The Lure of Old London Part 10

In the model of old London Bridge Mrs. D. found something with which she is now familiar, and my character for veracity with her went up by leaps and bounds. The spiked heads on the battlements might have belonged to objectionable relatives, with such satisfaction did she greet them. The model of the old bridge clothed the dry bones of the past with flesh, and Mrs. D., as a student of history, got a move on.

One can sympathise with her scepticism when one looks across at Bankside with its gabled houses sleeping in the sunlight, and the glimpse of a white country road shaded by green trees. That, Bankside! Surely, never!

I did not voice the thought, not wishing to quench the flax of the old lady's newly acquired faith.

The fire of London next engaged her attention. To myself it is the least successful of the models, although I confess to a childish pleasure in watching old St. Paul's and its neighbourhood all aglow, like one of those pictures one sees in the heart of a burning log. I thought, as I looked at it, of the words of a writer of the times, quoted by Walter Thornbury. "It was in the depth and the dead of the night," says the Rev. Samuel Vincent, "when most doors and senses were lockt up in the city, that the fire doth break forth and appear abroad." This is just the thing one would expect of those "penny dreadful" days, and the progress of the ghastly monster is described with a living terror as it "rusheth down the hill (Fish Street Hill) towards the bridge, crosseth Thames Street, invadeth Magnus Church at the bridge foot ... marcheth back towards the city again, and runs along with great noise and violence through Thames Street westward.... Rattle, rattle, rattle, was the noise which the fire struck upon the ear round about, as if there had been a thousand iron chariots beating upon the stones.... You might see in some places whole streets at once in flames, that issued forth as if they had been so many great forges from the opposite windows, which, folding together, were united in one great flame throughout the whole street; and then you might see the houses tumble, tumble, tumble from one end of the street to the other with a great crash, leaving the foundations open to the view of the heavens."

There was nothing half-hearted in the thrills provided for Londoners in _those_ days, and the quaint little toy behind the plate gla.s.s revives a ghostly repet.i.tion of them to an imaginative spectator. Mrs. D. said she hadn't seen "anythink so pretty for a long time," and I left her glued to the spot while I looked at Frost Fair on the Thames, with the Globe Theatre behind, and sought in vain to find any of to-day in the models of old Cheapside and Charing Cross.

I got Mrs. D. away from the Great Fire with a promise of prison cells and relics of Newgate, and I must admit to a sensation myself when face to face with the door of the condemned cell of Newgate Prison. This particular corner of the Museum makes a bid for popularity with those with a taste for horrors. The prison cells from Neptune Street, in which debtors were confined for indefinite periods for small debts, are an example of old London's cruelty to those of its unfortunate citizens who couldn't pay their way. "Sly House," as the place was called, because of the many who were seen to enter it and never seen to leave it, must have been an object of terror to the impecunious. "Sly House" possessed a subterranean pa.s.sage to the Tower and the docks, and prisoners were taken thence and embarked on the convict ship _Success_. The wooden walls are scored with the names of some of those wretched human beings who pa.s.sed months and years in this living tomb. Apparently, they were not all treated as is the man who lies chained from both wrists in the outer cell. He could not have found temporary diversion from his misery in such a task, but this other sitting at a table in the inner cell might answer to one of those names. It is rather difficult to decipher them in the dim light of the lantern which hangs in a corner of the cell, and as I stooped forward my foot inadvertently came in contact with the foot of the frowsy prisoner seated at the table. For an instant I was conscious of an odd sensation of something like fear: not fear of the poor lay figure, but fear of those dark days which, in some curious fashion, the momentary contact had brought _quite close_. It was as if I had stroked a stuffed tiger and it had suddenly snarled and showed its teeth! Quite absurd, of course; a touch of Frankenstein, born of my ambition to make the dry bones live.

