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The person charging this material is re- 
 sponsible for its return to the library from 
 which it was withdrawn on or before the 
 Latest Date stamped below. 
 
 Theft, mutilation, and underlining of books 
 
 are reasons for disciplinary action and may 
 result in dismissal from the University. 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 
 
 L161— 0-1096 
 
ENGLISH PHOTOGRAPHS. 
 
LONDON: 
 ROBSON AND SON, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W. 
 
ENGLISH PHOTOGRAPHS 
 
 BY 
 
 AN AMERICAN. 
 
 O, ENGLAND !—model to thy inward greatness, 
 Like little body with a mighty heart,— 
 
 What mightst thou do, that honour would thee do, 
 Were all thy children kind and natural ! 
 
 But see thy fault! SHAKESPEARE. 
 LONDON: 
 TINSLEY BROTHERS, 18 CATHERINE ST. STRAND. 
 | 1869. 
 
 [All rights reserved, | 
 
TO 
 
 CHARLES DICKENS, ESQ. 
 
 WITH 
 
 HEARTY ADMIRATION AND AFFECTION. 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2022 with funding from 
 University of Illinois Uroana-Champaign Alternates 
 
 https://archive.org/details/englishphotograpOOfisk 
 
PREFACH. 
 
 AFTER a series of articles has appeared in a popular 
 English Magazine, and has met with a certain de- 
 eree of success, there comes a demand that they 
 shall be republished in book-form. In obedience to 
 such a demand the following Papers are now re- 
 printed from Trystry’s Macazine. They have been 
 very carefully collated and corrected, and some of 
 them have been partially rewritten and considerably 
 enlarged. 
 
 I have read attentively all the criticisms upon 
 them in the English and American journals; and 
 while I am deeply grateful for the kindness that has 
 rendered the most of these criticisms favourable, I 
 have endeavoured to show my gratitude in the most 
 practical manner by making the various emenda- 
 tions, additions, and revisions which have been sug- 
 gested, wherever, after due reflection, they seemed 
 to be more accurate than my original statements, 
 or more reliable than my previous information. 
 
 The primary intention of these Papers was to 
 
Vill Preface. 
 
 give my own countrymen exact descriptions of Eng- 
 lish manners, habits, and customs as they appeared 
 to an American newly arrived in Great Britain. 
 But as these articles were to be first published in 
 a London Magazine, the large majority of whose 
 readers are Englishmen, it was deemed advisable 
 to strengthen the descriptions by placing alongside 
 of them certain American contrasts. The off-hand 
 style of the writing will seem the more suitable 
 when you remember that such great authors as 
 Irving, Hawthorne, and Emerson have already dealt 
 with portions of the same subjects. Perhaps there 
 is little that is new in these pages; but I have at 
 least tried to put the facts in a new form. 
 
 The title of this book, which may be regarded 
 as too fanciful, is really not altogether inappropriate. 
 The descriptions are vivid, instantaneous first im- 
 pressions, softened and tinted by subsequent experi- 
 ences. ‘They are, alas! too much like photographs 
 in. often lacking the life and colour of the things 
 described. JI am painfully sensible, also, of the in- 
 completeness of this volume; but console myself 
 with the knowledge that it would require a library 
 of such books to convey even a faint idea of Eng- 
 lish life in all its phases. When people turn over 
 the leaves of a photograph album, they exclaim, 
 “O! You have no views of Melrose Abbey!” or 
 ask, ““Why are there no portraits of Bright and 
 
Preface. 1X 
 
 Disraeli?” J anticipate this sort of criticism upon 
 these English Photographs. But there are other 
 albums by better artists which contain an immense 
 variety of other views. With these I neither could 
 nor would attempt to compete. There was room 
 in the world for dear Uncle Toby’s fly; and so there 
 may be for a little volume that is not a guide-book 
 to England, not a selection from Hnglish legendary 
 lore, not a philosophical treatise upon English traits, 
 not an account of the adventures of a traveller in 
 England,—but simply a record of some prominent 
 peculiarities: which first strike an American in the 
 Mother Country. 
 
 All that need be said here has now been said-— 
 with two exceptions: | 
 
 First: I most decidedly claim not to be ranked 
 among those who either see nothing good outside 
 of their native land, or else find fault with foreign 
 manners to flatter the vanity of their own people 
 and for the poor pleasure of penning sharp para- 
 graphs. These pages have been written with a good 
 spirit, and with the hope of doing good. If they 
 are often very frank, they are always meant to be 
 very friendly. Several reforms and improvements 
 which are herein suggested or advocated have been 
 begun since these Papers were first published; and 
 it is my happiness to think that my hands have 
 helped in the work by setting stronger hands in 
 
x Preface. 
 
 motion. I liked England before I came here; I 
 like it better than ever now that I have sojourned 
 here for two years; and I would willingly burn 
 these sheets if I thought there was anything in 
 them to offend a people to whose unvarying kind- 
 ness and hospitality towards Americans generally, 
 and myself personally, I bear most cordial witness. 
 Second: I shall always be very proud of this 
 book—notwithstanding all its defects; in spite of 
 the fact that, like Zoar in the Bible story, ‘it is a 
 little one,” and no matter what may be its reception 
 by the public—because it has been honoured by a 
 dedication to Mr. Cuartus Dickrns, and because it 
 has been thought not unworthy of the editorial 
 supervision of Mr. Epmunp Yartxes. Let no one 
 infer from this mention of their names that these 
 gentlemen indorse all I have said in this volume. 
 Quite the contrary may, perhaps, be the case. But 
 without them these English Photographs would never 
 have existed; and, since I have been fortunate enough 
 to know them, it is evident that my observations have 
 included some of the best representatives of English 
 
 character. 
 STEPHEN FISKE. 
 
 London, Christmas 1868. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 . ENGLISH STEAMERS . 
 
 . ENGLISH RAILWAYS . 
 
 . ENGLISH TRAVELLERS 
 
 . THe Encuish METROPOLIS 
 . ENGLISH CLIMATE 
 
 . ENGLISH Hotes 
 
 . ENGLISH CABS 
 
 ENGLISH JOURNALS . 
 
 . ENGLISH THEATRES 
 
 . ENGLISH SPORTS 
 
 . ENGLISH WoMEN 
 
 . ENGLISH Hovusss 
 
 . THe British PARLIAMENT 
 . ENGLISH CASTES 
 
 . ENGLAND AND AMERICA . 
 
 261 
 
ENGLISH PHOTOGRAPHS. 
 
 PH 
 
 No. I. 
 ENGLISH STEAMERS. 
 
 Durine an after-dinner speech, one of the wittiest 
 of the party with whom I came to England remarked, 
 ‘“‘ We crossed the ocean in the winner of the Atlantic 
 yacht-race of 1866; we arrived at Cowes, and we 
 landed on Christmas; and we should advise all our 
 fellow-countrymen to cross in the same vessel, arrive 
 at the same port, and land on the same day.” My 
 friend was perfectly right; this programme could 
 not be improved upon in the least. 
 
 Landing, then, at Cowes on Christmas Day, my 
 first impressions of England were most cheerful. 
 Dusk had fallen; the lamps of the little town were 
 all alight; from every house came gleams of Christ- 
 mas fires and sounds of Christmas merriment; and 
 at the wharf and along the beach were groups of 
 sturdy townsmen and watermen ready to give us a 
 Christmas welcome. To the telegraph-office, to send 
 
 B 
 
2 Einglish Photographs. 
 
 ‘a message across the seas that we had arrived safe 
 and well; then to the club-house of the Royal Yacht 
 Squadron, where a solitary member, passing a lonely 
 Christmas with his little boy, heartily dispensed the 
 hospitalities of the club; and then we were all taken 
 in charge by a genial citizen of Cowes, and driven 
 off to his residence to join a Christmas party. 
 
 And this was England! Here we were on Eng- 
 lish soil, in an English house, with English men,- 
 women, and children around us, English sports going 
 on, English songs ringing in our ears, and English 
 cheer cordially pressed upon us, and that, too, on 
 the best of all days in England—on Merrie Christ- 
 mas. The dream of a busy life was more than 
 realised at last. Safe from the stormy seas, we 
 seemed to be not only on shore but at home. 
 How handsome all the ladies looked! What won- 
 derful children the English boys and girls appeared 
 to be, with their bright ruddy faces and stout 
 rounded limbs! How jolly and, above all, how 
 comfortable were the large, broad-chested, hearty 
 men, with that queer English accent which con- 
 trasted so strangely with our American twang! 
 These first impressions, this feeling of the home- 
 liness and the comfortableness of old England, will 
 never be forgotten. They are experienced, I be- 
 lieve, in a greater or less degree, by almost all 
 Americans when first visiting this country; but, 
 
English Steamers. 3 
 
 coming as we did, and being received as we were, 
 they are unusually strong and vivid. 
 
 After a long night, during which everything was 
 so new, yet so familiar—so strange, yet so con- 
 genial—so different from New York life, and life 
 on board the yacht, and yet so thoroughly de- 
 lightful—that it seemed like a pleasant vision,—t! 
 left Cowes for London, and began to see the real 
 England. For all the outside world Dickens has 
 created an imaginary island, in which the happy 
 people dance around Maypoles in the summer, and 
 feast upon roast beef and plum-pudding in the 
 winter, and in which, although there may be some 
 poor folk, some wicked folk, and some suffering 
 folk, still the large majority of the population are 
 so rosy, so jovial, and so full of good beer and 
 good-nature, that life is a constant succession of 
 enjoyments. Seen by the light of Christmas fires, 
 and through the aromatic steam of Christmas pud- 
 dings and Christmas grog, as through a fairy fog, 
 England seemed to justify all the fine things that 
 had been said of it; but it assumed rather a less 
 romantic phase in the cold gray of a cheerless 
 December morning, when I put off to catch the 
 steamer for Southampton. The sun, having kept 
 the previous holiday too well, sullenly refused to 
 shine; the dull leaden light made everything look 
 disagreeable ; the fairy fog was succeeded by a 
 
4 English Photographs. 
 
 chilly, damp, morose mist, that soaked through 
 coats and boots remorselessly; and behold! all the 
 pleasing pictures of the night before were blurred 
 in the mind of the shivering voyager, like photo- 
 eraphs taken by an operator afflicted with the ague. 
 No matter; a short pull and we should be aboard 
 the Southampton boat, and find warmth and refresh- 
 ment in its comfortable saloons. Of course the boat 
 was to be like an American North river steamer, 
 with its separate cabins for ladies and gentlemen, 
 its smoking-room, its bar-room, its refreshment-room, 
 its soft carpets and luxurious furniture, its attentive 
 waiters, and its warm ample breakfast. We neared 
 her black hull; the unaccustomed cries of “ Ease 
 her!” “Stop her!” greeted our astonished ears; we 
 climbed, were pushed, were dragged up her wet 
 slippery sides, and instead of the cosy river steamer 
 of America we found organised discomfort and sys- 
 tematic inconvenience. Groups of passengers, as be- 
 numbed and as disconsolate as ourselves, were hud- 
 dled about the sloppy deck. They looked at us 
 mournfully and pityingly, as if they were saying 
 to themselves, “Another victim!” We looked at them 
 and thought, ‘““What horrors must be below if these 
 experienced natives prefer to suffer on deck!” We 
 anxiously inquired if this were the steamer for 
 Southampton? Yes. The regular steamer? Yes. 
 The only steamer to catch the London train? Yes. 
 
English Steamers. 5 
 
 These inquiries, uttered in a plaintive tone, to which 
 the cold added an involuntary stutter, were sym. 
 pathetically answered by a gentleman who had a 
 puddle for a cushion and a drop of rain for a nose- 
 jewel. “Start her!” cried somebody, “Start her!” 
 echoed somebody else, and off we went. 
 
 All the arrangements on board this steamer, as 
 on most other English steamers, were admirably 
 designed to give the utmost possible trouble and 
 discomfort to everybody. Walking up and down in 
 the mist and watching the wet and moody pas- 
 sengers, I noticed that all orders had to be shouted 
 by the pilot to a boy, and by the boy to the helms- 
 man or the engineer. In America the pilot com- 
 municates with the engineer by simply pulling a 
 bell once, twice, or thrice, according to the order 
 he wishes to give. On this boat, as on most other 
 English boats, the pilot or captain stalks about in 
 the cold on a bridge between the paddleboxes, and 
 the helmsman stands shivering at the wheel, exposed 
 to rain or snow or hail. In America both pilot and 
 steersman are under cover, in a little glass room 
 placed near the bow of the boat and commanding 
 a clear view of the course. Such simple conveniences 
 as a bell and a shelter from the weather have not 
 yet suggested themselves to the managers of Hnglish 
 steamers. The whole service is a quarter of a cen- 
 tury behind the age. [Every effort is made, appa- 
 
6 English Photographs. 
 
 rently, to subject the sailors to unnecessary exposure 
 and fatigue, and to render the passengers miserable. 
 The cabins are small, close, uncomfortably furnished, 
 and either insufferably hot or terribly cold. Unless 
 the weather be so fine that pacing the deck is plea- 
 sant, it is impossible to pass one agreeable moment 
 on any of these craft. What we experienced on the 
 Southampton steamer I have since endured on many 
 other English vessels, and notably upon the line 
 between Dover and Calais. The accommodations 
 on the best of the English passenger-boats, with the 
 single exception of the splendid steamers that ply 
 between Holyhead and Ireland, are not equal to 
 those of a second-class American tugboat. The 
 system is a disgrace to a maritime nation. 
 
 In America, for a service like that between Cowes 
 and Southampton, or like that of the penny steamers 
 upon the Thames, instead of these slow, black, dirty 
 vessels, with their exposed decks, their choky cabins, 
 and their cumbrous machinery of a captain, pilot, 
 helmsman, and intermediate boy, all shuffling about 
 in every sort of weather, and sharing with the poor 
 passengers the discomforts of an open-air voyage, we 
 should have a trim, neat, fast steamer, the decks 
 covered with awnings in summer, the cabins large, 
 handsome, and elegantly furnished, the boys em- 
 ployed to wait upon the passengers, instead of 
 serving as human speaking-trumpets or animated 
 
English Steamers. 7 
 
 bell-pulls, and all the arrangements so contrived as 
 to lighten the labours of the crew, and make the 
 trip a pleasure instead of a purgatory for the pas- 
 sengers. What reason is there that boats of this 
 kind should not be adopted in England? On the 
 line between Folkestone and Boulogne some enter- 
 prising English genius has discovered that it is not 
 necessary for a pilot to face a hailstorm or a gale 
 in order to direct the boat properly, and has erected 
 a shield of a couple of planks, with a pane of glass 
 in each plank, so that the pilot may shelter himself 
 behind them and yet see his way into port. The 
 erection of these planks is not a very revolutionary 
 proceeding; the enterprising genius has never sug- 
 gested that, by extending the shield so as to form 
 a room, and then covering it with a roof, the pilot 
 would be more perfectly protected and could see 
 just as well; but, such as it is, the invention is 
 looked upon as a dangerous innovation; no other 
 line has been bold enough to imitate it, and the 
 pilot takes advantage of it clandestinely, if at all, 
 evidently considering that a true British sailor ought 
 to do his work better when he is benumbed with 
 cold, drenched with rain, and blinded with hail- 
 stones. 
 
 Arrived at length at Southampton, we were di- 
 rected to the omnibuses on the wharf which carried 
 
 London passengers to the railway station. After a 
 
8 English Photographs. 
 
 drive of about a minute, the omnibus halted, and 
 we were made acquainted with another beautiful 
 British institution. A man came up to collect toll 
 from the passengers for the privilege of using the 
 pier. There was so much to pay for each person, 
 so much more for each trunk or portmanteau, so 
 much more for each bundle, amounting to a few 
 pence in all, but. necessitating ten minutes’ deten- 
 tion, dreadful squabbles about change, and long 
 arguments over the proper prices for the various 
 articles of luggage. Quite characteristically, one of 
 the Americans in the omnibus took out a handful 
 of silver from his pocket, and offered to pay for the 
 entire party if the toll-collector would only allow 
 the ‘bus to proceed. This novel proposition rather 
 delayed than facilitated matters; for the collector 
 was utterly unable to comprehend it, and the other 
 passengers protested emphatically against it. In fact, 
 a dispute about the toll appeared to be an indis- 
 pensable part of the ceremony of entering South- 
 ampton, and all parties were indignant at any sug- 
 gestion which tended to cut that ceremony short. 
 Obviously, it had never occurred to the steamboat 
 company to make a contract with the company which 
 owned the pier, by which all passengers should pass 
 free with their luggage, adding, if necessary, a trifle 
 to the steamboat fare to cover the cost of the con- 
 tract. As obviously the managers of the omnibus 
 
English Steamers. 9 
 
 company had never thought of paying the toll for 
 all their passengers in a lump, and charging a penny 
 additional fare. Hither of these plans would have 
 saved trouble; and there is nothing which a genuine 
 Briton so thoroughly enjoys as trouble about money, 
 especially when it takes the form of a dispute over 
 a halfpenny. The numerous Chancery suits in which 
 the law expenses exhaust the funds in dispute are 
 only another phase of this national idiosyncrasy. 
 Nevertheless, I must do the proprietors of piers and 
 landing-stages in other parts of England the justice 
 to state that they far surpass the Southampton Com- 
 pany in the preposterousness of their demands. Tor 
 instance, at Putney, where everyone goes to see the 
 boat-racing, you are charged a penny for crossing 
 a narrow bridge, only a few feet long, to reach your 
 steamer, and another penny when you return to 
 land. ‘The owners of the steamers never dream of 
 making any arrangements whatever for your com- 
 fort or convenience, and you must submit to this 
 extortion, charter a row-boat, or lose your passage. 
 
No. I. 
 ENGLISH RAILWAYS. 
 
 Ar Southampton I saw for the first time an English 
 railway train. The conclusions then formed have 
 since been indorsed by observations in all parts of 
 the kingdom, and attentive perusals of the reports 
 of railway companies in the public journals. And 
 first, I noticed that the same unnecessary exposure | 
 of the employés prevails upon the English loco- 
 motives as upon the English steamboats. In Ame- 
 rica, the part of the engine where the drivers and 
 firemen stand is cased-in with glass and comfortably 
 roofed. The men are kept warm by the furnaces, 
 they are protected from the weather, and they are 
 able to see quite as clearly as if they were in the 
 open air. The mammoth American locomotive at 
 the Paris Exposition showed this contrivance splen- 
 didly. Is there any reason why the English drivers, 
 like the English pilots, should be left out in the 
 cold ? Can they run the trains any more safely 
 because the snow is whirling in their faces, or the 
 rain beating down upon their heads ? What is 
 gained by keeping them uncomfortable ? Their 
 
English Railways. 11 
 
 health is endangered, their lives are shortened, their 
 occupation—not particularly enjoyable at the best— 
 is rendered more unpleasant than it need be, and all 
 for no other earthly reason than the tardiness of 
 the English mind to conceive or adopt a sensible 
 idea. J am very fond of riding upon locomotives, 
 and of talking with engine-drivers, and have often 
 asked the men why they are not under cover in the 
 American style. ‘Well, sir,” was the reply, “it 
 never has been done, sir, and we get along pretty 
 well as we are.” Behold the grand British argu- 
 ments against all reforms: “It never has been 
 done’ — ‘We get along pretty well as we are.” 
 Repeated in a thousand forms, adapted to a thou- 
 sand subjects, these are the responses which meet 
 one at every turn in England, and stop the way 
 against every Improvement for a while. In almost 
 the same words, and with invariably the same 
 ideas, the ignorant and the intelligent, the unedu- 
 cated and the enlightened, oppose everything that 
 is new, regarding all novelties with stupid suspicion 
 or stubborn hostility. 
 
 That the English railways do not pay the stock- 
 holders is not at all surprising. The system is ex- 
 pressly contrived to waste as much money as possible. 
 Against the first-class carriages there is nothing to 
 be said. They are the acme of comfort, and are 
 being adopted all over the world. If a passenger 
 
12 English Photographs. 
 
 be willing to pay more money for first-class accommo- 
 dations, he ought to be able to secure them. This 
 principle, universally accepted elsewhere, is now 
 being admitted in America ; and first-class carriages 
 of the English fashion are being introduced upon 
 many of the railways. But why should the second 
 and third class carriages in England be similar in 
 form to those of the first class, the only real differ- 
 ence being in the upholstering ? Why should not 
 the American style of cars be adopted for the second 
 and third class? Look at the saving in room, and 
 consequently in the running expenses and in the 
 wear and tear. Why, too, should -not the first-class 
 carriages be filled as they are on the Continent ? 
 If every seat in every compartment were occupied, 
 an English first-class carriage would comfortably 
 accommodate, say, twenty-four passengers. An Ame- 
 rican carriage of the same size would accommodate 
 fifty or sixty. But, as a matter of fact, the first- 
 class carriages are never full in England. Three 
 or four persons are in one compartment, two in 
 another, and a solitary traveller, who has bribed 
 the guard heavily, has an undisturbed monopoly of 
 a third. Thus, without a penny of advantage to 
 the company, a carriage which ought to convey 
 twenty-four persons is dragged over the line for the 
 convenience of six or seven people. You only pay 
 for the right to a single seat ; but give half-a-crown 
 
English Railways. 13 
 
 to the guard, and you will secure the whole com- 
 partment of six or eight seats. 
 
 The same waste of space, of locomotive power, 
 and of the wear and tear of the line, is observable 
 in the second and third class vehicles, though not to 
 the same extent. But even when the second and 
 third class carriages are filled, they hold about half 
 the number of people that could be seated in an 
 American car of the same size and weight; and 
 with this other great difference: that, whereas second 
 and third class passengers have to be packed very 
 closely in a car of the English style, they can sit 
 comfortably, without packing, in an American car. 
 Again, a great deal of money is thrown away upon 
 unnecessarily heavy trains. The Metropolitan Under- 
 ground Railway, which ought to be the best-paying 
 company in the world, runs engines and cars wihch 
 are fit for service upon the largest and roughest 
 overground railroads. The Underground carriages 
 ought to be as light as omnibuses, instead of being 
 fashioned upon the same model as those of the 
 overground companies. It is through such singular 
 leaks that much of the earnings of the English 
 railway is lost to the bond-holders. 
 
 Then, on account of the absurd want of system 
 in regard to luggage, more wasteful expenses are 
 incurred. At every station there is an army of 
 uniformed porters, all useless and costly. Not that 
 
14 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 I at all object to the uniforms ; on the contrary, I 
 should like to see the employés of the American 
 railways, and, for that matter, of the American 
 Government, in some such neat, distinctive costume. 
 On some lines, baggage is registered upon the con- 
 tinental plan, with expensive printed checks and 
 labels, a man to make out the checks, another to 
 weigh the luggage, and another to paste the labels, 
 and Heaven knows how many more to stand about 
 and look on, and receive sixpences from passengers 
 for these labours. If this device be not adopted,— 
 as is often the case, and notably on the Liverpool 
 and London Railway,—then it becomes a mere mat- 
 ter of chance whether you or somebody else obtain 
 your luggage at the end of the journey, since you 
 have no means of proving, on the instant, that it 
 is yours. But, under the most favourable circum- 
 stances, you must employ and fee a porter. The 
 money given by passengers to these porters would 
 relieve the railway companies from half their em- 
 barrassments if it could be collected for a year. In 
 America there are two copper checks, numbered, 
 for each trunk. One of these checks is strapped 
 to the trunk; the other, with the corresponding 
 number, is given to the passenger. That is the 
 whole system. QOne baggage-master suffices for a 
 station ; all that the porter has to do is to put the 
 trunks in the luggage-van, and he expects no fee 
 
English Railways. 15 
 
 for that. Once checked, your luggage is all right. 
 Nobody can get it except yourself, unless you lose 
 your check. It will remain at the dépdt at which 
 you arrive until you call or send for it. An express 
 agent will take your check in the cars, and. forward 
 the luggage to any hotel or residence, if you please. 
 Why is this system not adopted in England ? What 
 objections to it are there ? It costs nothing, it saves 
 expense, it dispenses with hosts of porters ; it is so 
 safe that lost luggage is as rare as a black swan in 
 America ; and it is so simple that it can be put into 
 operation at a day’s notice on any line. Ah! I 
 forget. There are the usual British objections: 
 “Tt never has been done, sir ; and we get on pretty 
 well as we are.” How sensible and how English ! 
 An American in England misses the sleeping- 
 cars, the “ ladies’ cars,” the smoking-cars, and one 
 or two more travelling comforts to which he has 
 been accustomed, which might be cheaply and 
 advantageously introduced, and which are only 
 withheld on account of the fine old British preju- 
 dice against novelties. In the United States, a 
 person who is obliged to travel all night pays a 
 few shillings extra for a berth in a sleeping-car, 
 and takes his seat there during the day, having a 
 little extra room and comfort for his money. At 
 night his berth is made up by the waiter, who 
 takes charge of his ticket ; he undresses ; he puts 
 
Cae English Photographs. 
 
 out his boots; he goes to sleep; he rests undis- 
 turbed. In the morning he has arrived at his 
 destination: his clothes are brushed and his boots 
 are blacked ; he makes his toilet at a dressing-table 
 in a corner of the car; the waiter will shave him— 
 few Americans shave themselves—if he choose ; he 
 has only to get his breakfast, and go at once to his 
 business. The traveller in England, under the 
 same circumstances, pays a few shillings to the 
 guard for the privilege of having two or three seats 
 instead of one. The guard, who has reduced this 
 means of swindling the railway company to a sys- 
 tem, furnishes him with a couple of sticks, and 
 shows him how to place them across the seats and 
 cover them with the cushions, so as to extemporise 
 a bed. Only two persons can occupy a compart- 
 ment in this way, when there are really seats for 
 six or elght. And so additional cars have to be 
 put on at the various stations. But what does that 
 matter to the guard, who has secured his shillings ? 
 Then, when night comes, the traveller stretches out 
 his legs; covers himself as well as he can; goes to 
 sleep if possible; is waked up a dozen times during 
 the night ; gets up in the morning frowsy, drowsy, 
 and with a cold in his head, and is compelled to 
 go to a hotel and spend a couple of hours in freshen- 
 ing himself up before he is fit even to think of the 
 business which he is in no condition to transact 
 
 yo 
 
English Railways. LG 
 
 that day. Why in the world cannot the English 
 railways have sleeping-cars ? Railway corporations 
 have no souls, of course ; but in America independent 
 companies seized the idea, built the cars, paid the 
 railway companies for the right to attach them to 
 the regular night-trains, and have realised fortunes 
 from the enterprise. Transporters of furniture are 
 able to secure special cars for their goods in Eng- 
 land, and surely anyone can obtain the right to run 
 a sleeping-car, if he pay enough for it. That there 
 is money to be made by such a speculation must 
 be evident to those who have journeyed in England 
 and observed the efforts which passengers make to 
 pass the night without actual suffering, and the 
 amount of extra fare which they vainly pay to 
 guards, to refreshment-saloons, and for drinks and 
 cigars, in order to achieve this result. 
 
 The institution called the “ ladies’ car” is so great 
 an accommodation to both male and female travellers, 
 so entirely inexpensive and so excessively simple, 
 that, until a stranger thoroughly understands how 
 perfectly inaccessible English corporations are to a 
 hint or suggestion of reform, he will never cease to 
 be astonished at the absence of this special carriage. 
 Not only in America, but all over the Continent, no 
 passenger train is considered complete without a 
 ‘ladies’ car.” On the Continent only ladies travel- 
 ling unattended are admitted to this compartment ; 
 
 C 
 
18 English Photographs. 
 
 in America gentlemen may enter when they are 
 accompanying their female friends. It would be a 
 good idea to adopt the continental system for 
 through and night trains, and the American system 
 for day trains that stop at numerous stations. As 
 I have said, the “‘ladies’ car” is a boon to both sexes. 
 A woman travelling alone is confined exclusively to 
 the society of females. She is in no danger of being 
 stared at or spoken to, or in any way insulted by 
 strange men. She can make herself comfortable 
 during the journey, and can sleep undisturbed by 
 apprehensions of intrusion during the night. If she 
 choose to unloose her waist-belt or exchange her 
 shoes for slippers, no considerations of modesty or 
 propriety can interfere. Her male friends, on the 
 other hand, know that she is quite safe and at her 
 ease. Ifthey are travelling by the same train, they 
 can smoke and chat and enjoy themselves in other 
 compartments without any fear of annoying her. So 
 long as they provide her with sufficient refreshments, 
 and occasionally pay their respects to her at the 
 junction stations, they may keep their minds at rest 
 about her while the train is in motion. Observe, 
 too, that there is nothing compulsory ahout the 
 ‘ladies’ car.” Ifa woman would rather be uncom- 
 fortable with her husband, brother, father, or friend, 
 in an ordinary carriage, she is at liberty to take her 
 choice. The gentlemen cannot enter the “ ladies’ 
 
English Railways. 19 
 
 car,” but any lady can enter the gentlemen’s cars. 
 I do not think that a single reasonable objection 
 can be urged against this system, while I know 
 that it has many self-evident advantages, and has 
 given entire satisfaction in France, Germany, Italy, 
 Spain, and the United States. Why it is not adopted 
 in England, only English railway managers can ex- 
 plain. A simple placard labelled, “Tus Carriacn 
 RESERVED FOR Lapis,” and an instruction to the 
 cuard to admit none but women to the car thus 
 labelled, are the complete paraphernalia required. 
 Is it too much to ask an English railway company 
 to try this cheap experiment ? 
 
 When I came to England, two years ago, there 
 were no smoking-cars. ‘The railway companies af- 
 fected to believe, with canny King James, that 
 smoking was a crime; and in their regulations they 
 treated smokers as criminals. Now, to at least five 
 Englishmen out of every ten, a cigar or a pipe, 
 though upon other occasions it may be considered 
 a luxury, is an actual necessity after a dinner and 
 during a journey. I remember that, when the 
 authorities attempted to enforce an odious and un- 
 constitutional excise-law in New York, a very able 
 editor, Mr. George Wilkes, calculated the number 
 of liquor-dealers and the capacity of the city prisons, 
 and then advised the dealers to disobey the law 
 
 simultaneously, since there were not prisons enough 
 
20 English Photographs. 
 
 to hold so many thousand offenders. This shrewd 
 advice was followed, and the law remains a dead- 
 letter. The British public did precisely the same 
 thing in regard to smoking in railway-trains. There 
 were not prisons enough in Great Britain to con- 
 fine all the railway smokers. Some conspicuous 
 transeressor, like Lord Ranelagh, who made him- 
 self a martyr to his cigars, was arrested now and 
 then, and forced to pay forty shillings; but doubt- 
 less, if the truth were known, the judges who en- 
 forced the fines had themselves broken the law; just 
 as a certain justice acknowledged from the bench 
 that he had always been in the habit of using a 
 railway-key, although his duty compelled him to 
 punish another gentleman for having one in his 
 possession. 
 
 Theoretically, then, the railway companies fined 
 you forty shillings if you smoked a cigar on 
 the train; practically, you tipped the guards and 
 smoked as many cigars as you liked. The com- 
 panies were thus placed in this dilemma: they 
 must either connive at the violation of their own 
 rules by their employés and the public, or else ar- 
 rest the majority of the male passengers in every 
 train. Such a position was ridiculous; but the 
 companies selected the former alternative. At last, 
 after frequent expositions of this state of affairs in 
 Tinsleys’ Magazine and in the daily press, Parlia- 
 
English Railways. pt 
 
 ment passed an Act obliging every railway company 
 to provide smoking-compartments in its passenger 
 trains. Never was a measure more obviously sensi- 
 ble. On Spanish railways gentlemen smoke every- 
 where; on Italian and German railways they smoke 
 in every car where there are no English ladies; on 
 French and English railways they smoke in every 
 car where there are no ladies; in America they 
 have a car to themselves, more or less elegantly 
 upholstered, and the remainder of the train 1s left 
 to the non-smokers, with no odour of yesterday’s 
 fumigation to offend their nostrils, and no cigar- 
 ashes to soil their dresses. Is not this the most 
 sensible plan? Some American smoking-cars are 
 fitted up with card-tables, chess-tables, and files of 
 newspapers; all are sufficiently comfortable. Was 
 there any reason, except the British reason that 
 it has never been done before, why almost every 
 English railway company should refuse to extend 
 the convenience of a smoking-car to its patrons ? 
 
 But now the railway companies regard this Act 
 of Parliament as an outrage, endeavour by every 
 means to evade it, and, since they can no longer for- 
 
 bid smoking, resort to petty attempts to annoy the 
 
 oO? 
 smokers. In a new series of regulations they call 
 attention to the fact that the parliamentary Act ex- 
 tends to the trains alone, and they announce severe 
 
 penalties upon everybody found smoking inside a 
 
22 English Photographs. 
 
 station. Consequently, if you have a lighted cigar 
 or pipe when you reach a dépét, you are compelled 
 to put it out and light another when you enter the 
 ear. If at any country station you are obliged to 
 await the arrival of a train, you are not allowed to 
 smoke upon the premises of the company. No cigar- 
 stands are permitted inside the stations, and the 
 cigars sold at the refreshment-saloons are so bad that 
 it is not too great a stretch of fancy to infer that 
 they are selected by the railway officials with the 
 sole object of discouraging smoking. On some lines 
 the smoking-compartments are labelled inside, so 
 that you are still forced to fee the guards or porters 
 to find your hayen of refuge. On all lines the old 
 style of carriages is retained for the smokers, and is 
 only distinguished from the others by small, movable 
 labels. This device has two objectionable results. 
 In the first place, the officials are able to crowd two 
 or three ladies into a smoking-compartment at the 
 last moment, in spite of the pathetic cries and heart- 
 rending appeals of the smokers, and thus you are 
 compelled, out of politeness to the ladies, to give up 
 your right to smoke in that carriage. In the second 
 place, as the cushions on the seats and sides of the 
 smoking-compartment are made of cloth stuffed 
 with hair or wool, they are admirably adapted to 
 retain the fumes of the tobacco. After a few fumi- 
 gations the cushions become saturated with that 
 
English Railways. 23 
 
 odour of dead tobacco, which is quite as offensive to 
 smokers as to non-smokers, and which makes the 
 compartment strongly resemble an old, low taproom. 
 So soon as a carriage is thus infected, the railway 
 officials remove the “‘Smoking-Compartment” label 
 to another part of the train, and fill the nauseous 
 carriage with the general public, whose loud com- 
 plaints are carefully noted in the hope that, by a 
 stern reaction of public opinion, the Act of Parlia- 
 ment favouring smokers will ultimately be modified 
 or repealed. I need scarcely point out that, by the 
 expenditure of a very few pounds, the smoking-cars, 
 like those of America, could be furnished with cush- 
 ions covered with leather and proof against bad 
 odours. Indeed, it would scarcely be worth while to 
 refer to these minor grievances at all, did they not 
 aptly illustrate the strenuous efforts of English rail- 
 way managers to inconvenience their passengers. 
 
 But if in some respects the English railways are 
 inferior to the American, in many others they are 
 unquestionably superior. In America the railway 
 has built up most of the cities, towns, and villages ; 
 but, like a rich old curmudgeon who gives his chil- 
 dren a fortune and insists upon coming to live with 
 them when they are married and settled, it becomes 
 a nuisance for ever afterwards. In England, having 
 had nothing whatever to do with the origin of the 
 places through which it passes, the railway conducts 
 
24. English Photographs. 
 
 itself much more agreeably, ministering to the pro- 
 sperity but not materially interfering with the com- 
 fort of its line of route, except in London, where it 
 bullies everything and everybody, from St. Paul's 
 Cathedral to the driver of a costermonger’s cart, 
 who curses as he sees the words “No thoroughfare,” 
 and the commencement of a railway viaduct. 
 
 To begin at the beginning: there are no such 
 stations, or dépdts as the Americans call them, in the 
 United States as in England. Ido not speak of those 
 gorgeous structures, half hotels and one-fourth con- 
 servatories and the other fourth stations, which are 
 erected in the principal cities here to ruin the rail- 
 way companies and bewilder the admiring traveller, 
 but of the ordinary dépots throughout the kingdom. 
 The worst of them have comfortable accommodations, 
 a refreshment-saloon, and a news-stand, and are so 
 arranged that the most determined suicide would find 
 it difficult to cast himself under the wheels of the 
 steam juggernaut. In America, the ordinary or aver- 
 age dépéot is as uncomfortable as possible; the re- 
 freshment-saloons are only open at hours when food 
 and drink are least required by the travellers; in- 
 stead of a news-stand, they have a news-boy, who 
 passes through the cars with the daily and weekly 
 papers and a few old novels, just at the time when 
 you don’t want to read and do want to sleep; and 
 the facilities for accidents are so ample, that the pru- 
 
English Railways. 25 
 
 dent custom of making your will before you start 
 upon a journey bids fair to be revived. 
 
 At none of the American dépéts can you find 
 those underground passages or those safety-bridges 
 by which travellers can pass from one side of the sta- 
 tion to the other without the risk of being run over 
 while crossing the track. On the contrary, everybody 
 takes his chance, and a favourite amusement with 
 impatient travellers is to walk upon the rails, tight- 
 rope fashion, while awaiting the arrival of the train. 
 On none of the American lines are the rails carried 
 under or over the country roads, nor are gates pro- 
 vided to be closed so as to stop the traffic upon such 
 roads while trains are in sight. A signboard, labelled 
 “Look out for the locomotive,” is stuck up at the 
 crossing, and the rest is left to Providence, who in- 
 terferes in such matters much less frequently than 
 railway directors suppose. Country wagons with 
 sleepy drivers crawl upon the tracks and are smashed. 
 People driving for pleasure, with horses which they 
 fondly imagine can beat any locomotive, try to cross 
 the rails an inch in advance of the approaching train 
 and are smashed. Cattle, left wandering about to 
 pick up an existence on the roadside by economical 
 owners, get upon the line and are smashed. In some 
 American localities, the railway accidents supply the 
 newspapers with their only local items, and regulate 
 
 the price of beef. 
 
26 English Photographs. 
 
 It might be, and indeed is, popularly supposed 
 that the American railway system could be adequately 
 described by the words “smash” and “dash;” but in 
 point of fact, the English trains run much faster than 
 the American ; and as the rails are more firmly laid 
 and better ballasted, there is little of that tremendous 
 jolting which, on some roads in America, makes the 
 passengers resemble a troupe of acrobats, flying fran- 
 tically towards the roof of the car, alighting upon 
 their own seats, or those of their neighbours, as it 
 may happen, and shaking so violently that each one 
 wonders how the others manage to keep themselves 
 from falling to pieces. Double tracks, which are the 
 rule in England, are the exception in America, and 
 this, which has been the cause of countless accidents, 
 obliges the trains to travel more slowly. When you 
 leave the main lines, or trunk lines as the English 
 call them, the slowness of the American trains is pro- 
 verbial. There is a story current, that a negro, 
 walking along one of these country roads, overtook 
 a train, and was invited by the good-natured con- 
 ductor to “jump aboard and ride into town.” “No, 
 tank you, massa,” replied the intelligent African ; 
 “T’se in a hurry, Lis.” The conductors, or guards, 
 are of a very different class from the guards of Kng- 
 lish railways. They wear no uniform; they are uni- 
 versally popular; of course, in a republic, they are 
 as much entitled to be regarded as gentlemen as any 
 
English Railways. 27 
 
 of the passengers ; they are offered and would accept 
 no bribes, and it is a remarkable circumstance that, 
 although they are not very well paid, they nearly 
 all manage to live well, dress well, and retire with mo- 
 derate fortunes at the end of a few years of service. 
 Let others explain this fact as they may ; my own pub- 
 lic belief is, that the conductors get rich by investing 
 their hard-earned savings in judicious speculations ! 
 Such matters occur to me by way of contrast; 
 but to appreciate the English railways justly one 
 must have come from a country where such contrasts 
 are to be found. The substantially-built stations, in- 
 stead of the flimsy wooden dépdts; the rapid and 
 easy motion, instead of the rough, painful jolting ; 
 the care with which life and property are protected 
 along the line, instead of the utter recklessness with 
 which both life and property are imperilled; the pre- 
 cautions against accidents, instead of the certainty of 
 accident; the civility of the guard, which is none 
 the less pleasant because it costs sixpence, instead of 
 the independence of the conductor, who feels under 
 no obligation to answer a question unless you are a 
 personal acquaintance ; the invariable double tracks, 
 instead of the single tracks, which, like the broad 
 road of Scripture, “lead to death ;” the magnificent 
 specimens of railway engineering across rivers and 
 under mountains, instead of the frail bridges that 
 crumble with the shock of the cars, or the ill-lighted 
 
28 English Photographs. 
 
 tunnels where rival trains rush to collisions—these 
 are some of the points of superiority which a newly- 
 arrived American notices during his first journey 
 upon an English railway. 
 
 In America there are none of those splendid via- 
 ducts which enable the trains in England to enter 
 the hearts of great cities, the cars passing over 
 the roofs of the houses, train crossing over train, 
 and passengers and freight brought to the centres 
 of fashion or of business, and yet no lives endan- 
 gered, no property destroyed, no time lost, nobody 
 inconvenienced. ‘Ihe American railway either goes 
 blustering through the main streets of the town, like 
 a mechanical rowdy, running over children, frighten- 
 ing horses, and scattering fire and smoke; or else 
 stops in the suburbs, like the same rowdy over-awed 
 by municipal regulations or legal injunctions, and 
 disgorges its cargo into cars drawn by horses, to be 
 slowly dragged to the central dépéts. This is the 
 case even in New York, where it requires an houtr’s 
 journey to reach the station at which the locomotive 
 is attached to the train. At Philadelphia, which is 
 on the route between New York and Washington, 
 the nuisance has become so great and the delay so 
 annoying, that special trains are now despatched to 
 the national capital by a new road which passes 
 around Philadelphia without stopping, and thus in a 
 double sense circumvents the Quaker City. 
 
Noe Ite 
 ENGLISH TRAVELLERS. 
 
 Many of these observations occurred to me at 
 Southampton, from which city I was about to start 
 for London; for, after purchasing my ticket and 
 the morning papers, my first thought was to dis- 
 cover a car in which I could smoke. The guard 
 did not know of such a car. A shilling sharpened 
 his vision and quickened his intellect, and I was 
 ushered into a compartment with five other smokers. 
 All Americans talk with their fellow-travellers, al- 
 though such acquaintances are understood to end 
 with the journey, unless otherwise cemented; but 
 I had been carefully instructed that Englishmen 
 never spoke to strangers, and that any attempt 
 to address an Englishman, unless I had previously 
 been introduced to him, and a certificate of my 
 pedigree furnished, would be resented as an im- 
 pertinence. Partly for this reason, and partly be- 
 cause the sensation of reading the London journals 
 on the very day of their publication fairly thrilled 
 me with delight, I said nothing, but became ab- 
 sorbed in my papers. These having been read, I 
 
30 English Photographs. 
 
 glanced at my fellow-passengers, who were absorbed 
 in their papers. 
 
 My cigar had gone out, but I knew too much 
 to ask an Englishman for a light, and did not 
 yet know enough to conform to the English cus- 
 tom and carry my own box of fusees, being a 
 native of a country where cigars and tobacco 
 are comion property, and where nobody carries 
 matches, because everybody else’s cigar is at his 
 service. Presently, to my intense astonishment, 
 the gentleman sitting opposite politely offered me 
 a light. It required very little reflection to decide 
 that he was not an Englishman; and yet I- was 
 puzzled to fix upon his nationality, for there were 
 evidences of roast beef and bitter ale in his rosy 
 cheeks and stout figure, which, but for his polite- 
 ness, would have identified him as a Briton. After 
 awhile another gentleman asked me to lend him 
 one of my papers. Surprised at such familiarity, 
 I immediately concluded that this person was not 
 an Englishman either, although his accent would 
 have induced any less well-informed observer to 
 swear that he had never been outside of the British 
 isles. Ten minutes more passed; the other gentle- 
 men finished reading their papers, and then— 
 could I believe my ears? —a general conversation 
 ensued. Everybody spoke to everybody else; the 
 moment that the party discovered that I was an 
 
English Travellers. BT. 
 
