty bound, serve you faithfully by night and by day, in any or in no way at all at all, and never will be guilty of the like again as long as I live, gra."

1 Blue-ruin, alias English Gin.--Not unaptly is this pernicious beverage so denominated. It is lamentable to observe the avidity with which the lower orders of society in London resort to this fiery liquid, destructive alike of health and morals. The consumption of gin in the metropolis is three-fold in proportion to what it was a few years ago.

Every public-house is now converted into "Wine Vaults," as they are termed, which the venders of poison and their account in; it is true, that the occupants are compelled to sell beer also, but in many of these receptacles, there is not even sitting room, and "something short," is thus the resource of men, women, and even children!

2 This discreet matron has realized a very daccnt competency, by keeping, in the Holy Land, a house of accommodation for _single, men and their wives_.--When a couple of this description require the asylum of her hospitable roof, she demands possession of all the money which the male visitor may have about him. This conceded, it is told over, and carefully sealed up in the presence of its owner, and left for the night in charge of the prudent landlady. The party is then shewn into a room, and in the morning the money is forth-coming to its utmost farthing.

~131~~ Circ.u.mstances considered, and as this had been his first offence, the servant, at the intercession of Dashall, was let off with a reprimand only, and ordered home, a mandate which he instantly and with many expressions of grat.i.tude obeyed.

The baronet having adjusted this business to his satisfaction, directed his attention to his newly acquired Munster friends, whom he not only treated with a liberal potation of aqua vitae, but in the warmth of his kindly feelings, actually drank with them, a condescension infinitely more acceptable to the generous nature of these poor-people, than was the more solid proof which he left them of his munificence; and of which, until absolutely forced upon them, they long and pertinaciously resisted the acceptance.

Our party pursuing their route, entered Holborn, and ordered refreshment at the George and Blue Boar Coffee-House; a place of excellent accommodation, and convenient for persons coming from the West of England.

Here, while our perambulators amused themselves in conversation on the occurrences of the morning, a chaise and four drove rapidly into the yard, the postillions decorated with white ribbons, "denoting," said Dashall, "the successful denouement, perhaps, of a trip to Gretna Green." His conjecture was correct; the happy pair just arrived, had been rivetted in the ties of matrimony by the far-famed blacksmith of Gretna.{1}

1 In tracing the pursuits of needy and profligate adventurers, with whom this vast metropolis abounds beyond that of any other capital in the world, wife-hunting is not the least predominant. This remark we cannot better ill.u.s.trate than by introducing to the notice of our readers, the following extraordinary detail, exhibiting in High Life, atrocious premeditated villainy, and in the mediocrity of female rank extreme and fatal cupidity.

An anecdote has come to our knowledge within the last few days which we think calls for publicity, as it may tend to place on their guard those tender-hearted spinsters whose sensibility of feeling may induce them for a moment to forget that prudence which is at all times the best safeguard of their s.e.x. The circ.u.mstances which we shall describe are considered quite unique among certain orders of the sporting world; and the Hero of the Tale, from the das.h.i.+ng completion of his plan, has obtained no small importance in the eyes of his a.s.sociates.

To our purpose;--About a fortnight back, a person, we will not call him a gentleman, the first letter of whose name is not far re-moved from the last letter of the alphabet, and who has been particularly distinguished for the das.h.i.+ng, although not very meritorious affairs in which he has been engaged, both on the turf and the road, as well as in the stable, found himself (to use one of his own fas.h.i.+onable phrases,) "hard up." In plain terms, his Exchequer was completely exhausted, and what was worse, his credit was altogether "out at the elbows." All ordinary, and, indeed, almost all extraordinary modes of "raising the wind," had long since been worn threadbare. Something, however, must be done; and to be "well done," it must be "done quickly." A happy thought struck him. He had heard of a lady, some few years beyond her "teens," who was possessed of a pretty round sum; he could not ascertain exactly how much, in her own right. This was a prize which he thought it would be most desirable to obtain. It was true, the lady was past that age when pa.s.sion is not at all times to be con-trolled; but then certainly not so far advanced as to have abandoned all hope of obtaining an agreeable husband, or not to be perfectly convinced that her attractions ent.i.tled her to entertain such an expectation. The only difficulty which suggested itself, was the mode of introduction. Two heads are better than one, and our hero called in a friend, to whom he unfolded his scheme, and whose advice and a.s.sistance he immediately bespoke. The friend had no scruples on the subject, and at once became a partner in the plot. Means were found to overcome the first impediment, and behold our two gentlemen in the presence of the fair object of their attack. The princ.i.p.al was immediately introduced as the son of Sir George ----, a highly respectable Baronet of the same name, but of a very different character. His manners were chastened for the occasion, his appearance fas.h.i.+onable, and his address distinguished by a warmth which the acknowledged purpose of his visit, that of soliciting the honor of being permitted to pay his addresses, in some measure justified. The lady was not displeased: to all appearance the connexion, which was thus offered to her was most nattering; the son of a baronet, and one especially who had expressed himself in a most disinterested manner, was not to be dismissed without due deliberation; she, therefore, with becoming frankness, consented to grant another interview on the ensuing day. The friends were punctual to the time appointed, and came in the carriage (_pro tempore_) of the suitor. They were shown into the drawing-room, and the conversation was mutually pleasing. At length our hero proposed to the lady to take a short airing in his carriage. At first she exhibited the usual coyness at such an invitation from one, to whom she was almost a stranger; but was ultimately bantered into a consent, and accordingly dressed for a ride. Having taken her seat between the two gentlemen, they engaged her on such topics as they thought most amusing, and the time pa.s.sed so agreeably that she scarce knew where she was going, till she had arrived at Barnet, on the north road. They stopped at one of the princ.i.p.al inns, and alighting, a slight cold repast was ordered. The convenient friend shortly after quitted the apartment to look to the horses, and the _soi- disant_ son of the Baronet instantly commenced an a.s.sault upon the lady's heart, which it would seem, was but too well received. He protested that he had long sighed at a distance, without having the courage to confess his flame; and, in short, that he could not exist unless she became his. The lady, whatever might be the feelings of her heart, laughed at the warmth of his declarations. This only induced him to become more impetuous; and at last, as a proof of his sincerity, he proposed, as they were so far on the north road, that they should order four horses, and set off at once to Gretna Green. This produced additional merri-ment on the part of the lady, which, as there was no specific refusal, was taken for consent; and on the return of the friend, he received a wink, which instructed him in the course he was to pursue, and in a moment, four horses were clapped to the travelling chariot in which they had arrived.