There is a portrait sketch of Jack Sheppard by Sir James Thornhill in the adjoining room. The audacious young rascal has a curious face in which there is intellect, even soul, and an animal sort of alertness, and the account of his daring escape from Newgate, where he was loaded with irons and chained to a staple in the floor, reads like a page from Dumas. He had, too, the sort of luck that attends heroes in fiction when he found that small nail with which he freed his chain from the floor staple. This done he got up the chimney, broke into a room over the chapel with the aid of another large nail, which was provided by Providence for the purpose, and with the help of an iron spike from the chapel door, hacked a hole in the wall, through which he climbed on to the leads. One holds one's breath when, these obstacles surmounted and liberty almost within his grasp, Jack is confronted with the need of a rope, and goes back to his cell by the way he had come to fetch his blanket! It is not only the courage, but the optimism of the act which strikes one, an optimism which was justified. He got the blanket, made the rope, and with its aid descended to the roof of a turner who lived in a house adjoining the prison. One must bear in mind, too, that Jack was still handicapped by his irons! Picture him, having effected an entrance into the turner's house by means of a garret window, slinking down the stairs, past closed doors which might open any moment to wreck his project at the moment of consummation.

According to that same account of his escape, a woman heard the c.h.i.n.k of his irons as he pa.s.sed one of those doors, and thought it was the cat!

Maybe she was sitting by the fire nursing her baby, or reading some tale of adventure, little dreaming that as exciting a story as any in fiction was being enacted at her elbow.

One hears with regret that Jack's liberty was short-lived. Not a week had pa.s.sed before he was at his old game of burglary, and being captured whilst drunk was once more imprisoned in Newgate, only to leave it this time to be hanged at Tyburn.

Whilst I sought to read the riddle of the young reprobate's strange physiognomy, Mrs. Darling was browsing with dark satisfaction amongst the murder trials and executions. There she stood, spectacles on the tip of her nose, hat perched at a jaunty angle, her lips forming the words of the "Sorrowful Lamentation and last Farewell to the world of four robbers," as she read:--

Four hopeless youth this day I tell In Newgate dark and drear.

O, hear their last and sad farewell To part this world of care.

On Tuesday next, that awful day Which fast approaches nigh, All in their prime of youthful years They must prepare to die.

"Ain't it 'eart renderin'!" she exclaimed, as I looked over her shoulder. "I reckon the man who said, 'Wot's got over the devil's back is spent under 'is belly,' wasn't very far wrong neither."

Upstairs we came to a halt before the gla.s.s case in which Queen Victoria's historic dresses are placed, beginning with the wedding dress, and continuing with the gowns the Queen had worn at great functions during those first years of her marriage. I invariably spend a few meditative moments before the yellowed satin wedding dress and the white silk which the bride had worn at dinner on that last day of spinsterhood.

The heart of just a girl beat beneath those stiff little bodices. She had the world at her feet, and it was the day of her mating with her hero. I must admit that, to myself, "Albert" has never appeared in a romantic light. Perhaps it's the fault of the "Memorial". Where is the man who could live down the Albert Memorial? The adoring queen did her dead husband an ill turn when she sought to immortalise him in such fashion.

Ah, well! the adored and the adorer are both in their graves now, and here, ironic fact, the bride's faded finery, after being laid away in lavender for years, has emerged from seclusion to enact the new role of relic.

"Now, if that'd bin _me_," remarked Mrs. Darling, as she stared at the ivory satin dress, "I should 'ave took orf that real lace, which must be worth _pounds and pounds_, and put on a nice himitation."

"Well, I'm glad it _wasn't_ you," I retorted.

The old lady winked at an attendant who was standing near, and I left her to complete the conquest while I paid a visit to the "Georgian dinner party". Those diners linger over their dessert an unconscionable time. I wished I had the chance to help them out with the wine and the biscuits. The red wine in the tall gla.s.ses, the cakes and fruit, tantalise a hungry man who stares at them through the gla.s.s. The gentlemen of the party apparently don't take tea. Three cups and saucers only stand in front of the hostess, who is about to pour out.

One of the guests has risen and placed his gla.s.s of wine on the mantelpiece. I imagine him the spokesman of the party. The museum was almost deserted, everybody having gone to lunch. I could hear Mrs.