 American, everybody spoke to me. One produced 
 sherry-and-water; another handed around a flask 
 of brandy-and-water; a third recommended some 
 of his Scotch whisky without any water; nobody 
 refused to accept a Transatlantic cigar. It was 
 thus that, after a few minutes’ debate as to whether 
 the whole party were not foreigners, I reversed all 
 my previous education, and learned the fact that, 
 with a few trifling exceptions, Englishmen are just 
 like other men, after all! 
 
 A bit of chaff led up to this amazing discovery, 
 and I recollect it very well, because 1t was my first 
 experience of that form of British humour. A satur- 
 nine gentleman in a corner of the compartment 
 favoured his friend opposite with a brief but har- 
 rowing account of his recent release from a ship 
 which had been quarantined for yellow fever. It 
 was to be inferred from his remarks that he had 
 fallen a victim to the pestilence, had but just re- 
 covered, and was fearful of communicating the 
 disease to his comrade. This story was very credi- 
 ble, for the relator looked as if jaundice had seized 
 him when the fever left, and deepened his yellow 
 to a dirty brown. His friend responded by nar- 
 rating his sufferings in a smallpox hospital, from 
 which he had emerged the day before, and describ- 
 ing his compunctions at bringing a disease which 
 might possibly prove contagious into a car so 
 
9 
 bo 
 
 English Photographs. 
 
 destitute of fresh air. Observing that these stories 
 were told to each other, but at me, and not at 
 once perceiving that they were a roundabout way 
 of hinting that the window near which I sat ought 
 to be lowered, I incidentally remarked in a depre- 
 catory manner that, although yellow fever and 
 smallpox had been my constant diseases for many — 
 years, the Asiatic cholera, which was my favourite 
 complaint at present, might not be agreeable to 
 those of the company who were less habituated 
 to such comparatively trifling maladies. Though 
 I still hold that Americans, like educated Irishmen, 
 speak the English language better than Englishmen 
 themselves, there was something in my accent which 
 betrayed my nationality, and as a stranger they 
 gave me welcome. The chaff was explained, the 
 window lowered, and then the sherry-and-water 
 followed in due course. Nothing could exceed the 
 kindness with which these Englishmen advised me 
 as to what I should do when I reached London 
 in order to gain my hotel safely. My programme 
 was so clearly marked out for me that I had only 
 to follow it and be happy. Cards were produced 
 and addresses exchanged. The whole affair was 
 more American than anything I had ever seen in 
 America, where, all reports to the contrary not- 
 withstanding, few friendships are hastily formed, 
 and everybody is not deeply interested in every- 
 
English Travellers. 33 
 
 body else’s business. One of my travelling com- 
 panions, | remember, was a country squire, going 
 up to London to consult his lawyer; another was 
 a surgeon in a government hospital; another was 
 a young student at home for the holidays; another 
 belonged to the army; another was the purser of 
 an English steamer. On the whole, I am convinced 
 that they were true representatives of their country- 
 men, since from no Englishman, of whatever rank 
 or condition, have I ever received any treatment 
 not as thoroughly hospitable. And almost all 
 Americans who have visited England will be glad 
 to indorse this statement. 
 
 Some of my own countrymen, whose experi- 
 ences of travelling Englishmen have been confined 
 to the Continent, declare that this sketch is alto- 
 gether too rose-coloured. The Englishman on the 
 Continent, however, is quite another being from 
 the Englishman at home. He seems instinctively 
 to resent the foreign air and foreign manners, and, 
 like all persons out of temper, naturally appears 
 at a disadvantage. The self-exiled Englishmen in 
 Canada and the other British colonies are more 
 English than those who remain at home, and so it 
 is with the Englishman who crosses the Channel. 
 At Calais he commences his unpleasant little game. 
 There are never sufficient cars at the Calais station 
 to accommodate all the passengers; but an Eng- 
 
 D 
 
34 English Photographs. 
 
 lishman thinks nothing of reserving a compartment 
 for himself and one or two friends. He scatters 
 his shawls, portmanteaux, and other movables 
 artistically about, and stands sturdily inside the 
 door of the compartment, ready to repel all intru- 
 ders. At home he would be incapable of a false- 
 hood; but on the Continent he considers it quite 
 right to assure you that all the seats are taken. 
 Speak to him in French, and he replies “ Complet,” 
 and stares in another direction, as if seeing his 
 two friends magnified to seven. Accost him in 
 English, and he regards you with suspicion, as if 
 it were a personal wrong that a foreigner should 
 be acquainted with his language, and again ans- 
 wers ‘“ Complet,” as if he had finally determined 
 to convince you that he was a foreigner and could 
 not understand. Only when the train is ready to 
 start and the astute conductor insists upon your 
 entering the compartment, can you obtain admission 
 without personal rudeness and the application of 
 physical force; and this is not always safe, as many 
 a damaged Frenchman will inform you. The same 
 scurvy trick, repeated at every principal station 
 for tourists, is quite characteristic of the English 
 traveller abroad. Any kind of foreigners are much 
 more pleasant to journey with, as I have frequently 
 had occasion to discover. 
 
 But Americans should be the last to throw stones 
 
English Travellers. 35 
 
 at the expatriated Englishman, since they themselves 
 are not reckoned the most agreeable of travelling 
 companions outside of the United States. Foreigners 
 complain that the Americans talk too much, tell too 
 much of their own domestic affairs, ask too many 
 questions of strangers, and are too difficult to get 
 rid of when once they fasten upon a complaisant in- 
 terlocutor. That there may be some justice in the 
 various counts of this indictment, is not for me to 
 deny. Travelling upon business rather than pleasure, 
 always in great haste, and for reasons which it was 
 my duty to keep secret at the time, I confess that 
 I have often changed my route and missed my ap- 
 pointed train, in preference to going forward in 
 company with certain select bands of my com- 
 patriots, who would have been as free with my 
 secrets as they were with their own. Yet there are 
 certainly no more pleasant fellow-voyagers than 
 Americans in America; and it would be as unfair 
 to condemn the whole nation upon the specimens 
 that one meets with abroad, as it is to judge of 
 the politeness of English travellers in England by 
 the unpardonable rudenesses of English tourists 
 on the Continent. Once I owed almost my life 
 to the kindness of an English gentleman, who 
 seemed to forget his flask of whisky—which he 
 could not present to an entire stranger—on leaving 
 the car during a winter-night journey from Manches- 
 
36 English Photographs. 
 
 ter to London; and at least a score of times more 
 I have had reason to be grateful for other scarcely 
 less memorable favours in English railway-cars. 
 
 But although a stranger soon learns that English- 
 men are just like other men, it takes a long while for 
 Englishmen to learn this of themselves.. I was re- 
 minded of this fact on the very journey which has 
 detained us so long. The Miiller murder had been 
 committed, and all sorts of plans had been devised 
 for enabling passengers in jeopardy to communicate 
 with the guards. Here was a gentleman locked up 
 in a compartment so as to be perfectly at the mercy 
 of his murderer; women shut in with ruffians had 
 complained of outrages; robbers found the railway- 
 cars the safest places for their crimes; and the 
 problem was to contrive some means by which such 
 occurrences might be prevented. The plan finally 
 adopted was that of an electric bell-pull, which set 
 in motion some sort of machinery that was to alarm 
 the guard. Obviously, those who intend to commit 
 crimes have only to seat themselves under this bell- 
 pull, and the cars are as unsafe for respectable people 
 as ever. 
 
 During the discussion upon the best mode of 
 prevention and warning, the American idea of a 
 signal-rope was suggested, but was at once argued 
 down. In America there is, of course, no danger of 
 
 murders, outrages, or robberies in the cars, since 
 
wo 
 ~I 
 
 English Travellers. 
 
 many persons sit in the same compartment, through 
 which other persons are almost constantly passing, 
 and the doors are never locked. But in order that 
 the conductor, who has entire charge of the train, 
 may communicate with the engineer, a rope runs 
 through the cars, under the roof, connecting with a 
 gong on the locomotive, and the conductor can stop 
 or start the train from any part of any car, by simply 
 pulling this rope. The successful argument against 
 the adoption of this system in England was, that 
 everybody would be pulling at the rope. Ifa gay 
 young fellow wanted to have a lark, he would dis- 
 turb the engineer by unlawful signals; if a peasant 
 wanted a light for his pipe, he would stop the train 
 to get a match. Now, Englishmen, Scotchmen, and 
 Irishmen of all degrees are constantly emigrating to 
 America; they reside there; they ride in the cars 
 through which the signal-rope passes; they are 
 sometimes the only occupants of the cars; yet not 
 one of them has ever been known to touch the rope 
 and interfere with the conduct of the train. It is 
 not that they are better educated there; many of 
 them go from the emigrant-ship straight to the cars, 
 and start on a long journey to the West. How is 
 it that men who cannot be trusted here become so 
 trustworthy in another country? Has the very air 
 of democracy a civilising power denied to the at- 
 mosphere of a monarchical nation? These questions 
 
38 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 would not be worth the trouble of answering, if they 
 appled only to a single rope in a railway-car ; 
 but small matters sometimes explain great mis- 
 takes. | 
 
 _ The very persons who are treated like children 
 here, who are cramped and hedged about with 
 onerous laws under pretence of preventing them 
 from injuring themselves; who are denied all rights 
 save those which they or their forefathers have im- 
 peratively demanded, and who are told that it 1s 
 ‘a, leap in the dark” and a fall over Niagara to give 
 even the best of them the right of suffrage, and 
 that now a compulsory system of education must 
 be adopted to induce them to send their children 
 to school— these very persons, when transferred 
 to the United States, show themselves capable of 
 managing their own affairs, electing their own 
 officials, making and administering their own laws, 
 educating their own and other people’s children 
 without compulsion, and promoting their own wel- 
 fare, happiness, and prosperity. What transforms 
 them? Have the Atlantic breezes a miraculous in- 
 fluence? Is salt-water so magical a regenerator ? 
 Do emigrants from Hurope gain new natures in the 
 New World? Do we, in these latter days, change 
 our souls with our skies? Has the fountain of 
 civilisation been found in the land where Ponce 
 de Leon sought that of eternal youth? Or is it 
 
English Travellers. 39 
 
 that Englishmen, Scotchmen, and Irishmen are the 
 same at home as in America and Australia, only 
 that in those countries their manhood is acknow- 
 ledged, appreciated, and respected; while here, un- 
 less they belong to certain rigid castes, it is dis- 
 trusted, disregarded, or denied ? 
 
No, IV. 
 THE ENGLISH METROPOLIS. 
 
 THE metropolis of London is composed of numerous 
 detached and different parts, like a dissecting map. 
 Two cities, four counties, several boroughs, and over 
 thirty parishes, townships, and villages are comprised 
 within its boundaries. There is not one of these 
 places to which you can take a stranger and say, 
 “This is London.” The metropolis is a country in 
 itself, and there is just as much difference between 
 the various parts of it, their architecture, inhabitants, 
 government, and customs, as there is between Liver- 
 pool, Manchester, Canterbury, and Brighton. Many 
 Americans suppose that the streets of London are 
 dull and gloomy. Set down one of these Americans 
 in Belgravia, and, after a glance at the tall, splendid, 
 Mansard-roofed. houses, wide streets, and frequent 
 squares, he would declare, ‘This is not London; it is 
 Paris.” Transport him to St. John’s Wood and show 
 him circuitous miles of beautiful villas, all embowered 
 in trees and flowers, and he would exclaim, ‘ This is 
 not London; it is some lovely country town, like an 
 English New Haven.” Dive with him into the tan- 
 gled. lanes, courts, and alleys of the City, and he will 
 
The English Metropolis. 41 
 
 observe, ‘‘This is not London; it is the old quarter 
 of Vienna.” Ride with him through Tyburnia, and, 
 mistaking the stucco for brown stone, he will remark, 
 “Ah! New York above Madison-square.” Only when 
 you bring him to a narrow, long street, edged with 
 low houses of dark brick, and ending with a curtain. 
 of fog, will the London of his imagination be reached 
 at last. 
 
 To describe London, then, one would have to go 
 over it inch by inch almost; and if he loved his task 
 the work would grow under his hands to several 
 volumes before the picture of the metropolis became 
 complete. This labour has never been done, and it 
 would be folly for any foreigner to undertake it. 
 Indeed, I have never met with but one author who 
 has sufficient knowledge of localities, history, archi- 
 tecture, gossip, biography, literature, art, poetry, tra- 
 dition, romance, obsolete customs, ethnology, politics, 
 and existing laws to grapple with such a subject, 
 and he is Mr. George Augustus Sala, whose Twice 
 Round the Clock might furnish a few notes for such a 
 book. 
 
 In any continental city the subdivisions of de- 
 scription are very easy; you have merely to paint 
 the old and the new quarters, the rich and the poor 
 people. But in London, while the differences are 
 broad, the shades of difference are also infinite, 
 and you soon learn that the metropolis has all the 
 
42 English Photographs. 
 
 variety of a nation, to say nothing of its truly na- 
 tional wealth, power, and importance. The longer 
 you live in it, and the more you travel about it, the 
 more you find to study. A stranger can scarcely 
 realise the fact that Soho and Portland-place, Bromp- 
 ton and the Minories, are only divisions of the same 
 London; that Ratcliffe-highway and the Circus-road, 
 Piccadilly and Hoxton, are inhabited by people 
 equally entitled to call themselves Londoners. Se- 
 ville is not more different from Madrid, Naples from 
 Turin, Philadelphia from Chicago, Buda from Vienna, 
 La Vendée from Marseilles, than these districts are 
 from each other. MHalf-an-hour’s drive from your 
 hotel will land you apparently in another part of the 
 world. There is nothing to which London can be 
 compared, except a jumble of a score of cities; and 
 there is no other place which I have ever seen or 
 read about which better .repays the investigations of 
 a traveller. 
 
 One of the first things which an American notices 
 in England is the antiquity of his surroundings. 
 Coming from a country in which everything is of 
 yesterday, he is at once struck with the apparent age 
 of the houses even before he sets out to visit those 
 edifices which are remarkable on account of being 
 old. Suppose him to be looking out of the window 
 of a railway carriage on his way to the great city. 
 He observes that the scenery is not very different 
 
The English Metropolis. 43 
 
 from that of central New J ersey, except that the 
 fields are divided by hedges instead of fences, and 
 that there is even less woodland. But every now 
 and then he flits past modest villages and secluded 
 hamlets, the dwellings overgrown with moss, the 
 churches seeming so venerable that he thinks they 
 must have been built soon after the Deluge. Happy 
 will it be for him if he can be content to take his 
 antiquity in this form. From Shakespeare’s birth- 
 place at Stratford-on-Avon to the Tower of London, 
 from Windsor Castle to St. Patrick’s Cathedral at 
 Dublin, almost all the old places have been restored 
 by modern hands. You go to see the work of your 
 ancestors, and are shown the result of the labours 
 of carpenters and masons of the present period. 
 People have even taken the hint of the Irishman, 
 who wondered why a person couldn’t build ruins for 
 himself, instead of going far away to inspect other 
 folks’ tumble-down shanties. But in the English 
 scenery there is an air of genuine antiquity —the 
 very hedges seem old, and are old; in such cottages 
 as you pass by the roadside you can easily imagine 
 that the old poets have been born. The American 
 Republic is not yet a hundred years of age—there 
 are very few edifices in the country that have been 
 built more than half a century—one half of the na- 
 tion has sprung into existence within the last twenty- 
 five years; but in England these periods are as no- 
 
44 English Photographs. 
 
 thing. What is a century to a country like this, 
 which owes its main roads to the Romans, and its 
 castles to the Normans ? 
 
 The American who comes to England has all his 
 reading realised. It is for him to thrill with delight 
 as he steps upon the land which so many generations 
 of his race have trod, and to gaze with something 
 more than curiosity at the dwellings which were 
 erected long before his own country had a name 
 among the nations. Show-places like the Tower and 
 Westminster Abbey do not impress him so strongly ; 
 he knows all about them, and expects them to be 
 ancient. But the age of the ordinary out-of-the- - 
 way houses, which have neither a pecuniary nor a 
 historical interest in being antiquated, is a source of 
 constant and undiminished surprise and gratification; 
 and nowhere can he enjoy these feelings so well as in 
 London, simply to stroll through whose streets is a 
 perennial pleasure to an educated foreigner. 
 
 The City of London proper, where most of the 
 old houses are to be found, is but a mere corner — 
 of the metropolis. It contains a resident population 
 of about a hundred thousand persons out of a metro- 
 politan population of about three millions. Within 
 its borders are concentrated most of the wealth, the 
 ignorance, the antiquity, and the prejudice of Lon- 
 don. It is one of the last and most formidable 
 citadels of the worst kind of conservatism. It is 
 
The English Metropolis. 45 
 
 the temple not only of business, but of shams. It 
 falls down and worships obsolete humbugs which all 
 the rest of the metropolis laughs at or repudiates. Its 
 ideas, like many of its edifices, belong to past cen- 
 turies. If from its Tower floated a black flag in- 
 stead of the royal ensign, the emblem would be more 
 appropriate. It spends fortunes upon childish follies, 
 and pennies in charities. It obstructs improvements 
 by its pretence of separate government, and impedes 
 justice by maintaining an independent police. It is 
 benevolent to the needy who are distant, and cruelly 
 parsimonious to the poor who are near. It supports 
 churches which nobody attends, and schools which 
 are patronised by the children of those who are rich 
 enough to pay for their children’s education else- 
 where. Most of the people who frequent it by day de- 
 sert it by night, but carry away with them the aroma 
 of its mustiness and the infection of its prejudices. If 
 Rome were suddenly transferred to the centre of Man- 
 chester, retaining its superstitions and its relics, but 
 giving up its convents and monasteries for warehouses 
 and factories, it would not be more out of place than 
 is the City of London in the metropolis of London. 
 The glory of the City is to be seen on Lord 
 Mayor’s Day, the 9th of November. Then the 
 newly-elected Mayor goes in state to Westminster to 
 invite the Barons of the Exchequer to dine with him 
 in the evening. There are speeches; there is a for- 
 
46 English Photographs. 
 
 mal examination of accounts; but the Barons of the 
 Exchequer have really nothing whatever to do with 
 the government of the City. Every intelligent person 
 knows that the whole thing is a farce; and the jour- 
 nals, with praiseworthy but useless persistence, ridi- 
 cule it every year. Still it is kept up by the City, 
 and every attempt to put it down, or even to let it 
 drop by degrees, is vigorously and successfully re- 
 sisted. In 1867 the Mayor was a Conservative in 
 politics; but by some strange paradox he ventured 
 to ride to Westminster in a plain carriage instead 
 of the usual gilded coach. From that day he became 
 unpopular. In 1868 he was replaced by a Mayor 
 who is a Liberal in politics, but who restored the 
 gilded coach to its former grandeur, and amused the 
 _ crowd by riding in it. 
 
 There is no more characteristic sight in Eng- 
 land than the Lord Mayor’s Show except the Punch- 
 and-Judy Show. It resembles no other procession 
 in the world, because, while it presents quite the 
 appearance, and excites all the laughter and merri- 
 ment, of a masquerade, it is seriously intended to 
 be solemn and imposing; and those who take the 
 most prominent parts in it absolutely believe that 
 they are being honoured. It is a spectacle at which 
 gentlemen jeer, shopkeepers scowl, and the news- 
 papers scoff; but it is perpetuated to please pick- 
 pockets, roughs, children, strangers, and the City 
 
The English Metropolis. AT 
 
 magnates, in open defiance of good taste, good sense, 
 and good order. 
 
 On the morning of the Lord Mayor's Show, I was 
 struck with the utter indifference exhibited by those 
 Londoners who lived remote from the line of the 
 procession. Not until you came within a couple of 
 squares of the destined route was there anything to 
 announce the celebration of the great City holiday. 
 The rest of the metropolis went on with its work or 
 its play as unconcernedly as if the Lord Mayor were 
 in.another hemisphere. But thousands of persons 
 were collected along the Strand, Fleet-street, Lud- 
 gate-hill, Cannon-street, and so on to the Guildhall, 
 crowded on the side-walks, leaning out of the win- 
 dows, standing on the tops of cabs, wagons, and 
 omnibuses, and perched on the roofs of houses. All 
 the shops were closed, and but few of the houses 
 were decorated. The proportion of women and 
 children was very great. Every man seemed to 
 have brought two women, and every woman half-a- 
 dozen children. Among the men the roughs were 
 evidently predominant, and they made themselves 
 disagreeably conspicuous before the Show arrived 
 by all sorts of horse-play, of which women were 
 generally the victims. From my post of observa- 
 tion, I could see the pickpockets at work. The 
 police did nothing, and could do nothing, but’ en- 
 deavour to keep the line of march clear. 
 
48 English Photographs. 
 
 By and by the procession passed—first, a band; 
 then men with banners; then another band; then car- 
 riages occupied by gentlemen who wore coats trimmed 
 with fur; then more bands, and more banners, and 
 more carriages; then the equipages of the sheriffs, 
 with splendid liveries of pink and white, blue and 
 white, and crimson; then more bands and banners; 
 then a man in demi-armour, who was greeted with a 
 cheer; then a detachment of lancers; and then a 
 cumbrous gilt chariot, like that used on the stage by 
 Cinderella, which was supposed to contain the Lord 
 Mayor; for very few of the spectators could recog- 
 nise him. All the people around me declared that 
 the Show was not worth the trouble of coming to see 
 it. But after it had passed the real work of the day 
 began. Up and down the street gangs of roughs 
 were charging upon the crowds of sightseers. Hand- 
 kerchiefs, pocket-books, and watches changed hands 
 as if by magic. The thieves held high carnival, 
 under the kind patronage of the Lord Mayor, the 
 sheriffs, and the police. 
 
 The best and most hopeful feature of the inaugu- 
 ration of the present Lord Mayor was the warning he 
 received from all quarters that his office and its ab- 
 surdities are considered obsolete, and must be relin- 
 quished. When he presented himself to the Lord 
 Chancellor, when he appeared before the Barons of 
 the Exchequer, when he listened to the speeches at 
 
The English Metropolis. 49 
 
 the Guildhall banquet, and when he read his morning 
 paper, the same warning was repeated. The bells 
 which once rang “Turn again, Whittington,” now 
 rang “Turn out, Whittington.” The Lord Chancel- 
 lor told him in so many words that the new Parlia- 
 ment would take measures to abrogate the mayoralty, 
 or to extend it, with higher duties and fewer fool- 
 erles, over the whole metropolis. The City has liter- 
 ally become too conservative for the Conservatives, 
 who have at length discovered the trick by which it 
 returns Liberal members to Parliament in order to 
 stop all reforms at Temple-bar, and cry “ Down with 
 the Church in Ireland, but spare our ancient insti- 
 tutions within the City walls!” The new Parliament 
 will probably disappoint most people by being and 
 doing very much like former Parliaments; but al- 
 though the City of London may escape for a few 
 years longer, its doom is sealed. Then some general, 
 comprehensive, metropolitan system of government 
 will be adopted, and everybody will be the better for 
 the change. At present the Duke of Cambridge and 
 Mr. Beales have charge of the parks; numerous and 
 conflicting authorities have control of the streets; 
 the Home Secretary and the Sheriffs share the prisons 
 between them; local, parochial, and parliamentary 
 boards impose rates and taxes; the supply of water 
 is doled out by private companies; the thoroughfares 
 are not properly cleaned nor lighted; and the citizens 
 E 
 
50 | English Photographs. 
 
 suffer under a complication of municipal and metro- 
 politan disorders at once annoying and oppressive. 
 Parliament has nibbled at this great reform for seve- 
 ral years, but the public are now almost unanimously 
 in favour of a wholesale measure, and it cannot be 
 much longer delayed. 
 
 Americans, and especially New Yorkers, have a 
 vital interest in the settlement of this subject, because 
 we have paid the Londoners the doubtful compliment 
 of thoughtless imitation. The government of New 
 York city used to be extremely simple; it is now 
 nearly as complex as that of London. We had a 
 Mayor elected by the people, and a Common Council, 
 also elected by popular vote; and these authorities 
 governed the city pretty much as the Lord Mayor 
 and Council govern the City of London, but with less 
 pomp and better success. This system was repub- 
 lican, and corresponded with the State and national 
 systems—the Mayor being the municipal Governor 
 or President, and the Common Council being the 
 municipal Legislature or Congress. By degrees, se- 
 duced by the example of English legislators, we have 
 changed nearly all this. The Mayor of New York 
 is now stripped of almost all his former executive 
 powers, and almost all the municipal departments 
 have been rendered independent of the legislative 
 supervision of the Common Council. The State Le- 
 gislature has interfered with the local government of 
 
The English Metropolis. 5L 
 
 New York as Parliament has interfered with the 
 local governments of the English metropolis, and the 
 results have been very similar. The parks, the police, 
 the fire-brigade, the water-supply, are now in charge 
 of Commissioners appointed by the Governor of the 
 State. A Board of Control, also appointed by the 
 Governor, supervises the municipal expenditures. 
 The city tax levy has to be approved by the Legis- 
 lature, and signed by the Governor. A Board of 
 Works, like that of London, will soon be created. 
 The State Legislature has assumed the right to grant 
 charters for street railways, and is now intent upon 
 superseding the municipal Street Department alto- 
 gether. In many respects the citizens are now better 
 served than ever before, but the taxes have fearfully 
 increased; and every now and then there is a strong 
 effort to return to the old republican system, but 
 political obstacles always interpose. 
 
 Everything is so much mixed*up with politics in 
 America that it is very difficult to write upon such a 
 subject as this without appearing partisan. The State 
 of New York is Republican in its politics, and the 
 City of New York is Democratic. Consequently, the 
 Republicans have for a number of years controlled 
 the State government, while the Democrats have had 
 almost unlimited sway in the city. The contest be- 
 tween the municipal and legislative systems has thus 
 become bitterly political; for every department ab- 
 
 LIBRARY —~ 
 
 ee 
 UNIVERSITY OF IHINATe 
 
 a 
 
 —_— 
 
52 English Photographs. 
 
 sorbed by the State government has been at once 
 supphed with Republican officials, who dispense its 
 patronage for the benefit of the Republican party, 
 to the injury and anger of the Democrats, who have 
 been summarily ousted from their strongholds. The 
 position of affairs being in every way different in 
 London, men of all parties are perfectly free to de- 
 cide for either of the two systems of local govern- 
 ment as their judgments may dictate, and upon the 
 final result of the London experiments depends in a 
 great measure the future of New York. If Parlia- 
 ment shall decide to abolish all municipal rights, pri- 
 vileges, and liberties, and place the entire metropolis. 
 under the control of a Board of Commissioners, un- 
 doubtedly the New York Legislature will follow this 
 example. If, on the other hand, Parliament shall 
 pass a bill transforming the aggregation of places that 
 is now called Loudon into one integral city, with a 
 Mayor and Boards of Aldermen and Councilmen 
 elected by the taxpayers or householders, as un- 
 doubtedly the government of New York will be 
 restored to its municipal form, since none of the 
 legislative boards and commissions can survive the 
 downfall of their British models. In the one city as 
 in the other every step towards the right path, or in 
 the right path, has been and will be desperately 
 resisted, but the English will have the honour of 
 being the pioneers. 
 
The English Metropolis. 53 
 
 In one important detail of local administration 
 New York is decidedly superior to London, and in 
 another detail both are behind the age. The water- 
 supply of New York is under the control of the 
 government, and thus the citizens are furnished with 
 plenty of Croton at the cheapest possible rates. In 
 London water is doled out at high prices by char- 
 tered companies, which might be just as wisely em- 
 ployed in furnishing the people with air. The go- 
 vernment interposes between grasping landlords and 
 poor tenants, and insists that sufficient light and air 
 and security against fire shall be afforded at the 
 landlord’s expense. It has the same right to insist 
 that a sufficient supply of water shall be guaranteed 
 to every citizen, since water is no less essential to 
 health than air and light. I rejoice to learn that the 
 Poplar District Board of Works has recently ordered 
 the demolition of several houses because they are 
 built below the surface of the street, and are com- 
 pletely devoid of water, except that which comes 
 from the damp plastering. Would that this excel- 
 lent example might be everywhere followed! When 
 I see the employés of the companies turning off the 
 water-supply at. stated hours of the morning and 
 evening, I seem to see them putting the screw upon 
 the taxpayers who have to sustain hospitals for the 
 sick poor. Scanty water means dirt, and dirt is but 
 another name for disease. In London every house- 
 
54 English Photographs. 
 
 holder pays dearly not only for every drop of water 
 he uses, but for every drop that is denied to his poor 
 neighbours in filthy courts and alleys. Water ought 
 to be as free as air in London; that is to say, it 
 ought to be furnished by the government and paid 
 for in the taxes, as it is in the United States. Both 
 countries, too, should take charge of the gas-supply. 
 The amount saved to the taxpayers in the lighting 
 of the streets alone would materially reduce the bur- 
 dens upon the citizens of great cities, and the saving 
 in gas-bills would be enough to pay at least the 
 interest of the National Debt. Every public hydrant 
 is equal to a fireman, every fountain to a doctor, 
 every gaslight to a policeman. By a sudden pro- 
 gress which has astonished even the progressive Ame- 
 ricans, England is about to connect first the tele- 
 graphs and then the railroads with the Post-office. 
 Let us hope that, having followed the example of the 
 continental nations in these important matters, we 
 may soon set the Continent an equally important 
 example in regard to the gas and water monopolies. 
 
No. V. 
 ENGLISH CLIMATE. 
 
 Tue differences in climate between England and 
 America are very remarkable. You leave New 
 York in winter, when the streets are blocked with 
 snow, the side-walks slippery with ice, and all vege- 
 tation destroyed by the almost Arctic cold. In a 
 few days you reach England, where it is also winter ; 
 but flowers are growing in the open air, and the 
 verdure covers the fields. Of course, stronger 
 contrasts than this may be obtained by going from 
 New York direct to Havana, or to France, or to 
 Italy; but then the difference does not strike an 
 American so impressively. In southern countries 
 you expect the winter to be mild,—and are some- 
 times disappointed, as at Nice; and the manners and 
 dresses of the natives are so strange that you take 
 the climate with the other foreign notions, and 
 without surprise. But in England an American is 
 apparently among his own people: they dress as he 
 does; they are evidently under the impression that 
 the weather is very severe; they wrap their over- 
 coats about them, and get as close to the fire as 
 possible; and yet there are the green fields, and the 
 
56 English Photographs. 
 
 flowers blooming through the snow, and the trees 
 not altogether destitute of life in the frigid month of 
 December. 
 
 The relative coldness of the two countries may be 
 estimated from the fact that in New York we say, 
 “The thermometer stands at so many degrees below 
 in London they say, “so many degrees below 
 
 ? 
 
 ZeYO 3’ 
 freezing point.” There is the same distinction in 
 regard to the heat. The warmest summer day in 
 London is coolness itself compared with an August 
 day in New York. In America everything, including 
 the climate, is extreme; in England everything is 
 medium. Many of my countrymen imagine that 
 England, like Newfoundland, is constantly enveloped 
 in fogs; but they are in the wrong concerning both 
 islands. I have seen at Newfoundland sunshine as 
 bright and skies as blue as those of Italy, while the 
 fog, which is commonly supposed to envelope the 
 island, lay, like a great bank, miles out to sea. In 
 England, outside of London, there is often most per- 
 fect weather, as balmy as that of spring in Spain, as 
 charming as that of winter in Florida. That London 
 is foggy enough must be admitted. From the thick 
 fogs of the consistency of pea-soup, which make mid- 
 day like midnight, in November, to the light haze 
 which closes the perspective of the streets in more 
 favoured months, the great metropolis is never with- 
 out its misty curtain; but one soon learns to love 
 
English Climate. 57 
 
 the fog and the rain as characteristics of London, 
 and would as soon see the City deprived of St. Paul’s 
 as of these peculiarities. The fact is, that you pay 
 no more attention to bad weather in London than to 
 the noise of the vehicles. It is a thing to be antici- 
 pated, and to miss if you are deprived of it. My 
 first purchase in England was an umbrella, and I 
 have carried that article religiously ever since; but 
 the most times I have ever found use for it, except 
 as a walking-stick, were in Paris and in Vienna, 
 where the rain, not being accepted as a matter of 
 course, was a most disagreeable nuisance. In Lon- 
 don you thank Heaven when the sun shines, and 
 say nothing when it does not. 
 
 The reason why most Americans prefer Paris to 
 London so decidedly is, that they never give the 
 latter city a fair chance. They land from the 
 steamer at Liverpool, hurry up to the metropolis, 
 drive to their hotel, and look out upon a fine display 
 of chimneypots, or upon a muddy street crowded 
 with busy people pushing on briskly through a 
 driving rain. Nobody calls upon them; there are no 
 great social centres where strangers resort to meet 
 everybody else; there is no single thoroughfare like 
 Broadway, or Chestnut-street, or the Boulevards, 
 where you are sure to encounter all your friends and 
 acquaintances some time during the day. If the 
 newly-arrived Americans have letters of introduction, 
 
 ‘ 
 
58 English Photographs. 
 
 they are at the bottom of the trunks, or else the 
 season is over, or else it 1s too much trouble to 
 present them; so a day is devoted to bothering the 
 bankers and boring the American Minister, and 
 another day to inspecting Westminster Abbey and 
 the Queen’s Mews; and all the while it keeps on 
 raining, and becomes more dreary and uncomfort- 
 able. Then one says, “I can’t stand this: let’s go to 
 Paris;” and another says, “ Agreed ;” and off go the 
 party, and detest London for ever afterwards. At 
 Paris they are astonished to find that they can get 
 along without speaking French, and are immensely 
 proud of the achievement. At the Grand Hotel, 
 from time to time, they come across all the Ame- 
 ricans who are in Europe. They can trot about the 
 streets to see and be seen; they can buy what they 
 mistake for the latest fashions; they live in a New 
 York on a larger scale. This explains why Paris is 
 said to be a place where good Americans go when 
 they die—jin other words, an American paradise. 
 Barring the money-making, which Americans have 
 no necessity to do when they travel, Paris is simply 
 a grand New York, and New York is a smaller Paris. 
 But London is sui generis, and must be studied to be 
 appreciated. Study takes time and patience, and 
 my countrymen have very little of either to bestow 
 on the greatest capital in the world. 
 
 Yet it would seem that those Americans who 
 
English Climate. 59 
 
 travel ought to feel most interested in England and 
 Englishmen. Surely one sees enough of Mr. and 
 Mrs. Smith, and Mr. and Mrs. Brown, and Mr. and 
 Mrs. Jones at home, without wanting to run against 
 them eternally in the regular routine of a Con- 
 tinental tour. I will back the average American 
 tourist to spend a year in Europe, see all the regula- 
 tion shows, and learn less of the countries and the 
 people than if he had remained by his own fireside 
 and read Harper’s Handbook or Murray’s library of 
 Guides. He knows nothing whatever of foreign 
 languages; he cannot get out of the ordinary ruts; 
 he mixes only with persons in his own condition. 
 If Americans were forced to know anything about 
 the French, they would never care for Paris; for it 
 is not in human nature that they should lke the 
 French houses, which are not homes—the French 
 dishes, which tantalise the appetite without satisfying 
 it—the Frenchwomen, who are heartless and artifi- 
 cial—or the Frenchmen, who are polite but insincere. 
 But as they sojourn in a Paris of their own, associ- 
 ating with their own people, living in hotels built 
 expressly for them, and fed with food and drink 
 modified to suit their tastes, they declare that the 
 French capital is Elysium, and London a dull, stupid 
 city. But London has at least these advantages: 
 first, that Americans are not obliged to herd together 
 and follow each other like sheep; and second, that 
 
60 English Photographs. 
 
 they can mingle with the natives and learn some- 
 thing new, either to imitate or avoid, if they will 
 stay long enough to study English customs. In 
 Paris, on the other hand, the natives are regarded 
 merely as curiosities in a museum or supernumeraries 
 in a play; and for all that the New Yorker learns of 
 their real life, sentiments, and habits, he might as 
 well have spent his money in his own city, riding in 
 the Central Park instead of the Bois, shopping on 
 Broadway instead of the Boulevards, living at the 
 Fifth Avenue instead of the Grand Hotel, and going 
 to the theatre to witness The Black Crook instead of 
 Le Pied de Mouton. 
 
 The fact that the climate is one of the things 
 which first disgusts an American with London has 
 led me into this episode; and now, to return to the 
 original subject, I remark that, after a somewhat 
 varied experience, I can think of no place which, 
 for a healthy man, has better weather all the year 
 round than England. There is just enough winter 
 to make the summer pleasant, and just enough 
 summer to render the winter enjoyable. Once un- 
 derstand that London is a country by itself, and 
 quite distinct from the rest of England in weather 
 as in everything else, and you will appreciate the 
 beauties of the English climate. The spring is lovely; 
 the autumn very delightful, although not compar- 
 able with the October and November of the United 
 
English Climate. 61 
 
 States. The wild winds of March are blowing as 
 I write, and the buds and blossoms of April are 
 beginning to appear; but during the long months 
 which have passed since August last there has been 
 no day in England which would not have been 
 considered very moderate in the north of America. 
 When I first came to London there was one memor- 
 able night when the rain froze as it fell, and the 
 streets were glazed with ice, and one memorable day 
 when the snow actually impeded the traffic, and cabs 
 and omnibuses toiled along drawn by double teams 
 of horses; but these occasions were so extraordinary, 
 that special mention will be made of them in the 
 chronicles of the year, and cockneys will tell of them 
 to wondering grandchildren half a century hence. 
 Now in the northern States of America such nights 
 and such days are among the incidents of every 
 winter; the schoolboys skate along the side-walks; 
 sleighs and sleds, which are almost unknown in 
 England, take the place of wheeled conveyances ; 
 and when the weather becomes milder the streets 
 are knee-deep with slush. That tremendous snow- 
 storm which stopped trains and traffic in London, 
 two years ago, and before which vestries and street- 
 cleaners were powerless, in spite of the terrible thun- 
 ders of the Times, would have been thought nothing 
 of in America. The shopboys would have swept it 
 away before it had fairly fallen, and the newspapers 
 
62 English Photographs. 
 
 would not have considered it worthy a paragraph, 
 much less a leading article. 
 
 But I must not forget that the past two years 
 are called exceptional by Englishmen. America and 
 England, made near neighbours by the Atlantic 
 cable, have apparently been endeavouring to ex- 
 change climates. New Yorkers, for the first time, 
 complain of too much rain, and Londoners of too 
 ereat drought. We have an earthquake upon a 
 erand scale in South America, and England follows 
 suit with a few slight, temperate shocks. We are 
 dazzled by two meteoric showers in North America, 
 and England rivals us in the celestial display, sur- 
 passing us one year and being surpassed by us the 
 next. Philosophers attempt to explain that the Gulf 
 Stream is slowly changing its course, approaching 
 to the American, and receding from the English, 
 coasts. If this hypothesis be correct it is by no 
 means impossible that, at the end of the present 
 century, New York may be noted for its fogs, and 
 London for its bright, clear weather. Such a mira- 
 cle would be scarcely so astonishing as that sug- 
 gested in the leading English journal, not long ago, 
 by a writer who has discovered that Great Britain 
 is situated over the crater of an active volcano, and 
 who predicts for his devoted country at no distant 
 date the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, Pompeii and 
 Herculaneum. But for myself, I cannot imagine 
 
English Climate. 63 
 
 England with any other climate than that which it 
 now possesses, and which is most appropriate to its 
 people, their customs and their architecture. The 
 quaint old residences, with queer bow-windows built 
 out like traps to capture all stray gleams of sun- 
 shine, assure us that there has been no change for 
 many a long year; and so completely satisfied must 
 any reasonable resident feel with the English climate 
 as it is, that he may well hold to the fond belief 
 that, though the fickle Gulf Stream leave its first 
 love and coquettishly embrace the American coast, 
 or though the quiescent volcano beneath us burst 
 its antediluvian bonds, excel Vesuvius, Etna, Hecla, 
 and Cotopaxi in its eruptions, and transfer the 
 British Isles to the torrid zone by its accumulated 
 heat, there will still be fog enough left latent in 
 the byways of England, and especially in the odd, 
 unfrequented corners of London, to last out our life- 
 time, and keep the dear old country in its present 
 state until all of this generation are ready to leave 
 it for that better land where no rain tarnishes the 
 golden streets and no frosts of winter chill the eternal 
 flowers. 
 
No. VI. 
 ENGLISH HOTELS. 
 
 Artists tell us that not only are all the faces in the 
 world different, but that the two sides of the same 
 face are unlike. The English side of the English 
 hotel system must be very pleasant, or Englishmen 
 would not adhere to it so persistently. The side 
 which is turned to foreigners, however, has quite 
 another appearance. That Englishmen admire the 
 system is evident from the dismal failure of a recent 
 attempt to conduct a London hotel upon the Ame- 
 rican plan. A splendid building had been erected, 
 and, after a time, one of the most popular and enter- 
 prismg of American hotel-managers was engaged ; 
 but the English directors of the hotel-company ob- 
 jected to any innovations, and the manager found 
 himself censured for everything which deviated from 
 the fine old British model. But Americans think 
 English inns anything but comfortable, because they 
 have been accustomed to a system so much better 
 at home. The English or European plan of letting 
 you a room at so much a week, and charging you 
 fixed prices for whatever other entertainment you 
 require, is by no means unknown in the United 
 
English Hotels. 65 
 
 States; but it has never been able to compete with 
 the American system of charging so much a day 
 for board and lodgings, giving you every accom- 
 modation for this money, and debiting you with no 
 extras except wines. 
 
 One cannot be surprised that the mode of hotel- 
 life in America is so little understood in England 
 when he finds beverages called “ corpse-revivers” 
 sold as American drinks near the Haymarket, an 
 American restaurant totally misrepresented at the 
 Paris Exposition, and such an authority as Mr. John 
 Oxenford promulgating the statement, which he 
 published in the Z%mes, that he used to le awake at 
 night at a first-class hotel during his visit to New 
 York, and watch the rats drinking out of his water- 
 pitcher. Genuine American drinks have names strange 
 enough; but the fact that certain decoctions are called 
 G6 
 
 ‘“brandy-smashes,” ‘‘ mint-juleps,” and ‘“‘ sherry-cob- 
 
 blers,” scarcely justifies the invention of the Hay- 
 
 ‘“ corpse-reyiver,” or of Mr. Sala’s “ that 
 
 market 
 thing,” and “that other thing,”—beverages never 
 heard of in the States except in joke. At the Paris 
 Exposition there were American dishes, and the 
 negro-waiters were beyond question; but the Eng- 
 lish bar and the French flowers and the lady money- 
 taker were strange to an American. Pointing out 
 - these and other discrepancies to the Boston girl who 
 was sitting, like Matthew, at the receipt of customs, 
 F 
 
66 English Photographs. 
 
 I asked her where she had seen anything of the kind 
 in the United States. “Well, sir,” she very shrewdly 
 replied, “you must remember that we are in France, 
 and must do something to please the Frenchmen.” 
 I wonder whether all the other national restaurants 
 in the outer circle of the Exposition building were 
 modified in the same manner and for the same 
 reason? If so, we who have eaten our way around 
 have not really dined @ la every country on the 
 globe, after all. As for Mr. Oxenford, an American 
 may dismiss the matter with a shrug of the shoulders, 
 and an inquiry as to what eccentricity of true genius 
 has burdened the brain with such singular images ; 
 but no doubt most Englishmen will henceforward 
 believe that the palatial hotels of New York are 
 overrun with vermin, and no number of American 
 denials will avail anything against that curious letter 
 in the Times. 
 
 An American hotel is a city within a city. Like 
 the old Roman baths, almost everything necessary 
 for enjoying life may be found within its walls. 
 You arrive, register your name, and are then in 
 possession of the freedom of the house, which is 
 furnished as luxuriously as a palace. You have a 
 comfortable room in which to sleep, elegant parlours 
 and drawing-rooms, fitted up like those of the best 
 private mansions, in which to receive your friends. 
 
 There is always a piano, and sometimes a good 
 
English Hotels. 67 
 
 library. The dining-room is open from six o’clock 
 in the morning to three the next morning, and 
 breakfast, luncheon, dinner, tea, and supper are all 
 included in the fixed price you pay per diem. The 
 bills of fare are very long and very varied, and the 
 landlords vie with each other in procuring all the 
 delicacies of the season. Most of the great hotels 
 have farms connected with them, so that the sup- 
 ples of butter, eggs, milk, vegetables, and poultry 
 are exceptionably good. At every meal you order 
 as many dishes as you please—it costs no more than 
 to order one. The Americans are rather extravagant 
 in this respect. It is not uncommon to see a deli- 
 cate lady surrounded with a score of plates, each 
 containing some rich dainty. ‘The Western people 
 who come to New York on business, and feel bound 
 to order everything upon the bill of fare, and try 
 to “eat their way right through,” are by no means 
 fabulous. It ought to be understood, however, that 
 the plats are not very large; they are in the French 
 style; but there is no limit to the number of them 
 which you may obtain. When an American sits 
 down to eat, he takes a bit of this and a bit of 
 that, until he hits upon the dish which precisely 
 suits his palate. J remember one of my countrymen 
 who had just landed in England, and, forgetful of 
 the change of locality and habits, ordered an Ame- 
 rican breakfast. After a long delay, relieved by the 
 
68 English Photographs. 
 
 perusal of the newspapers, he was amazed to see a 
 procession of waiters enter the room, the first bear- 
 ing aloft a boiled ham, the second a broiled chicken, 
 the third an omelette, the fourth a fried fish, the 
 fifth a beefsteak; and so on, until a feast for a 
 regiment was placed upon the table. The order had 
 astonished the landlord, but the breakfast and the 
 bill astonished the American. At home, he would 
 have been served with small portions of cach of 
 these dishes, and of a dozen more, if he liked. 
 But—lodgings, eating and drinking aside—much 
 more remains. An American hotel contains a large 
 billiard-saloon, a hair-dressing saloon, a telegraph- 
 office, a bulletin for the latest news, an office for 
 the hire of carriages and horses, a bar-room for those 
 who drink, a cigar-stand and smoking-room for those 
 who smoke, a news-stand with the latest pericdicals, 
 a reading-room with the city and provincial papers 
 on file, bath-rooms upon every floor, ticket-offices 
 for those who wish to go to the railways or the 
 theatres, a stock-list for those who take an interest 
 
 in speculations, a hat and cloak room, an office for 
 
 surplus luggage—-a thousand conveniences for the 
 comfort and gratification of the guests. Few English 
 hotels have any of these advantages and improve- 
 ments; none have them all. You soon tire of dining 
 in the “ coffee-room’”—so called upon the lucus-a-non- 
 
 lucendo principle, because so few persons take coffee 
 
English Hotels. 69 
 
 there—off of the inevitable joints which seem to be 
 the same every day; but if you order special dinners 
 your expenses are trebled. You must go outside the 
 hotel for a bath. If you want to play billiards you 
 must tramp over the town until you discover a table 
 unengaged. To despatch a telegram you must employ 
 a commissionaire. A porter must be sent to order 
 your horse or carriage. Another is necessary to 
 procure your tickets for the theatres. If you desire 
 to learn the news a boy must be employed to buy 
 your papers, or you must patiently await your turn to 
 pore over the advertisement-sheet of the coffee-room 
 journals. If you like ice in your drinks the fact 
 is reprovingly mentioned in the bill. It is impossible 
 to get supper later than eleven o’clock, and so you 
 are driven out to Evans’s. Unless you hire a private 
 parlour you have no place in which to receive your 
 friends, except you take them into the coffee-room, 
 where other people are eating, or into the smoking- 
 room, where everybody else is drinking. The menu 
 consists of about twenty dishes furnished with re- 
 markable but wearisome regularity all the year 
 round, To procure a good cigar inside a London 
 hotel is a miracle. Everything is admirably con- 
 trived to perpetually remind you that the hotel is 
 simply a building in which to sleep. There is no- 
 thing home-like about it. As for cheapness, all the 
 luxuries and comforts of an American hotel could 
 
70 English Photographs. 
 
 be obtained before the civil war for two dollars a 
 day—about eight shillings English. Now, in con- 
 sequence of the depreciated currency, the price is 
 doubled. Where could you live so well in England 
 for eight shillings a day? 
 
 Even were all other charges equal in English and 
 American hotels, the fees which you are obliged to 
 give to the waiters in England would overbalance the 
 account. In the United States servants, as a general 
 rule, neither expect nor receive gratuities, except at 
 the watering-place hotels, in the height of the season, 
 when the only way to get your plate filled at dinner 
 is to put some money upon it for the waiter. The 
 servants are regarded as part of the staff of the estab- 
 lishment, and are paid by the landlord. In England 
 they are paid by the guests, and an item called “ at- 
 tendance” is inserted in the bills beside. The land- 
 lords must make a nice pot of money by this trans- 
 parent swindle; for they pay very low wages, and 
 allow the servants to eke out a livelihood from gra- 
 tuities; so that you are doubly cheated—first by the 
 “attendance” generally, and then by the attendants 
 individually. Why the landlords do not charge 
 taxes and poor-rates in the bills, or invent a special 
 
 ? 
 
 item called “cook’s salary,” it is impossible to say. 
 They have as clear a right to do so as to charge for 
 attendance. A comic paper has immortalised this 
 
 double dodge in a capital picture. “I’ve paid for 
 
English Hotels. 71 
 
 ——~ 
 
 waiting in the bill!” cries an irritable old gentleman 
 to a servant who has asked him to remember the 
 waiter. “ Yes, sir,’ is the reply; “but that was for 
 waiting for your chops, sir.” 
 
 Aside from its gross injustice, this little matter 
 becomes a very serious business when you learn by 
 experience that your personal comfort at an English 
 inn or restaurant depends, not upon the amount or the 
 regularity of your legitimate payments, but upon the 
 frequency with which you fee the attendants. On the 
 Continent it is understood that these gratuities are the 
 waiters’ only wages, and the French and Germans have 
 adopted a fixed tariff, with which all comply and 
 which few exceed. So many francs or florins in the 
 bill; so many sous or kreutzers for the waiter. It is 
 a regular percentage and an intelligible system. But 
 in England, where everybody pays the servants, no 
 one seems to know how much he ought to give. The 
 waiter doesn’t know, or pretends not to know. He 
 “leaves it to you, sir.” And just as I have never 
 seen a cabman honest enough to offer to return the 
 extra fare ignorantly paid him, so I have never heard 
 an English waiter complain of receiving too much. 
 In practice, I find that the rule among Englishmen 
 is to give nothing but coppers. They seldom go 
 beyond pennies. They would rather part with five- 
 pence in copper than with a silver fourpenny-piece. 
 Perhaps Englishmen care comparatively little about 
 
72 English Photographs. 
 
 these extortions of waiters, for to them the custom 
 has the sanction of antiquity and the recommendation 
 of usage; but to Americans it is both an annoyance 
 and an expense. Ignorant alike of Continental tariffs 
 and English customs, the American is constantly 
 saying “Keep the change;” and when an English 
 waiter is once demoralised by receiving half a crown 
 when he expected only twopence, he is fit for nothing 
 in this world but a funeral ever afterwards. 
 
 On the whole, the best advice that can be given 
 to travellers is to endure all such annoyances philo- 
 sophically. You do not travel in order to reform 
 the institutions of foreign countries, but to observe 
 them. ut there are certain traps laid for Americans 
 at London hotels which a little friendly counsel from 
 a resident of the metropolis, if you are fortunate 
 enough to know one, will teach you to avoid. For 
 example: there is a hotel at the West-end, very select, 
 very fashionable, very expensive, and not very large. 
 Some Americans go there because the house has a 
 fine reputation; others, because it is a favourite re- 
 sort of the aristocracy. The Americans who stop at 
 this hotel are honoured, so soon as their nationality 
 is discovered, by having as an attendant the servant 
 who waited upon ex-President Van Buren when 
 he was the American Minister at the Court of St. 
 James's. This waiter amounts to fifty pounds extra 
 in the bill. He is very old, very respectable, wears 
 
English Hotels. ia 
 
 a white wig and a pair of white-cotton gloves, and 
 has a confirmed habit of spilling the soup. During 
 our stay at the hotel he devoted all his energies to 
 silent appeals for spare cash, and usually succeeded 
 in extracting from us half-a-crown a-day. We would 
 gladly have doubled the douceur to get rid of him, 
 for he was only dear to us in the pecuniary sense. 
 But we were told that if was “the thing” for Ame- 
 ricans to submit to this infliction, and we submitted; 
 but I have never been able to determine why we did 
 so, nor why we willingly allowed the old humbug to 
 fumble about the table and make a bad pretence of 
 performing duties which were really discharged by 
 our own servants. 
 
 There is another hotel to which many Americans 
 are recommended, the landlord of which was once 
 famous as a cook. He lives, as hundreds of other 
 people do in England, upon the reputation of what he 
 did ten years ago. ‘The guests are expected to excuse 
 all delinquencies on the ground that the landlord is a 
 man of talent, and could easily set everything right if 
 he chose to attend to his business. You must over- 
 look all the faults im the dinners on account of the 
 proprietor’s ancient culinary achievements, and praise 
 all the bad wines because he once had the best cellar 
 in London. Then, again, railway hotels are nuisances 
 to be avoided. To say nothing of the noise of the 
 trains which, echoed and reéchoed through the cor- 
 
74 English Photographs. 
 
 ridors, renders repose a problem, there is a vastness 
 about them quite inimical to comfort. Nobody 
 seems to know that you are there; the waiter 
 appears to be the only connecting-link between 
 yourself and the rest of the establishment. I have 
 such pleasant memories connected with one termi- 
 nus hotel that I should not willingly say anything 
 against them; but it is my duty to warn travellers 
 that it is not a decided advantage to a hotel to be 
 next to a railway deépéot. 
 
 Finally, there is at least one hotel in London at 
 which the old proverb is negatived, and the dearest 
 articles are not the best. This is a very old inn situ- 
 ated in the City proper, and dating from the days 
 when Pocahontas was the belle of the hour. It is a 
 thoroughly representative English house, with the 
 exception that it has not a special dining-room for 
 commercial travellers, or drummers, as the Americans 
 term them, who generally fare better and pay less 
 than any other sort of travellers in all parts of merrie 
 England, but who are exceedingly pleasant fellows, 
 always ready to offer an American a seat at their 
 special table if he happen to be alone in a country 
 town. At this hotel the best port is several shillings 
 a bottle cheaper than the worst, and the cellarman has 
 a tendency to mistake Chateau la Rose for common 
 claret. The proprietor who stocked the cellar has 
 deceased, and the head-waiter alone knows the secrets 
 
English Hotels. 75 
 
 of the wine-binns. Make his acquaintance, and you 
 may drink like a prince and pay like a peasant. 
 
 That wonderful character an American hotel- 
 clerk is almost unknown in England. At only one 
 house in London can he be found, and there he is 
 shorn of his fair proportions and shines with dimi- 
 nished glory. English landlords prefer a girl, who 
 knows nothing, but will coquette with everybody, 
 to a clerk of the American school, who knows every- 
 thing and will waste his time with nobody. In 
 America, if you wish to learn when to ride, where 
 to drive, what to buy, where to shop, when the 
 trains start, what theatre to attend, how much are 
 the hack-fares, who is worth hearing at the Opera, 
 what institutions to visit, where to procure the re- 
 quisite tickets, who is the fashionable tailor, what 
 is the last new thing in neckties, whose acquaintance 
 to make or avoid, where to spend your evenings, 
 where not to spend your evenings, what is the rate 
 of exchange, in short, what to do in any emergency, 
 and how to dispose of yourself generally—you con- 
 sult the clerk of the hotel. To quote the celebrated 
 Latin speech of General Jackson, which gained him 
 the degree of LL.D. from a Southern college, the 
 hotel-clerk, like the American Union, is ‘ multus im 
 parvo, sine qua non, e pluribus unum.” He expects 
 no fee; he would resent the offer of a bribe as an 
 insult; he is salaried by the landlord, and it is his 
 
76 English Photographs. 
 
 duty to answer any question you may ask. Like a 
 newspaper-editor, no kind of knowledge is unneces- 
 sary to him. He is a guide-book, directory, calendar, 
 railway time-table, fashionable gazette, trade-list, and 
 merchant's manual combined and incarnated. He 
 gives you the benefit of all he has gleaned from ten 
 thousand other guests, and distributes among them 
 the information he has managed to extract from you. 
 Kducation only develops his natural abilities ; like a 
 poet, he is born, not made. 
 
 Americans have embodied their high estimation 
 of the talents essential to a good landlord in the 
 popular saying, in reference to an unsuccessful 
 politician, ““He is a fine man, but he can't keep a 
 hotel;” but the landlord would be helpless with- 
 out his clerk. Indeed, in the clerk you see the 
 future proprietor in embryo, before age has dimmed 
 his discernment or riches blunted his faculties and 
 impaired his activity. He stands at his desk in 
 the office conversing with a hundred persons a 
 minute, sending them all away instructed and satis- 
 fied, and apparently managing the affairs not only 
 of the whole hotel, but of the whole city. You are 
 compelled to pay homage to a memory so tenacious 
 that it loses nothing, and so fresh that the slightest 
 remark leaves an indelible impression; to an eye 
 which observes everything without appearing to 
 wander from you; to a tongue which talks as 
 
English Hotels. 77 
 
 rapidly and yet as distinctly as the telegraph; to 
 a manner which is polite but reserved; to a bearing 
 which invites and inspires and justifies confidence ; 
 to an energy which seems constantly overtaxed and 
 still never tires. In the English hotels there is no 
 such ‘“‘ guide, philosopher, and friend” for the poor 
 traveller. The head-porter and the head -waiter 
 occupy his place without filling it, like a pair of 
 twin dwarfs seated in a giant's chair. He is a pro- 
 duct of the American system, and has become an 
 indispensable part of it. Place one such clerk in a 
 London hotel and he would revolutionise the inns of 
 the metropolis. When his virtues were once known 
 to the public, persons would journey for miles and 
 become guests of the hotel in order to advise with 
 him; and no American could by any chance be per- 
 suaded to patronise any other hotel than that at which 
 this modern Admirable Crichton was engaged. 
 
 The first thing which strikes a foreigner at an 
 English inn is, that there seem to be more waiters 
 than guests; the second is the resemblance of the 
 establishment to the popular idea of a harem; the 
 ‘third is the tremendous uncertainty in regard to 
 the amount of his bill. When he enters, he beholds 
 three or four maidens in the office ready to book 
 his name; four or five maidens in the bar pumping 
 up ale and pouring out spirits; a dozen waiters in 
 
 evening dress, grouped mournfully around a joint 
 
78 English Photographs. 
 
 of roast-beef in the coffee-room; a score of porters 
 feebly endeavouring to attach themselves to some 
 portion of his luggage, or posed picturesquely in 
 the extreme distance; and innumerable scullery- 
 maids, housemaids, and chamber-maids popping up 
 out of the cellars, or hanging, like domestic Azellas, 
 over the banisters. If he be an American, he longs 
 to discharge this army of incapables and replace the 
 office-girls with a clever clerk, the barmaids with a 
 couple of smart bar-keepers, and so on for the rest 
 of the multitude. An hour’s experience furnishes 
 him with some new ideas as to the division of la- 
 bour. There is one servant to light his fire, another 
 to answer his bell, another to bring his hot water, 
 another to procure him meat and drink, another to 
 attend to his bedroom, another to look after his 
 linen, another to black his boots, another to brush 
 his clothes, another to call his cab, and another— 
 generally a stout, rosy female—whose only duty 
 seems to be to walk into his room and say “ Good- 
 morning.” All of these servants with whom he comes 
 in personal contact must be tipped, or they are apt 
 to turn sulky, and render his life miserable. To 
 change a five-pound-note into sixpences, and dis- 
 tribute them promiscuously, is the first duty of the 
 newly-arrived traveller. Everybody looks to him for 
 remuneration for even the most trifling services; 
 
 nobody seems to be paid by the landlord, and yet 
 
Linglish Hotels. 19 
 
 there is the regular charge for “attendance” in the 
 weekly bills. 
 
 Before long, you learn that the real master of 
 the house is the head-waiter. He receives your 
 money, receipts your bills, makes your change, enters 
 your charges; and, having tipped all the people 
 * who attend upon you, it is now necessary to tip 
 this dignitary, who is rather a landlord than a 
 waiter, and who usually gets rich sooner than the 
 genuine proprietor. St. Paul says, that if one have 
 all the other virtues and yet have not charity he is 
 nothing; and so if you pay all the other servants 
 and do not pay the head-waiter, you have expended 
 your money in vain. Unfortunately, however, this 
 is a poor rule, and does not work both ways; for 
 to fee the head-waiter does not relieve you from the 
 necessity of continuing to fee the other servants. 
 Your bedroom is stuffy, has the lodging-house odour, 
 and is never lighted with gas. At an American 
 hotel, you can calculate your expenses to a nicety; 
 at an English hotel, much depends upon whether or 
 not the young lady who makes out the bills happens 
 to be flirting with another guest when she comes to 
 your account, and a great deal more upon the chance 
 whether you are in a hurry to get away. It may 
 be safely stated that at an English hotel, a foreigner 
 pays about three times more than an Englishman, 
 and receives about one-third the attention. The 
 landlord burdens you with his losses from other 
 
80 English Photographs. 
 
 people’s unpaid bills; the employés consider you a 
 pigeon to be plucked, and glare at your pockets with 
 a give-me-sixpenny stare equally irritating and dis- 
 tressing. 
 
 Englishmen have an impression—in part mis- 
 taken —that American families reside at hotels in 
 order to get rid of the cares of housekeeping. No 
 person who has lived at an English hotel will wonder 
 that English families do not adopt this American 
 idea; for, taking one with another—and I have no 
 intention of advertising the few exceptions — the 
 English inns are the dearest, the worst-managed, 
 the most unhomelike in any civilised country. The 
 genius which has made the English railway restau- 
 rants infamous in Mugby Junction has thrown around 
 the burly landlords, buxom landladies, witty waiters, 
 and pretty barmaids of England, a lovely but decep- 
 tive halo, which a few days of companionship with 
 these worthies unpleasantly dissipates. Landlords 
 should be burly, and landladies buxom, when they 
 drink so much and do so little; the wit of the wai- 
 ters is chiefly shown in avoiding untipped labour ; 
 the chamber-maids would be prettier if they did their 
 work better. But, as I have already said, the English 
 people seem to like their hotel-system as it is, and 
 any attempt to practically reform it meets with 
 strenuous opposition and bitter prejudice. How- 
 ever, the world moves, and even England cannot 
 stand quite still. 
 
NOneV LL: 
 ENGLISH CABS. 
 
 A Few months ago I had the pleasure of meeting in 
 society an American lady, residing in England, who 
 had just returned from a visit to the United States. 
 With great frankness she declared her entire disen- 
 chantment concerning New York. The streets of 
 that metropolis seemed to her very narrow and very 
 dirty, after her experience of London; and, above 
 all, she found herself most uncomfortable on account 
 of the absence of cabs. To be forced to plod up 
 and down the American thoroughfares, with no re- 
 fuge from pedestrianism but in an omnibus, a car- 
 riage, or a street-car, and to be debarred from going 
 to parties or theatres in wet weather, because there 
 were no “hansoms’” or “ four-wheelers” for which she 
 could send her maid, seemed to her unendurable in- 
 conveniences; and she had come back to England, 
 fully satisfied with a temporary sojourn in her own 
 country, and ready to settle down here contentedly 
 for the rest of her life. 
 
 No doubt the English cabs, with the exception 
 of those at Liverpool and Manchester, and including 
 most especially the cabs of London, are dear and 
 
 G 
 
82 English Photographs. 
 
 dirty. Equally certain is it that they will not bear 
 a moment’s comparison with the cabs of Paris, Vi- 
 enna, Berlin, and the rest of the European capitals. 
 English editors tell us this often enough, and with- 
 out the slightest effect on the cab proprietors. But 
 to Americans, who have never been accustomed to 
 anything of the kind at home, the English cabs 
 seem a positive luxury, and their fares ridiculously 
 cheap. Even the English omnibus—that unventi- 
 lated box upon wheels—that combination of imcon- 
 ‘veniences —'possesses several advantages over the 
 omnibus of the United States. The American om- 
 nibus Is more roomy, and the seats are more com- 
 fortably cushioned, and the windows will let down 
 so as to admit fresh air; but still it is but very few 
 removes from that Texian stage-coach, in regard to 
 which a traveller indignantly observed that he was 
 willing to pay for a ride and walk the whole dis- 
 tance, but he’d be hanged if he would carry a 
 fence-rail to pry thé coach out of the mud-holes. 
 
 He who rides in an American omnibus works 
 his own passage. There is no conductor to stop the 
 vehicle and open the door for him when he wants 
 to get in or out; he must pass his fare up to the 
 driver through a round hole in the roof, and as the 
 driver has double duties to perform, it is problem- 
 atical when the passenger will receive his change ; 
 he must vacate his seat and hang on to the straps 
 
English Cabs. 83 
 
 whenever a lady wishes to enter the crowded ’bus, 
 since there are no limits to American politeness, and 
 no regulations enforced as to the number of persons 
 that the omnibus is to carry; and lastly, if he hap- 
 pen to sit near the hole in the roof through which 
 the fares are handed to the driver, he must pay 
 everybody’s money and be held responsible for the 
 change. An English omnibus has its faults; but, 
 nevertheless, it 1s sometimes “full inside ;” while in 
 every American omnibus there is always “room for 
 
 9 
 
 one more.” An English omnibus has seats outside, 
 which gentlemen prefer in any decent sort of weather. 
 And, best of all, it also has a conductor, who will 
 attend to your entrance and exit, receive your 
 money, and sometimes remember to let you out 
 within a few squares of your destination. It is re- 
 lated of Mr. Anthony Trollope, that when he desired 
 to leave an American omnibus, he shouted through 
 the pay-hole to the driver, and when he desired to 
 pay his fare he pulled the check-rein and stopped 
 the vehicle. These proceedings, although they ex- 
 cited much ridicule, seem to me perfectly natural. 
 
 In some parts of London what are called “ex- 
 press omnibuses” are run, at an extraordinary speed, 
 early in the morning, for the convenience of clerks 
 and others doing business in-the City. These ex- 
 presses have their regular customers, and never 
 stop for chance passengers. They make the jour- 
 
84 English Photographs. 
 
 ney from the suburbs to the City almost, if not 
 quite, as quickly as the trains on the underground 
 railway. Old fogey as England is often considered, 
 it is many years ahead of the United States in street 
 conveyances, and in several other matters nearly as 
 important. Doubtless the English omnibuses may 
 be capable of great improvements; no one can ride 
 in them and not agree with this opinion; but it is 
 not for Americans to cast any slurs upon a means 
 of locomotion far in advance of anything of the kind 
 in the United States, where the fares are the same 
 for all distances, and where foolish laws prevent 
 the omnibuses from running on Sundays, when the 
 greatest number of people wish to travel about. 
 
 I do not forget the American street-railways, 
 which many persons and many journals are now 
 anxious to have introduced into England. If George 
 Francis Train had been more of a business man and 
 less of a buncombe orator, this experiment would 
 have been tried in London long ago; and, in spite 
 of the prejudices which he managed to create against 
 his own scheme, the project of street-railways now 
 has so many and such influential friends, that well- 
 informed journalists predict that these railways will 
 soon supersede the omnibuses. If these predictions 
 prove correct, there are large fortunes to be realised 
 by the omnibus proprietors, who have only to follow 
 the example of their American brethren by first 
 
English Cabs. 85 
 
 claiming indemnities for the loss of their routes 
 and then investing the money thus acquired in the 
 stock of the railway companies. It is quite certain 
 that street-railroads in England will pay. In Ame- 
 rica the dividends are something enormous—forty 
 per cent per annum has been paid by some com- 
 panies. Legislators and lobby-agents grow rich upon 
 the bribes offered to secure the passage of Acts per- 
 mitting the streets to be occupied by these railroads. 
 I believe that the Birkenhead railway—tramway it 
 is called in England—is very remunerative; and in 
 the little Spanish town of Jerez, whence almost all the 
 best sherry is exported, I found that the street-rail- 
 way was regarded as a profitable investment. How 
 much greater, then, will be the gains of the tramway 
 companies in such a place as London, which is a 
 city of suburbs and magnificent distances, and in 
 which the daily travel is almost incalculable ! 
 
 But if my suggestions in regard to this matter 
 could have any weight with members of Parlia- 
 ment, I would beg of them not to grant charters 
 for any street-railway companies before sending a 
 commission to New York and Philadelphia to in- 
 quire as to the operation of the system in the United 
 States. For example, there is no reason why a per- 
 centage of the profits of the companies should not be 
 paid to the local government as the price of the right 
 of way. Most of the present companies in American 
 
86 inglish Photographs. 
 
 cities. have escaped from this just debt by ignoring 
 the municipal governments, and obtaining their char- 
 ters—generally by direct purchase—from the State 
 legislatures; but so powerful has been the agitation 
 upon the subject, that all future corporations will be 
 compelled to insert a clause giving the local tax- 
 payers a share of their earnings, more than enough 
 to keep the streets clean and in repair. Such a 
 clause ought to be forced into every English char- 
 ter. There is no better model than the State of 
 New Jersey, which preserves its inhabitants from. 
 all State taxation by simply levying a percentage 
 upon every ticket issued by the Camden and Am- 
 boy Railway Company. 
 
 Again, it has been proved by experience that the 
 English omnibus proprietors will not voluntarily 
 adopt the transfer-ticket system, which works so 
 admirably in Paris. The railway proprietors will be 
 just as obstinate, unless the law steps in to compel 
 them to accommodate the public. In New York, 
 where this point was. overlooked in the charters, the 
 companies refuse to issue transfer-tickets, although 
 they are almost all owned by the same capitalists; 
 but in Philadelphia you have the privilege of chang- 
 ing your route as often as you please, for the same 
 fare, so long as you are travelling in the same gene- 
 ral direction. Then the shameful overcrowding pe- 
 culiar to the American street-cars should be prevented 
 
English Cabs. 87 
 
 by strict legislation ; for in the United States the pas- 
 sengers are packed into the cars as closely, but not 
 as comfortably, as herrings in a barrel, seats or no 
 seats, ventilation or no ventilation, and all the re- 
 monstrances of the press are unavailing. If an 
 occasional death, frequent accidents, and life-long 
 illnesses result from this practice, the companies 
 console themselves with their enormous dividends; 
 for “corporations have no souls.” Besides this, it 
 is undeniable that street-railways do encumber the 
 thoroughfares and impede the business-traffic, and 
 it is a question whether the underground railways, 
 when their ramifications beneath the streets are per- 
 fected, will not supersede the necessity for American 
 tramways in England. Concerning these and a hun- 
 dred other very important points of detail, a parlia- 
 mentary commission could readily obtain reliable 
 information, and it is to be hoped that no char: 
 ters for street-railroads will be granted until the 
 subject be thoroughly investigated. 
 
 The substitutes for cabs in America are hackney- 
 coaches—lumbering, two-horsed carriages, little used 
 by the citizens, except at Irish funerals, but left free 
 to victimise poor strangers. Just before I left New 
 York two hansoms had appeared on Broadway, and 
 were regarded as great curiosities; and a speculator 
 had bought up afew second-hand broughams, and sent 
 them out to catch customers at night, but with no 
 
88 English Photographs. 
 
 great success. Nominally under the control of the 
 police, the drivers, who are generally roughs, or ruf- 
 fians, as Dickens rechristens them, contrive to evade 
 all the efforts of vigilant officials like Inspector Brack- 
 ett, to keep them in order. Printed rates of fares are 
 directed to be placed in every coach, and the drivers 
 hide them under the cushions or floor-cloths, where 
 travellers can never find them. Legally the fare 
 is fifty cents—two shillings English—per mile; 
 but practically the passenger is at the mercy of the 
 driver, who will not accept less than one dollar 
 —four shillings English—for any distance, however 
 short, and who will coolly drive off with your trunks 
 in the daytime, or knock you down in the nighttime, 
 if you resist his demands, which are uniformly extor- 
 tionate. The law directs him to give you a ticket, 
 with his number inscribed, when you engage his 
 coach. Practically he never does anything of the 
 kind, and abuses you manfully if you ask for his 
 ticket. Compare these dear and dangerous hack- 
 ney-coaches with the cabs of England. You have 
 only to step into the street, or send out a servant, 
 and your cab is immediately at your service. Over 
 five thousand of these vehicles are on hire in London 
 alone. ‘The cabmen pay the proprietors ten shillings 
 per day for the use of the horse and cab. For six- 
 pence a mile, or two-and-sixpence an hour—the 
 legal fare is two shillings—you may ride wherever 
 
English Cabs. eae tt 
 
 TE UE UE EEE EE 
 
 you please. If you are in doubt about the distance, 
 police-notices are plentifully posted detailing the ex- 
 
 a device un- 
 
 act fares between various localities 
 known to the inventive Americans. If you quarrel 
 with your cabman you may order him to drive to 
 the nearest police-station, and have the affair settled 
 at once. A London cabman dares not disobey such 
 an order; a New-York driver would tip you into the 
 Kast River first. 
 
 Unquestionably the London cabbies always want 
 more than their just fares, and usually manage to 
 get it; but, as a rule, they are rather inclined to 
 whine than to be insolent, and, except with drun- 
 ken men, they are seldom quarrelsome. I have 
 employed cabmen at all hours of the day and 
 night, and much more frequently than the majo- 
 rity of people, and I have never yet had a dispute 
 which an extra sixpence did not satisfactorily 
 settle. There are people who upon principle would 
 not give an extra sixpence to settle anything; but 
 they are not Americans, or else they are better fitted 
 for another world where there is no small change. 
 Even such persons will admit, however, that it is 
 better to be begged for money than to be knocked 
 down and robbed of it; and this is just the distinc- 
 tion between English and American cabmen. In 
 point of fact, almost all the English cabbies are beg- 
 gars. They have no fixed idea of the just amount 
 
90 English Photographs. 
 
 of their fares. If you .hand them what you think 
 right, and walk off, they drive away; if you hesi- 
 tate, they begin to talk about. the bad weather, and 
 rough roads, and long distances, and ask you for 
 more money. They never have change; and should 
 you venture to say “How much?” they regard you 
 as fair game, and name any price less than a sove- 
 reign. During the recent cab-strikes some philoso-— 
 pher amused himself by. calculating what the results 
 would be if every cabman were paid his: exact fare 
 by every passenger. Why, in the first place, the 
 cabman’s receipts would be cut down at. least one- 
 third. Imagine the consequences for yourselves— 
 they may be summed up in the two words misery 
 and starvation. This may be an argument for rais- 
 ing the legal fares of the cabs; but that is a matter 
 beyond my province. I only desire to call attention 
 to the fact that nowhere in the world, and particu- 
 larly in England, is the dealing between a cab-driver 
 and his passenger conducted upon business principles 
 —so much service for so much money. You have 
 often heard cabmen say, “ My horse is:lame; sir;” or 
 “Tve driven very fast, sir;” or “It’s a rainy night, 
 sir;” or “Td like to drmk your health, sir,” as an 
 excuse for receiving more than the law allows; but 
 nobody ever heard a cabman say, “ You have given 
 me more than my fare, sir;” or “This shilling be- 
 longs to you, sir, as I’ve only driven you a mile.” 
 
English Cabs. 91 
 
 One night after a dinner-party, having carelessly put 
 my gold and silver together in my vest-pocket, I paid 
 the cabmen sovereigns for shillings, and half-sove- 
 reigns for sixpences, in the dark; but neither at my 
 host’s house nor at my hotel did any cabman call to 
 refund the money. I do not deduce from this acci- 
 dent that all cabmen are thieves; I merely state that 
 English cabmen swindle you more civilly than most 
 others. Only at Paris is the pour-bowre so fixed a 
 charge that no intelligent person need be humbugged. 
 
 To my countrymen anxious to see London I give 
 this advice, instead of the stereotyped formula. of the 
 guide-books about. riding on the top of the ommni- 
 buses: call a hansom and drive till yow are tired; 
 then get out and walk till you are tired of that; 
 then call another cab to convey you back to your 
 hotel or lodgings. The hansom is preferable to the 
 ‘“four-wheeler,” because you can see the streets bet- 
 ter. There was a time when it was not considered 
 proper for ladies to go about in hansoms; but when 
 Mrs. Grundy came to reason upon’ the matter, she 
 discovered that a “ four-wheeler”—which is a rough, 
 bare, close brougham—gave much more scope for 
 improprieties than open vehicles like the hansoms. 
 Private hansoms, elegantly appointed, are among 
 the most stylish equipages to be seen on the Drive 
 of Hyde Park—the Central Park of London. And 
 this reminds me how often I have laughed heartily 
 
92 English Photographs. 
 
 at an American’s description of his first attempt to 
 enter a hansom the doors of which were closed. 
 Amid the cries of a street-crowd he succeeded in 
 climbing over the front and seating himself inside, 
 very proud of his exploit, but very anxious as to 
 how under the sun he was ever to get out again. 
 
 The cabmen of London are more useful than 
 guide-books or directories. If you wish to go to any 
 place the cabman will hunt it up. If you lose your 
 way you have only to call a cab and you are sure to 
 be set right. Lose your way in London you most 
 certainly will if, as I strongly advise, you walk out 
 as often, as early, and as late as possible, as Judge 
 Busteed used to advise the Irish democrats to vote. 
 For the authorities of the metropolis began naming 
 the streets—which are about three thousand in num- 
 ber—with the liberality of a spendthrift, and ended 
 their task with the meanness of a miser. Many streets 
 have half-a-dozen names—one for every block—while 
 innumerable squares, terraces, rows, gates, roads, vil- 
 las, gardens, hills, places, parks, and crescents, are 
 thrust into them indiscriminately, and make the con- 
 fusion worse confounded. On the other hand, there 
 are scores of streets with precisely similar names. 
 The Post-office Directory mentions thirty-seven King- 
 streets, twenty-nine John-streets, twenty-seven Queen- 
 streets, twenty-four New-streets, and so on for a long 
 list. As for the numbering of the houses, that seems 
 
English Cabs. 93 
 
 an affair of chance, which nobody can regulate and 
 none explain. In the suburbs of all English cities 
 
 everybody calls his residence by some fanciful name 
 —‘‘Rose Lodge,” or “ Violet Villa,” or “ Corinthian 
 Cottage,” or “The Hermitage’—and expects his 
 friends to know its location as well as he does him- 
 self, forgetting that a hundred other sentimental 
 householders have chosen similar titles for their 
 dwellings. Nevertheless, in spite of all these aids to 
 losing yourself, I urge you to walk, and, when you 
 are utterly confused, trust to the nearest cabman. 
 During your strolls you will always find amuse- 
 ment, and often instruction. No American’s educa- 
 tion is complete until he has come to England, and 
 studied attentively the country and the people. No 
 Englishman’s education is complete until he has 
 made a similar study of America. The two countries 
 are so much alike, and yet so different, that at every 
 step there is something new to learn—something to 
 imitate—something to avoid. In some respects, the 
 Americans are centuries in advance of the English 
 people; in others, we Transatlantic folks, compared 
 with the English, are barbarians. If I were forced 
 to sum up the characteristics of the two nations in a 
 single sentence, I should say that the English are too 
 fond of retaining old ideas because they are old, and 
 that the Americans are too fond of adopting new 
 ideas because they are new. Too much Conserva- 
 
94. Linglish Photographs. 
 
 tism versus too rapid Progress—this is England and 
 America in a nut-shell. A dear old English friend 
 named Robert Hanna, who instructed me in my 
 youth, and taught me to love this country next to 
 my own, put the same thought mto another form. 
 “England,” said he, “has too much law, and Ame- 
 rica too little.” Not to take the reader farther away 
 from the subject of which I began ‘to write, I own 
 that these thoughts occurred to me, as they probably 
 have to many others, when I first drove about in a 
 hansom, and saw something of the mysteries of Lon- 
 don. Along your haphazard route you notice on 
 every hand some proofs of the ultra-Conservatism of 
 England. Across certain streets, for instance, you 
 see iron railings erected, with a gate, and sometimes 
 a gatekeeper. These streets are not always the most 
 unfrequented. Southampton-street, Strand, one of 
 the busiest thoroughfares in London, is thus barred 
 and disgraced. Upon inquiring, you learn that such 
 streets are the property of noblemen; that the gates 
 are closed at fixed hours by the nobleman’s com- 
 mands; and that, in order to show that public traffic 
 is permitted on sufferance, and to prevent any de- 
 suetude of legal rights, the gates are shut formally 
 once a year, no matter how much the public may be 
 inconvenienced. Would any other people than the 
 English permit this ? 
 
 Riding farther, you discover that the transit of a 
 
Linglish Cabs. 95 
 
 cab across a public park is forbidden by some- 
 body who signs himself ‘‘ George, Ranger,” and that 
 you are obliged to drive miles out of your way in 
 consequence. Would any other people than the 
 English submit to this? Arrived at another park 
 in the evening, you see a number of men and wo- 
 men walking about disconsolately inside, and you 
 are informed that they do not know how to get 
 out, the gates being locked at nine o’clock. Yon also 
 discover that, although the gates of this park are 
 closed, officials are at hand to open them for cabs 
 and carriages, and that these useless officials, who 
 merely represent ‘a public annoyance, are salaried by 
 the Crown, to whom the parks belong. The Crown 
 in England means the people. Would any other 
 people than the English allow themselves to be bad- 
 vered and worried like this? You attempt to drive 
 out to the suburbs, or to cross from one side of the 
 Thames to the other, and toll-keepers present them- 
 selves, and mulct you of what is virtually a fine for 
 passing from street to street. Englishmen know that 
 turnpike and bridge-tolls in a great metropolis are 
 nuisances which should be abolished; but the British 
 argument, “It has always been so,” covers all these 
 cases. No foreigner can help feeling that all such 
 ancient weeds in the fair garden of England ought 
 
 to be plucked up by the roots. 
 
No. VIII. 
 ENGLISH JOURNALS. 
 
 TuERE is a prevalent impression in the United States 
 that the number of newspaper readers there, in pro- 
 portion to the population, is much greater than in 
 England. This impression I believe to be altogether 
 mistaken. Statistics may indorse it; but the time 
 has gone by, in this age of splendid financiecring, 
 when anybody credits the maxim that “figures do 
 not lie.” English travellers in America mention as 
 an astonishing incident that even the hack-drivers of 
 New York are seen reading the daily papers, forget- 
 ful of the fact that cabmen in England are to be ob- 
 served, during leisure intervals, consulting the same 
 sources of information. The provincial press of Eng- 
 land is far in advance of that of America, both in 
 matter and manner, and is quite as generally circu- 
 lated. Ifin some cases the subscription-list of some 
 American newspaper exceeds that of the correspond- 
 ing class of journals in England, it must be remem- 
 bered that in England papers are often hired by the 
 readers at so much an hour, and are consequently 
 perused by thousands of persons whose names do not 
 appear on the list of subscribers. In America nine 
 
English Journals. 97 
 
 out of every ten individuals read the papers; and, 
 according to my observation, the average is little, if 
 any, less in England. 
 
 In every point but one the superiority of the 
 English press to the American cannot be denied. In- 
 deed, we had better readily admit it. No newspaper 
 in America can rival the best English journals in 
 typographical appearance—that 1s to say, in the ex- 
 cellence of its material and the clearness of its type. 
 Neither can the American papers bear comparison 
 with the English in the style of their editorials, and 
 the grammatical perfection of their foreign and local 
 reports. A slipshod style, expressing slipshod thoughts, 
 is the prevailing characteristic of the American press ; 
 while in England the editorials, the foreign corre- 
 spondence, and the local reports are composed by 
 gentlemen who at least understand the art of writing 
 the language correctly. There are exceptions to these 
 rules in both countries, as I shall presently point out ; 
 but the rules are the same, nevertheless. No journal 
 in the United States prints leaders—editorials we call 
 them—like those in the best English papers; and no 
 American journal has yet been able to secure corre- 
 spondents like Russell of the Times, and Kingston of 
 the Telegraph, or local reporters like Woods and Tur- 
 ner, except in extraordinary instances. ven in 
 as, for example, dur- 
 
 these extraordinary instances 
 ing the Southern Rebellion—the press-writers of 
 H 
 
98 English Photographs. 
 
 America have not been allowed that pomp of type 
 and position which the London editors cheerfully 
 accord to their more favoured brethren; and their 
 productions, printed in small type and hidden in 
 unfrequented portions of the paper, are no more 
 appreciated than the microscopic beauty of the but- 
 terfly compared to the gorgeous plumage of the pea- 
 cock. Finally, various circumstances have combined 
 to render the newspapers of England actually cheaper 
 than those of America. You can purchase most of 
 the London daily journals for a penny—two cents ; 
 while the New York journals of the same rank cost 
 four cents—twopence English. Thus, by a singular 
 change of fortune, the American newspapers are now 
 dearer than those of England, although the cheapness 
 of the American press had no small share in the re- 
 duction and ultimate abolition of the stamp-duty in 
 England. 
 
 The one point in regard to which I claim supe- 
 riority for the American press is enterprise. The 
 American papers give’ the news in bad type, upon 
 poor paper, and often in the worst possible form ; 
 but they give it, and they give it by telegraph, and 
 they give it at the earliest possible moment. The 
 English journals, on the contrary, are lamentably 
 deficient in news. Take away the telegrams of Mr. 
 Reuter and the parliamentary reports, and the real 
 news furnished by a London paper may be summed 
 
English Journals. 99 
 
 up in a couple of sentences. The London journals 
 are also deficient in individuality. They are per- 
 fectly satisfied to reprint such local news as they 
 publish from other papers. The Zimes would not 
 quote from the News until the News reduced its price 
 to one penny, but it constantly quoted from the Ev- 
 press, Which is merely an evening edition of the News. 
 All the morning journals consider the Pall Mall 
 Gazette fair game, and crib its contents without an 
 apology; and the Pall Mall avenges itself every 
 Saturday by summarising all the best items in the 
 weekly papers. Anyone who reads all the London 
 journals day after day will soon learn that, barring 
 the editorials, nine-tenths of their literary contents 
 are precisely the same, and consist chiefly of parlia- 
 mentary, market, and financial reports, Reuter’s tele- 
 grams and sporting news. 
 
 Now, as regards Reuter’s telegrams, the American 
 press would be afraid to depend for its information 
 upon an outside association, which might be honour- 
 able or dishonourable; which might furnish or with- 
 hold such information as it pleased; which might or 
 might not seek to influence the stock-market through 
 the most influential journals, and which, in all that it 
 does, is as independent of the press as the press ought 
 to be independent of it. The telegrams for the Ame- 
 rican press come from the agents of an association 
 composed of the newspapers themselves ; but no first- 
 
100 English Photographs. 
 
 class American journal will trust implicitly even to 
 this source of information. It has its own special 
 correspondents, who are instructed to telegraph as 
 freely as if the Associated Press did not exist; and 
 thus a constant check is kept upon the journalistic 
 combination. If Mr. Reuter’s integrity were not equal 
 to his ability, he could at any moment revolutionise 
 the stock-markets in England, and for two days com- 
 pletely delude the British public; and the London 
 press would unconsciously assist such a fraud, instead 
 of preventing it. In America a swindle of this charac- 
 ter would be impossible, because the press carefully 
 guards its own interests as well as those of the public, 
 and refuses to be hoaxed even by a forged Presiden- 
 tial proclamation, although it be written by a jour- 
 nalist upon telegraphic paper and has every other 
 mark of authenticity. 
 