Darling's laugh in the distance. She and the attendant seemed to have a good deal to say to each other; but in the corner where I stood there was no one to disturb the Georgian ladies and gentlemen at their talk.

Their voices, speaking through the tunnel of nearly two hundred years, were an atmosphere rather than a sound, and I was making an effort to interpret it when Mrs. D. reappeared. She said she was sorry to have kept me waiting, but the man to whom she had been talking knew the barber who used to shave her husband when he had "bin on the drink," and judging from her air of pleasant pre-occupation the encounter seemed to have had a cheering effect.

I noticed, as she spoke, that her eyes wandered hungrily to the Georgian dinner table, and I suggested that after we had had a look at the top floor we should go and get some lunch. An idea had suddenly occurred to me of steak pudding at the "Cheshire Cheese". Mrs. D., I felt, would appreciate the homeliness of that place of entertainment.

There's a nice little furnished flat on the top floor of the Museum which would suit me "down to the ground," as Mrs. D. expresses it. One is not allowed to go inside and explore, and from where I stood I could only catch tantalising glimpses of the three rooms it contained. In one was an old four-poster standing cosily in a corner that seemed made to hold it. To the right, through an open door, I caught a slant glimpse of a fine apartment in which stood a magnificent old carved sideboard, two ancient wooden chairs, and some pictures in oval gilt frames on the panelled walls.

An opening into the third room, of which I could see just a corner lit by a small-paned window, excited my curiosity still more. The flat had no doubt been so staged with an idea of enhancing its desirableness. A touch of mystery is as provocative in a house as it is in a woman. What old Wemmick did with his drawbridge and his cannon is an instance of what can be done by condescending to make believe.

As I continued to stare, a face appeared at the small-paned window lighting the mysterious room. It was Mrs. Darling's face, grimacing mischievously. How did she get there? I walked to the end of the corridor and turned to the left, turned again, and behold, the secrets of room three were revealed. A prim faded apartment with an open spinet, old wooden chairs standing stiffly against the panelled wall, an alcove in which old china was ranged, and needlework pictures.

Mrs. Darling had again disappeared, and I stood for some time taking stock of the contents of the room three and room two from this new point of vantage. I was rather sorry I had wrested their secrets from them.

All Mrs. D.'s fault. It was just like her to find a prosaic solution whilst I was making mysteries out of nothing. There she was again, signalling from the spot where I had stood a few minutes before. She seemed to be inviting me to a game of hide and seek, but a sense of dignity, and fear of the attendants, prevented my accepting the challenge.

On our way downstairs we went into Room Four to see the relics of the Great Plague. There is a bell used by the men in charge of the death carts, when they went round calling their awful summons, "Bring out your dead!" That old rusty bell with the long wooden handle could tell a tale of horror if its iron tongue could speak our language. What sights it has seen as the dead cart rumbled through the dark, narrow streets of ancient London, and the bell rang its accompaniment to the bell-man's fearful chant. Doors would open and lights shine out across the pavement. The stricken silence of the night would be broken by stealthy movements and smothered voices, shapeless, horrible burdens would exchange hands, and the cart continue its way over the cobbles to the awful goal of the plague pits. Perhaps it's well that rusty old bell _can't_ speak!

There are also the Bills of Mortality, and remedies prescribed as preventive measures (boiled milk with two cloves of garlick, was one I noticed), also two fuming pots, in which charcoal was burnt: one found at Moorfield and one in Town Ditch, Broad Street.

In a healthy reaction from the horrors of the Plague, Mrs. D. insisted on having another look at the model of the Great Fire before we left the Museum. It was only by reminding her that the "Cheshire Cheese" was a "pub," and closed at three o'clock, that I at last succeeded in getting her away from the fascinating toy.

It is now past 1 A.M., and as I have been writing ever since 10 P.M., I must leave the account of our visit to the "Cheese" till my next. Mrs.