 As examples of the lack of enterprise of the Bri- 
 tish press, take the foreign and the continental news 
 which appears in the papers. The recent impeachment 
 trial at Washington excited more public interest in 
 Kngland than any other event which has occurred since 
 the accession of Napoleon to the throne of France; 
 but what London newspaper except the Times had a 
 special despatch concerning it? And to what did 
 the single special despatch of the Times amount? To 
 less than a dozen words, costing at the utmost about 
 five pounds! Why, if the Queen of England had 
 
English Journals. 101 
 
 been upon her trial instead of the President of the 
 United States, the American journals would have 
 been filled with telegraphic reports of the progress of 
 the case, the evidence for and against her Majesty, 
 and the popular speculations and prejudices, concern- 
 ing the verdict. During the impeachment furor, 
 thousands of other newspaper readers turned, as I 
 did, to the telegraphic columns of the London press, 
 only to be disappointed by some such despatch as 
 this: ‘‘ America 
 
 The Australasian has arrived out.” 
 Or take the recent war in Abyssinia. No English 
 journal sent its correspondent instructions to tele- 
 graph the news; and the result was that the entire 
 press of England would have been satisfied to publish 
 simultaneously the official despatches to the India 
 Office, had not the London staff of the New York 
 Herald obliged them with copies of the telegrams re- 
 ceived from the advance brigade of General Napier’s 
 gallant army. Or consider the local news. If Mr. 
 Gladstone, or Mr. Bright, or Mr. Disraeli, or Lord 
 Stanley deliver an important speech in any part of 
 England, you may happen to read a report of it in 
 the next morning’s papers; but how is that report 
 obtained? Not through the enterprise of the press, 
 but as a speculation on the part of the telegraph 
 companies, which furnish it at so many pence per line 
 to such journals as choose to print it. The reporter 
 is not at all responsible to the press. He might make 
 
102 English Photographs. 
 
 a fortune by misrepresenting the sentiments of the 
 Premier or the Foreign Secretary, if he were suffi- 
 ciently shrewd and dishonest. The papers have no 
 euarantee of his capability or his honesty, though 
 they all print his news. In America no such risk is 
 incurred by the newspapers. Again, Washington is 
 about ten hours’ distance from New York by rail, as 
 Paris is ten hours’ distance from London; but almost 
 all the Washington correspondence of the New York 
 journals comes by telegraph, while the Paris corre- 
 spondence of the London journals comes by mail, in 
 spite of the fact that less than the amount now paid 
 in large salaries to Paris letter-writers would give the 
 English papers all the news and gossip of the French 
 capital telegraphically, and in time for the next 
 morning’s issue. An average American newspaper 
 contains ten times as much absolute news as an aver- 
 age English journal. In a word, the difference be- 
 tween the American and the English press in regard 
 to enterprise is precisely the difference between the 
 telegraph and the railroad. 
 
 At a public dinner not very long ago, Dr. Russell, 
 the famous correspondent of the Z7%mes, complained 
 of telegraphic reports on the ground that they were 
 merely skeleton narratives, utterly incomprehensible 
 until the mail accounts came to hand to give them 
 flesh and blood. The simile is powerful, and, so far 
 as concerns the English press, it is true. But Dr. 
 
English Journals. . 108 
 
 Russell has only to turn to the American papers to 
 find reports as particular and as imaginative as his 
 own telegraphed in full to the leading journals. For 
 instance, the progress of the Prince of Wales in Canada 
 and the United States was reported by telegraph to 
 the New York journals, and these reports crossed the 
 ocean and were reprinted in the London journals 
 weeks m advance of the letters of the special corre- 
 spondents who were sent out from England at a 
 considerable expense to describe the Transatlantic 
 reception of his royal highness. This was before the 
 oceanic cable was laid; but the ignominious defeat 
 of the English journalists might have been avoided 
 by a prompt employment of the telegraphic facilities 
 then in existence. Later still, the British public were 
 often entirely deprived of special news from America 
 in regard to the late civil war, although that war 
 concerned them almost as nearly as if Great Britain 
 had been one of the combatants. ‘Since the Atlantic 
 cable has been in operation we have seen the opening 
 of the Paris Exhibition fully chronicled in the New 
 York papers of the following morning, while the 
 London journals were content to wait two days for 
 complete reports. We have seen full accounts of the 
 coronation of the Emperor of Austria as King of 
 Hungary at Pesth, and of the canonisation of nume- 
 rous saints by the Pope at Rome, published in the 
 New York papers three days in advance of the Lon- 
 
104. English Photographs. 
 
 don journals. We have seen full descriptions of the 
 eruption of Mount Vesuvius printed in New York a 
 week before the London editors heard that the vol- 
 cano was once more vomiting flame and smoke. We 
 have seen the futile Garibaldian invasion of the Papal 
 territories reported day by day through the cable to 
 the New York press, while all the London journals, 
 except the Telegraph and News, were without corre- 
 spondents at the chief points of interest, and the cor- 
 respondents of these papers wrote by mail instead of 
 sending their news by lightning. Hundreds of other 
 instances might be cited did not these suffice. The 
 truth is, that in America the press has created the 
 inland telegraph lines, and the American press now 
 makes the Atlantic cable remunerative; while in 
 England the press never employs the wires when it 
 can make use of the mail, and contributes an insig- 
 nificant trifle towards the support of the sub-Atlantic 
 miracle. Upon these points statistics are, [own, most 
 trustworthy and decisive, and they have been repeat- 
 edly paraded before the public. 
 
 In every country there are two or three journals 
 which are regarded by foreigners as representative 
 organs. They are not always the best papers nor 
 the most widely-circulated papers; but there is some- 
 thing about them characteristic of the nation and its 
 institutions. Not to multiply illustrations which will 
 at once occur to every reader, I may mention that 
 
English Journals. 105 
 
 England would hardly be itself without the Times. 
 There are many thousands of Englishmen who never 
 read it, just as there are many thousands of Ameri- 
 cans who never read the New York Herald; but it is 
 universally accepted as the exponent of British public 
 opinion, even when it sets that public opinion most 
 at defiance, as I think it did during the recent Ame- 
 rican civil war and the still more recent Garibaldian 
 invasion. The general rule of newspapers is that 
 their influence secures a large circulation, and this 
 large circulation brings them a corresponding amount 
 of advertising. The Z2mes is a remarkable exception 
 to this rule. In circulation—it only claims to issue 
 about sixty thousand copies per day—it is surpassed 
 by several journals, in influence by few, in advertise- 
 ments by none. Its London rivals in enterprise are 
 the Telegraph and the News; but it crushes them 
 daily by appearing with a quadruple sheet of adver- 
 tisements, in spite of their lower rates and more 
 popular subscriptions. It has almost every requisite 
 of a good newspaper except the latest news, and 
 almost every requisite of a good advertising medium 
 except the largest circulation. Its real superiority is 
 its typographical perfection ; its supposed power is 
 in its editorials, scarcely one of which you can read 
 carefully without detecting a fearful blunder in gram- 
 mar, rhetoric, or fact; its most popular feature is 
 its almost verbatim reports of the debates in Parlia- 
 
106 English Photographs. 
 
 ment, which uniformly eclipse those of the other 
 journals, that condense Disraeli’s sarcasm when they 
 represent Liberal principles, and Gladstone’s argu- 
 ment when they advocate Conservative politics. 
 
 The Times depends upon Reuter’s telegrams for its 
 foreign news, upon the previous evening’s papers for 
 its local news, and upon extensive clippings for its 
 general news; but its political news, derived from pri- 
 vate and social sources, used to be wonderfully accu- 
 rate. All through the debates upon the Reform Bill 
 I noticed that, while the Government organs were re- 
 peatedly misinformed as to the policy of Mr. Disraeli, 
 and the Liberal organs were very wide of the mark 
 as to the course chosen by Mr. Gladstone, the edito- 
 rial prognostications of the Times were invariably 
 verified by the Parliamentary leaders. The plan of 
 its editors is to find out what is going to be done 
 and then predict it, thus preserving an appearance of 
 influence. In this regard that journal is the only 
 one in England which has ever been able to combine 
 complete independence with reliable information. But 
 so far as foreign politics are concerned, it is impossi- 
 ble to trust a newspaper which represented the Con- 
 federates as successful in the American war, declared 
 Garibaldi the conqueror of Rome, and persistently 
 describes Napoleon as insecurely seated upon the 
 throne of France. 
 
 Whatever it may have been in the past, the Z%mes, 
 
_ English Journals. 107 
 
 under its present management, is a close corporation, 
 to which outside talent has very little access. Its 
 conductors distinctly avow that they are determined 
 to make each department a specialty under the 
 charge of writers technically educated—a policy 
 which would absolutely abolish the profession of a 
 journalist if it could be carried into effect. But the 
 Times violates its own ideas by its own appointments, 
 e.g. it allows Mr. Tom Taylor to write its art criti- 
 cisms, though he is not a painter; and Mr. John 
 Oxenford to write its dramatic criticisms, though he 
 is not an actor. I do not say, nor think, that better 
 critics could be found; but I simply carry out the 
 paper’s own theory to show its absurdity. The 7imes 
 assumes the greatest possible mystery in regard to 
 its editorial writers, although they are sufficiently 
 well known to have their portraits paraded in the 
 satirical papers, and prides: itself upon a correspond- 
 ence which is too tardy for news, and too soon for 
 prophecy, and which might as well be written up in 
 the office from the files of foreign journals. It never 
 corrects an error, and never apologises for an injus- 
 tice, and is therefore the best-hated newspaper in ex- 
 istence. Its forte is Napoleonic, and consists in put- 
 ting forth its great strength upon great occasions; 
 but it could always be beaten on its own ground, 
 and off its own ground, if other London journals 
 would but employ the telegraph properly. 
 
108 English Photographs. 
 
 The receipts of the Z%mes are enormous, and 
 its expenditures are economically lavish and gene- 
 rously mean. Its internal organisation is a model 
 for all other newspapers in the world, since it 
 provides its employés with substantial reasons to re- 
 main in its service, and takes every possible pre- 
 caution against interruption in its business. ‘The 
 employés need not leave the office even for their 
 meals. An excellent restaurant is upon the Times 
 premises. A sick-fund for its compositors is con- 
 stantly maintained. One of its chief attractions is 
 its amateur correspondence; but it is so regardless 
 of the first principles of journalism, that although 
 the reputed speeches of Mr. Murphy, the anti-popish 
 lecturer, were discussed for weeks in its columns by 
 numerous letter-writers, it had not the tact to send 
 a phonographic reporter to take down Mr. Murphy’s 
 speeches word for word, and thus end all controversy 
 —a plan which would have suggested itself to an_ 
 American editor at once. What is technically called 
 its “make-up” is miserable, except in its advertising 
 columns. It has a standing head for “Forrien Iv- 
 TELLIGENCE ;” but you will generally find a letter 
 from Spain, or the United States, or some other 
 foreign country in another portion of the paper. 
 Pufts of books, of machines, of all sorts of odd no- 
 tions, drift almost daily into its ‘ City Intelligence” 
 or money article. Its Paris correspondent writes 
 
English Journals. 109 
 
 about Spain, about Italy, about every other nation 
 than the French, and seems thoroughly mformed 
 upon every subject outside his own department. 
 Open your T?%mes of this morning, and you will 
 discover scattered about in its broad pages a number 
 of trifling letters about little nothings, which seem 
 to be, but are not, thrown in to fill up waste space. 
 These epistles are part of the system of the Times, 
 which, with the versatility of the elephant, moves 
 heavy weights in its editorials, and picks up pins in 
 its correspondence. 
 
 In its mechanical department the Times is 
 almost perfection; but, although it uses Hoe’s 
 American presses, I should like to see it adopt 
 that new invention by which both sides of the 
 paper are printed simultaneously. Its method of 
 publication is quite provincial. Like most. of the 
 other London journals, it is terribly in the power 
 of Mr. W. H. Smith, M.P., the news-dealer, who 
 purchases a large proportion of its daily issue. Mr. 
 Smith is a Conservative, and the Zimes is now 
 Liberal in politics; but while Mr. Smith was can- 
 vassing Westminster against Mr. John Stuart Mill, 
 the favourite Liberal philosopher, you vainly looked 
 in the Zimes for any opposition to the Conservative 
 candidate. Most of the other Liberal organs, except 
 the Star, were in the same predicament. Mr. Smith 
 
 could—I do not say he would—have practically 
 
110 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 suppressed them if they had imperilled his election 
 by their attacks; and so Mr. Mill was left to his 
 fate by his journalistic friends. The clubmen, poli- 
 ticians, and gossips of London have had many a 
 laugh and joke over this state of affairs; but I can 
 only deeply regret it. It is an evil thing for English 
 journalism, and for journalists all over the world, 
 that any man should have, even temporarily, the 
 power over the leading London press that the French 
 Emperor has over the press of France. An organ- 
 
 isation of special carriers—who receive their papers 
 directly from the office, and deliver them directly 
 to subscribers—like that in successful operation in 
 connection with the Philadelphia Public Ledger, 
 would obviate all difficulties, and render the London 
 press again independent. 
 
 In its faults, as in its virtues, I consider the 
 London Times unique; and because it is generally 
 conceded to be the most distinguished newspaper in 
 the world, and because all writers, no matter what 
 they may say publicly, are privately anxious for the 
 honour of contributing to its pages, it seems amply 
 worthy of the space occupied in criticising it. More 
 than this: I find it feared in England to an extent 
 incomprehensible in the United States. Politicians 
 live in dread of it, although they declare that its 
 opinions are as variable as the weathercock; artists, 
 authors, singers, and actors shudder before it, al- 
 
English Journals. 11] 
 
 though they openly assert that its criticisms may be 
 tempered by social influences, by judicious flattery, 
 by apropos engagements for a concert, or by well- 
 paid offers to revise successful plays; and attachés of 
 other newspapers so tremble when its name is men- 
 tioned, as to sink their voices to a whisper, fright- 
 ened lest the very walls have ears. Only after a visit 
 to England can any American understand the sur- 
 prise of the cockney prisoner in the play, when the 
 threat of writing to the Z%mes produced no effect- 
 upon the brigands his captors, or the boldness of my 
 publishers in venturing to print what I have written. 
 But the fact which surprises me is, that politicians, 
 artists, authors, singers, actors, and other public 
 characters should really dread a journal about which 
 they are always ready to retail any quantity of scan- 
 dal, or should scandalise a journal which they really 
 dread. I state this paradox, but cannot explain it. 
 When these remarks or criticisms upon the 
 Times were first published in Timsley’s, numerous 
 friends assured me, personally or by letter, that 
 the Zimes would never forgive so outspoken an 
 article, and that I should be summarily annihilated. 
 Worse than this, they informed me that the Thun- 
 derer’s vengeance would be extended to my friends, 
 the editor who admitted the article, and the pub- 
 lisher who issued it—nothing, I believe, was said 
 concerning the printers who printed it. No mortal 
 
112 English Photographs. 
 
 power could avert this punishment. We should 
 either be slowly withered by a life-long and con- 
 temptuous silence, or swiftly destroyed by an om- 
 nipotent leader, just as the gods might please. <A 
 dozen precedents of similar crimes and similar con- 
 demnations were recited to justify these awful pre- 
 dictions. My informants were influential persons, 
 who knew their ground better than I did; and upon 
 any other subject I should have credited them 
 implicitly. But fortunately I had been connected 
 for several years with another great journal, in an- 
 other country, which is also endowed, by popular 
 superstition, with mysterious wrath, and is supposed 
 to keep a Black Book, in which the names of its 
 victims are recorded in blood-red ink; and I recol- 
 lected that, during all these years, I had never heard, 
 inside the office, of attacks dictated by mere personal 
 motives, or free criticisms answered by crushing con- 
 tempt; but that, on the contrary, the Black Book 
 and the celestial anger were the exclusive property 
 of ignorant gossippers. Then I read over my article, 
 as one might read his death-warrant, and, thinking 
 it all true, patiently awaited the impending doom. 
 If the Times had a Bogey in a dark closet, as nurses 
 have to frighten children, I wanted to see it. If 
 I had felt afraid of the Times, I should have gone 
 down on my knees every morning and evening, and 
 
 thought solemnly for ten minutes of Richard Cobden 
 
English Journals. Lis 
 
 —how he was assailed, and what honours are now 
 paid to his memory ! | 
 
 Months have since passed and nothing has 
 happened. None of the predictions of my kind 
 friends have been verified. There has been no 
 change, either for the better or the worse, from any 
 Olympian influences. I wish that my experience 
 might help to dissipate all that mist of foolish fancies 
 which hangs around great journals, and degrades 
 the reputation of journalists. It is almost impos- 
 sible to write seriously upon the subject; but if the 
 newspapers themselves would speak out boldly, print 
 the tales which they know to be in circulation about 
 themselves, and put to the blush those who invent 
 and circulate them, much of the evil might be reme- 
 died. People are always ready to believe ghost- 
 stories, or to half-believe them; but journals now- 
 adays are not edited by ghosts, with private wrongs 
 to avenge and secret crimes to punish, but by men 
 of the world, who deal with public matters from a 
 public standpoint, and who are fully aware that 
 they are most powerful when most impartial and 
 impersonal. 
 
 And all this leads up to a few final words upon 
 the Zimes topic. The sign of coming danger for 
 that journal is, that it is no longer bought or read 
 by the young people. Brisker and cheaper papers 
 are superseding it with the rising generation. It is 
 
 I 
 
114 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 a fatal fault. It does 
 not accurately represent the spirit of the age. Mr. 
 
 beginning to be out of date 
 
 Walter, its proprietor, must be a very good-hearted 
 man ; for I hear that he is educating one hundred 
 and fifty poor children upon his estates, all of whom, 
 when they are old enough to take a paper, will cer- 
 tainly subscribe for the Telegraph. But Mr. Walter has 
 seriously injured his own journal by again becoming 
 a Member of Parliament. The strength of the Times 
 has been its political independence ; but, notwith- 
 standing all his declarations to the contrary, the 
 world can no more disassociate the proprietor of 
 the Zimes from his paper than from his body. He 
 is again a Liberal politician, and the Times has 
 lately become a Liberal partisan organ. During 
 the recent canvass it spoke of “ our” victories and 
 “our” losses as if it had been the News or the Star. 
 I am astonished that the Conservatives should have 
 made even a pretence of opposing Mr. Walter ; it 
 would have been better for both parties to have 
 supported him, since he insisted upon being a can- 
 didate, so as to make him an independent Member; 
 but no true journalist can congratulate him upon his 
 election. He wields what might be the greatest 
 power in England. It is his privilege to manufac- 
 ture Members of Parliament, not to become one of 
 them. He who can create and direct political 
 parties should not place himself under the disci- 
 
English Journals. 115 
 
 pline of the party whip. The press needs no repre- 
 sentatives in Parliament—it is a parliament of itself, 
 more important than that which meets at the Palace 
 of Westminster. As a Liberal organ pure and 
 simple, the Zimes never can compete with the 
 journals which already hold that rank, and have 
 held it consistently for years. Let some responsible 
 persons, not known to be attached to the paper, be 
 sent to the Reform and Carlton Clubs to hear what 
 professional politicians say about it, and an amazing 
 unanimity will pervade the two reports. The 
 Liberals do not welcome an ally that may prove 
 another Trojan horse ; the Conservatives are em- 
 bittered against the friend who stood by them so 
 steadfastly during the passage of the Reform Bill, 
 but who has gone quite over to the enemy at 
 last. The Times, which once had the confidence 
 of both parties and the information from both par- 
 ties, is now reduced to learn of Disraeli’s resigna- 
 tion from the columns of the Telegraph of the day 
 before. 
 
 An astronomer, who is powerless to alter the 
 courses of the stars, can at least observe and predict 
 them; and my observation and prediction is, that the 
 Times will lose a thousandfold more than it can pos- 
 sibly gain by exchanging its independence for par- 
 tisanship. It has, I acknowledge, vast reserve forces 
 at its disposal. Within the past few months, taught 
 
116 English Photographs. 
 
 by the lessons of the Abyssinian War, it has com- 
 menced to receive special telegrams from distant 
 correspondents. ‘This system, carried out with more 
 enterprise, is sure to prove remunerative ; for special 
 news will always increase the circulation of a news- 
 paper. At present the despatches are amusingly 
 brief; but the effort at least is satisfactory, and 
 deserves encouragement and imitation. Then, again, 
 the Zimes can, at any moment, cut down its price 
 per copy and increase its advertising rates, so as 
 to furnish a handsomer paper than any of its rivals 
 at the same cost to the subscriber. I believe that 
 this bold strategy will be tried whenever the circu- 
 lation falls below fifty thousand daily—that is to 
 say, probably within five years. The success of 
 the manceuvre is not so certain; it may be post- 
 poned, like the Waterloo charge of the Old Guard, 
 until it is too late. Mechanical and typographical 
 perfections count for little in newspapers of the 
 present day. They are like the flowers in the 
 vestibule of the theatre, which please those who 
 enter, but never attract a single paying spectator. 
 The play’s the thing, in journalism as in theatricals. 
 News,—plenty of news, the earliest news, the latest 
 news, local news, foreign news, exclusive news, all 
 the news,—this, with political independence and 
 impartiality, are what the people want in a daily 
 
 paper; and they will have it, no matter whether 
 
English Journals. LG 
 
 the Times chooses to furnish them with it or not. 
 If not, so much the worse for the Times. 
 
 Foremost among the competitors with the Times 
 is the Telegraph, which has a magnificent circula- 
 tion, and would have an equal influence if it were 
 more moderate in its utterances, and if it would 
 make use more freely of the invention from which 
 it derives its name. The Telegraph, like the New 
 York Ledger, is a fine illustration of the benefits of 
 unlimited advertising. No dead-wall in London is 
 without its sign-board, no fence is without its an- 
 nouncement of unparalleled circulation. Most of the 
 American newspapers are content to advertise in 
 their own columns alone; but few of the London 
 journals, except the Zimes and Post, disdain to take 
 advantage of the publicity of posters. The Tele- 
 graph keeps up a steady rivalry with the Times in 
 its news, and rises to fresh efforts every time it is 
 beaten. Of late it has been remarkably and re- 
 peatedly successful. One of its peculiarities, and its 
 principal fault, is an exaggeration of tone. Every 
 good thing is the best in creation, and every bad 
 thing is the worst in the world, with the Telegraph. 
 A minor characteristic is an invincible and most 
 comical aversion to the Pall Mall Gazette, which 
 that journal, by constant chafing, does its utmost 
 to aggravate. Its special correspondence is in such 
 a vein that it is all attributed to Mr. Sala, although 
 
118 English Photographs. 
 
 that gentleman can hardly be in five places at 
 once; and it kindly maintains a Paris correspon- 
 dent in order that the other papers may make fun 
 of him. Its leaders are apparently written under 
 the stimulus of the reward of a gold medal for the 
 person who shall commence farthest away from his 
 subject, take the longest time in reaching it, and 
 employ the greatest number of words in expressing 
 his ideas. The consequence is, that the Telegraph's 
 editorial essays differ as distinctly from editorials 
 proper, as the harangues of a professional exhorter 
 differ from a clergyman’s sermons. To invoke 
 the Muses in the most classical style before describ- 
 ing a dog-fight, or to picture a steeplechase between 
 the planets as a preliminary to an account of the 
 Premier’s appearance at a country fair, is nothing 
 to a writer for the Telegraph; while for imappro- 
 priate piety and gushing sentimentalism this news- 
 paper has not its equal. None of its contributors, 
 like one of the editors of the New York World, 
 seems able to do himself justice in less than a 
 column and a half. Its prize-writer occupies two 
 columns without reaching his subject at all. But 
 when this is good-naturedly said—and it is becom- 
 ing less applicable every day—all is said on that 
 side of the question. Accustomed as Americans are 
 to short, pithy leaders, too often grossly expressed 
 and couched in very bad English, they are very 
 
English Journals. 119 
 
 ready to laugh at the long and pleonastic editorials 
 in the London papers; but none can fail to do 
 justice to the consistent Liberalism of the Telegraph, 
 to its summary of the debates in Parliament, which 
 conveys a better idea of the proceedings than the 
 most elaborate reports, and to its earnest efforts to 
 obtain the news in spite of many disadvantages, diffi- 
 culties, and disappointments, and to give it to the 
 public at the lowest possible price. But if this paper, 
 or any other London journal, would add to its con- 
 tents a brief abstract of the news of the day, such as 
 is published in the American papers, it would con- 
 siderably increase its attractions to business men, 
 who, in England as in America, have little time to 
 sift a few grains of intelligence out of numerous 
 bushels of words. The Star, in a genial leader, 
 which quite surprised me into gratitude, asserts that 
 some London journals publish such an abstract 
 already. This is a mistake. They publish short 
 editorials upon prominent topics of news, which is 
 quite a different matter. 
 
 Looking at the London daily papers en masse, 
 you will find that the majority of their contents are 
 exactly alike, after making due allowances for pecu- 
 liarities of style and editorial differences of opinion. 
 The keen competition for news so observable in the 
 American papers is almost unknown in England. 
 You will rarely read any important intelligence 
 
120 English Photographs. 
 
 in one newspaper which is not published in all 
 the others; and if you do, it is ten to one that 
 the special news is contradicted the next day. In 
 fashionable intelligence, however, the Post is far in 
 advance of its contemporaries, and is really the only 
 journal worth consulting for this kind of news. 
 Why it should be so I cannot explain, since the 
 same intelligence is easily obtainable by all the 
 papers; but the Post gets it first and pays for it— 
 or is paid for it—very handsomely, and the other 
 journals are satisfied to copy it the morning after- 
 wards. The ridiculous “ Court Circular,” chronicling 
 that the Queen rode, drove, or walked in or out of 
 the Home Park, and had or had not a slight cold, 
 is still regularly published in all the London papers, 
 and the movements of the other members of the 
 royal family are recorded with the same exactitude ; 
 but not a single paper has the spirit to inform us 
 what the royal family had for dinner, and how much 
 they ate, or what time they went to bed, and how 
 they slept—information as valuable as, and more 
 interesting than, that to which they now surrender 
 half a column daily. ven the Post is deficient in 
 this respect. 
 
 The News was the official and popular organ of 
 the Liberal party before the establishment of the 
 Telegraph, and is now seeking to regain this position 
 by reducing its price from threepence to one 
 
English Journals. or 
 
 penny. In tone this journal closely resembles the 
 New York Times—its Liberalism has a Conser- 
 vative element, its opposition is gentlemanly, its 
 manner is genial. Some of the attachés of the News 
 state that all of them are possessed of private for- 
 tunes, and work rather for the love of the profession 
 than for the pecuniary rewards. I tell the tale as 
 it is told to me, and sincerely hope that the state- 
 ment may be true without a solitary exception; in 
 which case we may place the News among the cu- 
 riosities of journalism. Its proprietors have certainly 
 a right to rank first among newspaper publishers, 
 for they are said to have repeatedly divided among 
 their employés a large portion of the profits of the 
 paper. The foreign correspondence of the News was 
 once unrivalled; I am sorry to learn that it has been 
 recently reorganised. Its City article is declared by 
 business men to be superior to that of any other 
 paper. Upon American affairs, while the Times has 
 no fixed opinions at all, and the Zelegraph none that 
 it knows of, the News has always advocated the doc- 
 trines of the Republican party, and was the only 
 ‘London journal thoroughly right from the begin- 
 ning to the end of the late American civil war. At 
 present, with its reduced price, the News is begin- 
 ning to compete with the Star, the English Radical 
 organ. 
 
 The Star is an exact reproduction of the New York 
 
122 English Photographs. 
 
 Tribune, or the Tribune is an ‘exact reproduction of 
 the London Star, whichever way you may please to 
 phrase it. Whatever the Zribune says about American 
 politics the Star accepts as gospel; whatever the Star 
 says about English politics the Tribune accepts as 
 rather truer than the Gospel, of which it has, on the 
 whole, not too high an opinion. Each regards the 
 other as the only real exponent of national senti- 
 ment, praises John Bright and Charles Sumner as 
 the greatest statesmen in their respective countries, 
 condemns Mr. Disraeli and President Johnson as the 
 most outrageous villains unhung, and does all this 
 in the same authoritative and uncompromising style. 
 Need I say more to present both journals to the 
 minds of my English and American readers ? 
 
 The Advertiser is a journal which is probably 
 without a parallel. It is published by the Licensed 
 Victuallers’ Association, yields its proprietors a 
 handsome profit, prints as much news and is as 
 large as most of the other papers, and is chiefly re- 
 markable for its inveterate hostility to the Emperor 
 Napoleon. That sovereign must tremble whenever 
 he happens to read the Advertiser. Hardly a day 
 passes without its ignominiously dethroning him, 
 and either condemning him to banishment or de- 
 capitation, just as the editor chances to be in a good 
 or bad humour after dinner. Barring the fact that, 
 
 after a while, you indignantly wonder why a monarch 
 
Hinglish Journals. io 
 
 so persistently kicked out still holds on to his crown 
 so obstinately, there is much pleasant reading to be 
 found in the Advertiser, and the editor is never afraid 
 to tell you so frankly and emphatically. 
 
 The Herald and the Standard is the organ of the 
 Tory party. Itis the same paper with a double name 
 and a double issue—a journalistic Siamese twins, or 
 a newspaper eagle with two heads, or a press Orator 
 Puff. The two papers are published at the same office, 
 and their contents are the same, with the exception of 
 the editorials, which differ in words but not in ideas. 
 The Herald is a small paper, sold at threepence for 
 the benefit of those old Tories who do not like either 
 the size or the price of the Standard, which is a large 
 paper sold for a penny. The Standard claims to be 
 the largest journal in the world, and to have the 
 largest circulation; and I have no reason to doubt 
 its assertions. But does, or does not, the circulation 
 of the Herald count with that of the Standard in the 
 returns? This is the paper to which Manhattan 
 wrote those notorious letters during the American 
 war, in which he described the grass growing in the 
 streets of New York, and the green apples roasting 
 upon the trees in New Jersey, and the Confederates 
 driving the Yankees to their native dens at the 
 point of the bayonet. This romancer, the lineal 
 descendant of Munchausen, is still considered .an 
 authority by many people in England; and you 
 
124 English Photographs. 
 
 may often hear him gravely quoted upon American 
 affairs. We can afford to laugh at all this now, 
 although there was a time when it caused us no 
 slight anger, which poor Joe Scoville was the first 
 to deprecate when he was brought before the au- 
 thorities in New York. It is not singular that the 
 double - barrelled Conservative organ should have 
 been wrong concerning the events of the American 
 war; but it is strange that the Tory chiefs should 
 so constantly mislead it concerning home politics. 
 What is the use of being an organ unless political 
 leaders will set the tune which is to be played? The 
 Herald and Standard, although it steadily defends 
 the Conservative cause, is rarely correct in its pre- 
 dictions as to Mr. Disraeli’s policy, and was especially 
 wide of the mark during the Reform-Bill troubles. 
 After the recent elections the Tories did not con- 
 descend to inform it of their plans; and on the 
 very morning that it was proclaiming victory it 
 read in the Liberal organ of the Premier’s premature 
 or strategetical resignation. Surely such absurd 
 blunders ought not to be allowed to happen so fre- 
 quently. 
 
 The Standard, Star, and News publish evening 
 editions, enriched with miscellaneous sketches by 
 ‘“Costermonger Joe,” “the Amateur Casual,” and 
 other writers; the Z%mes publishes a second edition 
 at noon; but the Pall Mall Gazette, the Globe, and 
 
English Journals. 125 
 
 the Glowworm are the legitimate afternoon papers of 
 London. The Glowworm is printed as a programme 
 for some of the theatres and music-halls, and is an 
 excellent specimen of its class; the Globe is a Con- 
 servative journal, pert, trenchant, more lively, and, of 
 late, better informed than any of its Tory contempo- 
 raries; and the Pall Mall Gazette ranks as the best 
 evening journal printed in the English language, not 
 only for the copiousness and authenticity of its in- 
 formation, but for the admirable essays and reviews 
 which it contains, and the dainty elegance of its type 
 and paper. There is no journal in America which 
 can be compared to it; and although I am not certain 
 that it circulates very extensively, I do know that 
 its approbation is more prized, and its disapproba- 
 tion more dreaded, by the literary, artistic, and 
 political aspirants of England than the praise and 
 blame of any other daily paper except the Times, 
 with which journal the Pall Mall Gazette often un- 
 fortunately sympathises in its cockney views of cur- 
 rent events. Unlike most other newspapers, the Pall 
 Mall devotes a considerable space to religious ques- 
 tions, which it discusses from a semi-sceptical, wholly 
 philosophical point of view, very shocking to weak- 
 minded readers. Its politics are those of an Inde- 
 pendent Liberal 
 
 what we should term in America 
 an Old Line Whig. It does not particularly like 
 Gladstone; it particularly dislikes all Radicals; and 
 
126 English Photographs. 
 
 it has a deep but quiet fondness for the nobility. 
 Its shrewd humour is mainly devoted to gibes and 
 jeers at the Telegraph, as already noted. Better than 
 all, it publishes the news, and often surpasses all its 
 contemporaries in its diplomatic information, parti- 
 cularly in regard to Eastern affairs. 
 
 Let me add that all of the London journals 
 claim the right—which is, in effect, a public wrong 
 —to ignore any event, incident, or person that 
 conflicts with their politics or their prejudices ; 
 and that in this respect those papers which profess 
 the most perfect impartiality are the most notorious 
 offenders. 
 
No. LX. 
 ENGLISH THEATRES. 
 
 AutHoucH London has the reputation among fo- 
 reigners of being a very dull city, there is really 
 
 which 
 
 no continental capital—Paris not excepted 
 contains so many and varied places of amusement. 
 Many persons have an idea that at Paris, Vienna, 
 Berlin, Florence, Rome, and Madrid there is, by 
 day and night alike, an unceasing round of gaieties. 
 and pleasures. Let these misguided folk go to the 
 cities of a thousand delights, and they will often 
 feel the time hang heavily on their hands, unless 
 they can find happiness in sitting on the side- 
 walks, smoking cigars, pipes, or cigarettes, and 
 drinking coffee, beer, or vile native wines, as the 
 custom is among the residents of these favoured 
 localities. But in London there is always some- 
 thing to see or hear; and any traveller who will 
 take the trouble to glance over the advertising 
 columns of the newspapers in the morning, will 
 discover plenty of amusements to occupy him for 
 the ensuing twenty-four hours. Now, Americans 
 are as fond of amusements as the English—that 
 is to say, much more fond of them than the French, 
 
128 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 who are proverbially misrepresented upon this point. 
 Taking the average Englishman and the average 
 Frenchman, the former goes oftener to the theatres, 
 has more holidays, laughs more, and spends more 
 evenings where something besides a drink and 
 a smoke are to be had for his money, than the 
 latter; and yet the average Frenchman 1s con- 
 stantly held up to us as a devotee to amusements! 
 The only genuine ground for this assertion is, that 
 the Frenchman passes most of his time away from 
 home; but this seems not at all singular, when 
 we consider that he has no home in which to re- 
 main. 
 
 An American on first visiting London possesses 
 a most exalted notion of the English theatres and 
 actors. The American stage is a mere offshoot 
 of that of England. Our plays, our dramatic tra- 
 ditions, and a large majority of our actors, are 
 English. It was once sneeringly asked, Who reads 
 an American book? The question might now be 
 parodied with, Who sees an American play? I have 
 witnessed several, rather from duty than from in- 
 clnation; but I may sincerely add that I hope 
 never to see the most of them again. As to Ame- 
 rican actors, the case is very different, as will be 
 explained presently. But nine out of ten Americans 
 in London go first to the music-halls, because these 
 
 institutions are very unlike anything in the United 
 
English Theatres. 129 
 
 States. Patronised by the Prince of Wales, fre- 
 quented by a certain class of the nobility, and 
 continually attacked by what is called the respect- 
 able press, the English music-halls are splendidly 
 advertised all the world over, and most foreigners 
 have a great curiosity to see them. It is very easy 
 to construct a music-hall on paper. A large, richly- 
 decorated room; a well-stocked bar; a capital 
 orchestra; a stage for the singers, dancers, and 
 pantomimists ; a crowd of men and women, sit- 
 ting at tables and smoking and drinking; another 
 crowd of men and women standing in the lobbies ; 
 numerous waiters forcing their way through the 
 crowds; plenty of light, and not much ventilation 
 —these are the constituents of the place. Add the 
 facts that many of the women present are not of 
 the best character, and that the performances are 
 very popular, and the picture is almost complete, 
 unless you wish to throw in a few private boxes 
 with curtains suggestively closed. 
 
 There is no doubt that the music-halls are the 
 favourite places of amusement for the English 
 masses. The opera may be a failure and the 
 theatres thinly attended; but the music-halls are 
 always well filled. Perhaps the origin of this 
 popularity may be found in the perfect freedom 
 of manners allowed: one may dress as he likes, 
 wear a bonnet or hat, smoke cigars or pipes, and 
 
 K 
 
130 English Photographs. 
 
 drink anything he is able to pay for, from honest 
 ale to dubious champagne. At any rate, I know 
 of no instance of the success of a music-hall with- 
 out this freedom. But when this is admitted, there 
 is a great deal to be said in praise of the perform- 
 ances. Cramped and restricted by the opposition 
 of the theatrical managers, who have repeatedly 
 endeavoured to close the halls by Parliamentary 
 power, the proprietors succeed, nevertheless, in giv- 
 ing an entertainment so pleasing to the people that 
 the theatres are compelled to adopt their ideas, steal 
 their songs and dances, and purchase at second- 
 hand their dresses and decorations. Indeed, almost 
 the only managers in London who display extraordi- 
 nary enterprise and ability are those of the music- 
 halls and the east-side theatres. The popular songs 
 of the day come from the music-halls, and if the 
 words are often trashy—though they are never so 
 trashy as in theatrical burlesques—the melodies are 
 generally excellent. Certainly, there are few other 
 composers of light comic melodies in England than 
 those connected with these institutions, even though 
 the latter do borrow their themes from the French. 
 At no theatre in London is the orchestra so fine, 
 the ballet so good, the scenery and costumes so taste- 
 ful and elegant, as at the best music-halls. Those 
 who take the pains to investigate the matter will 
 be surprised to learn the exact truth of these state- 
 
English Theatres. Reet 
 
 ments, and will confess that there is some other 
 excuse than the liberty to drink and smoke for those 
 persons who prefer to leave the theatres and patro- 
 nise the rival entertainments. The taste of the 
 Prince of Wales is not so bad as some critics sup- 
 pose. 
 
 An outsider, who has no interest in the discus- 
 sion, cannot but be amused by comparing what he 
 reads about the music-halls with what he sees and 
 hears at them. Fortunately, to the foreigner all 
 things are pure. ‘Travelling, like charity, covers 
 a multitude of sins. No matter how doubtful the 
 reputation of a place may be, the tourist is able to 
 visit it under the cloak of curiosity, even though 
 this cloak cover a clerical habit or a lady’s robe. 
 Have we not all met foreign clergymen at the Paris 
 Mabille? We may meet them also at the London 
 Alhambra. Go, then, to a music-hall, and you will 
 observe that the spectators are the worst part of 
 the spectacle. The manager 1s not responsible for 
 that; he opens his doors to the public, and all 
 who pay are admitted. Theatrical managers do no 
 more. But although you may see plenty of women 
 with easy virtue and men with no virtue at all, you 
 will also see numbers of respectable middle-class 
 people, with their wives, sisters, and friends sitting 
 around them, as comfortable as Germans at a bier- 
 garten; and a few of the upper classes, attracted 
 
132 English Photographs. 
 
 either by curiosity or the reputation of some fa- 
 vourite performer. There is no disturbance, no 
 disorder; nothing to offend your eyes except the 
 cigar-smoke, and the painted hussies in the lobby; 
 nothing to offend your ears half so roughly as the 
 équivogues and double entendres which are not only 
 tolerated but are applauded at the theatres. 
 
 And what is the entertainment which is often de- 
 nounced as so demoralising? It. commences with a 
 concert by the orchestra, which is composed of better 
 performers than you can hear anywhere else, except 
 at the opera, and of soloists whom the most fastidi- 
 ous critics applaud when they happen to appear at 
 Exeter Hall or the Crystal Palace. Then come 
 little pantomimes and ballets, the principal dancers 
 being rather less indecent than those you see at the 
 theatres, and the ballet-girls being precisely the 
 same women whom you behold, an hour after, at 
 the Theatre Royal this or that. There are gym- 
 nastic and acrobatic feats such as were once ex- 
 hibited only at circuses. There are negro minstrels 
 of about the average quality. Englishmen think 
 them very clever, because they have never seen 
 minstrels like Bryant, Buckley, Birch, and Backus 
 in London. ‘This entertainment is interspersed with 
 comic songs by male and female singers, in the cho- 
 ruses of which the audience heartily jom. The 
 sentiments of these songs are seldom bad, although 
 
Linglish Theatres. 133 
 
 the language may sometimes be unrefined. They 
 advise you to do a good turn when you can; to lay 
 by for a rainy day; to beware of false friends who 
 desert you when you are up a tree; never to de- 
 ceive your own true love; and much more to the 
 same effect. Most of these songs are sung in cha- 
 racter-dresses. You hear the originals of the tunes 
 which have made the fortunes of most English bur- 
 lesques, and of most English burlesque-writers since 
 peerless Planché. 
 
 What is there demoralising or indecent in a 
 programme like this? Yet it is the staple fare of 
 the music-halls. I have before me the bills of half- 
 a-dozen different establishments, all of which I have 
 visited in the routine of London sight-seeing, and — 
 there is very little variation from the sketch which 
 I have given. Sometimes there are local songs. If 
 you wish to learn the difference between a genuine 
 and a bogus local song, listen to one at a music- 
 hall, and then to the weak travesty which is now 
 being sung at the Strand Theatre. Why, at a 
 music-hall the singer turns the news of the week 
 into rhyme. Nowhere can you hear the Duke of 
 Edinburgh more heartily cheered, the opinion of 
 the people in regard to the disestablishment of the 
 Irish Church more frankly expressed, the bills be- 
 fore Parliament more freely criticised, the general 
 
 national feeling more truly manifested, than at the 
 
134 English Photographs. 
 
 music-halls. Public sentiment is often better repre- 
 sented there than in the newspapers. The applause 
 and hisses are surer criteria of popular favour or 
 disfavour than the cheers of packed meetings, or 
 the groans of suborned disturbers of the peace. 
 Disraeli, Gladstone, Bright, and Beales go for pre- 
 cisely what they are worth at these places of amuse- 
 ment. All classes are present, are perfectly un- 
 biassed, are entirely free to demonstrate as they 
 choose; and the result is a reliable verdict. It 
 speaks well, too, for the respectability of Englishmen 
 that no immorality is tolerated on the stage. What 
 immoralities the majority of the audience may be 
 guilty of privately, Heaven and themselves only 
 know; but that portion of the entertainment which 
 is under the charge of the music-hall managers is 
 remarkably free from vice. Upon only one occasion 
 have I heard anything like an indecent remark, and 
 then the performer was so tremendously hissed that 
 he was obliged to come forward and apologise. It 
 would do one good to assist at such a rebuke at a 
 London theatre; but there hissing is a lost art, ex- 
 cept upon first nights, when few of the paying 
 public are present. The tobacco-smoke, and the 
 cheap prices, and the indiscriminate company, may 
 keep many persons away from the music-halls; but 
 it ought, in justice, to be understood that there is 
 nothing in the programme of the entertainments 
 
Linglish Theatres. 135 
 
 —$—$—$—— 
 
 to deter them from attending. In fact, the whole 
 thing is rather tame for those who are accustomed 
 to La Traviata and Don Giovanni at the Opera, and 
 Henry Dunbar and Oliver Twist at the theatres. It 
 is at least a satisfaction to record that foreigners 
 may visit these places without danger to their 
 morals, and observe innocently some thoroughly 
 characteristic features of British life and manners. 
 All this may read like a defence of the music- 
 halls; but that is not my intention. I only want 
 to secure a local standpoint from which the Lon- 
 don theatres may be fairly judged. The experiment 
 of music-halls upon the English model was tried a 
 few years ago in the United States, and I hear that 
 it is to be again revived in New York; but it failed 
 formerly, partly because the performers were not 
 of the right calibre, partly because pretty waiter- 
 girls were employed, and partly because of the 
 strenuous opposition of the theatrical managers ; 
 and the halls were finally suppressed by legislative 
 enactments. The American public consented to this 
 suppression for the simple reason that they knew 
 they had something better than the music-halls at 
 the theatres; the British public has not consented 
 to any stringent Parliamentary interposition, be- 
 cause the English theatres are not now so good as 
 the concert-saloons. But the critics of the represen- 
 tative journals of England very naturally take the 
 
136 English Photographs. 
 
 side of the theatres, since the most of these gentle. 
 men are professional dramatic writers. 
 
 When this remark appeared in Tinsley’s, Mr. 
 Punch, with his usual wit, promptly replied : “That 
 is certainly not his reason, nor is it a natural one, 
 as theatrical authors are generally much more in- 
 clined to castigate managers than to fondle them.” 
 I am not to be settled by a clever sophism, and 
 would like to see Mr. Punch’s young men do a little 
 more castigation and a little less fondling in the 
 theatrical line. Mr. Punch emphasises his opinions 
 by a sketch representing “a gent” declaring diseust- 
 edly that he would rather listen to some ‘ Not for 
 Joseph” singer than to Hamlet at Drury Lane. The 
 satire would have some sting if the famous hunch- 
 back could name an English actor able to perform 
 Hamlet creditably. Mr. Barry Sullivan and Mr. 
 Phelps are the standard tragedians at Drury Lane 
 during the tragic season, and both of them must be 
 haunted by more real ghosts than that of Hamlet’s 
 father when they undertake to impersonate the 
 melancholy Dane—not, perhaps, by the ghost of 
 Shakespeare, who is too used to having his creations 
 murdered, but certainly by the ghosts of thoce 
 ereat tragedians of the past, whose very shoes 
 Messrs. Sullivan and Phelps are unworthy to un- 
 loose. In other countries an actor plays a part 
 because he is competent to play it ; in England it 
 
English Theatres. 13% 
 
 seems to be taken for granted that he is competent 
 because he plays the part. Upon no other hypo- 
 thesis can a foreigner understand the encouraging 
 criticisms, to say nothing of the eulogiums, which 
 are wasted upon the present race of tragedians 
 in England, unless he fall back upon the theory 
 that the critics, unable to find the actors they need, 
 are ready to make the most of any who come along. 
 America is considered by some English theatrical 
 professionals as a sort of uncivilised country, where 
 every ordinary actor is a star, and receives unlimited 
 money. But ask one of the travelled tragedians of 
 England at the present time what was his success 
 among a theatrical people accustomed to the King 
 Lear of Edwin Forrest and the Hamlet of Edwin 
 Booth. Let bygones be bygones; for both coun- 
 tries appreciated Kean, Kemble, and Macready. Put 
 national prejudices aside; for most of the American 
 actors are either born in England or descended 
 from Englishmen. Speaking as an impartial critic, 
 the London stage is now as far below that of New 
 York in tragedy as it is below that of Paris in 
 comedy. 
 
 As for theatrical management, the less said the 
 more pleasant for Londoners. From the moment 
 you go into a London theatre, until the moment 
 you leave it, the lack of managerial tact, enterprise, 
 sagacity, attention, and industry is painfully appa- 
 
138 English Photographs. 
 
 rent. These deficiencies are partially explained 
 when you are informed that most English managers 
 have Parliamentary or other duties to perform, and 
 that they lease the front of the house to persons 
 who are bound to realise their profits at the expense 
 of those who are unfortunate enough to compose 
 the audience. One Member of Parliament, who is 
 also a manager, secured a splendid puff for his 
 theatre, some months ago, by persuading an honour- 
 able friend to ask her Majesty’s Ministers why the 
 Lord Chamberlain had vetoed the drama called 
 Oliwer Twist. The play, beg thus made an affair 
 of State, attracted general attention, and the Lord 
 Chamberlain withdrew his veto. Why the Lord 
 Chamberlain should be bothered with dramas at 
 all nobody seems to know. The law, or regulation, 
 investing him with the functions of a dramatic 
 censor, ought to have been obsolete these twenty 
 years. Why should there be a censorship of plays 
 any more than of newspapers or books? In Ame- 
 rica, the business tact of the managers and the 
 moral sense of the people are quite sufficient to 
 regulate the stage, and so they would prove in 
 England. Do prove, may perhaps be the better 
 phrase; for although every play has to be sub- 
 mitted to and approved by the Lord Chamberlain 
 before it can be produced, his lordship’s censorship 
 is usually restricted to excising the word “God” 
 
Linglish Theatres. 139 
 
 and substituting the word “Heaven” in the text. 
 Gross immoralities — except in French comedies— 
 or disloyal political allusions — except in Irish 
 dramas—he, of course, would not permit ;_ but 
 neither would an English audience. Briefly, then, 
 the London censorship is another sham that ought 
 to be abolished. The Lord Chamberlain’s veto can 
 have no effect outside of London; it is seldom 
 exercised ; it is wholly unnecessary; but occasion- 
 
 ally it becomes vexatious—as, for Instance, when it 
 forbids Camulle to be acted while La Traviata is 
 allowed to be sung,—and the time has come for 
 it to be reformed out of existence. 
 
 _At most of the English theatres you are compelled 
 to pay a fee for securing your seat during the day— 
 which is precisely equivalent to charging you extra 
 for paying cash and taking all the risks. In what 
 other business would this custom be tolerated? Man- 
 agers defend the practice very ingeniously, however, 
 by arguing that if a person desires to pick out and 
 ensure his seat at his leisure, instead of taking his 
 chances with the crowd, he ought to pay extra for 
 the privilege. Another fee is charged at most of the 
 theatres for the bill of the play—a swindle which 
 could only be equalled by a restaurant-keeper who 
 should ask you for sixpence before handing you the 
 bill of fare. Some of the theatres admit their patrons 
 at half-price after nine o'clock; but this custom is being 
 
140 English Photographs. 
 
 eradually abandoned. With scarcely an exception, 
 the theatres are inconvenient, uncomfortable, and 
 dark. The entrances and exits for the audiences are 
 dreadfully inadequate. In case of a fire at any London 
 theatre, it is a certainty that two-thirds of those pre- 
 sent would be either burned or jammed to death. In 
 New York, the best and largest theatres can be com- 
 pletely emptied, through the ordinary exits, of a full 
 audience, in less than four minutes; but what would 
 be the result if the narrow lobbies and narrower stair- 
 cases of a London theatre at the West End were put 
 to this test of safety? The most expensive seats are 
 those in the private-boxes, and yet not more than 
 two persons in each box can see the stage comfort- 
 ably. The stalls are the next dearest places; but 
 ladies in bonnets are not admitted to the stalls. This 
 rule, adopted when ladies wore bonnets like coal- 
 scuttles, is now enforced when the strictest personal 
 examination on the part of the bewildered usher is 
 required to determine whether the trifle of lace and 
 jet which a lady wears upon her head is or is not 
 a bonnet. Then a foreigner asks, with amazement, 
 why the first few rows of seats on the floor of the 
 house are called stalls, and command the highest 
 prices, while the rows of seats just behind them are 
 called “the pit” and are the cheapest? In France, 
 and in America, the whole of this area is termed 
 ‘the parquet” or “the parquette,” and is the dearest 
 
English Theatres. 141 
 
 because it 1s the best place from which to view the 
 performances. Before the drama, and between the 
 acts of the drama in London, you must listen to an 
 orchestra so far inferior to the German bands which 
 perambulate the streets, that a comparison would be 
 odious. Dance-tunes between the acts of a tragedy, 
 and funeral-marches between the acts of a comedy, 
 are the most pardonable of the crimes of London 
 orchestras. Every tier has its refreshment-bar, as if 
 the theatre were a legitimate adjunct to a grog-shop, 
 and no Englishman could sit out a play without the 
 support of a drain of spirits. When you leave the 
 place of amusement there is a final fee to pay to the 
 man who announces your carriage, and you drive 
 home with the delightful consciousness that you have 
 been mulcted in every possible style by the theatrical 
 manager you were weak enough to patronise. 
 
 It would be quite useless to contrast an English 
 theatre with a similar establishment in the United 
 States, where there are no charges for secured seats, 
 no fees for attendants, no price put upon the pro- 
 eramme, no difficulty of egress, no economy in the 
 amount of light afforded to the audience, no stairs 
 to ascend or descend before you reach the stalls, no 
 absurd regulations as to dress—since the good taste 
 of the audience is quite sufficilent—and no mediocrity 
 in the orchestra. English managers have adopted as 
 a maxim the saying that the British public like dis- 
 
142 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 comfort. This idea appears to me most erroneous. 
 Englishmen, like everybody else, will go to see a 
 popular play even though it be performed in a cel- 
 lar; but I am doubtful whether they will go because 
 it is performed in a cellar. On the contrary, the 
 best-patronised theatres in London are those which 
 have the best locations; and whenever an out-of-the- 
 way place of amusement draws crowds it is because 
 of some specialty which cannot be enjoyed anywhere 
 else: as, for example, the Llack-eyed Susan burlesque 
 at the New Royalty, and Mr. T. W. Robertson’s won- 
 derful comedies at the Prince of Wales’s. But when 
 we step from the auditorium to the stage, contrasts 
 and comparisons are not without their value. The 
 dramas and melodramas of the present day we are 
 obliged to accept; for neither English playwrights 
 nor translators from the French are able to furnish 
 us with anything superior, and the Americans are 
 satisfied either to purchase English plays and trans- 
 lations, or to commit them to memory without pur- 
 chase. Nevertheless, it is a reproach to dramatic 
 literature that the supplies for the modern English 
 stage should be derived from some five or six gentle- 
 men, who are overworked with orders from managers, 
 and bestow upon us, not the ripe fruits, but the im- 
 nature blossoms of their brains. Still, scores of plays 
 are handed in at every theatre each week of the year, 
 and filed away among the manager’s manuscripts 
 
English Theatres. 143 
 
 unread, unless they chance to be accompanied with 
 some influential recommendation. Among these hun- 
 dreds of dramas surely a few must be good. One 
 might take the Derby odds upon that fact. If some 
 enterprising manager in want of an attraction would 
 but read over the manuscripts submitted to him in 
 the course of a season, he would astonish both him- 
 self and the public with the result of his researches. 
 Shakespeare himself would stand no chance now, un- 
 less he were strongly recommended to the managers 
 —and very little even then. The age of poor Smol- 
 lett is revived. Take away a few writers, whom any- 
 body acquainted with theatricals can name at once, 
 and the London theatres would be obliged to close 
 their doors, or—happy alternative !—revive the suc- 
 cesses of many years ago. 
 
 Only a short time since two London theatres 
 were in a terrible predicament. None of the 
 stock-writers could sell them a play, and the 
 ‘managers consulted despairingly. At last both 
 heard of a popular dramatist who had a five-act 
 comedy, never acted, in his portfolio; but the dra- 
 matist was absent at a provincial city. One manager 
 wrote, the other telegraphed, and the telegrapher 
 secured the comedy, which proved a failure. The 
 story lacks spice without the names and circum- 
 stances; but it simply shows how limited are the 
 dramatic resources of the English metropolis, and 
 
144 English Photographs. 
 
 how false is the American idea of the fecundity of 
 British dramatists. 
 
 But it is in the English actors that an American is 
 most disappointed. Perhaps he expects so much from 
 the successors of Garrick and Siddons that the reality 
 falls far short of his anticipations. He sees the old 
 playhouses but not the old players. He finds more 
 appropriate scenery in England, and a stricter ad- 
 herence to the traditions of the stage; but no great 
 genius among the men, and comparatively little 
 talent among the women. Since the retirement of 
 Miss Kate Terry there is no English actress, except 
 Miss Herbert and Miss Sedgwick, who would be ac- 
 cepted in America as an exponent of high comedy ; 
 and no Shakespearian actress now adorns the English 
 stage except Miss Glynn, and, in certain parts, Mrs. 
 Scott-Siddons. ‘Tragedians there are none of native 
 birth. The best Hamlet is a Frenchman; and in 
 their rage for something ouwiré the London critics 
 have recently frantically indorsed a German whom 
 his own country never knew, and America rejected 
 as an amateur. Mr. Lester Wallack, the best light 
 comedian who now speaks the English tongue, is only 
 known in England as the son of his father, Mr. J. W. 
 Wallack. Another Wallack, the cousin of Mr. Lester, 
 is the first melodramatic actor of the day; but Lon- 
 don only knows him as a youthful and not successful 
 
 debutant. Mr. John Gilbert, Mr. William Warren, Mr. 
 
English Theatres. 145 
 
 Mark Smith, Mr. Charles Fisher—these are merely 
 names to Englishmen; but such American actors 
 have no equals upon the London stage. There is no 
 line of theatrical business, except eccentric comedy, 
 in which the United States are not more than a 
 match for England to-day, whatever they may have 
 been some years ago. ‘That no national feeling may 
 be enlisted in the comparison, I again repeat that 
 most of the American actors are of English birth or 
 descent; but what we believe is, that England has 
 sent us the best and kept the worst. 
 
 There is no tragedian in England like Booth; no 
 comedian like Jefferson; no burlesque actress like 
 Mrs. Wood; no tragic actress like Madame Ponisi, . 
 Miss Davenport, or Eliza Logan, not to mention 
 Charlotte Cushman; no comedy actress like Mrs. 
 Hoey, Mrs. John Drew, Mrs. Chantrau, Mrs. Sefton, 
 or Miss Henriques, who has just become an Eneg- 
 lishwoman by marriage. There are no old men 
 like Gilbert, Fisher, Smith, Warren, and poor dead 
 Blake; no rising young tragedians like Barrett, 
 Shewell, and Barton Hill. In women the American 
 theatres are especially strong; the English theatres 
 particularly weak. The majority of London actresses 
 would not be tolerated in New York. On the other 
 hand, there are some London actors who: are in- 
 comparable. Wigan, Clarke, Bancroft, Hare, Mon- 
 tague, Younge, Belmore, Vezin, Webster, Neville, 
 
 L 
 
146 English Photographs. 
 
 James, Thorne, Dewar (in one character), Vining, 
 Shore, Murray, Craven, Irving, Brough, and Con- 
 quest, are upon this list; but the most of these are 
 eccentric actors, although I use that term in a sense 
 broad enough to cover a multitude of styles. In 
 their specialties these gentlemen are unrivalled in 
 any country. As for precious John Parry, he is a 
 whole company in himself—orchestra and chorus in- 
 cluded—and is well worth a visit to London to see 
 and hear. 
 
 The English “stars,” technically so called, of 
 course belong to both countries; and but few of 
 them are not as well known on the other side of the 
 Atlantic as in this metropolis. If American “ stars” 
 are not so well known and appreciated in England, 
 that is, perhaps, the fault of circumstances; although, 
 as most of them have attempted an appearance here, 
 the facts would warrant me in stating the truth 
 somewhat more bluntly. But, a la My. Disraeli, I 
 aspire to judicial accuracy in these statements, and 
 the Americans are getting old enough and great 
 enough to afford to be a little longer underrated and 
 misunderstood in regard to their histrionic as well as 
 their historical rank among the nations. 
 
No. X. 
 ENGLISH SPORTS. 
 
 Ir has already been stated that the English are 
 more fond of evening amusements than the French. 
 They are also more fond of holidays than the Ger- 
 mans, and, like the Germans, they love to spend 
 their holidays out of doors. On account of the 
 number of religious festivals which the good people 
 of Vienna are called upon to celebrate, the number 
 of working-days per week in that city is practically 
 reduced to five. But in London the number of 
 working-days is practically only four or four and 
 a half. First, Sunday has to be deducted from the 
 week; then the labouring-classes do not care to 
 labour on blue Monday; then the Saturday half- 
 holiday must be subtracted; and what with Volun- 
 teer parades, Crystal Palace fétes, public receptions, 
 Reform demonstrations, military and naval reviews, 
 Lord Mayors’ shows, Good Friday, Christmas, and 
 other religious holidays, great cricket-matches, the 
 Derby, the University boat-races, and many other 
 metropolitan festivals, the Londoners contrive to 
 secure at least another halfa day of relaxation per 
 week on the average. They are the same sort of 
 
148 English Photographs. 
 
 pleasure-loving people as their ancestors, who used 
 to dance around bonfires in the narrow streets of 
 the old city, and play at quintain before the lords 
 and ladies at Smithfield. The games have changed, 
 but not the popular disposition. The London clerks 
 placard the fences with splendid posters urging buy- 
 ers not to shop later than two o’clock on Saturdays ; 
 and shipwrights who had been starving for months 
 recently struck work because they were asked to 
 labour, at extra wages, on Saturday afternoons. 
 
 In America the general holidays are confined 
 to Sundays, the Fourth of July, New-Year’s Day, 
 and, for a. few years past, Thanksgiving Day. More 
 than half the nation ignores Christmas; the cele- 
 bration of Washington’s birthday in February is 
 becoming obsolete; April Fools’-day, once very gene- 
 rally observed, now passes almost unnoticed; and 
 the First of May is only a local holiday in New 
 York city, because all yearly leases terminate at that 
 date, and half the inhabitants change their places 
 of residence or of business between sunrise and sun- 
 set. Nowhere in America do they make a holiday 
 for the mere sake of having an outing, as the Eng- 
 lish do; but, on the contrary, the sentiment of the 
 public is, unhappily, to diminish the days of rest. 
 If Congress were to enact that there should be in 
 each month at least one national legal holiday, life 
 in America would be much more pleasant, and the 
 
English Sports. 149 
 
 character of the Americans would be gradually but 
 wonderfully improved. But perhaps when the na- 
 tion is as old as the English we shall be ready to 
 play more and work less. 
 
 In Germany during the summer houses are al- 
 most superfluous except as places in which to sleep. 
 Everybody dines and spends the evening in the 
 open air, cooling himself with constant lager-bier, 
 and entertained by social gossip and the music of 
 bands. During the summer in America the almost 
 tropical heat clears the streets in the noontide, but 
 drives people out of doors for a little fresh air 
 as evening approaches. Except in extraordinary 
 summer seasons the weather is never very warm 
 in England; but still the people like to be out of 
 doors all the same. They go out to Epsom under 
 pretence of looking at a race which very few of them 
 see; they travel out to Putney to catch a glimpse 
 of the rival University boats flashing past; they 
 crowd Lord’s Ground and the Kennington Oval on 
 the plea of witnessing cricket-matches, although the 
 attendance is greatest when the cricket is worst; 
 they flock to the Crystal Palace whenever the di- 
 rectors afford them an excuse for revisiting this 
 familiar resort by advertising some additional at- 
 traction; they are ready to demonstrate by meeting 
 in Hyde Park or marching through the streets as 
 often as Mr. Beales gives the word, although few 
 
150 English Photographs. 
 
 of them know or care what it is all about; they 
 are willing to stop work and shut-up shop at any 
 time that a van for a rural pic-nic or an excursion- 
 ticket for anywhere falls in their way. 
 
 This fondness for holidays and for the open air is 
 a national characteristic. The Queen truly represents 
 her subjects when she so consistently avoids Lon- 
 don and prefers the waterside at Osborne, or rural 
 felicity at Balmoral. The instinct of Englishmen is to 
 get away from cities whenever they have the chance. 
 During the summer there is a general exodus. The 
 poorer classes rush out to the suburbs as far as the 
 iron chains of poverty will allow them to go, stop 
 and drink beer at pleasant hostelries with skittle- 
 grounds attached, or take tea at the curious little 
 tea-gardens—where you bring your own hyson and 
 sugar, and are supplied with hot water for a penny 
 or two—and are unwillingly dragged back to town 
 at night by stern necessity. The middle classes rush 
 off to Brighton, Margate, and a hundred other sea- 
 side resorts, the men returning to the city most 
 reluctantly on Mondays, and dashing away again 
 on Saturdays to rejoin their wives and children. 
 The upper classes, waiting impatiently till the close 
 of the fashionable season, rush across to the Conti- 
 nent, or back to their country-houses, as if London 
 were plague-smitten. By a singular freak of fashion, 
 the upper classes stay away from London in win- 
 
English Sports. 151 
 
 ‘ter, when it is most comfortable, and its in-door 
 amusements most enjoyable, and come to the me- 
 tropolis in the summer, when the country is most 
 beautiful and inviting, thus losing the best and ac- 
 cepting the worst seasons in both city and country. 
 Fashion demands no such sacrifices in any other 
 capital on either side the Atlantic, and why should 
 Englishmen continue to submit to them? Ah! I 
 forget that “it has always been so”! 
 
 For the out-of-door sports of England, I can find 
 no basis of comparison in any other country. In 
 yachting, rowing, cricket, racing, hunting, shooting, 
 swimming, and all athletic games, the English are 
 absolutely unrivalled. The Americans are the only 
 people who even pretend to compete with them in 
 yachting; but although the success of the America, 
 and of the Transatlantic yacht-race, has given Ame- 
 rican yachtsmen just cause for pride, and has yet 
 to be equalled by similar exploits on the part of 
 Englishmen, still, the United States cannot claim to 
 rank with Great Britain in the number of yachts, 
 yachtsmen, and yacht-clubs, nor in the interest 
 with which all classes regard this magnificent sport, 
 In rowing, the Americans are equally far behind, 
 and many years must pass before the Yale and Har- 
 vard boat-races will excite the enthusiasm among 
 Americans which the Oxford and Cambridge match 
 excites among Englishmen. The rage for cricket 
 
152 English Photographs. 
 
 in England may be fairly paralleled by the rage 
 for base-ball—the English game of rounders im- 
 proved and systematised— now prevalent in the 
 United States. Base-ball clubs are as numerous, 
 and base-ball matches as popularly attended, in 
 America as cricket-clubs and cricket-matches in 
 England; but the game has sprung into popularity 
 within the last ten years. Previous to that time, 
 if an American had been asked what game of balls 
 was most popular in his country, he would have 
 been compelled to answer either bowls or billiards. 
 Bowls have now gone quite out of fashion in Ame- 
 rica, and there are fewer bowling-alleys there than 
 in England at the present day. Billiards are very 
 general in both countries—I might say in all coun- 
 tries 
 
 although the game is considerably varied. 
 American billiards are played with four large balls, 
 on a medium-sized table, with only four pockets, 
 and a losing hazard counts against the player. The 
 English, with their three small balls and immense 
 six-pocketed tables, are apt to sneer at the Ameri- 
 can game, and to exclaim, like a French champion 
 player who came to New York, “ With four balls 
 one ought to score for ever!” The French cham- 
 pion discovered his mistake in his first match, and 
 the English stop sneering when they see the game 
 well played, as Roberts will cheerfully testify. 
 
 There is no hunting in America now, the South- 
 
English Sports. 153 
 
 erners, who once maintained this noble English 
 sport, having had no leisure, money, nor inclination 
 to resume it since the civil war. Shooting is kept up 
 by a few gentlemen in the Middle States; but such 
 a thing as hiring land to shoot over is almost un- 
 
 known there. Horse-racing, 
 
 which flourished thirty 
 years ago, first degenerated to horse-trotting, and 
 then became monopolised by betting-men, whose con- 
 duct drove the public from the courses. A powerful 
 effort is now being made to revive racing in the 
 English style; a jockey-club has been organised 
 upon the English model; new race-courses have 
 been opened, and an American Derby is annually 
 announced; but our children will be old men be- 
 fore they ever see an American Derby-day to com- 
 pare with that in England. Swimming clubs and 
 matches are seldom heard of in the United States ; 
 public athletic sports are to be witnessed only when 
 Caledonian Societies give their annual pic-nics; 
 boxing is not a popular accomplishment, although 
 prize-fighting has been fully naturalised; you may 
 count the number of tennis and racquet courts in 
 America on the fingers of one hand. Of course, 
 hawking, which is still practised in some districts of 
 England, is believed by Americans to have vanished 
 with the age of knighthood. 
 
 Such being the differences between the two coun- 
 tries, it is worth while to state their causes and 
 
154 English Photographs. 
 
 results. One principal cause is the absence of the 
 class of landed aristocrats in America. There are 
 thousands of gentlemen in England who inherit com- 
 fortable incomes, who have no desire to increase their 
 fortunes by engaging in business, and who devote 
 their energies to muscular development. These gen- 
 tlemen keep horses and hounds; they buy or build 
 yachts; they learn cricket at school, practise it at 
 college, and form cricket-clubs afterwards; they had 
 rather be in the winning boat at a University race 
 than graduate with high honours; they take every 
 means to exercise their bodies, and become strong, 
 healthy, hearty fathers of strong, healthy, hearty 
 children, who follow in their footsteps. They set 
 the fashion of athletics to the middle classes, having 
 inherited it from ancestors who won lands and titles 
 by sturdy blows in ancient wars; and the middle 
 classes adopt it because it brings them into personal 
 contact with the upper classes. They are backed up 
 by officers in the army, who have plenty of leisure 
 hours, and are anxious to keep themselves in con- 
 dition. Government clerks, in pretty nearly the same 
 case, are ready recruits for the muscular clubs. Now, 
 in America. there are no such classes. Very few 
 Americans inherit fortunes, and those who do either 
 go to work to increase their wealth, or speedily 
 drink themselves to death. Society frowns upon a 
 
 man who has no business, no profession, no means of 
 
English Sports. 155 
 
 obtaining a livelihood, and will not accept the excuse 
 that somebody else has earned his livelihood for him. 
 In England one asks, “ Who.is he ?” when a stranger 
 appears ; in America we ask, “ What does he do ?” 
 Americans exercise their ingenuity as Englishmen 
 exercise their bodies. Then the American army is 
 very small; every man in it is kept at work, and I 
 do not believe that 1t contains a single athletic club. 
 The clerks in the employ of the Government are 
 liable to be changed every four years, when a new 
 President is elected, and are never very well salaried. 
 The owners of yachts and racehorses are business 
 men, and can spare comparatively little time for their 
 amusements. Thus athletics, having no firm root in 
 a select moneyed class, have gained very little favour 
 with the masses, who are also engrossed in business 
 and excel only in the race for wealth. 
 
 It is true that these facts do not account for 
 all the differences previously mentioned, because in 
 France, Russia, Germany, and elsewhere on the Con- 
 tinent, we find classes who have hereditary wealth 
 and leisure, but who do not excel in any out-of-door 
 sports. The difference of races must explain this ; 
 for the English have invariably proven themselves 
 superior in bodily exercises to the people of the 
 Continent, both in ancient and modern struggles. 
 Doubtless, then, the large infusion of continental 
 blood has, in some measure, deteriorated the American 
 
156 English Photographs. 
 
 physique ; but I will not press this point too curiously. 
 That the absence of a numerous, idle, moneyed aris- 
 tocracy is really at the root of the matter is clearly 
 shown by the fact that since the recent civil war, 
 when many young men at the North rapidly acquired 
 competencies, a remarkable revival of out-of-door 
 sports has occurred in the United States. The yacht- 
 clubs have doubled their lists of members; racing has 
 almost superseded trotting, and the turf seems about 
 to become an institution; while the base-ball clubs 
 promise to produce a stronger generation of Ameri- 
 cans. This impetus began soon after the war, and 
 owes its origin to the money made during the war by 
 thousands of persons who were in the prime of life, 
 and who would have grown old, under ordinary 
 circumstances, before realising fortunes. Add to this 
 that there are many more gymnasia in America than 
 in England, and we may entertain some hopes that 
 Brother Jonathan may yet equal John Bull in mus- 
 cular Christianity. But many years must elapse, the 
 moneyed class must be extended and refined, and the 
 poorer classes must learn that, as in England, honest 
 livelihoods may be gained by proficiency in athletic 
 exercises, before this consummation can be reached. 
 There are at least four out-of-door spectacles in 
 England which can be seen nowhere else, and which 
 will well repay a longer journey than that across the 
 Atlantic. The first is a hunt, with the fox well away 
 
English Sports. 157 
 
 and running true, the hounds in full cry, the red- 
 coated horsemen following at break-neck speed, leap- 
 ing fences, hedges, brooks, and ditches in a wild 
 enthusiasm that nothing can restrain. Until they 
 have assisted at such a spectacle, Americans cannot 
 understand what pleasure there can be in riding over 
 a rough country at a dangerous pace, injuring the 
 farmer’s crops and trespassing upon his land, all for 
 the sake of catching up to a fox that is of no earthly 
 value when he is killed. Indeed, no American farmer 
 would permit such invasions of his rights without a 
 protest from a rifle or a lawyer. Not until they see 
 an English hunt can Americans comprehend those 
 glorious lines which Boucicault puts into the rosy 
 mouth of Lady Gay Spanker, and which would have 
 immortalised their author had he written nothing 
 more. Hunting will never be naturalised in any 
 other country than England ; the spirit of the present 
 age refuses to recognise it; the laws of property are 
 dead against it; but it lives in Great Britain, a mag- 
 nificent relic of a glorious past, and, so far from 
 exhibiting any symptoms of decay, it has more sup- 
 porters and admirers than ever. The London cock- 
 neys vie with the country squires in their devotion 
 to it. Those who cannot afford to keep hunters hire 
 them for the meet, and those who can do neither 
 openly envy their happier friends. Perhaps some 
 farmers grumble—as to that I cannot speak—but I 
 
158 English Photographs. 
 
 have never yet encountered one Englishman who 
 had a word to say in opposition to this king of sports. 
 Like many other institutions in England, nobody 
 would venture to originate it now, but nobody wants 
 to have it suppressed. One can foresee that it must 
 die some day, like the hereditary aristocracy which 
 maintains it; but it is a satisfaction to believe that 
 the day will not come in our time. Few Americans 
 ride well enough to join in a hunt; even the smooth 
 bridle-paths of the Central Park try the mettle and 
 skill of most American equestrians too severely ; but 
 those who can ride ought not to miss a meet when- 
 ever they come to England. Not even a buffalo- 
 chase may be named in the same breath with an 
 English fox-hunt. 
 
 The second national spectacle is, of course, the 
 Derby-day. Other races have their attractions, but 
 this is a British miracle. When London appears to 
 empty itself upon the road to Epsom; when every 
 species of vehicle in the land may be seen in line 
 along the highway; when a black stream of people 
 pours across the Downs; when the Grand Stand, the 
 continent of carriages opposite, the innumerable tents 
 and booths, the crowds in the betting-rings, the mul- 
 titudes that line the course, and the matchless horses 
 that seem to spurn the turf come into sight: when 
 you behold this scene, so often described, yet always 
 this bewildering combination of a drive, a race, 
 
 New 
 
English Sports. 159 
 
 a pic-nic, a fair, a mass-meeting, and a festival—then 
 I can imagine that even an American might regret 
 for one moment that he was not an Englishman, so 
 that he might have some sort of proprietorship in so 
 unique a celebration. I have seen a bull-fight in 
 Spain, a canonisation at Rome, a Garibaldian uprising 
 in Italy, a coronation in Hungary, a religious festival 
 in Austria, a Carnival in France, and a Fourth of 
 July at home; but none of these can begin to rival 
 the Derby-day in England. In fact, the Derby has 
 no rival unless we turn to that third British spec- 
 tacle, the University boat-race, when for four miles. 
 the river is framed in with thousands of spectators ; 
 when the water is covered with steamers and the 
 bridges are overweighted with people who cling 
 to every coign of vantage like swarms of human 
 flies; and when, at the first stroke of the contesting 
 crews, the whole world seems to be suddenly put in 
 motion, the noisy steamers dash forward, the crowds 
 on foot and horseback run along the banks, and the 
 intense excitement finds vent in cheers and shouts 
 and inarticulate cries. Having seen these spectacles, 
 one more remains, and that is the Harrow and Eton 
 cricket-match at Lord’s Ground, when fifteen thou- 
 sand ladies and gentlemen are present to see the boys 
 play ; when all the carriages in London appear to be 
 placed three deep around the green; when you may 
 come face to face with representatives of half the 
 
160 English Photographs. 
 
 nobility of the realm; when old Harrovians and 
 Ktonians go into ecstacies over each well-played ball 
 and clever catch, and scream themselves hoarse with 
 words of encouragement and warning. Having seen 
 the hunt, the Derby-day, the University race, and the 
 cricket-match, any traveller may rest satisfied with 
 his views of out-of-door English sports. There are 
 many more to be witnessed; but he has seen the best. 
 
 Taking the Englishmen en masse, as one must do 
 upon these occasions, their physical superiority over 
 masses of Americans is very apparent. They are 
 taller, they are stouter, they are more strongly and 
 compactly built, they have ruddier, healthier com- 
 plexions, they are more muscular and in better con- 
 dition. Man for man, no doubt they could be matched 
 in America. The most robust Cornishman is rivalled 
 by a Maine lumber-man; the sturdiest Highlander 
 would have to do his utmost to equal the giants 
 of the West. But certainly I have never seen ten 
 thousand such men gathered together at any one 
 place in America, except in the American volunteer 
 army. New York city could not furnish half the 
 number of gentlemen having the physical abilities of 
 those who are standing around the players at Lord’s 
 while these pages are being written. You may see 
 fathers and sons—here come a pair: the father a 
 Member of Parliament, the son a captain in the 
 army, and both famous cricketers—who look like a 
 
English Sports. 161 
 
 couple of athletes. Yonder is a cricketing family— 
 three brothers, all celebrated, their mother, who bats 
 almost as well as either of them, and their sisters, 
 who are capital bowlers. The quiet young student 
 who has just passed puts on the gloves with Jem 
 Mace, and holds his own creditably. These are 
 exceptional instances? Yes; but observe the men 
 on every side of you; look at the school-boys who 
 are playing the game; step into the tennis and 
 racquet courts, and notice the youths who are hitting 
 away from mere love of vigorous exercise, and say 
 whether they do not appear to be of the same pat- 
 tern, and then tell me where, in the United States, I 
 can meet so many perfectly healthy, able-bodied 
 gentlemen at so promiscuous an assemblage. Not, 
 certainly, at a base-ball match. It will require 
 another generation of base-ballers to create men like 
 these. 
 
 But often at horse-races and boat-races I have 
 had my pleasure spoiled by another fine old English 
 sport, called “serving out a welsher.” A welsher 
 is a man who bets and loses, and cannot pay. So 
 long as he happens to win he is safe; but when he 
 loses, and the stake is demanded, his doom is sealed. 
 By general consent he is kicked out of the betting- 
 ring and turned over to the tender mercies of the 
 crowd, who, attracted by the shouts of ‘ Welsher !” 
 
 are already thirsting for their prey. A hundred 
 M 
 
162 English Photographs. 
 
 men kick, strike, and tear at the unhappy wretch, 
 who vainly implores the protection of the police. 
 He has offended no law, except in making his bet ; 
 but the guardians of the law look coolly on while 
 the mob bait and worry him, like a pack of dogs 
 with a stable rat. Of course honest folk must deny 
 him their sympathy; but surely the law will pro- 
 tect him from assault? No; this is a recognised 
 English sport. The enjoyment of the race would 
 be mcomplete without it. Ifthere be a brook near 
 by the welsher is carried to it, ducked, thrown back 
 when he tries to crawl out, and beaten at intervals 
 till he is almost senseless. Ifhe break away from 
 the crowd, his clothes torn, his face bloody, his 
 body bruised, then comes the excitement of a 
 chase. His persecutors are at his heels, some pelt- 
 ing him with stones, some hitting him with sticks, 
 and all yelling like wild-beasts. He trips, stumbles, 
 falls, and a dozen hobnailed shoes kick at him sa- 
 vagely. Then, at length, the sport has gone far 
 enough, and the police rescue him and carry him 
 off to the station-house. I should lke to know of 
 any other civilised country which permits such 
 outrages as this—not in its backwoods or its re- 
 mote regions, but in its metropolitan districts. In 
 the same sense, and with as good-reason, as the 
 saying that if you scratch a Russian you will find 
 a Tartar, one might assert that if you scratch an 
 
English Sports. 163 
 
 Englishman you will find a bulldog. Englishmen, 
 however, are rather proud of this “serving out a 
 welsher.” They insist that it shows their national 
 love of fair play and fair dealing, since the welsher 
 is only punished because he won’t pay. Perhaps 
 they are right; but would not the illustration be 
 more evident if some fair play were shown to the 
 welsher? A thousand to one is not usually con- 
 
 sidered just odds in a fight. 
 
No. XI. 
 ENGLISH WOMEN. 
 
 EncuisH women have their out-of-door sports as 
 well as the men. They row, they ride, they have 
 archery meetings, and, more than this, they walk 
 out in every kind of weather. I am not about to 
 repeat the old cry that American ladies wear thin 
 shoes, fade quickly, and die early. This cry was 
 never quite true except in regard to ladies of 
 fashion ; and such ladies are very much alike all 
 over the world, wearing the same attire, living 
 the same life, and coming to the same end. But, 
 unquestionably, the opening of the New York Cen- 
 tral Park—which rendered all American parks sud- 
 denly fashionable—and the subsequent and conse- 
 quent introduction of English walking-boots, have 
 greatly benefited American women, and have blessed, 
 like a new Providence, the American children. I 
 have had the honour of introductions to English 
 matrons who appeared quite as young as their 
 daughters, and have met an English lady who 
 assured me that she was a grandmother, although 
 she looked young, handsome, and charming enough 
 for a maiden of eighteen; but I think I could find 
 
English Women. 165 
 
 similar phenomena in America, and I have encoun- 
 tered some English girls who seemed old enough 
 to be their own mothers, not to say grandmothers, 
 and ugly enough to suggest the theory of demoniacal 
 influences. The truth is, that American ladies, as 
 a rule, are as handsome as the English, and last 
 just as long; but theirs is a different style of beauty, 
 and each man has his own ideal. 
 
 The American women have much smaller hands 
 and feet, slenderer waists, more graceful, delicate, 
 and fuschia-like forms, and liveler manners, than 
 the English, The English women have better 
 busts, fuller figures, clearer complexions, fewer head- 
 aches, rounder voices, and more robust health than 
 the American. I do not want the American women 
 to look’ like the English, but I want them to be 
 as healthy, and to introduce to the world as healthy 
 children. To accomplish this they should wear 
 warmer under-clothing, walk more, be more inde- 
 pendent of the weather, live more in the open air, 
 and take horseback-exercise regularly. Almost every 
 English lady knows how to ride; that goes without 
 asking; but in America, although you may be sure 
 that every lady can thrum the piano, not one in fifty 
 can ride. Croquet is not exercise—for which reason, 
 I presume, the American women have been willing 
 to adopt it; but gardening is a healthy amusement, 
 which most Americans neglect, and in which English 
 
166 English Photographs. 
 
 ladies take the utmost delight. Foreigners who re- 
 side for any time in England soon learn the pleasures 
 of a garden. I have seen an Italian prima donna, for 
 whom the critics cannot find sufficient praises, nor 
 the public adequate applause, digging away with 
 enthusiasm and a trowel at six o’clock in the morn- 
 ing; and it is astonishing how much interest Ameri- 
 can residents here take in an occupation which they 
 scarcely thought of in their own country. Better 
 this than forming women’s clubs or agitating for 
 women’s rights by declaiming women’s wrongs. Far 
 better than resorting to watering-places every summer 
 in quest of rest and strength, and returning in the 
 autumn more fatigued than ever. Knglish women 
 go to watering-places also; but they go for the 
 water, and flirt incidentally ; they bathe; they trot 
 about on the beach; they make walking excursions 
 into the adjacent country ; they are not so particular 
 abont their todlettes as in town. The American ladies 
 go to flirt, and take the water incidentally; they pass 
 the day in frequent changes of dress for the breakfast, 
 lunch, promenade, drive, dinner, and evening dance ; 
 go to bed when they should be thinking of getting 
 up, and commit more follies in a few weeks than they 
 can satisfactorily repent of during the remainder of 
 the year. The first duty of a woman is to be hand- 
 some and healthy, and the average English woman 
 performs her whole duty faithfully; the average 
 
Linglish Women. 167 
 
 American woman fails after the handsome half, but 
 does that half splendidly. 
 
 Women are worse treated in Great Britain, how- 
 ever, than in any other civilised country. High or 
 low, rich or poor, married or single, few of them es- 
 cape some of the disabilities, prejudices, and injustices 
 from which their sex suffers. They are obliged to 
 endure not only all the pains and penalties inflicted 
 upon the women of other nations, but also certain 
 special injuries and annoyances invented and prac- 
 tised by Englishmen alone. Perhaps an American 
 notices this state of affairs more quickly than other 
 observers, because he comes from a country in which, 
 according to the judgment of foreign critics, the 
 women are treated too well. But the Americans do 
 not believe that itis possible to be too kind to women. 
 They hold that, while men may have been created 
 ‘a little lower than the angels,” women were formed 
 upon a perfect equality with the celestial personages. 
 Nor is this a mere sentimental belief, as immaterial 
 as French politeness. It is carried into practical 
 effect in a thousand ways, and to a great- extent it 
 modifies and mollifies the habits, customs, and man- 
 ners of the people. The result is, as our critics tell 
 us, that the American women are spoiled. But in 
 Kngland the case is even worse; for here the men 
 are spoiled. 
 
 In this age of vast educational experiments, it 
 
168 English Photographs. 
 
 would be an excellent plan to ship a few thousand 
 Englishmen to the United States and marry them to 
 American women, and bring a few thousand Ameri- 
 cans here and marry them to Englishwomen. The 
 experiment would probably be very beneficial to 
 both countries; but it would certainly teach the 
 bold Britons many facts in regard to women’s rights 
 and wrongs of which they are now in happy, uncon- 
 scious, and selfish ignorance. They would discover 
 that in America marriage is not simply a partnership 
 to which the woman brings the most cash-capital, in 
 which she does the hardest work, and from which 
 she derives the least advantages, as is too often the 
 case in Hngland. In the United States the husband 
 is the person who is expected to possess the money, 
 or to earn it; and the wife is considered so precious 
 and sufficient a treasure as to require no dowry but 
 her own charms, and to deserve the life-long labours, 
 sacrifices, and protection of her spouse without giving 
 him any other return than her existence, and as 
 much as she may see fit of her companionship. 
 Everywhere, in public or private, the inexorable rule 
 is, Place aua dames. The only institution in which 
 men are still supreme is politics; but women are not 
 yet allowed to vote because the great majority of 
 them do not wish to vote. If they did wish it there 
 would be no party in the United States rash enous 
 to deny them the suffrage. 
 
English Women. 169 
 
 The inferior position of Knglishwomen is first 
 apparent to a foreigner in a variety of little details. 
 Returning from an early-morning ride, he notices 
 the cottages of the working-people by the roadside. 
 The women are up and about, making the fires, car- 
 rying the coals, opening the house, while the men 
 are still snoring soundly. I should like to see an 
 American husband wait for his wife, or an American 
 son for his mother, to perform these matutinal func- 
 tions. If he were not speedily bewigged by his own 
 better-half, a more serious punishment would be ad- 
 judged him by a vigilance committee of neighbour- 
 ing housewives. Or breakfast is being prepared, and 
 you notice the women buttering the bread so as to 
 save their lords and masters the slightest unneces- 
 sary exertion. An American husband might eat dry 
 bread for ever if he were unwilling to butter it him- 
 self. Then you catch sight of a woman on her knees 
 lacing or unlacing a man’s boots. So menial a ser- 
 vice would scandalise the best American wives. If 
 an Knglishman want a pipe, it is the woman who 
 fills it and hands him the light; if his pot need re- 
 plenishing, it is the woman who procures and pours 
 out the ale; if there be an errand to be done, it is 
 the woman who trots off while the man loafs or rests 
 at home. In short, Englishwomen belonging to what 
 are called the lower classes are evidently the servants 
 of the men, while in America the men are as evidently 
 
170 English Photographs. 
 
 the servants of the women, only that this latter ser- 
 vice, being that of the stronger to the weaker, never 
 seems like servitude, even in the humblest families, 
 but takes the nobler forms of politeness, solicitude, 
 and duty. 
 