Darling is, presumably, sleeping the sleep of the just, and I hope not disturbed by anything worse than dreams of the Great Fire. To lay any ghosts of _that man_ with the rusty old bell who may haunt my own thoughts, and yours, I quote dear old Herrick's words of another and happier "Bell Man":--

From noise of scare-fires rest ye free, From murders, Benedicite; From all mischances that may fright Your pleasing slumbers in the night, Mercy secure ye all, and keep The goblin from ye, while ye sleep.

Past one o'clock, and almost two-- My masters all, good day to you!

Yours ever,

GEORGE.

CHAPTER XII

CARRINGTON MEWS, SHEPHERD MARKET, _24th February._

My Dear Agatha,--To take up my story where I dropped it the other night.... You can approach the "Cheshire Cheese" either by the front door in Wine Office Court or by the back door in Cheshire Court. I prefer the tunnel-like pa.s.sage leading to the back door, it seems a more fit means of transporting one from Fleet Street of to-day to the Fleet Street of 1667.

Mrs. D.'s visions of bread and cheese gave place to something more appetising as the combined odours of steak puddings, mutton chops, baked potatoes, and Irish stew greeted our entrance into the narrow pa.s.sage where waiters jostled each other and hurled orders, like invectives, at the kitchen upstairs. Walls, panelled to the ceiling, old rough benches, sawdusted floors, a glowing fire burning in the large old-fashioned grate--_this_ was the "Cheshire Cheese" of two hundred and fifty years ago. One crosses the threshold of this homely tavern, and in the twinkling of an eye is admitted to an intimacy with the rude comfort of the past. Brisk waiters were pouring sparkling ale into tankards, and placing before customers plates containing helpings generous enough to satisfy the appet.i.te of a starving man. In the box in the corner, curtained off by a faded crimson frill from the rest of the room, were two vacant places, which Mrs. D. and I took, and from my seat there I could watch the gentleman in the morning coat who serves The Pudding. It occupies the place of honour in the middle of the room, together with an enormous joint of good old English roast beef. The Pudding resembles a mountain of the volcanic order, and into its steaming crater the server, after having cut slices of crust from its sides, delves deep with a long-handled silver ladle, bringing up savoury portions of the mysterious contents.

The waiter brought the menu, but we did not need to study it. To go to the "Cheshire Cheese" without having some of The Pudding is to explore a wine vault without tasting of the vintage stored in the old barrels. By the way, if you want a napkin at "The Cheese" you have to ask for it.

The presence of pewter on the tables, and the absence of napkins, is all part of the ritual which strives to keep alive the spirit of those days when, rumour has it, Dr. Johnson frequented the place. As to whether he ever did is one of those disputed points of history which furnish material for conjecture and research with the student of old times.

Those who say he _didn't_ base their a.s.sumption chiefly on the fact that Boswell never mentioned the "Cheshire Cheese," but even Boswell did not record what Johnson had for dinner every day, or how often he visited his barber. Also, Johnson may have given up frequenting the "Cheshire Cheese" before he knew Boswell. Seeing that Johnson lived just round the corner, it is only reasonable to suppose that now and again he might drop in, especially as his friend Goldsmith, whose visits to the tavern are usually granted, lived almost opposite it. Picture the Doctor, fed up with his collection of quarrelsome old women--Mrs. Williams, Mrs.

Desmoulins, Miss Carmichael--not to mention Levet, the eccentric apothecary (Good G.o.d, Agatha! was there ever such a victim to good nature?)--Picture him, on some bitter winter's night, putting on his c.o.c.ked hat, his greatcoat and m.u.f.fler, taking his stout stick, and banging the door of his asylum behind him with a grunt of satisfaction.