 But this sketch has darker tints. These lower- 
 class women not only perform menial services, but 
 they are treated far worse than any other servants in 
 the world. Many of them are married only in name. 
 From various causes, but mainly from lack of educa- 
 tion, the marriage-rites are lightly esteemed by these 
 poor women—or rather not by the women, who 
 would give almost their lives for honest marriage-lines, 
 but by their fathers and the fathers of their children. 
 As among the negroes of the South before emanci- 
 pation, a man and woman agree to live together ; 
 their relatives, friends, and neighbours acknowledge 
 the implied relationship by calling the woman ‘“Mrs.,” 
 and the upper classes care nothing about it, since it 
 does not immediately concern them, and is pretty 
 sure to provide another generation of labourers for 
 the work of the future. In the South emancipation 
 had to be attended by the’solemnisation of thousands 
 of marriages, which might have been made in heaven 
 years before, but had not been legally ratified on 
 earth ; and so in England, any genuine reform among 
 the lower orders will have to be commenced by a 
 
 joint crusade of clergymen and teachers—the former 
 
English Women. Wall 
 
 for the parents, the latter for the children. At pre- 
 sent, all concerned accept the situation; the unmar- 
 ried couples congratulate themselves upon having 
 saved the parson’s fees, and spend more than the fees 
 in drink to celebrate their economy, and the women, 
 having lost their virtue, often find themselves linked 
 with brutes who had no virtue of their own to lose, 
 and who soon deprive them of every comfort in life. 
 Even when things turn out better than this, the 
 man never treats his mistress quite so well as he 
 would his wife. He feels that she has no hold upon 
 him, while he has every hold upon her. The lan- 
 guage he uses to her is coloured with this con- 
 scious superiority. If she offend him, he knocks 
 her down or beats her, and she has no redress, 
 fearing to go to the magistrate lest she should there- 
 by lose a home. If she be his wife, her tongue is 
 tied quite as tightly; for then she is obliged to go 
 home to him to suffer fresh brutalities. Ido not say 
 that all the labouring class of Englishmen are drunk- 
 ards, but most of them drink too much, and they 
 drink a poison of which the women feel the dire 
 effects. The women drink also, and society counte- 
 nances them in this vice. To see an English ale- 
 house or gin-palace, with the women standing up at 
 the counter and behind the counter, is a positive 
 shock to a stranger. Nowhere else can you meet so 
 disgusting a sight, so brutalising a custom. On the 
 
172 English Photographs. 
 
 Continent, women are to be seen sitting in cafés or 
 bier-gartens, and sharing their light wine, coffee, or 
 chocolate with male friends; but nowhere on the 
 Continent is there such a licensed Pandemonium as 
 an English bar. In America the drinking-saloons 
 are countless; but in none of them would a woman 
 be permitted to enter and call for a drink. There is 
 no express law against the admittance of women, but 
 there is the unwritten law of public opinion that 
 would punish, not only the woman who infringed it, 
 but the proprietor of the bar-room in which such an 
 outrage upon decency occurred. A drunken woman 
 is a rarity in every other country; but in England 
 this woful spectacle is as common as the rain. 
 Custom may blind the eyes and deafen the ears 
 of Englishmen to the sights and sounds of vice among 
 women that startle the foreigner at every turn; but 
 this monster, Custom, is a part of the ill-treatment 
 of Englishwomen. No man has a right to accustom 
 himself to crime. Custom permits women to drink 
 gin at public-houses in the most frequented streets. 
 Custom admits women, unattended, to the upper gal- 
 leries of all the theatres. Custom permits prostitutes 
 to take entire possession of the Haymarket and its 
 vicinity after ten o'clock at night. Custom opens 
 dance-houses and promenade concerts for the express 
 accommodation of prostitutes, although the authori- 
 ties who license them know that they are simply 
 
English Women. 173 
 
 places of assignation. Custom sets apart certain dis- 
 tricts of London for the residences of lewd women. 
 Custom keeps open night-houses, in order that prosti- 
 tutes may be able to get drunk after the regular 
 taverns have closed at midnight. Custom is respon- 
 sible for all this; but Englishmen are responsible 
 for the custom. The police and the magistrates are 
 powerless to suppress many acknowledged haunts of 
 vice in England, because there is no public opinion 
 to sustain them. Nay, as public opinion cannot be 
 r1eutral, it tacitly declares itself in favour of vice, 
 and forces the police and the magistrates to aid and 
 abet the very institutions they were created to anni- 
 hilate. In other countries, crime hides itself from 
 the eyes of the policeman and trembles at the very 
 name of a magistrate. In England, it puts itself 
 under the protection of the law, and transforms the 
 law’s officials into its own agents and instruments. 
 The police mount guard in order that nobody may 
 interfere with the criminal, and the magistrates actu- 
 ally assist him to collect his infamous dues from his 
 victims. 
 
 In Leicester-square there is a place called the 
 Judge and Jury Club. The authorities cannot be 
 ignorant of its existence, for there Finlen, the agitator, 
 used to be employed, and this fact has been men- 
 tioned both in Parliament and the press. Besides, a 
 policeman politely pointed it out to me when I was 
 
174 English Photographs. 
 
 seeing the sights of London. The authorities know 
 also that this is a model-artist exhibition, for the fact 
 is advertised liberally. The Judge and Jury part of 
 the business is a burlesque of an English trial, in 
 which the judge, lawyers, and witnesses endeavour 
 to surpass each other in verbal filth and physical 
 vulgarity; but the real attraction of the Club to its 
 frequenters is the display of almost nude women in 
 eroups upon the stage and the orgies behind the 
 scenes after the performance. Yet this den, which 
 would not be allowed to exist in any other city, is 
 regularly licensed for the sale of liquors and as a 
 place of amusement. This is an English custom. In 
 a prominent part of Holborn, and in a street at the 
 head of the Haymarket, are two dancing- saloons, 
 called respectively the Assembly Rooms and the Ar- 
 gyle Rooms. A few silly people are sometimes to be 
 seen dancing in these rooms; but the object of their 
 existence is to afford a rendezvous for the courtesans 
 of London and their admirers, who flock there every 
 evening, from ten o'clock to twelve, Yet these places 
 are regularly licensed, and. policemen, who know 
 every woman in the rooms to be a courtesan and a 
 vagrant, are stationed there to protect the premises 
 and the proprietors. This is another English custom, ° 
 based, however, upon continental models. In various 
 side-streets about Leicester-square are little shops, 
 with grated openings in the doors and porters stand- 
 
English Women. 175 
 
 ing without. To these the courtesans resort after 
 their other haunts are shut, and there they can obtain 
 a drink, a supper, a customer, and, if necessary, a bed. 
 These foul nests are also regularly licensed, and, in- 
 deed, have a special license authorising them to keep 
 open an hour later than the taverns—a privilege 
 which they contrive to extend to any hour they like. 
 The police are as well acquainted with Rose’s and 
 Coney’s as with their own station-houses; they fully 
 understand what is going on inside, and sometimes 
 they make domiciliary visits; but their approach is 
 announced by a watchful sentinel, and they conveni- 
 ently argue that if they see nobody, there can be no- 
 body to be seen, although half-emptied glasses adorn 
 the tables, hats, shawls, and coats are strewn about 
 the floor, and scarcely whispered conversations are 
 audible from behind the opposite doors. This is an- 
 other English custom, and if a new or over-zealous 
 officer does anything to disturb it, the magistrate 
 rebukes him the next morning by discharging the 
 offended offender on his own recognisances. 
 
 Soon after these statements first appeared in 
 print the police authorities ordered “an inquiry 
 into the conduct of certain of the force whose duties 
 bring them in contact with the night-houses and 
 houses of ill-fame in and around the Haymarket.” 
 The newspapers added that, “the result of the in- 
 quiry, so far as it has yet gone, has been the removal 
 
176 English Photographs. 
 
 of three inspectors to other localities, and one or 
 two constables beside. A great number of police-ser- 
 geants are said to be included in the investigation.” 
 IT know nothing of any individual cases, and am 
 ignorant even of the division to which the police 
 stationed about the Haymarket belong; but it seems 
 to me that removal to another locality is a very 
 slight punishment for such open connivance with 
 vice and disorder as that of which some policemen 
 have been guilty. Removal from the force would 
 be much more effectual. 
 
 Hogarth never painted nor Dickens described 
 worse scenes than those enacted in the licensed 
 night-houses. One morning, I recollect, long after 
 the legal hour for closing the establishment, the po- 
 lice visited a night-house near Leicester-square. The 
 house is arranged with a neat little shop—in which 
 nothing is ever sold—opening on to the street. Pass- 
 ing through the shop, you go up-stairs and find your- 
 self in a small room, furnished in a light Parisian style, 
 and with a large table in the centre. Around the 
 table, on the night in question, were a dozen courte- 
 sans, and as many of their admirers, laughing, drink- 
 ing, singing, shouting, and bandying coarse jokes. 
 A young lord, with more money than sense, was call- 
 ing for bottles of “fizz” 
 
 giving his IO U to the bar-tender for the amount. 
 
 slang for champagne—and 
 
 Suddenly there came a knock at the baize-door, and 
 
English Women. iit (i 
 
 the porter was heard to call, “ Be still a moment, 
 please, ladies; here’s the police.” I happened to be 
 waiting on the stairway for a friend, and saw the 
 whole modus operandi. “Who is it?” asked the land- 
 lord. The porter mentioned the policeman’s name. 
 “Take him a glass of sherry; that’s all right,” was 
 the response. The fun and noise went on. JHalf-an- 
 hour afterwards there was another knock, another 
 inquiry, another name. “ Here, Mary, you must go 
 down to him,” said the landlord. Evidently this 
 policeman preferred Mary to sherry. The riot and 
 rampage were louder than ever. Another knock ; 
 three policemen this time; the thing was growing 
 more serious. I listened to hear whether this trio 
 of officers of the law were to be propitiated with 
 wine or women. Neither. The door of the drink- 
 ing-room was thrown open, and the three policemen 
 marched in. The courtesans had vanished through 
 another door, but betrayed their presence not less 
 by their giggling and talking than by the muffs, 
 cloaks, and gloves they had left in the room. Their 
 admirers were sitting quietly around the table, 
 smoking peacefully. ‘‘Lodgers?” asked one of the 
 policemen. ‘“ Certainly, sir,” replied the landlord. 
 The women tittered loudly. “‘ Good-night,” said the 
 policeman ; and the three guardians of the peace 
 marched gravely away. This, drawn from life, is a 
 
 night-inspection by the Haymarket police in 1868. 
 N 
 
178 English Photographs. 
 
 Justice is said to be blind, but are her represen- 
 tatives deaf as well? If so, how much did it cost 
 to blind and deafen them ? 
 
 If, as is universally admitted, prostitution is the 
 worst fate that can befall a woman, then those who 
 not only allow but practically legalise prostitution 
 are women’s worst enemies. The English are guilty 
 of this sm. They are more guilty, and guilty in 
 a more brutal manner, than any other civilised peo- 
 ple. In France, it is true, prostitutes are licensed ; 
 but they are numbered, classified, and regulated, 
 like convicts; they are restricted to certain houses, 
 streets, and hours; they are made to feel that they 
 are odious. In Italy, Spain, Germany, America— 
 in every country, alas !—prostitution exists; but it 
 is under the rose, it is an outcast, it is hunted down 
 whenever it shows itself too conspicuously. But 
 the English present the prostitutes with the free- 
 dom of the city, as if they were honoured guests. 
 Respectable people are crowded off the streets that - 
 room may be found for the abandoned. The tax- 
 payers contribute heavily and knowingly to the 
 support and protection of the women of the town. 
 Vestries license dance-rooms, cafés, and other re- 
 sorts, for the sole accommodation of the vicious, and 
 householders who call themselves decent gladly come 
 forward and sign the applications for such licenses. 
 
 Not to London alone, but to almost all the cities 
 
English Women. 179 
 
 and large towns in Great Britain, these sentences 
 apply. Dublin is as bad as Liverpool, and Edin- 
 burgh worse than either. Where any repression 1s 
 attempted, it is so partial as to be quite ineffec- 
 tual. But in a capital like London the nuisance 
 could be abated in a week if the opinion of the 
 people demanded its abatement. I remember the 
 time when Broadway, New York, was infested by 
 courtesans, to about one-tenth of the extent that 
 the Haymarket is at present—that is to say, it was 
 intolerable. The police determined to clear the 
 street, and they proceeded to arrest as a vagrant 
 every woman whom they knew to be a prostitute, 
 or found soliciting gentlemen. In a week the pri- 
 sons were full, and the pavements respectable; and 
 since then Broadway has never been so badly af- 
 flicted with this pest. There were certain streets 
 in New York, such as Greene and Mercer, almost 
 entirely occupied by the satanic sisterhood. The 
 houses were watched by the police, and greenhorns 
 were warned off; but.so soon as the nests were 
 thought to be filled with unclean birds, a descent 
 was made, and the whole party, male and female, 
 caged in the Tombs. The police of London could 
 deal with the same evil in the same way. Draw 
 a cordon around the vicinity of the Haymarket at 
 eleven o'clock any night, except Sunday, and four- 
 fifths of the courtesans of London would be in cus- 
 
180 English Photographs. 
 
 tody before daylight. Do not be satisfied with 
 removing the police to other localities, but remove 
 the women altogether. Of course no such measures 
 —and, in the present state of human nature, no mea- 
 sures whatever—would completely suppress prosti- 
 tution; but they would prevent.it from flaunting in 
 the face of the law, and they would acquit the 
 English public from the charge of conniving at its 
 offences. 
 
 It was my good fortune to meet at Seville a very 
 learned and intelligent physician, who had travelled 
 over the world, visiting professionally all the houses 
 of ill-fame, in order to write a work upon the sub- 
 ject. The Doctor assured me that the number of 
 American women whom he had found in such houses 
 was so inconsiderable as not to be worth mention- 
 ing. Sometimes, he said, women would pretend to 
 him that they were Americans; but upon examina- 
 tion confessed that they were English, or had been 
 born on the Continent and emigrated to the United 
 States. The stories he had to tell of the outrages 
 practised upon emigrant ships were, however, most 
 horrible. In America, then, prostitution lacks one 
 most cruel phase which at once arrests attention in 
 Kngland. In the United States the fallen women 
 are almost all foreigners; here they are the natives 
 of the country, the lost sisters of the very women 
 whom you meet in society. This is a terrible truth, 
 
English Women. 181 
 
 a 
 
 the causes and consequences of which demand care- 
 ful consideration. Most of the city courtesans come, 
 of course, from the country. If you have the heart 
 to inquire as to their antecedents, you will discover 
 that many incidents of rural life described by Field- 
 ing are not yet obsolete. The most of the poor 
 women have been seduced by the sons of well-to-do 
 people in the rural districts—young squires and 
 lordlings; boys home from college; officers of the 
 army, and the like. Next among the dangerous 
 classes rank the British soldiers, whose uniforms’ 
 have an irresistible charm for servant-girls. Singu- 
 larly enough, the young squires and lordlings grown 
 older, the boys out of college and studying law, 
 medicine, or literature, and the officers of the army 
 on town-leave, are the most reliable and liberal sup- 
 porters of the seduced girls when they have become 
 courtesans. These facts offer no good omen to Eng- 
 lish homes. There is a proverb that reformed rakes 
 make the best husbands; but it is exceedingly 
 difficult to meet with your reformed rake. Gene- 
 rally, he becomes more rakish the longer he lives. 
 He begins by injuring innocent women, and he ends 
 by associating with the most depraved. You may 
 see him in his old age at the lowest haunts of 
 London, the butt of the women who were once his 
 victims; or, worse still, he may be rich enough to 
 maintain such a seraglio as that pointed out to fo. 
 
182 English Photographs. 
 
 reigners in the Regent’s Park, or that in which a 
 certain nobleman lives in the country—harems that 
 would disgrace Turkey, where prostitution wears 
 the mask of polygamy, or Utah, where it calls itself 
 religion. 
 
 And, since I have mentioned Mormondom, let 
 me: recall the fact that Brigham Young’s satellites 
 draw their supplies of spiritual wives from Great 
 Britain, and that the authorities here offer no op- 
 position to his system of organised prostitution, 
 although they are fully aware of the destination 
 of the Mormon emigrants. The United States and 
 England must share the blame of Mormondom be- 
 tween them—the former for permitting, the latter 
 for sustaining, its existence. But there are Mormon 
 churches in England, while there are none outside 
 of Utah in America. Brigham Young would soon 
 be without a bride to “seal” if he depended. upon 
 American women alone for his followers. 
 
 Were it not that the vices of prostitution and 
 adultery underlie all grades of English life, and crop 
 up unmistakably in all phases of English society, I 
 might be excused from devoting so much space to 
 the subject, for there are numerous other wrongs of 
 women which beseech attention. Englishmen have 
 made the path straight and smooth from the cottages 
 of the lower classes to the pavements of the towns 
 and the dark waters below Waterloo-bridge, and at 
 
English Women. 183 
 
 every stage of the journey they have placed pub- 
 licans to dull conscience and excite passions, and 
 officials to keep the track clear and plain; but that 
 is not the sum of their offences against women. 
 Here are England, Ireland, and Scotland, consti- 
 tuting one country, and yet in each of these pro- 
 vinces the laws of marriage are practically different ; 
 so that a woman may be a wife in one province and 
 a mistress in the others; and a child may be legiti- 
 mate or illegitimate as it happens to be born on this 
 or that side of an imaginary boundary line. Is there 
 any other civilised nation that would tolerate such 
 an outrageous condition of things? The House of 
 Lords have had the whole subject before them re- 
 cently in the Yelverton and other suits, and in every — 
 case they have decided according to law, but con- 
 trary to justice. They are not to be blamed for 
 obeying the law; but they are not to be pardoned 
 for declining to amend it. In Scotland the parents 
 of a bastard can legitimatise their child by marrying 
 after its birth; in England they cannot. Yet Eng- 
 land and Scotland are said to be parts of one empire! 
 A simple declaration of marriage is binding in one 
 part of the country, but not in another. Is that 
 national consistency? The cure for such contra- 
 dictions is so excessively simple that it is impossible 
 not to wonder why it is withheld. In some of the 
 border States of America, where settlers had pre- 
 
184 English Photographs. 
 
 ceded clergymen and magistrates, the ceremony of 
 marriage once consisted in the couple taking each 
 other by the hand and jumping over a broomstick. 
 That was equivalent to the old Gretna-green and 
 present Scottish rites. When these States were or- 
 ganised and the government legally formed, the 
 question in regard to such marriages came before 
 the Legislatures, and was dealt with very sensibly. 
 Acts were adopted legalising all informal marriages 
 up to a certain date after the passage of the laws, 
 and there was a satisfactory end of the matter. 
 Parliament has only to vote a Bill of the same cha- 
 racter, with a clause setting forth the legal mode of 
 marriage hereafter, and this whole problem, which 
 ~ has vexed so many minds, will be summarily settled 
 upon a backwoods precedent. Whatever touches 
 her marriage and her children must always touch 
 most keenly the heart of a woman, and so long as 
 these anomalies in the laws exist, and so long as the 
 law of primogeniture benefits the eldest son at the 
 expense of his brothers, sisters, and mother, so long 
 will Englishmen be open to the charge of deliberate 
 legislative cruelty towards women. 
 
 Of grosser kinds of cruelty, such as wife-beating, 
 wife-kicking, and wife-murder, Englishmen appear 
 to have almost the monopoly. It is sickening to read 
 in the police-reports of the daily papers the records 
 
 of those crimes against the persons of women which 
 
English Women. | 185 
 
 disfigure the current annals of England. Taking a 
 paper at random from the file before me, I find that 
 the reports open with three attempts at picking 
 pockets; then comes a rape case; then a woman 
 robbed with violence; then a woman thrown out of 
 a window; then a woman beaten to death; then a 
 woman poisoned. Better all the stabbing and shoot- 
 ing affrays betwecn men in the United States than 
 these continual assaults upon women in a country 
 where every common man professes to know how to 
 use his fists—but prefers his teeth or his boots—and 
 every ruffian displays his knowledge of “the manly 
 art” by hitting some defenceless woman with a club 
 or an axe. Englishmen are conscious of their supe- 
 riority over ‘‘the fiery Frenchmen, the stupid Ger- 
 mans, the assassinating Italians, the dumbfounded 
 Spaniards, and the rowdy Americans,” to use Mr. 
 Roebuck’s elegant adjectives; but if any of these 
 barbarians heard a woman’s voice exclaiming, ‘“ Don’t 
 kick me any more, please, Bill! Jl do all you want 
 if you won't kick me any more!” I would not insure 
 Bill’s life for a farthing. But in civilised England a 
 crowd recently heard these cries, and waited patiently 
 outside till Bill had kicked his woman into eternity. 
 Still, as I have before hinted, there are injuries 
 which torture women more crucially than black eyes 
 or slit throats. Like the old Christians, they care 
 less for wounds which kill the body than for those 
 
186 English Photographs. 
 
 which kill the soul. Iam often surprised, however, 
 that they bear physical wrongs so patiently. lse- 
 where women sometimes kill or horsewhip their se- 
 ducers; in England they quietly go upon the town, 
 and send their children to ‘“‘ baby-farmers” to be 
 starved. At Milwaukie recently an English labourer 
 attempted to beat his sick wife one Sunday after- 
 noon. He had an easy antagonist by his own fire- 
 side; but suddenly the door was burst open, and in 
 walked a dozen Irish viragos, who thumped him with 
 mops and pokers until he cried for mercy and swore 
 that he would never molest his wife again. In 
 America, too, women have coolly sacked the grog- 
 shop that was ruining their husbands, pouring the 
 liquors into the streets and threatening the landlord 
 with tar and feathers if he complained. Are English 
 women less brave at home than across the seas ? 
 Is there no heroism in the breasts that have suckled 
 so many heroes? One good example of extempore 
 justice, with only Judge Lynch on the bench, would 
 be worth a dozen tardy convictions and merciful 
 sentences before the stipendiary magistrates. 
 
 More real progress in what is termed the wo- 
 man’s-rights movement has been made in England 
 than in America, although the agitation commenced 
 in the United States, and has been very strenuously 
 pressed upon public attention for several years by a 
 small body of women and two or three fanatical 
 
English Women. 187 
 
 men. Nothing approaching the very close vote 
 in the House of Commons last session upon the 
 question of giving women the suffrage has ever been 
 achieved in America, nor have American women 
 ever succeeded in getting their names placed on the 
 registry subject to the revision of the lists, nor 
 has any American body so learned and influential 
 as the British Association ever permitted a woman 
 to read such a paper as that with which Miss Becker 
 has lately caused so decided a sensation in England. 
 If Miss Becker—who has a happy knack of substi- 
 tuting words for arguments—would only convince 
 the women that they desire the suffrage, she would 
 be domg more practical work than in endeavouring 
 to convince the men that women ought to have the 
 right to vote. 
 
 To give Englishwomen the suffrage would only 
 increase their responsibilities, and they have enough 
 responsibilities already. What they urgently re- 
 quire is some profit from their present toils, some 
 protection against their present lords. Miss Becker 
 wishes them to jump up to the summit of their 
 rights, and then come down the legislative ladder 
 step by step. Is it not better to climb up the lad- 
 der? The Bill to grant married women the right 
 to hold and dispose of their own property and 
 earnings is vastly more important to women than 
 the right of suffrage. Such a law has been passed 
 
188 English Photographs. 
 
 in America and in France ; it operates admirably ; 
 there is no trouble whatever about it, and there 
 is no reason why it should not be adopted in Eng- 
 land. Many English wives are the bread-winners ; 
 they support their husbands instead of being sup- 
 ported ; they have independent incomes which, if 
 put into the savings-bank, would furnish them with 
 a fund for old age or for the education of their 
 children ; but earnings, income, and savings are all 
 at the mercy of drunken, dissolute, spendthrift, or 
 thoughtless husbands. How would the right to vote 
 remedy that ? Would the women return Members 
 of Parliament pledged to vote for the necessary 
 Bill? Well, they can do that now. They take a 
 more active interest in the elections than the women 
 of any other nation; and that their influence is 
 feared is evident from the readiness of politicians 
 to declare in favour of woman suffrage. Instead of 
 this impractical question, let the ladies catechise the 
 candidates in relation to a Woman’s Property Bill, 
 and something substantial will be secured. Thou- 
 sands of women, from the wives of small tradesmen 
 —who are really the active partners, while their 
 husbands are only the sleeping partners, in the 
 business—to the wives of aristocrats of the bluest 
 blood—who have brought their husbands the money 
 with which to sustain meaningless titles—would be 
 
 deeply interested in such a canvass, profoundly in- 
 
English Women. 189 
 
 different as they now are to Mr. Mill’s chop-logic 
 and Miss Becker’s sophistical paraphrases. If the 
 women of England or America were polled to-day, 
 not one in a thousand would be in favour of woman 
 suffrage. Let the reader think over the list of his 
 female acquaintances. If he know one who wants 
 to vote for a Member of Parliament, unless some of 
 her relatives be candidates, he is fortunate in strong- 
 minded friends. True women entertain no ambition 
 to become half-and-half men—political mermaids, 
 social hermaphrodites, an anomalous variety of ‘the 
 sex called man.” I intend no discourtesy to Miss 
 Becker ; but had she been Mrs. Becker it is doubtful 
 whether the British Association would have been 
 favoured with her curious theories upon women’s 
 rights. 
 
 Finally, I am compelled to reprobate the loose 
 manner in which many Englishmen think of and 
 speak about women. They have a bad habit of 
 telling gross stories over their wine, and often sully 
 a reputation by an innuendo or destroy it by an 
 apt monosyllable. With all their faults of morals, 
 the French are more merciful, the Americans more 
 just. A Frenchman damns a woman’s reputation 
 upon a syllogism. He says, ‘“‘ All women are bad; 
 this person is a woman; therefore she must be 
 bad ;” but that kind of wholesale scandal passes 
 as a sceptical joke, hurts nobody, and lets its object 
 
190 English Photographs. 
 
 escape. An American says, “I believe what I saw;” 
 and his judgment, although decisive, harms only 
 those whom he has detected. An Englishman says, 
 “They tell me that So-and-so is queer ;” or, “I 
 have it from Smith that,” &c, These are the slanders 
 that damage women. What a picture could the 
 artist of the Saturday Review paint if she would 
 hang the “Man of the Period” alongside of her 
 “Girl of the Period”! I was fairly amazed at some 
 of the English comments upon the remarkable 
 article whose title I have just quoted. It was as if 
 every man whose tongue had been loudest against 
 women rushed into print to declare his indig- 
 nation that another person should write what he 
 had himself often said. Writers, who, according 
 to their former proud avowals, were more familiar 
 with the cottages of St. John’s Wood than with 
 their own lodgings, shuddered with an apparently 
 holy horror that the name of that locality should 
 be printed. Persons from whose lips I had often 
 heard the broadest blasphemies against the fair sex 
 suddenly sallied forth as the self-appointed defenders 
 of woman, and slashed away so vehemently that I 
 at first believed they were in earnest. Men who 
 had repeatedly boasted of their amours with veiled 
 but hitherto virtuous ladies of the aristocracy 
 hoarsely declared that the purity of the maidens of 
 the period was unimpeachable, and frantically de- 
 
English Women. 191 
 
 nounced as a foul slanderer the “titled lady” who 
 had contributed that disgraceful article to the 
 Saturday Review. Amid the chorus of honest in- 
 dignation — sincere, perhaps, and perfectly natural 
 under the circumstances —these discordant notes 
 jarred most inharmoniously. Doubtless the cause 
 was good; but may Heaven save the fair sex from 
 such doubtful champions ! ) 
 
No. XII. 
 ENGLISH HOUSES. 
 
 THERE is an excellent chance for some speculative 
 showman—some British Barnum—to realise a mode- 
 rate fortune by importing to this country, erecting 
 and exhibiting, an American house. Ido not mean 
 a specimen of the log-cabins in which a large propor- 
 tion of my countrymen are supposed to reside, nor 
 a model of the modest White House, at Washington, 
 which is made to serve as a poor substitute for a 
 Presidential palace; but I mean an average American 
 house, such as those which are erected in all the 
 cities of the United States for the residences of the 
 middle-class population. Compared with a dwelling 
 of this kind, the middle-class houses in England seem 
 destitute equally of comfort and convenience, al- 
 though those who have never been accustomed to 
 anything different or better consider them quite com- 
 fortable and convenient enough for all practical pur- 
 poses. But then different people have different 
 minds. An Englishman absolutely believes that he 
 can warm a room by building a grate-fire at one end 
 of it. An American visiting this country is in a con- 
 tinual shiver, his face being scorched and his back 
 
English Houses. 193 
 
 cold, or vice versa, until he becomes thoroughly ac- 
 climated, and learns that the most healthy warmth is 
 that which exercise in the open air imparts to the 
 blood. 
 
 Suppose the British Barnum to have his model, 
 and to commence his show. “ Here, ladies and gen- 
 tlemen,” he would say, ‘“‘is a model of domestic archi- 
 tecture. When you inspect it you will agree that it 
 beats anything at the Polytechnic. This is a house 
 intended for a family of six persons and two ser- 
 vants. Enter at the basement, and you will observe 
 that there is no servants’-hall, no housekeeper’s-room, 
 no scullery-room. The servants’-hall is the kitchen, 
 that being kept as neat as a parlour, since there are 
 no slops, no carrying about of water, no cartage of 
 coals in this house. A housekeeper would be super- 
 fluous, as the house keeps itself. The scullery is in 
 this corner of the kitchen, which is only used for 
 cleaning the pots and pans. In England we send 
 out the washing, and pay heavy bills to the laun- 
 dresses. Now, alongside of this kitchen-range you 
 will see tubs, which form a table when the lids are 
 down, and which are supplied with hot and cold 
 water, the hot water being heated by the kitchen- 
 range. Turn the handle of this machine, and the 
 clothes are washed; turn that machine, and the 
 clothes are wrung; place them in yonder hot-air 
 cupboard, and the clothes are dried. Yes, sir, quite 
 
 O 
 
194 English Photographs. 
 
 like magic. The cook does this work easily on a 
 Monday morning, and there is no additional expense, 
 no clouds of steam, no fuss and ill-temper. That 
 large box is a refrigerator, which keeps the meats, 
 milk, butter, and so forth, cool and fresh. By a 
 self-reoulating apparatus, a constant supply of dis- 
 tilled iced water is obtained. That brick erection is 
 a furnace, which warms the whole house with a 
 single fire. No pokers, tongs, coal-scuttles, sifters, 
 chimney-sweeps, and girls to lay the fires and act as 
 domestic coalheavers here, ladies and gentlemen. 
 This house heats itself, as you might say. 
 
 “Ascend to the upper floors, please. The dining- 
 room,—with a butler’s pantry opening out of it, with 
 a small iron safe for the family plate, a sink for 
 washing glass and china, and a lift to bring the 
 dishes directly to table without any fear of their 
 cooling on the stairs, and without any odour from 
 the cooking to spoil good appetites. If you ring the 
 bell in any room in the house, the servants are not 
 obliged to trip up-stairs to ask what you desire, 
 down-stairs to procure it, and up-stairs again to 
 bring it to you. We are now on the third-floor, and 
 perhaps some lady or gentleman would like a glass 
 of sherry and a biscuit? I ring the bell, whisper 
 down this tube, and, presto! the refreshments rise 
 from Fairyland—that is to say, the basement—upon 
 this dumb-waiter, and are here in this closet, ready 
 
English Houses. 195 
 
 to your hand. The sherry is English, sir; you 
 needn’t be afraid of it. This lift or dumb-waiter, 
 runs from cellar to attic, and is useful for bundles, 
 
 parcels 
 
 anything you like. Perhaps you are chilly: 
 turn the register this way and in ten minutes a Hot- 
 tentot would be happy. Or you are too warm: turn 
 the register that way, and regulate the temperature 
 to suit yourselves. The heated air is injurious to 
 health? Well, you can have it fresher without open- 
 ing the windows. I pull the cord of this ventilator, 
 and you feel the change directly. You remark that 
 there are no bath-tubs in the sleeping-rooms. No; 
 but there are baths upon every floor, for the ser- 
 vants as well as the master. See! I draw this cur- 
 tain, and here you have them—full-bath, sitz-bath, 
 shower-bath, and vapour-bath complete. Hot and 
 cold water in any room by simply pressing one of 
 these knobs. Stationary washstands in-every dress- 
 ing-room, which connect directly with the main 
 sewage-drain. Do you need a light to see that room, 
 sir? Just pull out the electrical gas-burner, and 
 there’s an illumination immediately, without the ne- 
 cessity for safety-matches. Like Aladdin’s Palace, 
 isn’t it, sir? Everything, you see, to save labour, 
 waste, and servants. The rent? About two hundred 
 pounds a-year in American currency. Yes, ma’am, 
 two servants do the whole work of this house, and 
 have plenty of spare time. Numbers of families keep 
 
196 English Photographs. 
 
 only one. This way out, please. The halls and 
 passages, you will notice, are of the same tempera- 
 ture as the rooms. No draughts of cold air when- 
 ever anybody opens the door. Thank you! Now 
 for the next batch of visitors.” 
 
 The most of the comparisons [ wish to make will 
 suggest themselves to the reader of this monologue. 
 Of course, I have seen some of the American im- 
 provements in some English houses; but still, the 
 extent to which they have been adopted is very 
 limited. If there be a bath-room in an English 
 house, it must answer for the whole household. If 
 there be a lift, it stops at the dining-room floor, 
 although coals and water have to be carried to the 
 higher stories. If hot and cold water be laid on, it 
 is only in certain select apartments. Ventilators are 
 almost unknown, except, perhaps, that antiquated 
 sort which are let into the windows. Heated air is 
 considered unhealthy, and so the ladies and child- 
 ren sit before the grate-fires with shawls over their 
 shoulders, and catch cold in order to prevent in- 
 juring their lungs. Gas is making its way into all 
 English houses now, but is still forbidden to be used 
 in sleeping-apartments, although the smoke from 
 even a wax-candle is hardly preferable to the odour 
 of the small amount of gas which can possibly es- 
 cape. No stranger can live for a week in an English 
 house and not be ill from exposure to the chilly 
 
English Houses. 197 
 
 halls and stairways, even if he succeed in making 
 himself comfortable before the fire. The English 
 wrap themselves up to cross the hall as though they 
 were going out of doors. Refrigerators are com- 
 paratively a new invention here. Iced water is ve- 
 toed as injurious to the teeth. It is true that in 
 England one generally has no trouble to keep cool ; 
 the trouble is ever to get warm. 
 
 The parade, labour, skill, and paraphernalia re- 
 quired to maintain and manage an English fire are 
 bewildering to a foreigner. There are the grate, 
 and the ornamented fender, and'the rug before the 
 hearth; the steel shovel, tongs, and poker that are 
 kept for beauty, not for use; and the steel poker, 
 tongs, and shovel that are to be used. Need I say 
 that the foreigner always undertakes to employ the 
 wrong poker, and is detested accordingly? Then 
 there is the handsome coal-box that stands by the 
 fireside, and the ugly coal-scuttle which the maid 
 carries in and out to replenish the former. Matches, 
 waste-paper, bundles of kindling-wood ad libitum, 
 and the first issue thereof is smoke. Presently there 
 comes flame, and then, after many hours of manipu- 
 lation, heat is generated. Not much heat, but still 
 enough to make one wish for more. Meanwhile, the 
 fire consumes the coals with a fiendish disregard of 
 their price per sack. By way of revenge, I presume, 
 everybody who enters the room gives the fire a sav- 
 
198 English Photographs. 
 
 age poke. but, like Stephano’s fish in the Zempest, 
 it is a most delicate monster. Let but a foreign 
 hand touch the poker, and the fire grows sullen and 
 dies out. Every man thinks he can dress a salad; 
 every man thinks he can poke a fire: these are the 
 two least venial of human errors. When the fire 
 dies, either naturally or by some unskilful touch, it 
 strews the whole fender with its ashes. Then one of | 
 the maid-servants produces a box full of blacklead 
 and brushes, takes away the ashes and sifts them, 
 and, by dint of much hard work, polishes the grate 
 again. ‘There is no other institution in England so 
 troublesome, vexatious, unsatisfactory, and ungrate- 
 ful as an English fire; but the people love it, and 
 praise it, and shiver round it, as if it were a fire from 
 Heaven, like that which lit the altars of the gods. 
 
 It is evident that the origin of the numerous 
 labour-saving contrivances in America is the lack of 
 good servants; but in London the inhabitants have 
 been complaining for years of the lack of good ser- 
 vants, and are yet very slow to introduce servant- 
 saving machines. Americans, who know what the 
 horrors of servantdom really are, cannot but regard 
 these complaints as ill-founded. Everywhere in Eng- 
 land, not excepting London, the servants seem as- 
 tonishingly docile, civil, willing, and well-trained. The 
 worst London maid-of-all-work who ever transformed 
 a lodging-house into a purgatory shines like an angel 
 
English Houses. 199 
 
 by contrast with her Irish sister in New York. The 
 most stupid, drunken, negligent coachman in Eng- 
 land is a perfect master of his business by contrast 
 with his brother, the independent adopted fellow- 
 citizen, who murders your horses in the United 
 States. Perhaps the best servants we have had in 
 America during the past twenty years were the black 
 slaves in the South; but they were exceedingly lazy, 
 wasteful, and expensive, so that I have often heard 
 a Southern planter declare that he was the real slave 
 forced to work for his negroes. But, thirty or forty 
 years ago, there were a set of servants, mostly 
 blacks, attached to Knickerbocker families in New 
 York and New Jersey, who were as near perfection 
 as men and women can become. Those were the 
 days of Dutch kitchens, Dutch dishes, Dutch neat- 
 ness, and Dutch housewifery, now long past and 
 never to return. With them faded away the old 
 faithful race of servants, who honoured and _ re- 
 spected their employers, and were honoured and re- 
 spected by all. Occasionally one happens upon a 
 descendant of this race, with ali the virtues of the 
 good old stock; but the accident is very rare. I re- 
 member one of them now 
 
 a negress named Diana 
 —with whose culinary art no French cook could 
 compete, and with whose merits as a woman few 
 whiter women could compare. She lived only to 
 show us what treasures we had lost. 
 
200 English Photographs. 
 
 The English servants, at their best, are precisely 
 like these Knickerbocker marvels. At their worst, 
 they are so much better than the present race of ser- 
 vants in America, that any American who values his 
 comfort more than his democracy would do well to ex- 
 change countries for this reason alone. Nevertheless, 
 we are right to flatter ourselves that we have no good 
 servants because of our democracy. It is not plea- 
 sant to think of thousands of young men and women 
 who grow up as servants in private houses with no 
 ambition beyond exchanging their domestic servi- 
 tude for the public servitude of a little landlordship 
 and landladyship in a minor tavern. In America a 
 coachman may win his way into Congress, and a 
 servant-girl may marry a future President. If we 
 must have either discomfort or feudalism, let us 
 choose discomfort. But sometimes when I watch the 
 English servants at their work it occurs to me that, 
 as there is nothing degrading in household service, 
 and as Americans pay very dearly for it, surely it 
 ought to be more honestly and ably performed even 
 by embryo Congressmen and the possible wives of 
 Presidents. If any remaining Pogram object to this 
 sentiment as unrepublican, I'll make it stronger by 
 suggesting that we should have in America stricter 
 laws to compel our future rulers to give us fairer 
 work for our fair wages. 
 
 One pregnant advantage that the English have 
 
LEinglish Houses. 201 
 
 is, that their servants are their own countryfolk. A 
 native-born American servant is almost an impossi- 
 bility. In old times we used to find them in some 
 of the Eastern States, but they were chiefly farmer’s 
 daughters sent out as “ helps” to neighbours, in order 
 that they might learn housekeeping, and so fit them- 
 selves for becoming industrious wives. This is the 
 reason why they were called “helps,” and not ser- 
 vants; for, being of the same social rank as their 
 employers, there was nothing servile in their occupa- 
 tions. Naturally, the same term came in time to 
 be applied to all servants; but it is now very sel- 
 dom used. The servants in America, then, are all 
 foreigners—Irish in the east, Germans in the west. 
 English and Scotch servants are more scarce, and 
 are always sure of commanding better places and 
 higher wages. Germans are preferred to the Irish, 
 because they know more about domestic duties, and 
 are generally neater in appearance. They have, 
 however, propensities for lager-bier, lovers, and 
 waltzing at late balls, which test the temper of the 
 most patient mistress most severely. The Irish go 
 from the emigrant ships to the “intelligence offices,” 
 or servants’ agencies; and often they have places— 
 that is to say, are hired—the next day after they 
 leave shipboard. Poor girls! The wonder is, not 
 that they know so little, but that they learn so 
 quickly. Coming from homes destitute of every 
 
202 English Photographs. 
 
 comfort — from straw-thatched cabins, where the 
 only housekeeping consists in piling peat upon the 
 fire—from hovels where all the meals are cooked in 
 the same pot, and gaunt Poverty casts its curse upon 
 the scanty fare—they are transferred in a moment 
 from the horrors of the steerage to what seem to 
 them palaces, and are transformed in .a twinkling 
 
 from emigrants tos 
 
 ‘culinary artistes,” or “ first-class 
 general servants.” They have never had any money 
 before, but they are too shrewd to squander their large 
 wages. With a generosity to which one cannot do too 
 ample justice, their first thoughts are for their poor 
 relatives in Ireland; their first savings are sent to 
 bring these wretched sufferers to the promised land. 
 These Irish servant-girls, whose devotion to their 
 religion shames many a Christian in higher sta- 
 tions, subscribe immense sums of money for the 
 Roman Catholic Church, for the support of priests, 
 and for charity. They have always a trifle left, 
 too, for Fenianism or any other “ism” that assumes 
 the garb of the champion of old Ireland. Think- 
 ing of all their devotion and their patriotism and 
 their sacrifices, their faults appear trivial; but 
 they have most vexatious faults. They soon learn 
 their independence; their self-respect takes the form 
 of unbridled insolence; they are, almost without 
 exception, virtuous while in service, but they are 
 very fond of drink; they assume unservantlike 
 
English Houses. 203 
 
 finery, despise those caps which English maids wear 
 so jauntily, and make frequent drafts upon their 
 mistresses’ wardrobes. Cousins are always coming 
 to see them; and as every Irishman is their cousin, 
 a thief or burglar often turns up in a well-regulated 
 household. Funerals are their delight; and as some 
 Trish friend is always dying, and as they are invited 
 to every wake, a considerable portion of their time 
 is devoted to the dead rather than to the living. 
 They domineer over the real mistress of the house, 
 order her out of the kitchen, and give her the full 
 benefit of a temper spoiled by early brutality. They 
 reserve all their affection for their own country- 
 people, and never have the slightest attachment to 
 the families with whom they live. Regarded philo- 
 sophically, they are excellent patriots; but regarded 
 practically, they are very bad servants, in every 
 way inferior to those of England and Europe. 
 
 But there is such a calamity as too much of a 
 good thing. The English have too many servants. 
 The labour is divided into very small portions, and 
 there must be a man or a maid for each portion. 
 Butler, housekeeper, cook, housemaid, parlour-maid, 
 nurse, nurse-maid, laundry-maid, lady’s-maid, foot- 
 man, valet, scullery-maid, and page, or “ buttons,” 
 they muster in a diversified but formidable array, 
 and each one is pledged by some secret bond of the 
 fraternity never to do anything that is assigned by 
 
204 English Photographs. 
 
 ustom to the departments of his coadjutors. At 
 least three or four servants must be attached to a 
 moderate household in London. In the country I 
 have known fifteen servants engaged to wait upon a 
 family of four persons. Ido not speak of noblemen’s 
 families, for these maintain an immense retinue of 
 dependents and underlings, but of a quiet country- 
 house, with no game-preserves to. look after, and no 
 stud of hunters to require extra stablemen. English 
 ladies are, as a rule, better housewives than American 
 women, and they have need to be so. To manage so 
 many employés satisfactorily demands talents, labour, 
 and experience enough to fit a man for the rank of 
 drill-sergeant, or even that of general. In many 
 English houses the servants form a household within 
 a household. They must have a separate table, not 
 furnished forth with the funereal baked meats from 
 their masters’ feast, but with everything cooked espe- 
 cially. Even in the plainest houses there is a fixed 
 extra allowance for the servants’ beer. In great 
 houses the upper servants have a third table in the 
 housekeeper’s room. All this draws heavily upon 
 the income of the head of the family. 
 
 Servants’ wages are not very dear in England, but 
 not much cheaper than in America. Perquisites are 
 about the same in both countries. Vails, or gifts from 
 visitors to servants, are not thought of in America; 
 but in many parts of England the custom is con- 
 
Linglish Houses. 205 
 
 tinued in all its ancient force. During the dull sea- 
 son last summer, there was a determined attack upon 
 it in the newspapers, but very little effect was pro- 
 duced. Gentlemen furnished statistics to show that it 
 would have cost them less to buy their own shooting- 
 grounds than to accept invitations from friends and 
 pay pounds to the gamekeepers. Other gentlemen ci- 
 phered up the amount of money of which they had 
 been mulcted by the understrappers at houses which 
 they had honoured with visits. The journals, in 
 long, logical, and learned leaders, protested against 
 such impositions upon guests. But when the ser- 
 vants, aggravated beyond endurance, at last rushed 
 into print, and, with homely pathos but bad gram- 
 mar, recorded how much extra work the visitors 
 made for them, almost everybody felt that the ser- 
 vants had the best of the discussion. At any rate, 
 to tip English servants is the custom, and Ameri- 
 cans should not venture upon an exception. It is 
 impossible to offend any Hnglishman of what are 
 called here “the lower orders” by offering him a 
 shillmg. From the policeman who points out your 
 way to the page who ushers you into a drawing- 
 room, they all have itching palms. In any other 
 country you can ask a question of a street-loafer 
 without being solicited for “the price of a pint of 
 beer ;” but not in this. Nowhere else is poverty so 
 very hard and so utterly shameless. Even in Spain 
 
206 English Photographs. 
 
 —$$—$ 
 
 and Italy the beggars are too proud to ask for alms 
 if you address them politely. | 
 Undoubtedly the staple household dish in Eng- 
 land is roast-beef; but it is no longer “the roast-beef 
 of old England”—it is the roast-beef of old Nor- 
 mandy. Better beef can now be obtained in the 
 United States than in England, owing, I presume, to 
 the extensive importations of meat from France. The 
 beauties of a “porter-house steak” are not appreciated 
 here. English butchers cut their meat differently. 
 But although the Americans have better beef, they 
 cannot cook it like the English. Ribs and the sirloin 
 are not baked in ovens, American fashion, but are 
 legitimately roasted upon spits before an open fire. 
 Go to one of the old London chop-houses up the nar- 
 row courts leading from Fleet-street or the Poultry, 
 and, after having eaten a rump-steak broiled, you 
 can lay your hand below your heart and confess that 
 you have tasted meat for the first time in your life. 
 By what occult science, or by what happy knack, the 
 ‘cooking of this specialty is brought to such perfec- 
 tion it is useless to imagine. Kat, and you will be in 
 no mood for asking questions. The secret is as pro- 
 found as that of those potatoes at Evans's, which are 
 so wonderfully superior to all other potatoes in the 
 world, that the proprietors must have had a second 
 sir Walter Raleigh to discover them and another Ire- 
 
 land to grow them. Poultry is almost tasteless in 
 
English Houses. UG 
 
 England, and the natives wisely eat ham or smoked 
 tongue with it to give it a flavour. With the deli- 
 cious fowls and turkeys of America still fresh in his 
 memory, my countryman feels a pang of disappoint- 
 ment whenever he sees poultry in Great Britain. 
 Perhaps I ought to modify this judgment in favour 
 of the English goose; but goose is nothing without 
 apple-sauce, and genuine apples are as scarce as 
 rubies in England. 
 
 In all the English bills of fare there are only 
 a few points in which the Americans may not 
 justly claim superiority. American beef, veal, poul- 
 try, and lamb are more excellent. English game, 
 palatable as most of it is, cannot rival American 
 game. English larks are surpassed by American 
 reed-birds; hares are not so good as American rab- 
 bits; English wild-fowl are uneatable when compared 
 to those of the United States. But in fish the Eng- 
 lish have no equals. Whitebait is ten times better 
 than the frost-fish of the Raritan river, which it 
 somewhat resembles. English soles are princes 
 among the finny tribe. English salmon excel Ame- 
 rican salmon. The John Dory is the king of fish: 
 the more you eat of him and of sole and of turbot, 
 the less you value the American shad. Shrimps, 
 prawns, and periwinkles are altogether English and 
 altogether good, Either the Americans have no 
 oysters or the English have none; for what the Eng- 
 
208 English Photographs. 
 
 lish call oysters are so different from the American 
 shell-fish that comparison is impossible. The worst 
 oyster, however, is that of Naples, because it seduces 
 you into fond expectations by having shells like the 
 American, and then repels you by its watery, cop- 
 pery, English taste. Turtle in England is unique; 
 the American turtle cannot be named with it without 
 an apology. But I reserve my most energetic enthu- 
 siasm for English pork and mutton. A Yorkshire 
 ham is a delicacy in whose presence no American 
 can be moved by any partiality for his native pigs. 
 A saddle of South-down mutton would win the ver- 
 dict of an epicurean Paris in a competition between 
 the best dishes of all countries. There is nothing 
 like it; there are no prejudices of palate which it 
 cannot overcome. As for the English mutton-chops, 
 let us not waste weak words concerning them: there 
 are no other mutton-chops in either hemisphere. 
 
 But when all this has been conceded, the fact 
 remains that the Americans have by far the best, 
 most varied, and most extensive bill-of-fare. I am 
 aware that this is, In a great measure, a matter of 
 individual opinion, and therefore in all I have said 
 of English dishes I have endeavoured to condense 
 the results of a long series of references to other 
 Americans who have visited England. It is sufficient 
 for me to indorse the verdict of this national jury. 
 I am afraid, however, that the verdict of a jury of 
 
English Houses. 209 
 
 Englishmen who have visited America might be very 
 much on the other side. Until recently, I supposed 
 that it was admitted that American fruits were much 
 more juicy and luscious than the English, with, per- 
 haps, the single exception of the plums. But the 
 other day a party of Englishmen, all of whom had 
 been twice to the United States, gravely asserted the 
 contrary, and were surprised at my extraordinary 
 lack of discrimination when I could not agree with 
 them. Their English fruit must have ripened upon 
 the sunniest walls—may it ever be so!—and their 
 American fruit must have been eaten before it was 
 matured. This incident has completely shaken my 
 faith in anybody’s judgment on the tables of the two 
 countries, and I only submit these paragraphs as a 
 humble contribution of information on this most im- 
 portant subject, which some great gourmet will, some 
 day, discuss and decide authoritatively. Still, it is in 
 order for me to protest vigorously against that spec- 
 tral canvas-back duck which haunts an American at 
 English dinners as the albatross haunted the Ancient 
 Mariner. The canvas-back duck is not a fair spe- 
 cimen of American wild-fowl. Some people pretend 
 to like it because it has the flavour of the wild celery 
 upon which it feeds; but to develop this flavour the 
 bird has to be cooked quickly before a flaming fire, 
 and eaten almost raw. This duck is very expensive 
 in America, and is consequently valued very highly 
 P 
 
210 English Photographs. 
 
 by epicures; but the majority of Americans would 
 as soon think of feasting upom uncooked crows. The 
 wild-game of the United States is of a very different 
 character. It may be pretty fairly judged, all things 
 considered, by the prairie-fowl which are sent over 
 to the London markets; but only the breast of this 
 fowl should be eaten. A wild-turkey is the best of 
 game. ; 
 
 Few travellers will deny that Delmonico’s restau- 
 rant, at New York, is to be ranked far above the best 
 restaurants of Paris. .There we have the perfection 
 of French cooking applied to a larder more abundant 
 and more diversified than anyin Europe. But when 
 you go from this restaurant into private families, the 
 same superiority in the materials and in the cwisine is 
 observable, and the lower you descend in the social 
 scale the better are the dinners by contrast with 
 those of similar classes here. There are tens of thou- 
 sands of poor families in England who can afford 
 meat but once a week, if at all; but no correspond- 
 ing class can be found in America. An ordinary 
 labourer lives as well there as a small shopkeeper 
 does in Great Britain. After all, that is a superiority 
 more grand than any which may be established for 
 excellence in particular dishes. 
 
 An American in London is by no means forced to 
 deprive himself of the food of his own’country. One 
 may procure anything he desires in this metropolis, 
 
English Houses. 211 
 
 if he only knows where to apply for it. An Italian 
 may live like the Italians, a German like the Ger- 
 mans, and an American like the Americans, without 
 quitting London. Buckwheat cakes may be ordered 
 for breakfast at the hotel which Americans most fre- 
 a mixture 
 
 quent. Green corn and even succotash 
 of corn and Lima beans—are to be purchased in 
 cans. Salt mackerel is imported here. Hominy is 
 not unknown in many English houses. Pumpkin- 
 pies are a rarity, but they do exist. In Paris a 
 widow has made a fortune by keeping them at her 
 restaurant. Mince-pies are as common in England 
 as plum-puddings in America. Bring with you a 
 plain recipe, and English cooks will reward you 
 with a pot-pie as appetising as those of New Jersey. 
 Bourbon whisky is to be had for the seeking. A 
 lager-bier saloon has been opened in the Strand, and 
 ought to be patronised by Americans, who are almost 
 as habitual bier-drinkers as the Germans. Tomato 
 and terrapin soups are for sale in London. Ameri- 
 can cheese may be seen at any cheesemonger’s. In 
 Covent Garden you will be supplied with American 
 apples. Everything that is good comes to London. 
 As you travel upon the Continent you will learn 
 that from every port the best articles are despatched 
 to England and the worst to the United States, but 
 that the Americans are invariably expected to pay 
 the best prices. Whatever effect this may have upon 
 
212 English Photographs. 
 
 your national vanity, it should at least teach you 
 to prize life in London more dearly. 
 
 No American can be long content with those stock- 
 dishes of an English hotel, which seem to have been 
 cooked together in the same pot or pan, nor with the 
 monotonous variety of chops and steaks, steaks and 
 chops, at the English restaurants; but then he can act 
 upon the hints just given, and go afield to secure his 
 native dainties in the shops. Or let him turn in at Ver- 
 rey’s, that oasis in the culinary desert of England, and 
 dine like a Parisian and better than most Parisians. 
 Probably there are not a sufficient number of Ameri- 
 can sojourners in London to support an American 
 restaurant, although there are a dozen English chop- 
 houses in New York; but certainly an American bar, 
 like that called ‘‘The Cosmopolitan,” at Paris, would be 
 very successful, if well conducted. I know that there 
 is said to be an American bar in Leicester-square, but 
 that is not the suitable locality. In thoroughly Eng- 
 lish houses the very names of American beverages 
 are quite unheard of; but if some daring genius, in 
 a moment of inspiration and in summer, would only 
 introduce the mint-julep to the British public, all 
 England would rise up, drink his health in his own 
 decoction, and immortalise his memory. Meanwhile, 
 however, it is possible to get on very nicely with 
 claret-cup. 
 
 Hitherto I have treated only the middle-class 
 
Linglish Houses. ying’ 
 
 houses of England. The country-houses, the ances- 
 tral homes, of Great Britain have been amply de- 
 scribed by abler pens. Perhaps it is because Ameri- 
 cans have no ancestral homes of their own that so 
 many of them are ready to regard England with the 
 home feeling. All considerations of rank, wealth, and 
 position apart, it must be an unrivalled gratification 
 to feel that you are living in a residence which has 
 been in the possession of your family for hundreds of 
 years. That sense of home which is the highest of 
 all comforts must be intensified from generation to 
 generation by this lineal occupancy, until it pervades 
 every plank and stone. None can respect this feel- 
 ing so well as those strangers who come from a new 
 country, where the people change their dwellings 
 with the years, are born here, live there, and die 
 here, there, and everywhere, and are in many cases 
 unable to point out the locality of their own birth- 
 places or their fathers’ graves, so rapidly do land- 
 marks disappear. Scattered among the New Eng- 
 land States and the Dutch settlements of New York 
 and Pennsylvania, and even more frequent among 
 the older Southern States, are old homesteads and 
 families who love them and cling to them; but in 
 the majority of instances the continual metamor- 
 phoses of American life have destroyed all such local 
 settlements and attachments. The son emigrates to 
 a section of the country which his father never saw; 
 
214 English Photographs. 
 
 the father dies, and the family estates pass into 
 strange hands, never to be reclaimed. A vast pro- 
 portion of the population, also, has come from dis- 
 tant lands, and can have no hereditary home in the 
 United States. 
 
 The restless, migratory habits which are so great 
 a benefit in developing and enriching a new coun- 
 try have their disadvantages in preventing anything 
 like a well-organised and cultivated society in Ame- 
 rica, except among the literary notabilities of Boston, 
 the Knickerbockers of New York, and the Qua- 
 kers of Philadelphia, and thus deprive the nation 
 of those standards of taste, of art, and of culture in 
 which England is unquestionably superior. But 
 when he comes to balance advantages and disadvan- 
 tages, it is not singular that the American should 
 prefer his own country, after all. He rents his house 
 by the year, because he hopes to move into a better 
 one soon; the Englishman leases his for a lifetime, 
 because he knows he shall never rise above a certain 
 station, When everybody stays where he is, nobody 
 has a chance to get ahead; but when all are in mo- 
 tion, the strongest or cleverest soon pushes himself 
 into leadership. An Englishman can say, “ My great 
 grandfather lived in this house; my grandfather suc- 
 ceeded him; in due course the property came to my 
 father ; and now it belongs to me;” which is a very 
 pleasant state of things, provided the house be habit- 
 
English Houses. 915 
 
 able and the property worth owning. But an Ame- 
 rican can say, “I don’t know who my great-grand- 
 father was; I never heard of my grandfather; but 
 my father lived in the poorhouse, and I was born 
 there, and to-day I am the President of the United 
 States.” England is a capital place for those whose 
 forefathers have left them a name and a fortune; but 
 America is the place for those who have to work 
 their own way. 
 
 The etiquette of English houses differs very 
 slightly from that of American houses. About fif- 
 teen years ago the American gentlemen began to 
 adopt the English style of dressing, and since that 
 time they have also adopted most of the English social 
 customs. ‘The American ladies try to dress like the 
 French, and pride themselves upon their Parisian 
 taste; but this is a feminine peculiarity everywhere, 
 and the American ladies are only exceptional in pro- 
 curing the French fashions so quickly. It requires 
 two seasons to introduce a new mode de Paris into 
 England; a single season suffices for the United 
 States. Take a recent example. The ‘‘ Grecian 
 bend” came out at Paris two years ago; it was 
 adopted in America last autumn; it is displayed in 
 English shop-windows, but not yet upon English 
 ladies, for the first time this winter. The distance 
 between Paris and London, in fashion as in every- 
 thing else, is about two years. But London sets the 
 
216 English Photographs. 
 
 fashions for American gentlemen. ‘The fellows who 
 have their clothes sent over from Poole’s” lead the 
 ton. JI can remember the time when all Americans 
 of any station were attired in Hamlet’s customary 
 suit of solemn black—black-cloth coats and trousers, 
 and black-silk waistcoats, and black-beaver hats. This 
 costume is still preferred by some politicians, who 
 believe that it gives them a semi-professional air. 
 But tweed suits, and coloured walking-coats, and 
 light trousers are now as prevalent in New York as 
 in London, and—marvellous revolution !—the gen- 
 tlemen now agree to dress for dinner, for the opera, 
 and, to some degree, for the theatre. The rough- 
 and-ready American of the past has been banished 
 with the buffaloes to the far West, and it is as un- 
 just to infer that the typical American gentleman 
 is one of the few relics of bygone days that stragele 
 in from the prairies, as it would be to mistake for 
 typical English gentlemen some of the rural squires 
 we meet at the Cattle Show. The ceremony of 
 dressing for dinner implies a great deal—social re- 
 finement, for instance, and cultivation, and a respect 
 for polite conventionalities. Twenty years ago Ame- 
 ricans were amazed at the ceremoniousness of Eng- 
 lish society, and the rules of precedence and the ter- 
 ribly formal processions from the drawing-rooms to 
 the dining-rooms; but they have the same cere- 
 
 monies in their own houses now. I own that the 
 
English Houses. 217 
 
 recent attempt of Congress to interfere with the 
 court costume of American ministers abroad seems to 
 invalidate much that I have said; but then it must 
 be considered that ardent republicanism in America, 
 like ardent loyalty here, is still a potent catch-word 
 with some voters; and, although the one cry means 
 just as much and as little as the other, politicians use 
 them in both countries. Mr. John Bright would 
 gain as little popularity in England by refusing to 
 wear a court-suit as Minister Adams would have 
 gained. in America by insisting upon wearing a court- 
 suit. These national follies prove nothing except the 
 folly of human nature; and that requires no proof. 
 
No. XIII. 
 THE BRITISH PARLIAMENT. 
 
 OFTEN, when visiting Westminster Palace, which con- 
 tains the English Houses of Parliament, I have pleased 
 myself with the fancy that this edifice was an epitome 
 of the government of England. It stands between 
 Westminster Abbey and the Thames Embankment, 
 which may well represent the Past and the Future. 
 It is built over and around the old palace, part of 
 which is used for its entrance-hall, just as the en- 
 larged England of the Present embodies and _ pre- 
 serves prejudices and prerogatives of ancient days. 
 Its style of architecture is Gothic, but marred and 
 made ridiculous by fripperies in gilt and iron, like 
 modern manners patched upon old, quaint charac- 
 ters. The House of Lords is larger than the House 
 of Commons, although so few peers attend the re- 
 gular sessions that a small ante-chamber would suf- 
 fice for their accommodation—facts typical of the 
 extended privileges and little attention to duty on 
 the part of the aristocracy. The House of Commons 
 is not large enough to seat all of its members, al- 
 though they sit closely together upon their benches; 
 
The British Parliament. 219 
 
 and this lack of practical room in so immense a 
 building is intensely English. While the Commons 
 are thus crowded, much space is wasted in separate 
 entrances, halls, and robing-rooms for the Queen, 
 who visits Parliament very seldom, but has a tower 
 to herself when she comes, and ail her apartments 
 reserved for her whether she comes or not. More 
 space still is occupied by Members’ dining-rooms, 
 public dining-rooms, kitchens, &c.; and the dining- 
 rooms—famous as Bellamy’s—are supported and 
 managed by Parliament; for eating and drinking 
 are a very important part of English politics. In 
 the House of Commons a wire-screen is placed be- 
 fore the pen in which the few lady spectators are 
 packed, while in the House of Lords no such barrier 
 exists; for the aristocracy have long since discarded 
 many feudal follies still adhered to by the common 
 people. The House of Lords offers better facilities for 
 visitors, though the House of Commons is the more 
 popular body. 
 
 Nine hundred and ninety-nine Englishmen out of 
 a thousand live and die without having had the re- 
 motest chance of hearing the great parliamentary 
 orators speak in Parliament, no matter how eagerly 
 some of them may desire that right. Suppose the 
 public press were not in existence, or for some rea- 
 son should decline to print the parliamentary re- 
 ports, the proceedings of both Houses would be 
 
220 English Photographs. 
 
 virtually held in secret. In America the most ample 
 accommodations are afforded to the people in all 
 legislative chambers. In Congress, for example, 
 there are spacious galleries, open to all comers, the 
 only requisites for admission being a decent appear- 
 ance and deportment. There is very seldom any 
 disorder among these spectators, even during the 
 most exciting debates; and whenever disorder oc- 
 curs, a motion to clear the galleries is an immediate 
 remedy. But Parliament has an hereditary fear of 
 the people; admits them only by ticket, and so 
 limits the number of visitors that it is easier for a 
 camel to go through the needle’s eye than for the 
 average Englishman to gain admittance to the gal- 
 lery. There are very few difficulties, however, in the 
 way of an American who wishes to hear Gladstone, 
 Disraeli, Bright, and Lowe, in the glories of debate. 
 In Parliament, as everywhere else in England, the 
 greatest courtesy and the extremest privileges are 
 granted to an American so soon as his nationality 
 is announced ; and I have seen my countrymen seated 
 comfortably in the Speaker’s Gallery of the House of 
 Commons, while the Prince of Wales was obliged to 
 be content with a bit of the steps, and aged and dis- 
 tinguished peers, like Earl Russell, were compelled to 
 stand. 
 
 One cannot go to the Palace of Westminster too 
 
 often. Simply to walk round it is a pleasure. You 
 
The British Parliament. O21 
 
 may learn from guide-books that it is the largest 
 Gothic structure in the world, and you are at once 
 impressed with its magnificence; but the more you 
 study the external details of its architecture and 
 compare it with the venerable abbey opposite, the 
 more you will appreciate the wonderful beauty of 
 its workmanship. Surely the terrace on the river, 
 although almost unfrequented, is one of the most 
 delightful lounges in London. There is a day’s 
 sight-seeing in Westminster Hall, where Cromwell 
 was inaugurated, and where the Champion of Eng- 
 land rides in to throw down his gauntlet to the 
 world when a new sovereign is proclaimed; and in 
 the little courts of law at the side, where some of 
 those judges whose learning and impartiality have 
 made the bench of England a model judiciary may 
 be seen in their dignified gowns and ridiculous wigs. 
 Why judges and lawyers should wear wigs in Eng- 
 land nobody can explain. Perhaps it may be ima- 
 gined that as the boys of the Bluecoat School are 
 compelled to go without caps so that their heads 
 may be cool enough to acquire knowledge, so the 
 members of the bench and bar cover their heads in 
 ‘order to retain the knowledge which they have ac- 
 quired; but other schoolboys learn and wear caps, 
 and other judges and lawyers are learned without 
 wigs. Usages which have no other recommenda- 
 tion than antiquity, and which are now utter 
 
22 LEinglish Photographs. 
 
 absurdities, are, unfortunately, only too common in 
 Great Britain. 
 
 Passing through Westminster Hall, whose perfect 
 proportions are insulted by the awkward statues scat- 
 tered about, your first visit to the House of Lords 
 will probably be a disappointment. The chamber is 
 superb. The gorgeous but tasteful decorations of 
 crimson and gold; the throne, which, unlike most 
 thrones, does not resemble a gilded but uncomfort- 
 able chair; and the curious woolsack, a square seat, 
 without arms or back, for the presiding officer, the 
 Lord Chancellor, quite surpass your expectations ; 
 but the few gentlemen in morning dress, seated on 
 either side of the chamber, are by no means ade- 
 quate representatives of what was once the most 
 august of legislative bodies. The mumble -mumble 
 of Karl Russell, or the prosing of Earl Malmesbury, 
 or the chirrupping of Earl Granville, is a poor. sub- 
 stitute for eloquence; the ordinary outgivings of 
 Earl Derby do not justify his title of “the Rupert 
 of debate.” The proceedings are not very different 
 from those of the American Senate ; but you will be 
 surprised to hear the presiding officer take an active 
 part in the discussions. 
 
 It is upon some field-night, when both sides of 
 the House are crowded, when royal personages are 
 seen on the floor, when the galleries are filled with 
 the best society of London, and when the presence 
 
The British Parliament. 223 
 
 of the peeresses adds refinement and brilliancy to 
 the scene, that the House of Lords vindicates its 
 existence. But grandest of all is the display when 
 the Queen in person opens or prorogues Parliament. 
 Then all the peers are in their crimson robes; then 
 the chief officers of state are bedecked with their 
 richest finery ; then the ladies of the court are dazz- 
 lingly beautiful in their splendid ‘¢oilettes ; then the 
 Queen wears the Kohinoor diamond for a brooch, 
 and the members of the royal family stand splen- 
 didly beside her on the dais, not unlike the wax 
 figures at Madame Tussaud’s; and what with the 
 heralds in their obsolete costumes, the attendants 
 in astonishing liveries, the Lord Chancellor bend- 
 ing the knee, and the dim light from the pictured 
 windows, the spectator seems transported back to 
 the days of chivalry, and realises something of what 
 the aristocracy of England was. I happened to be 
 present when the Queen opened the last famous 
 Parliament, and shall never forget the grandeur of 
 the sight. But out-of-doors the rain was steadily 
 falling, and Leech nor Doyle nor Tenniel ever con- 
 ceived anything more grotesque than the royal 
 procession draggling slowly through the mud, as if 
 thoroughly woe-begone at the idea of having to open 
 a Parliament which was about to pass the Reform 
 Bill! 
 
 The House of Commons is a much more busi- 
 
224 English Photographs. 
 
 ness-like chamber than the House of Lords. It is 
 furnished in green and dark oak, like a library, and 
 is lighted from the ceiling, like the American House 
 of Representatives. There is a special gallery for 
 the reporters, whose presence, if the Government 
 can only understand it, is more important than that 
 of the Prime Minister himself: The members sit upon 
 benches on either hand of the Speaker—the Minis- 
 terialists to the right, the Opposition to the left. 
 You can attend no meeting of the House of Com- 
 mons without learning something useful. For in- 
 stance, the presence in Parliament of the members 
 of the Cabinet is worthy of imitation in America. 
 These gentlemen represent the various departments 
 of the Government. They are ready to explain the 
 estimates for their several departments, and to ans- 
 wer any questions that may be asked. The Ameri- 
 can Congress will never be truly a representative 
 body until the members of the President’s Cabinet 
 have places in it, and are prepared to retain or re- 
 sion office according to the decisions of the House. 
 The President being merely an executive officer, 
 there. ought to be no more popular or congressional 
 hostility towards him than there is in England to- 
 wards the Queen. But in England the Cabinet acts 
 as a buffer between the Executive and the Legisla- 
 tive and popular powers, while in America the Cabi- 
 net 1s a fixture, and instead of its being held respon- 
 
The British Parliament. 225 
 
 sible for the acts of the President, the President is 
 held responsible for the acts of the Cabinet. Such 
 disgraceful and outrageous spectacles as that pre- 
 sented by the recent impeachment of President John- 
 son, which justly lower the country in the eyes of 
 the world, and cast discredit upon all popular go- 
 vernments, would be impossible if the members of 
 the Cabinet had seats in Congress, and were made 
 responsible for the conduct of their departments. 
 But when this reform was mooted in Congress a 
 few years ago, it was voted down by a coalition of 
 Democrats and Republicans, under the leadership of 
 the Hon. $8. 8. Cox of Ohio, who made a very facetious 
 speech against it, but whose sole argument seemed to 
 be that, as the heads of departments were dispensers 
 of patronage, their presence in Congress would exer- 
 cise an undue and pernicicus influence upon its de- 
 cisions. No better illustration of the corruption of 
 American politics 1s needed; but to the philosophic 
 mind it is really a comfort to discover somebody who 
 thinks that, under any circumstances, the American 
 Congress could be worse than at present. 
 
 Another parliamentary practice which ought to 
 be imitated in America is that of extemporaneous 
 oratory. Written speeches are the curse of Con- 
 oress; and the permission to print in the official 
 reports speeches which have never been delivered, 
 and have not even been read, is at once a swindle 
 
 Q 
 
226 English Photographs. 
 
 upon the public and an insult to the House. This 
 abuse, growing more impudent with impunity, has 
 now reached such a height that members print 
 what they would not dare to say, and would not he 
 permitted to say, in debate. In Parliament, mem- 
 bers are forbidden to read their speeches, and the 
 idea of printing them unread has never occurred to 
 the British intellect. ‘Speakers may use notes, but 
 their words are extemporaneous, and the result is 
 that in Parliament you find orators, and, what is 
 rarer still, you find debaters; while in Congress the 
 talkers are many, but the genuine public speakers 
 are in a minority of two or three. 
 
 The United States is supposed to be, par excel- 
 lence, the country of popular representation; but 
 although its population is very much greater than 
 that of England, the number of representatives in 
 the British Parliament is more than double the 
 number of representatives in Congress. Of the 658 
 members of the House of Commons, about thirty 
 take part in the debates; but the most of the 
 speaking is done by about twelve members. Some- 
 times this gives a tiresome monotony to the proceed- 
 ings. One gets weary of hearing Mr. Gladstone’s 
 opinions, Mr. Disraeli’s views, Mr. Bright’s eloquence, 
 Mr. Lowe’s sarcasm, Mr. Osborne’s fun, Mr. Hardy’s 
 splurges, over and over again. But although these 
 gentlemen speak often, they speak well. Mr. Bright 
 
The British Parliament. 227 
 
 is undoubtedly the greatest orator in England, 
 and can only be rivalled in America by Mr. Wen- 
 dell Philips. These two gentlemen are very much 
 alike in their ciear, silvery voices, their earnest, plau- 
 sible, fascinating style, and the perverse impractica- 
 bility of their ideas. Everybody is glad to listen 
 to them; everybody is charmed by them; but no- 
 body is convinced and converted. They are sweet- 
 sounding trumpets that summon no practical fol- 
 lowers. The reforms which they advocate are car- 
 ried by other men, and by means of which they have 
 no conception, or to which they are, in fact, opposed. 
 Thus Wendell Phillips in America advocated dis- 
 union in order to get rid of slavery, and lo! eman- 
 cipation resulted from the reéstablishment of the 
 Union; while in England John Bright laboured 
 hard to oust a Conservative Ministry that was ac- 
 tually engaged in granting the household suffrage 
 which he had long desired. Reformers of this school 
 are like Colonel Hardy in Paul Pry—they want not 
 only their own way, but their own way of having 
 their own way ; and Providence appears to take plea- 
 sure in thwarting them, in leaving them stranded 
 and surpassed, and in accomplishing their aims by 
 other and hostile agencies. Mr. Lowe talks very 
 rapidly and with very little gesticulation, but every 
 sentence has its sting; and there is at times a rush, 
 
 a dash, an éan in his oratory that reminds you of 
 
228 English Photographs. 
 
 a charge of fierce, hardy, agile French Zouaves. He 
 can kill a measure with a metaphor, and sum up an 
 opponent’s speech in an epigram. His style of ora- 
 tory is rather American than English. Indeed, all 
 the best parliamentary orators drop the whimsicali- 
 ties of English accent and pronunciation when they 
 rise to address the House. Mr. Gladstone speaks 
 with great clearness and earnestness, but his man- 
 ner lacks variety and his voice modulation. Besides, 
 he is remarkably verbose. In the graces of his ora- 
 tory and the classic coldness of his style he resembles 
 the late Edward Everett, but his reputation as an 
 orator seems to me exaggerated. Mr. Disraeli is 
 like nobody but himself. His eloquence is as pecu- 
 liar as his character. He has a hundred mannerisms 
 which in another speaker would be absurd; he is 
 often bombastic; he never seems to be quite in ear- 
 nest: he is a parliamentary Rabelais. But there are 
 touches in every one of his speeches which no other 
 orator can rival. His satire is so keen and cool, his 
 humour so Mephistophelian, his phrases so neat and 
 
 sparkling—not epigrams, but very epigrammatical 
 that the House always hears him with delight, and 
 applauds him even when it cannot agree with him. 
 No one can hear Mr. Disraeli argue and think him 
 sincere. He appears to despise both those who laugh 
 at his hard hits and those whom he attacks. He 
 strikes you as a man who believes nothing and 
 
The British Parliament. 229 
 
 trusts nobody. In his wildest flights he seems to 
 say with a wink, “I don’t mean this.” But his 
 opponents are afraid of him, and with reason. They 
 remember Peel. When at bay he is indeed very 
 dangerous. During the Reform debates he with- 
 stood the whole House of Commons single-handed, 
 and answered a dozen violent assaults in one speech 
 of wonderful vigour and point. I think that his 
 manner does him an injustice. He is more sin- 
 cere, more earnest, less sceptical, less bitter, than he 
 appears. Certainly England has no more remark- 
 able man. In spite of all the clamour against him, 
 he is not unpopular. Englishmen cannot help being 
 proud of him, for he has succeeded. 
 
 The American Congress is in no respect so re- 
 presentative a body as the English Parliament. All 
 the prominent men in England are well educated ; 
 there are very few educated men in Congress. The 
 authors of America have no chance of political pre- 
 ferment. The learned men of America never think 
 of offering themselves for election. To be a lawyer 
 is the almost indispensable qualification for a Con- 
 gressman. Merchants are elected now and then, but 
 always under protest. Such a philosopher as Mr. 
 Mill would become the editor of a weekly newspaper 
 and the founder of a new sect in America, for the 
 doors of practical political life would be shut and 
 barred against him. The local politicians in the 
 
230 English Photographs. 
 
 United States, who manage all the nominations and 
 elections, have a profound distrust of and dislike 
 for literary men. If a member of Congress were 
 to publish a book like Mr. Kinglake’s, he would be 
 ostracised forthwith. Comparing the two legisla- 
 tures, I think the American Senate fully equal to the 
 House of Lords in ability and dignity; the American 
 House of Representatives far below the House of 
 Commons in education and character. The majority 
 of the Commons—the men whom you never hear, 
 
 who sit and listen and vote and are happy—have 
 
 not so much active intelligence as the majority in 
 Congress, but they are more respectable, and, not 
 to put too fine a point upon it, they are less corrupt. 
 But it is foolish to suppose that there is no corrup- 
 tion in Parliament. He who believes that six hun- 
 dred and fifty men pay large sums simply for the 
 honour of sitting in the House of Commons, without 
 salaries and with very little social advancement, has 
 too high an opinion of human nature. There are 
 numerous parliamentary jobs; there is a constant 
 struggle for places, preferments, and appointments; 
 votes are bought and sold, and have a recognised 
 market-value. But it is all done decently and 
 quietly. Just as dealing in stocks is not gambling, 
 and taking chances at a fancy-fair is not buying 
 lottery-tickets, so there is a form of parliamentary 
 corruption which the world has agreed to consider 
 
The British Parliament. Del. 
 
 not corrupt. The Government of England is like an 
 immense cheese, with rats and mites innumerable 
 gnawing away at it in the dark. But they keep in 
 the dark. No newspaper exposes them; if ever a 
 scandal occurs it is speedily hushed up, and nobody 
 has the bad taste to refer to the accident. In Ame- 
 rica the rats gnaw away in the daylight. There is 
 always a squabble between them and about them. 
 They do not know enough to be silent. Public men 
 shout charges of corruption at each other; the news- 
 papers keep the words “ FRaup” and. “ PLUNDERING 
 THE TREASURY’ always.in type. In England there is 
 more corruption than appears on the surface; in 
 
 America there is less. But I must add that a direct 
 bribe in money is exceedingly rare in the British 
 Parliament, and deplorably frequent in the American 
 Congress. There is a difference, perhaps, between ac- 
 cepting a thousand pounds’ worth of railway shares 
 and a thousand pounds’ worth of bank-notes. In 
 both legislatures party lines are very closely drawn ; 
 but in both there are several members who act in- 
 dependently of party. The number of these inde- 
 pendents is about equal in both countries. For se- 
 veral years there has been no recognised leader of 
 the Opposition in the American Congress. Parlia- 
 ment could not get. through its work without this 
 official. But many of the faults of the American 
 Congress would be remedied if the members of the 
 
232 English Photographs. 
 
 Cabinet had seats in that body. Imagine what the 
 British Parliament would be if all the members of 
 the present Ministry and all the members of the 
 late Ministry were to be withdrawn, and then you 
 can form some estimate of the condition of Con- 
 egress. These gentlemen are a nucleus of able, ex- 
 perienced, and responsible statesmen, sufficient to 
 redeem any legislative body from mediocrity. Con- 
 gress lacks this redeeming feature, and is below me- 
 diocrity. 
 
 On the whole, Parliament wastes much more time 
 and does less work than Congress. Almost all im- 
 portant bills are introduced by the Ministers; ihe 
 private members have certain fixed days when their 
 bills can be considered, but they are always liable to 
 be overslaughed by ministerial necessities. In Con- 
 gress there are no government bills; the names of 
 the States are called in order, and any member may 
 introduce a bill. So far, the English system is pre- 
 ferable. Then, in Congress the bills are referred to 
 the various standing committees; many of them are 
 summarily killed in the committee-rooms; the best 
 are reported back to the House and passed or re- 
 jected, under the operation of the previous question, 
 with comparatively little speech-making. In Par- 
 liament every bill has to be submitted to the com- 
 mittee of the whole House. There may be a debate 
 and a division upon the application for leave to 
 
The British Parliament. 233 
 
 bring in the bill, upon the second reading—the first 
 reading being a matter of form—upon going into 
 committee, and upon the final passage. All the 
 while the bill floats upon a river of talk, or sinks 
 beneath the flood of Opposition oratory. Of course, 
 but few measures survive this prolonged and crucial 
 ordeal. The majority perish miserably. Good or 
 bad, the House has no time to attend to them, and 
 down they go. Standing committees would do all 
 this work better, quicker, and more satisfactorily. 
 Even in the smallest details of business precious 
 moments are wasted. On a division the members 
 file out into the lobbies to the right and left of the 
 Speaker, and are counted by tellers as they return. 
 If a member goes to his own right instead of the 
 Speaker’s right, he votes against his own party and 
 has no remedy. If he explain his mistake he is 
 laughed at, and thus a stupid custom is allowed to 
 override a member’s vote. In Congress the mem- 
 bers stay in their places, their names are called by 
 the Clerk, and their votes recorded ‘‘Aye” or “ No.” 
 This is simpler and more dignified. If a member’s 
 vote be wrongly recorded, or if he desire to vote the 
 other way, he has only to rise and ask permission of 
 the House. The English mode of taking a division 
 would not be tolerated among school-boys, but every 
 attempt to change or modify it is voted down. At- 
 tention has frequently been called to the rude man- 
 
234 English Photographs. | 
 
 ner in which the Commons rush into the House of 
 Lords when they are summoned to hear the Queen's 
 speech ; but American legislators are quite as fond 
 of a4 row and a scramble. Anglo-Saxon men are 
 never anything but grown-up boys; Frenchmen, 
 Italians, and Spaniards scarcely ever get further 
 than babyhood. 
 
 The desks and stuffed arm-chairs of the American 
 Congress contrast strongly with the plain benches 
 of Parliament; but benches have been tried in Con- 
 gress, and were not liked. The American legislators 
 read their newspapers, write their letters, and engage 
 in general conversation during the sessions. Speakers 
 are seldom heard unless they are men of mark, like 
 Thaddeus Stevens, or very eloquent men, like Ge- 
 neral Banks. British legislators, having nothing else 
 to do, are obliged to listen to the speakers, and are 
 very critical as to oratory. If an honourable mem- 
 ber talks nonsense he is coughed, cheered, or hooted 
 down without mercy; but after all, this is orderly 
 disorder. There are some speakers whose rising is 
 the signal for the instant departure of the majority 
 of the members. Others have only to rise in an 
 almost empty House, and, as if by magic, members 
 come trooping in from the lobbies, dining-rooms, 
 smoking-rooms, and clubs. The cry of “Bright is 
 up!” “ Disraeli speaks!” or “Gladstone next!” se- 
 
 cures a crowd like that which used to flock around 
 
The British Parliament. Yay) 
 
 Tom Corwin in Congress. There ought to be better 
 oratory in Congress than in Parliament; for crowded 
 galleries and the enthusiasm of numerous spectators 
 are great incentives to eloquence; but to hear an 
 American orator at his best you must attend a mass- 
 meeting. We have no Websters and Clays nowa- 
 days; no Calhouns and Randolphs; but England. is 
 able to maintain a splendid succession of orators. 
 
 A grave fault. of Parliament is that it attempts 
 too much. It undertakes to legislate for England, 
 Ireland, Scotland, Wales, India, and the colonies, 
 not only in gross but in detail. Not satisfied with 
 these tremendous tasks, it also bothers itself with the 
 government of London, which, next to Washington, 
 whose government is intrusted to Congress, is the 
 worst administered city on the globe. There is a 
 machine so powerful and so perfect that it can crush 
 an iron boulder to atoms or crack a chestnut with- 
 out grazing the kernel. The British Parliament 
 wishes to rival this machine, and tries to lay down 
 an international policy and a provincial railroad. with 
 the same skill and judgment. The House of Com- 
 mons, like the American House of Representatives, 
 has been endeavouring for years to concentrate all 
 powers within itself. Practically it has succeeded. 
 Royalty has been rendered almost a nullity. The 
 Sovereign is merely an hereditary president of an 
 imperial republic, but with much less political in- 
 
236 English Photoa-aphs. 
 
 fluence than the President of the United States. 
 Indeed, if the Queen were to die to-morrow and the 
 fact of her death could be concealed from the people, 
 the Government would go on just the same as at 
 present, so long as any member of the royal family 
 remained to perform her social duties. Very re- 
 cently the Zimes was at great pains to inform its 
 readers that the pardoning power possessed by the 
 Queen is a mere form, and that the real pardoning 
 power is the Home Secretary. All the Queen’s po- 
 litical powers are mere forms; in nothing, from the 
 choice of a Prime Minister to the appointment of a 
 government clerk, can she dispute the will of Par- 
 lament. She has her personal prejudices, but they 
 cannot affect politics; she has her own ideas about 
 reform, disestablishment, and a thousand other pub- 
 lic measures, but she is compelled to act according 
 to the ideas of Parliament. Monarchy in England 
 is tolerated on condition that it is neutral. Once a 
 political power, it is now only a social convenience. 
 A Queen suits society much better than a King, and 
 when, in addition to being a woman, the Sovereign 
 has all the womanly virtues of Victoria, there is no 
 excuse for opposition. But the England of 1868 
 would not endure another Elizabeth, and would 
 scatter the four Georges to the four quarters of the 
 earth. | 
 
 The subjugation of the House of Lords is not 
 
The British Parliament. ord 
 
 less complete than that of royalty. The policy of 
 the peers is obedience to the Commons. Whenever 
 they object, they are threatened with extinction. 
 Then they grumble a little and submit to their 
 master. But with every submission they grow 
 weaker, and their protests are treated with greater 
 contempt. They have thrown out Mr. Gladstone’s 
 bill for disendowing the Irish Church, but every- 
 body knows that they will pass it now that Mr. 
 Gladstone has obtained a majority at the popular 
 elections. The period is approaching when even do- 
 cility will not save the House of Lords. The theory 
 that a man is born a statesman because he is heir to 
 a title is opposed to the common sense of the age. 
 Consequently, we see propositions in the public 
 prints and in electioneering addresses looking to the 
 transformation of the House of Peers into a Senate, 
 the members to be elected like Members of the 
 House of Commons. ‘This is the very thing to please 
 the new constituents, who, having once tasted the 
 pleasures of voting, will be anxious to vote for as 
 many Officials as possible. I beg to ask what chasm 
 divides an elected Senate from an elected Sove- 
 reion? Ifit be absurd to make a man a legislator 
 because his father happened to be a duke, why is it 
 reasonable to make another man the Chief Hxecu- 
 tive because his mother happened to be aqueen? In 
 what respect is an hereditary monarchy superior to 
 
238 English Photographs. 
 
 an hereditary legislature, and how can those who 
 attack the latter defend the former? I ask these 
 questions without attempting to answer them; but 
 no one who does not shut his eyes to the signs of 
 the times can deny that England is becoming rapidly 
 republicanised, and that the House of Lords is 
 doomed. In-truth, there are a number of pure Re- 
 publicans in England, who joyfully anticipate the 
 period when every man will have a vote by ballot, 
 and when the voters will elect their own rulers. For 
 the better or worse, that is the drift of English 
 politics. Kverywhere on this side of the Atlantic, 
 some of the governed classes are dissatisfied with 
 the form of government under which they live. The 
 United States, with all their faults, are the only na- 
 tion in existence within whose boundaries no party 
 and no person is willing to accept any change in 
 the principles of the government, quarrel as they 
 may about the personnel of the administration of 
 public affairs. 
 
 Parliament, having such unlimited powers, and 
 undertaking to do so much, actually accomplishes 
 very little. Any great measure, like the Reform 
 Bill, blocks the wheels of the legislative machine, 
 and scores of smaller measures are lost or post- 
 poned. From every part of the country come com- 
 plaints of enterprises delayed and injustices per- 
 petuated because Parliament is too busy with the 
 
The British Parliament. 239 
 
 fate of ministries to attend to the domestic interests 
 of the people. Ireland’s grievances are more loud- 
 mouthed, but are not more annoying, than those of 
 Scotland—nay, than those of England itself. Even 
 the Welsh are dissatisfied in their weird, weak way. 
 A conglomeration of nationalities, rather than a 
 united nation, the British Empire endeavours to sa- 
 tisfy all its subjects by a single legislature. The 
 Americans improved upon this plan when they or- 
 ganised a national government from various inde- 
 pendent States. A national legislature was formed 
 to deal with national affairs, but local affairs were 
 left to the State legislatures. The national legisla- 
 ture maintains an army and navy, manages the fo- 
 reign policy, coins money, imposes and collects the 
 customs and the internal taxes; but if a company 
 desire to build a railroad, open a turnpike, or engage 
 in any business that requires a charter, the necessary 
 powers are obtained from the State legislatures, not 
 from Congress. Here everybody appeals to the im- 
 perial Parliament for everything. Ifa local legisla- 
 ture to deal with local questions were established in 
 Ireland, you would hear no more of Irish discontent. 
 Embryo orators would have a grander field for their 
 eloquence than Fenian conclaves or Orange lodges. 
 Dublin would again become a capital city; and Ire- 
 land, instead of feeling itself ignored, would soon be 
 changed into an industrious, energetic, and import- 
 
240 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 ant member of the empire of which it forms a part. 
 Add the appointment of a prince as viceroy, and in 
 ten years you would not recognise the country. 
 