How the wind howls through the dark courts! But there are ruddy lights in the windows of "The Cheese," and inside a blazing fire, the smoke from a dozen churchwardens, the scent of hot punch, and last but not least, listeners and the companionship of congenial spirits. Whatever Johnson may have done in his life, he certainly haunts the old place in death. One cannot turn one's eyes in any direction without encountering mementoes of the old lexicographer, and there is the bra.s.s tablet set in the wall over "The Favourite Seat of Dr. Samuel Johnson". You can't get away from that! "Deny it who can!" says the tablet defiantly, and it suddenly occurred to me that here is another task for Paul Pry--a task more fascinating even than the quest of the "curious sculptured figure,"

which disappeared so strangely from St. Ethelburga's, Bishopsgate. One could make it the work of a lifetime to find out if Dr. Johnson was in the habit of frequenting the "Cheshire Cheese". Meanwhile, perhaps the problem would have been solved by accident. Some descendant of one of the Doctor's correspondents finds an old letter amidst a bundle of dusty doc.u.ments that had not seen the light of day for many a long year--a letter in which the Doctor, after giving a vivid account of the Gordon Riots, congratulates himself that Bolt Court is so near the "Cheshire Cheese," it not being safe for respectable citizens to be much abroad in the streets at nights. The letter would be put up to auction, and the "Cheshire Cheese" would run up the bidding....

The waiter placed before me a portion of The Pudding, and Mrs. D.

brought me back to realities to ask what I imagined was in it. I told her there was steak in it, oysters, kidneys, and larks, and she said it wasn't fair to the birds. She also subsequently became of the opinion that it wasn't fair to the eaters, when she suffered embarra.s.sment from the tiny bones of the larks. If it was a bloater, said she, you'd know what you were about, and where to look for the bones, but bones in a beef-steak pudding, where you didn't expect them, were a trap for the unwary. I rea.s.sured her that I had never heard of an accident, and I had lunched and dined many times at "The Cheese," but I regret to say that The Pudding, from Mrs. D.'s point of view, was not a success.

When paying the bill I said something to the waiter about the Familiar Spirit of the place, and he suggested that we should visit the rooms above. He then went out into the sawdusted pa.s.sage by the bar, and in exactly the same tone of voice as that with which he ordered chops and steaks, shouted up the stairs, "Charlie, a gentleman to see The Chair".

Whereupon up we went, gathering sawdust on the soles of our shoes as we climbed the twisted staircase, past the kitchen (where The Pudding is cooked in a huge copper boiler which is kept going all night)--at this moment the fizzling, sputtering, steaming scene of a score of culinary activities--past a grandfather clock in the corner which is older than Dr. Johnson himself, and into the room where stands the original chair used by Dr. Johnson at the Mitre Tavern in Chancery Lane, which place, I need hardly add, exists no longer.

There the old chair stands, wide enough and st.u.r.dy enough to hold the ponderous form in the snuff-coloured coat with the bra.s.s b.u.t.tons. I hope the wearer of that coat had many a pleasant hour within the wooden arms, now empty with an emptiness never more to be filled apparently. The chair, alas! is enclosed in a gla.s.s case, no doubt a necessary precaution, but one which must effectually keep the ghost out of his seat. No self-respecting ghost could condescend to enter a gla.s.s case.

_I_ should have had the chair standing in a corner of the room where, in some quiet hour, the Doctor might seat himself for a while to recall bygone times in a spot where yesterday still defies to-day.

A night at the "Cheshire Cheese," by the way, might be prolific in ghostly adventure. That grandfather clock on the staircase would have something to say. A clock is, to me, the mouthpiece of a silent house, and after I had visited the bar, to help myself to a drink, and had sat for a while in the Doctor's seat in the dark coffee-room, I should mount the stairs softly, taking the clock unawares. Old clocks are given to thinking aloud, and there's no telling what this one might not reveal.

But I am forgetting--the house would not be as silent as I had been picturing it. There would be another sound close at hand, one to which no stretch of the imagination could impute a ghostly interpretation: the sound of _The Pudding_ bubbling and rumbling in the copper boiler! And the ghosts would reasonably wish to avoid the reminder of a feast in which they are no longer able to partic.i.p.ate. Nevertheless, I shall put the "Cheshire Cheese" on the list of places I intend to visit when I'm a ghost myself. Meanwhile, I am just going out to post this and buy an evening paper. It therefore behoves me, dear Agatha, to say,