 Two such local legislatures, one in Dublin and 
 one in Edinburgh, would relieve the imperial Parlia- 
 ment of the greater portion of the work now imposed 
 upon it, but which it does not and cannot do; and the 
 nation, being more efficiently governed, would develop 
 its resources with astonishing vigour. This scheme 
 is not a new one; it is not even an American idea; 
 it has been tested with abundant success in the Brit- 
 ish colonies. Asa plan for the pacification of Ireland it 
 has at least these advantages over Mr. John Bright’s 
 —it would cost nothing, it would not interfere with 
 the laws of property, and it would be successful. 
 What would Australia, what would Canada be, if 
 they had no local legislatures and were forced to 
 apply to the imperial Parliament whenever they 
 needed a new barfk or a new stock company ? 
 Some persons may object to the spirit of independ- 
 ence which such a policy would generate; but this 
 is really an argument in its favour. Australia is 
 certainly more independent of England than Ire- 
 land; but it is also more loyal. Parliament does 
 not understand Ireland, and cannot legislate satis- 
 factorily for Ireland; but all difficulties would be 
 solved if Ireland were allowed to manage its do- 
 mestic affairs in its own way; and Scotland is in 
 
The British Parliament. 241 
 
 rauch the same case. There is work enough for 
 Parliament to do in amalgamating the elements of the 
 empire, instead of twaddling over trifles that ought 
 to be left to local boards. With the glaring discre- 
 pancies between the marriage-laws of England and 
 Scotland staring it in the face and provoking the 
 censure of every other civilised country, the impe- 
 rial Parliament spends hours in discussing such tri- 
 vialities as the widening of Park-lane, the location 
 of the Brompton boilers, and the good taste of the 
 statues in Westminster Hall! There must be one 
 machine to smash boulders, and another to crack 
 chestnuts; and Parliament should reserve itself for 
 
 the boulders. 
 
No. XIV. 
 ENGLISH CASTES. 
 
 Tue distinctions of caste among Englishmen strike 
 an American visitor very quickly and unpleasantly. 
 In the United States you may see many different 
 races of people; but the native Americans all belong 
 to the same caste. One may be richer than another; 
 some may be better educated than others; the social 
 positions of the persons you meet may vary; but 
 there is something about every man which shows 
 that he is as good as any other man, and that he is 
 fully aware of the fact. The Irishmen and Germans, 
 who form so large a proportion of the population, 
 you can identify at once; or, if they have become 
 undistinguishable from the masses of Americans, it 
 is because they have lost their native peculiarities 
 and adopted the national tone and manner. No 
 American would think of travelling in any other 
 than a first-class car; the other classes are for the 
 immigrants. No American would think of occupy- 
 ing a menial situation; such positions are reserved 
 for those immigrants who have not yet had time 
 to better themselves, and for the negroes. Select 
 
English Castes. 243 
 
 —- 
 
 the poorest American you can find, and open a con- 
 versation with him, and you will soon discover that 
 he is fully informed upon political affairs, and has 
 received sufficient education to express his ideas 
 clearly, and to support them by logical arguments ; 
 while in the perfect equality with which he treats 
 you, and in the unconscious independence which 
 pervades everything he does and says, you will 
 notice that indefinable assertion of manhood which 
 is the key to the American character. In England, 
 you find people of practically a single race—as if 
 America were inhabited by native-born Americans 
 alone—and yet the distinctions of classes are as broad 
 as the gulf described by Lazarus. All are English- 
 men, but how different in quality! 
 
 Many, you are pained to observe, practically 
 regard themselves, and are regarded by their social 
 superiors, as creatures of another species. There are 
 castes whose natural instinct it is to cringe. There 
 are other castes born, like maggots, to grow fat in 
 corrupt corners. You can divide the population into 
 sections; you can number them in classes, like the 
 children of a school; you can see that each man 
 knows himself to be in a groove from which there 
 is no escape, unless he leave the country. With 
 military discipline: one caste marches into the pri- 
 sons, another into the streets, another into the ser- 
 vants’ places, another into the trades, another into 
 
244 English Photographs. 
 
 the shops, another into the wholesale business, an- 
 other into banking, another into the professions, and 
 another into the aristocracy. Nobody attempts to 
 leave his company to reach a higher position, and 
 everybody suits his manners to his station. 
 
 Money makes very little difference in these castes. 
 Cash cannot give a man social position in England. 
 The people pride themselves upon their stolidity ; 
 they admire their own inertia. Ifa shopkeeper is 
 conducting the same business in the same place as 
 his grandfather, he announces the fact to the world 
 as a matter of congratulation, not seeing that, with 
 his superior advantages, he ought to feel it a dis- 
 grace that he has advanced no farther than his 
 ancestors. High and low, all are alike in this. 
 Great names, instead of inspiring their possessors to 
 great deeds, weigh them down like lumps of lead. 
 Call the roll of the House of Peers, and you will 
 hear the brightest titles in history; but attend a 
 sitting of the same House, and you will see three 
 or four sleepy old gentlemen presided over by a new 
 lord, whom they secretly despise because his title is 
 so very recent, and respect because he has more 
 talent than all the rest of them put together. Mr. 
 Disraeli and Mr. Gladstone have broken through 
 routine by becoming Premier without titles; but 
 these are only exceptions that prove the rule. When 
 French schoolmasters can say to their pupils, “Study 
 
Linglish Castes. 245 
 
 hard, and you may yet be Emperor of France, like 
 Napoleon, who was once a poor schoolboy such as 
 you,” then English schoolmasters may say to their 
 untitled pupils, “Study hard, and you may yet be 
 Premier, like Mr. Disraeli and Mr. Gladstone.” The 
 truth is, that. Mr. Disraeli became Premier because 
 the older aristocracy had so died out that there was 
 only one nobleman in the Tory party fit to succeed 
 Lord Derby, and he is Lord Derby’s son, whose ser- 
 vices were urgently needed as Secretary for Foreign 
 Affairs. The Tory aristocracy being thus exhausted, 
 the leading Tory commoner was sent for by the 
 Queen. Now that the Liberals have regained power, 
 Lord Russell has made way for Mr. Gladstone for 
 the same reasons. By and by Mr. Disraeli and Mr. 
 Gladstone will receive titles—Mr. Disraeli has already 
 
 compromised the matter by accepting a title for his 
 
 wife—and then all will go on as before, unless the 
 new Reform Bill miraculously vitalises Hnglish 
 politics. 
 
 One of the first English castes with which an 
 American comes in contact is that of the shop- 
 keepers. So soon as he arrives at his hotel, if his 
 name be notable enough to be published in the 
 Morning Post, or in one of the Anglo-American 
 papers issued in London, he is at once overwhelmed 
 with circulars from tradespeople and calls from en- 
 
 terprising clerks. Tailors introduce themselves with 
 
246 English Photographs. 
 
 books of patterns and samples of the latest fashions. 
 Jewellers cover his table with precious stones and 
 specimens of their manufactures. Dry-goods dealers 
 send in silks, velvets, and laces for the inspection of 
 the ladies. Everybody is willing to give him un- 
 limited credit, or to deduct from five to fifteen per 
 cent discount for cash. Unused to any such solici- 
 tations and deference in his own country, he begins 
 to be deeply impressed with a novel sense of his own 
 importance and with the intelligent appreciation of 
 the English people, and probably orders a great 
 many things which he does not need as some slight 
 return for the compliments lavished upon him. Par- 
 ticularly is he surprised at the peculiarly intimate 
 relationship that seems to exist between royalty and 
 trade. The Queen, or some other member of the 
 Royal Family, appears to be a patron of half the 
 shops of London. On the top of his bills and over 
 the various stores he sees signs such as these: ‘“ Gun- 
 maker to the Queen,” “ Breeches-maker to the Royal 
 
 vy] 
 
 Family,” ‘Hatter to the Prince and Princess of 
 Wales.” One shop, disdaining English royalty as 
 too common, parades itself as ‘‘ Under the Patronage 
 of the Princess Ypsilanti of Vienna’—whoever that 
 lady may be. Another shop, believing that in num- 
 bers there is strength, displays the names of all the 
 continental sovereigns, beginning with the Emperor 
 
 of France and ending with the Viceroy of Egypt. 
 
English Castes. 247 
 
 At first the foreigner imagines that these must 
 be the best shopsin London. Before long he discovers 
 that they are often the dearest. He cannot expect 
 to have his little spice of royalty without paying for 
 it. After awhile he learns that the Queen has appa- 
 rently a dozen or a score of gunmakers, breeches- 
 makers, and hatmakers in her service, and that the 
 Prince and Princess of Wales are equally well sup- 
 plied. A few questions will teach him that royalty 
 never heard of nine-tenths of the people who parade 
 its names in front of their doors. Pecuniary or 
 other influence has procured them bits of parchment 
 from some subordinate, and their signs are painted 
 in large letters to astonish the ignorant, and are 
 bedecked with the royal arms to convince the scepti- 
 cal. English people are very seldom taken in by 
 this humbug. Ifa costermonger were to announce 
 himself as “ Purveyor of Potatoes to her Majesty,” 
 or if a chimney-sweep were to put at the top of 
 his card—as one of them has done—“ By Special 
 Appointment to the Royal Family,” no Englishman 
 would be surprised. This sham flourish of royal pa- 
 tronage is a catch to which he has been accustomed, 
 and, if he be at all economical, it only tells him at 
 which shops not to deal. But with foreigners the 
 case is different. A tradesman. whose claim to re- 
 putation is that he furnishes his goods to the Prince 
 of Wales, assured me that during the summer, when 
 
248 English Photographs. 
 
 the London season was over and all the fashionables 
 had left town, his employés are kept busy by the 
 Americans, who come over just at the time when 
 London is deserted, and stop here long enough to 
 order his goods before leaving for Paris. And yet 
 this tradesman will not add the American coat-of- 
 arms to the royal collection at the top of his bills! 
 Let me warn my compatriots against putting 
 their trust in any prince’s name over a shop-front, 
 Already it has come to be understood in England 
 that some of the best shops are those which make 
 no parade of royal patronage. High-sounding names 
 over the door are like the certificates in the adver- 
 tisements of patent pills—generally bogus. When 
 you begin to count how many tailors, how many 
 furnishers, how many shoemakers, how many hosiers, 
 how many jewellers, how many hatters, how many 
 glovers, how many whipsters, how many hairdressers, 
 and how many photographers the Royal Family 
 seem to have throughout England, without noticing 
 any of the other places which they patronise libe- 
 rally according to the advertisements, you will begin 
 to doubt which is the real Original Jacobs. Dis- 
 trust them all, as the more intelligent Britishers- do. 
 As good wines need no bush, so good shops do not 
 require this pretension to royal custom. I do not 
 know what official is responsible for these trade- 
 certificates or diplomas, issued with an apparent 
 
English Castes. 249 
 
 royal sanction, nor what are the perquisites of the 
 office which this person occupies; but, for the sake 
 of their own dignity and honour, those members of 
 the Royal Family whose names are taken in vain 
 (in a double sense) by multitudes of aspiring shop- 
 men should look into the matter personally, and 
 abate an evil which has involved the retail dealers 
 of England in a mire of petty hypocrisies, pretences, 
 and deceits. 
 
 Another peculiarity of English shopkeepers is 
 their employment of the guinea and the farthing in 
 their transactions. The guinea is the pecuniary 
 symbol of British Conservatism. There is no such 
 coin issued from the Mint. It was obsolete years 
 ago. The pound or sovereign has entirely replaced 
 it. Yet it lives in the charges of shopkeepers and 
 theatrical managers, and benevolent societies. When- 
 ever you pay a guinea for anything, you may make 
 up your mind that you have been cheated out of a 
 shilling. The English Press never exposes this 
 swindle, because, among other reasons, writers are 
 always paid by the publishers so many guineas a 
 column or so many guineas a page. It would be 
 fairer and more business-like to say so many pounds, 
 so many shillings; but the writers perfectly under- 
 stand that, if this were the rule, their recompense 
 would soon be the pounds without the shillings, and 
 so they have no interest in attacking the guinca 
 
250 English Photographs. 
 
 nuisance.” But these gentlemen ought to remember 
 that, while they receive guineas, they also pay out 
 guineas, and that, in the end, on everything, from 
 furniture to silk hats, they lose more than they gain. 
 A single leader in the Zimes, a few squibs from Mr. 
 Punch, and this swindle would be extinguished. It 
 exists simply because it has existed, and it robs the 
 rich just as the farthing swindle robs the poor. At 
 the cheap shops in England you may see articles 
 marked in large letters ““ONE SHILLING,” and 
 then in smaller letters ‘‘ELEVENPENCE,” and then mn 
 smaller letters still, almost illegible to those who 
 do not wear spectacles, ‘three farthings.” ‘These are 
 goods sold at more honest shops for one shilling 
 and tenpence. But the eyes of the shrewd British 
 matron are attracted, first of all, by the staring an- 
 nouncement of ‘one shilling.” She does not sce 
 the “elevenpence” until she ‘is half-way into the 
 shop, and the “three farthings” are unknown to her 
 until she meets them in the bill. Sauntering by 
 one of these shops, and. observing that the proprietor 
 seemed to be disengaged, I stepped in and asked 
 him, among other questions, what effect it would 
 have upon his business if he were boldly to adver- 
 tise his goods at “two shillings” instead of the de- 
 ceptive “one shilling elevenpence three farthings.” 
 ‘Why, sir,” he replied—I don’t pretend to give his 
 exact words—“it would show that I didn’t under- 
 
English Castes. 251 
 
 stand human nature, and I might as well quit.the 
 business.” An American shopkeeper would be hooted 
 if he attempted to add mills to his prices. 
 
 Perhaps the guinea swindlers understand human 
 nature also; but the farthing swindlers have. this 
 advantage over them—there is such a coin as a 
 farthing, while a guinea is an impossibility. No 
 London shopkeeper of the present day ever received 
 one over the counter, and every tradesman knows 
 that he is taking an extra shilling out of your 
 pocket dishonestly—pleading, of course, custom for 
 his excuse—when he sells his wares for a guinea 
 instead of a pound. When Napoleon called the 
 English “a nation of shopkeepers’—an epigram far 
 from true—his satire was more bitter than he knew. 
 If all the English resembled their shopkeepers they 
 would be completely contemptible; for the British 
 shopkeeper’s first lesson is to cringe to his rich cus- 
 tomers; his second lesson is to bully his poor cus- 
 tomers. When he gets rich he bullies everybody, 
 and forces his clerks to do the cringing. A _ tho- 
 roughly-trained English waiter says “Thank you, 
 sir,” when you tell him to bring a scuttle of coals, 
 and “Thank you, sir,” when you inform him that 
 ‘he is an unmitigated blockhead. The British shop- 
 keeper appears to believe this the true manly model ; 
 and, if you are an American, he disgusts you with 
 his servility as much as he overcharges you in his 
 
253 English Photographs. 
 
 bill. In Paris you are overcharged as badly, but 
 there you expect it. What a relief it is to find that 
 many English shops employ women as clerks! for 
 the women are always more independent than the 
 men. Being women, they cannot quite cringe. Even 
 Mrs. Heep, in David Copperfield, is not so agegra- 
 vatingly ‘umble as her son Uriah. 
 
 Unquestionably the English caste that the ma- 
 jority of Americans most wish to meet is the no- 
 bility. It is altogether a mistake to suppose that, 
 because we are all democrats in the United States, 
 we have no aristocratic sympathies. Of course we 
 shall never have a nobility of the Huropean model 
 in America, because nobody would consent to be 
 left out in the cold, and a nation of noblemen would 
 be somewhat absurd. Theoretically we are all sove- 
 reigns now; but that goes for very little where the 
 honour is so numerously shared, although, as we 
 shall presently observe, it has its value on this side 
 of the ocean. But the Americans have always had 
 a decided love of titles, as their militia ‘“ generals,” 
 “colonels,” and ‘ captains,” and the unelected 
 “Judges,” “senators,” and ‘“honourables” unmistak- 
 ably indicate. We have no patents of nobility ; but 
 we are happy in the possession of several aristocra- 
 cles. There is the old Plantation Aristocracy of the 
 South, sadly disturbed now by the recent war, 
 but still in active existence. There is the Intel- 
 
English Castes. 
 
 nD 
 Cu 
 Oo 
 
 lectual Aristocracy of Boston, to which none but 
 those who are Yankees and Radicals and literary 
 persons are admitted. A man may have every other 
 virtue, but if he fail in one of these three qualifica- 
 tions, he is forever debarred from this magic circle. 
 There is the Knickerbocker Aristocracy of New York, 
 which is hereditary, and is confined exclusively to 
 the descendants of the old Dutch families—wealth, 
 abilities, politics, and fame counting for nothing in 
 this clique. There is the Select Aristocracy of Phil- 
 adelphia and Maryland, the constituents of which 
 are very varied, embracing wealth, Quakerism, Roman 
 Catholicism, political prominence, and family con- 
 nections, as it may happen. Lastly, there is the 
 Military Aristocracy, originally composed of the 
 graduates of the Military Academy of West Point, 
 but increased during the recent Rebellion by the 
 creation of thousands of generals, colonels, and cap- 
 tains, not only from among the actual combatants, 
 but from among those who never saw any other 
 than a political campaign, nor heard an explosion 
 more terrific than the popping of a champagne-cork. 
 These forms of American aristocracy, however, are 
 merely social distinctions, recognised by those who 
 claim them, but ridiculed and disregarded by out- 
 siders. The Military Aristocracy is the only one 
 which has any genuine political power, and we may 
 expect to see it very strongly represented in the 
 
254 English Photographs. 
 
 government during the presidency of General Grant. 
 As for liveries and crests, they are almost as fre- 
 quently noticed upon American carriages as upon 
 English equipages. | 
 
 One of the first journeys in England which an 
 American of English origin undertakes is to the 
 place from which his ancestors emigrated ; one of 
 his first acts is to inquire for his crest or coat-of- 
 arms, if his family be lucky enough to have one; 
 and poor indeed must be the family which a Lon- 
 don stationer will not accommodate on demand 
 with a lion rampant over a crown, or a goose strad- 
 dling a coronet. There are also heralds’ offices in 
 the leading American cities—private speculations, of 
 course—where very pretty patterns can be procured; 
 but the thing is considered more genuine when it 
 comes from England. Many Americans, unable or 
 unwilling to trace out their family lines, or with a 
 characteristically democratic independence of official 
 heraldry, have invented coats-of-arms for themselves. 
 was with the 
 
 One general—a fighting general, too 
 utmost difficulty dissuaded from spoiling a new 
 china dinner-service by ornamenting it with a neat 
 thing in bright colours, designed by himself and 
 wife, representing the American eagle uncomfort- 
 ably perched upon the points of two planets—em- 
 blematical of his rank—and bearing upon its noble 
 bosom a shield, decorated with stars, stripes, and 
 
English Castes. 255 
 
 the intertwined monograms of the brave officer and 
 his bride. 
 
 For the benefit of those of my compatriots who 
 may have any modest doubts about this matter, I may 
 be permitted to narrate my own experiences, which 
 have been extremely fortunate. One of my com- 
 panions on the voyage from America rather dis- 
 couraged me at the beginning, for, after minute 
 inquiries, his assumed ancestry was found to be lost 
 among three bachelors, much to his disgust and dis- 
 comfiture; but, in spite of this warning, I persevered 
 in my researches, and was rewarded with two crests, 
 either one of which would do no discredit to a 
 lord, and a coat-of-arms of which no duke could be 
 ashamed. Seventeen and sixpence English—about 
 five dollars in greenbacks—was a cheap price to pay 
 for such honours, although my family had emigrated 
 from Suffolk to America soon after the heroes of the 
 Mayflower. Indeed, there is no longer an excuse 
 for any American who returns home from Europe 
 without some connection with nobility ; for, besides 
 the complaisance of English stationers, an Italian 
 company, which is making a road near Florence, 
 will sell valid titles, with genealogies complete, to 
 all customers for three hundred dollars in gold— 
 a very small sum, considering the amount of false- 
 hood involved in the transaction. 
 
 Although the sight of a lord is no longer rare in 
 
256 English Photographs. 
 
 the United States, yet an American feels it to be a 
 very different thing to meet a nobleman on the 
 nobleman’s own ground. ‘That a duke or an earl 
 should appear like any other man while visiting a 
 Republic is quite natural; but it is a disappointment 
 to find him looking so much like other men—often 
 so very much plainer than other men—in England. 
 It never seems precisely right that he should wear 
 none of the insignia of his rank—not even a red 
 ribbon at his button-hole, like a French chevalier. 
 The spectacle of a titled person in plain clothes thus 
 undistinguished is never unaccompanied with a sense 
 of depressing doubt in the American mind. Perhaps 
 it would be too much to confess that my country- 
 men, and especially my countrywomen, expect to 
 behold noblemen always in court-suits—silk stock- 
 ings, knee-breeches, and gold-laced coats complete ; 
 but it is certain that, while the appearance of foot- 
 men in full livery, particularly when powdered, is a 
 mitigation and a relief, a real republican feels almost 
 injured or defrauded when he sees men of rank in 
 ordinary attire. The gilt on the gingerbread is 
 wanting, and the gingerbread does not look so 
 attractive. Consolation may be sought, however, 
 at some public festivals or dinners where royalty 
 presides and noblemen are decorated with stars and 
 collars, or—though this is more difficult—in a pre- 
 sentation at Court through the American Minister. 
 
English Castes. 257 
 
 There are glitter and splendour enough at a levee 
 or a drawing-room to satisfy the most democratic 
 curiosity. But in general the noblemen of England 
 are remarkable only for the simplicity of their ap- 
 pearance and their manners. Still more surprising 
 is the fact that many people in England who have 
 titles find them onerous and embarrassing burdens. 
 The most influential London journals lately asserted 
 that Lord Cranbourne would gladly have parted 
 with one-third of his heritage to get rid of the here- 
 ditary rank that banished him to the House of Lords 
 on the death of his father, the Marquis of Salisbury, 
 and that Lord Stanley would be willing to make a 
 similar sacrifice to avert a similar fate. But although 
 young and ambitious members of the aristocracy 
 may find their honours too heavy, thousands of 
 commoners are eager for the distinctions of titles, 
 and hope to gain them either by the accumulation of 
 riches, or by political services, or by eminence at the 
 Bar, although they are fully aware that no modern 
 patents of nobility will ever win for them or their 
 children the entrée to the sanctum sanctorum of that 
 ancient historical aristocracy of which new peerages 
 are obvious imitations—like paste diamonds or 
 Sheffield plate. 
 
 But paste diamonds shine as brilliantly as the 
 real ones on the stage, and Sheffield plate is as 
 serviceable as silver plate on the breakfast-tray ; and 
 
 Ss 
 
258 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 it is solely upon this principle of serviceability, of 
 usefulness, that intelligent Englishmen defend their 
 modern rank and titles. They have utterly aban- 
 doned the antique cant concerning ‘divine right” 
 and “blue blood,” and now speak of the peerage as 
 the reward of merit, of intellect, of industry. This 
 position is easily comprehensible, and, I must frankly 
 add, easily defensible. The Americans cannot help 
 understanding and appreciating it, because in their 
 own titles of honour and station they have the same 
 kind of rewards, except that these rewards are not 
 hereditary. But the peerage must be open to every 
 commoner who chooses to exert himself sufficiently 
 before this defence can be unconditionally accepted. 
 Doubtless the time will come when a dukedom will 
 
 e as free to all competitors as the degree of Doctor 
 of Laws, or of Divinity; and a K.C.B. will be no 
 more difficult to rival than an M.A. Even now, so 
 far as I can see, the genuine life of England is dis- 
 tributed among the newer and younger aristocratic 
 classes and the upper middle classes, and is mainly 
 concentrated on the public press, with which these 
 classes are becoming more or less intimately con- 
 nected, and through which they speak. The hope, 
 the heart,.of England is its free press, which, in 
 spite of its faults, is more powerful and more inde- 
 the United 
 
 and gains greater strength and 
 
 pendent than that of any other country 
 
 States not excepted. 
 
English Castes. 259 
 
 influence every year as it draws to itself all Eng- 
 lishmen who are wise enough not to be satisfied with 
 the present condition of affairs, and bold enough to 
 desire something better. 
 
 But above and below these classes all is stag- 
 nation. The older aristocracy seem to suppose that 
 a handle to one’s name elevates him above his fel- 
 lows; the inferior classes are apparently content to 
 become thieves, servants, costermongers, shopkeep- 
 ers, or tradespeople, because their fathers were so 
 before them. The hereditary principle affects both 
 he highest and the lowest castes; the struggles 
 and upheavals come from the middle ranks. It 
 is with these that Americans who visit England 
 most associate; for although they may be trades- 
 men or the sons of tradesmen themselves, they 
 will instinctively refuse to mingle with the classes 
 here who follow precisely the same occupations, 
 but with incomparably less intelligence and edu- 
 cation, and with an indescribable vulgarity and 
 servility. It is at once an insult and a lesson to 
 Englishmen of the lower classes that British aris- 
 tocrats should receive American democrats as equals, 
 and, without inquiry as to their ancestry or antece- 
 dents, accept the sons of American mechanics as their 
 honoured guests, while the same noblemen would 
 refuse to recognise their own countrymen of similar 
 talents and similar social positions. Nay, more; a 
 
269 English Photographs. 
 
 poor English couple, to whom all parts of an aris- 
 tocratic mansion, except the servants-hall, are for- 
 ever shut so long as they remain in Great Britain, 
 may emigrate to America, and live to see their chil- 
 dren cross the Atlantic and enter the same mansion 
 on terms of perfect equality with its noble proprietor. 
 But such privileges are not extended in England to 
 natives of Australia and Canada, or to returned 
 emigrants from those countries: they belong to 
 democrats alone; they are part of the individual 
 sovereignty of freemen. These truths have their 
 pregnant moral for Englishmen, and thousands of 
 sturdy workers and thinkers in Great Britain have 
 learned that moral well in long and bitter years of 
 painful experiences, though Mr. Thomas Carlyle has 
 not. 
 
No. XV. 
 ENGLAND AND AMERICA. 
 
 IXVERYWHERE in England an American is asked what 
 is the true sentiment of his country towards Great 
 Britain. specially has this question been very fre- 
 quently put since the Honourable Reverdy Johnson 
 succeeded Mr. Charles Francis Adams as the Ame- 
 rican Minister to England, and endeavoured to settle 
 the Alabama dispute off-hand, by delivering impas- 
 sioned speeches about our “common language, 
 common literature, and common origin,” and by 
 exchanging personal compliments with almost the 
 only Englishmen who had ever avowed themselves 
 to be our enemies. The English people accepted 
 Minister Johnson’s loverlike rhapsodies with some 
 surprise but in the best possible spirit, and they were 
 both disappointed and astonished when the unani- 
 mous outbreak from the American journals—Repub- 
 lican, Democratic, and Independent alike—convinced 
 them that the American Minister had exceeded his 
 instructions, and misrepresented the feelings of his 
 countrymen. Now the majority of Englishmen 
 adopt another tone, and say, “ You are unreasonable. 
 
 We can’t tell what you want. Everything fair has 
 
262 English Photographs. 
 
 been offered to you, and you refuse everything. 
 Evidently, you desire to keep the matter open for 
 political eventualities.” They say this, but they do 
 not like Americans any the less for what seems to 
 them obstinacy and prejudice. Englishmen have too 
 much of these qualities themselves not to respect 
 them in others. For centuries the rest of the world 
 has called Englishmen unreasonable, and this cha- 
 racteristic has come to be accepted as a national 
 virtue. The Americans have lost a great deal 
 through Minister Johnson’s attempt to make terms 
 in a hurry, and his willingness to take any sort of 
 terms that suggested themselves to save time; but 
 they have gained a great deal more by proving to 
 Kngland that they are quite in earnest about the 
 Alabama business, and that there is a powerful 
 and unanimous public sentiment upon the subject 
 throughout all parts of the United States. 
 
 It does net take long to discover what is the true 
 sentiment of Hngland towards America at present. 
 It is friendship—a sincere, appreciative friendship. 
 In spite of a few cliques who amuse themselves by 
 sneering at the great Republic and at all republi- 
 cans, the people of England are unquestionably our 
 friends. As for the Alabama dispute, which is the 
 only topic that now interferes with this friendship, 
 the English people would end it at once, if they 
 could. Mr. Punch spoke out the heart of England 
 
England and America. 263 
 
 when he said, “ Don’t let the dirty money divide 
 us!” xpress it more diplomatically, more euphe- 
 muistically, more verbosely; but that is the popular 
 idea. The English do not care to argue whether 
 they have done right or wrong in the past; they 
 simply wish to pay the money, if it be a question of 
 money, and get the last source of international 
 trouble out of the way. To them, at the worst, it is 
 only an affair of twopence on the pound in the next 
 income-tax; and what is that for a rich country? 
 They paid the Abyssinian war-debi, and never felt 
 the expense ; and they can pay the Alabama debt, if 
 necessary, quite as easily. What is an extra two- 
 pence on the pound compared to long years of 
 squabbling and heart-burnings, and, perhaps, a ruin- 
 ous commercial war after all? This is the English 
 side of the subject, and no one can deny that it is 
 very generous and very characteristic. Then why 
 not accept it? Because Americans cannot but 
 believe that its generosity is uncalled for, and that 
 it is characteristically prejudiced. We do not want 
 generosity, but justice. Do you suppose that 
 America cares anything more for “ the dirty money” 
 than the English, if it comes to that? We feel most 
 deeply the point which Englishmen hasten to ignore 
 altogether: we do want to argue whether England 
 was right or wrong in what she did at the com- 
 mencement of the Rebellion. 
 
264 Linglish Photographs. 
 
 + 
 
 The English Secretary for Foreign Affairs speaks 
 precisely like Mr. Punch and the people. He says, 
 “We cannot submit to accept the decision of any 
 arbitrator upon our proclamation of neutrality or 
 other executive acts; but if any court of arbitration 
 shall decide that we ought to pay you damages for 
 the ‘piracies of the vessels that escaped from our 
 ports, we will do so with pleasure as soon as the 
 accounts can be revised by a Commission.” Instead 
 of talking about the Alabama question as ‘‘a small 
 cloud” and “a trifling difference” that is “all settled 
 now and forever,” the American Minister should have 
 responded with as exact an expression of American 
 sentiment. ‘Sir,’ he should have answered, ‘the 
 people of the United States feel very deeply aggrieved 
 towards England, but they are willing to submit 
 their grievances to arbitration. They do not desire 
 war; they do not want your money, unless it be 
 fairly awarded to them as legal damages; but they 
 do wish to vindicate those principles of international 
 law which they think you have violated, and they 
 have a national interest in the serious discussion and 
 judicial decision of the grave issues involved.” | 
 
 if the American Minister had spoken in this style, 
 the English Foreign Secretary would have under- 
 stood him perfectly; his own people would have 
 indorsed him, and: the settlement which he has 
 
 needlessly postponed would have been, by this time, 
 
i 3) 
 op: 
 Cr 
 
 England and America. 
 
 accomplished. But, unfortunately, the American 
 Minister spoke after dinner, and there is a great 
 deal of difference between the before-dinner and 
 after-dinner views of international relations. Before 
 dinner some Englishmen may be brought to admit 
 their belief that most Americans are enemies of 
 Great Britain at heart, and that we were responsible 
 for much of the Fenian troubles. So some Ameri- 
 cans can be induced to talk before dinner of the 
 British influences that have caused all the disturb- 
 ances in the United States, and to utter threats of 
 collecting the Alabama claims at the point of the 
 bayonet, riddling British royalty with Rodman guns, 
 and planting the star-spangled banner upon the 
 Tower of London. After dinner, when the time for 
 speech-making arrives, the same Englishmen, warmed 
 with good wine and good fellowship, hail the Ameri- 
 cans as brethren, having the same origin, speaking 
 the same language, and united by a thousand ties of 
 kinship and affection, although accidentally separated 
 by a very wide ocean and a different form of govern- 
 ment. Then the same Americans, moved partly by 
 genuine feeling and partly by champagne, respond 
 to this outburst with a heartiness calculated to bring 
 tears to the eyes of the most unimpressionable 
 observer, and talk eloquently of a common literature, 
 a common destiny, and a future which no cloud of 
 war can ever darken. As usual, the truth is midway 
 
266 English Photographs. 
 
 these two extremes. Mr. Charles Dickens distin- 
 euishes between his countrymen and his country in 
 regard to love of literature, and there is an equal 
 distinction between my countrymen and my country 
 in regard to love of England. Englishmen and 
 Americans naturally affiliate, and quickly become 
 the very best of friends; but England and America 
 have never yet been really friendly, although I 
 heartily hope that the era of good feeling is now 
 rapidly approaching. 
 
 To go back to 1776, and refer to the ancient 
 animosities of the American colonists against Great 
 Britain, seems at first sight as absurd as to recall the 
 period when every Englishman hated the frog-eating 
 Frenchman upon instinct. Yet many Englishmen 
 do still dislike the French, in spite of Cobden’s treaty 
 and the cordial alliance of the two governments ; 
 and many Americans do dislike England upon 
 hereditary and traditional grounds. The outrages 
 and excesses of the Normans planted a prejudice 
 against Hrance in English breasts, which neither time 
 nor education has been able entirely to uproot, and 
 which is transmitted from generation to generation, 
 nobody knows how ; cropping out now and then in 
 a manner which shows that, although modified by 
 circumstances, it is very little weakened. For ex- 
 ample, Tennyson’s verses, ‘Form, form, riflemen, 
 
 form |!” of which he is now a little ashamed, fairly 
 
England and America. 267 
 
 reflected the popular sentiment of the time they were 
 written ; and the connection which he discovered 
 between Napoleon and Satan would have done no 
 discredit to the poets of those good old days 
 when Kneland and France were open enemies. In 
 the same way, the memory of British outrages and 
 excesses during the American Revolution has never 
 completely died out in the United States, and, in 
 fact, is constantly revived and intensified_by a 
 variety of causes. You will remember that Great 
 Britain employed Hessian troops during the Revolu- 
 tion, and that these hirelings were the most brutal 
 of soldiers, more feared by the women and children, 
 and more hated by the men, than the savage Indians, 
 who were also in the pay of the British Government. 
 Time often brings about most curious revenges. 
 During the recent war with Austria, when Prussia 
 was trampling upon the smaller German states, there 
 was a thrill of rejoicing in America when the news 
 arrived that the Hessians were suffering hotly and 
 heavily. Critically analysed, this feeling was not, 
 perhaps, either very sensible or very creditable; for 
 it may reasonably be asked what the Hessians of the 
 present day have to do with the hirelings of 1776, 
 and why their defeat and conquest by Prussia should 
 seem to be a just retaliation for the acts of their 
 grandfathers and granduncles in America. But in 
 
 these matters nations are like women—they do not 
 
268 English Photographs. 
 
 reason, they simply feel ; and they are also unlike 
 women, since they forgive very slowly, and never 
 forget. 
 
 But the American prejudice against England is 
 more than a matter of hereditary sentiment and 
 tradition ; itisa matter of education. An American 
 child knows about the Revolutionary War before he 
 can read. In the original thirteen States almost 
 every town has its tavern where General Washington 
 lodged when he was whipping the Britishers ; or its 
 house where the British officers had their head- 
 quarters before or after they were whipped; or its 
 field where the whipping occurred, and where rusty 
 musket-balls are still ploughed-up; or its veteran 
 gossipper, whose father, like Solon Shingle’s, “ fit 
 
 ? 
 
 into the Revolution,” and who is thereby authorised 
 to tell long stories of the daring deeds of the heroes 
 of ’76, and the frightful atrocities of the British 
 invaders, the interest of which is heightened by the 
 fact that the narrator is mistaken by the children 
 for his own ancestor, on account of his venerable 
 appearance, and sometimes makes the same mistake 
 hunself in the excitement of his revolutionary remin- 
 iscences. Then on Sunday, when the children are 
 taken to church, they see over the church-door a 
 tablet recording that the edifice, erected for the 
 worship of God, was used by the British as a stable 
 
 during their occupation of the town ; or was burned 
 
England and America. 269. 
 
 down by the British during the war, and piously 
 rebuilt by the congregation when American Inde- 
 pendence was achieved. Do you imagine that all 
 these influences make no impression upon youthful 
 and susceptible minds, and create and foster no anti- 
 English prejudices ? It is true that such teachings 
 are in a measure confined to the inhabitants of the 
 older States ; but the natives of these States carry 
 their prejudices, their traditions, and their local and 
 family legends along with them when they emigrate 
 to the West, transmitting them to their children and 
 their children’s children ; but, lest any of the old 
 stories should be forgotten, England takes care to 
 resuscitate them by giving Americans some new 
 cause of offence in every gencration. 
 
 Next, when the children are old enough to study, 
 still stronger influences come into play. LEvery- 
 where throughout the United States, except In some 
 parts of the benighted South, there is a comprehen- 
 sive and liberal free public-school system, and in 
 every school the history of the United States is a 
 text-book. The country is so young that its history 
 is not a very long one, and all the scholars learn it 
 by heart. Now, until the outbreak of the Southern 
 Rebellion, nine-tenths of the history of the United 
 states consisted simply of accounts of the wars with 
 England; and when a record of the rise and fall of 
 the Southern Rebellion comes to be written for our 
 
270 English Photographs. 
 
 school-books, England will figure almost as promi- 
 nently, and, to American eyes, not more creditably, 
 in that. The children, not only of native Americans, 
 but of German, Irish, Scotch, English, French, and 
 other immigrants, are sent to the public schools; 
 and thus every child in the United States uncon- 
 sciously and unintentionally receives a thorough 
 anti-English education. The parents may never 
 have heard of Great Britain, or they may have 
 been citizens of Great Britain; but the childrez 
 become thorough Americans, and sympathise with 
 the Amevicans against England. 
 
 To the education of traditions, of the schools, 
 and of tales and novels—for all the most popular 
 works that have any national character are imbued 
 with the spirit of ’76—the effect of numerous cele- 
 brations must be added. Besides various local anni- 
 versaries, like those of the battles of Lexington and 
 Bunker's Hill in Massachusetts, of Monmouth in New 
 Jersey, of the evacuation of New York, of the battle 
 of New Orleans, and of Perry’s victory on Lake Erie 
 in the war of 1812, the Fourth of July of each year, 
 the anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, 
 was observed with military honours in every city, 
 town, and village up to the time that the late civil 
 war began. On that day the Revolutionary ardour 
 of the people, maintained lukewarmly during the 
 year by the pictures of battles with the British, and 
 
England and America. 271 
 
 by the portraits of Washington which adorn every 
 house, was allowed full and ample vent. The militia 
 were paraded; the survivors of 1776 and 1812 were 
 feasted and escorted in processions; fireworks were 
 displayed, cannon fired, and bells rung; and from 
 one end of the land to the other there was a general 
 jubilation, At every gathering public speakers, more 
 or less eloquent, bearded the British lion in his den, 
 dragged him from his lair, trotted him up and down 
 before the people, exposed his weaknesses as com- 
 pared with the increasing might of the American 
 eagle, and only refrained from turning the poor 
 animal inside out, and tearing him to pieces, ora- 
 torically, upon condition that he would behave him- 
 self better in future. This exhibition was often 
 laughable; but it had its uses and it has its moral. 
 Before the rebellion of 1861, the Americans had 
 begun to notice its comical side. They are too 
 good-natured and too conscious of their own strength 
 to bear malice, and their sense of humour is so keen 
 that they laugh at themselves as readily as at other 
 people. Since the British lion offered no resistance, 
 and made no reply to the taunts and invectives of 
 the oratorical Wombwells and Van Amburghs, it 
 became rather a bore to see him so hauled about 
 and roughly treated. Consequently, the popular 
 liking for this feature of the celebration visibly di- 
 minished, and the old style of Fourth-of-July speak- 
 
272 English Photographs. 
 
 ers found themselves chaffed, guyed, burlesqued, and 
 caricatured by their own countrymen. During the 
 civil war, the hon of England disappeared from the 
 Fourth-of- July exhibition almost entirely. At the 
 South, the people were endeavouring to cease to be 
 Americans, and were dependent upon British sym- 
 pathy and assistance. At the North, the people had 
 something more important to think about. It was 
 useless to waste breath in cheering for the victories 
 of 1776, when the news of the victories of Vicksburg 
 and Gettysburg were flashing over the telegraph- 
 wires, and calling for every hurrah that could be 
 uttered. Besides, everyone felt that glorifications of 
 the rebels of 1776 interfered somewhat with denun- 
 ciations of the rebels of 1861; and although, as the 
 French phrase it, there are rebels and rebels—just 
 as Hinglishmen admire in Mazzini the very qualities 
 which they condemn in James Stephens—still such 
 distinctions are too nice for popular oratory; and 
 throughout the war the Fourth-of-July speeches 
 were mainly political harangues or military criti- 
 cisms. When the Union is firmly reéstablished, the 
 old custom will be revived, however; the national 
 menagerie, composed of the British lon and the 
 American eagle, will be again exhibited, and the 
 performance will proceed as usual, until it shall 
 again be mollified and abbreviated by more import- 
 ant events. 
 
England and America. OF 
 
 Yo 
 
 It was at a period just prior to the outbreak of 
 the Rebellion that the anti-British sentiment was 
 weakest in America. The ancient grudge was ex- 
 pending itself in a healthful and practical manner— 
 in a fair rivalry of commerce upon the sea, and of 
 prosperity and plenty upon the shore. This was 
 the period when many Americans believed, with the 
 American commodore who aided the English fleet in 
 China, that, “after all, blood is thicker than water.” 
 Alas, they were too soon to discover that blood 
 counts for nothing when pounds, shillings, and pence 
 are in the opposite scale. ‘This was the period also, 
 when the concurrence of Old England and New 
 England upon the anti-slavery question effaced the 
 memories of Bunker’s Hill from the Massachusetts 
 mind, and rendered Fanueil Hall and Exeter Hall 
 almost identical. The American anti-slavery reform- 
 ers were glad to receive sympathy and assistance 
 from any quarter; and, having recognised the negro 
 as a man and a brother, they could not refuse to 
 acknowledge the fraternal relationship of English- 
 men, who had been the first to declare the same 
 manhood and brotherhood. 
 
 At no period, however, did the anti-British feel- 
 ing lose its hold upon the masses of Americans. 
 The anti-slavery alliance between Old and New 
 England only made the Southern people more bitter 
 against their future allies; and the majority at that 
 
 ft 
 
274 English Photographs. 
 
 time was with the South. The genuine public senti- 
 ment was clearly shown during the Crimean war, 
 when, without caring for the issues involved, and 
 without the least reason to become reconciled to 
 the Muscovite despotism, the Americans openly sym- 
 pathised with Russia merely because England was 
 fighting on the other side, and the British Minister 
 at Washineton, Sir John Crampton, was sent out of 
 the country as if to emphasise this fact. Nor was 
 the magnificent welcome extended to the Prince of 
 Wales in 1860 any proof that all the animosity 
 against England had faded away. True, the recep- 
 tion of his Royal Highness by the American masses 
 was most enthusiastic. He will bear witness that he 
 was never more féted and toadied even in his own 
 country. When he arrived at Detroit, the crowd 
 and the excitement were so great that the Royal 
 party, not anticipating any such demonstration from 
 Democrats, were half afraid to land, and mistook the 
 friendly cheers for hostile vociferations. During his 
 tour through the country very many people, unable 
 to catch a glimpse of his Royal Highness, solaced 
 themselves by gazing admiringly at his boxes, which 
 were handed cut of the luggage-car for popular 
 inspection. At the great ball in New York, so many 
 ladies and gentlemen were anxious to dance near to 
 the Prince of Wales, that the flooring gave way 
 beneath the party. Indeed, the members of the 
 
England and America. O75 
 
 crack Irish regiment of New York, the 69th, were 
 almost the only persons who refused to do him 
 honour; and the compliment which he paid the 
 American nation by visiting the tomb of Washine- 
 ton at Mount Vernon was immensely gratifying. 
 But the visit of the Prince of Wales condoned none 
 of the real or imaginary offences of Great Britain. 
 We all know how little these royal receptions mean. 
 The Sultan has visited England, and been received 
 by cheering crowds, and many ladies and gentlemen 
 have danced before him, and volunteers and regulars 
 have paraded for his inspection; but all this has had 
 no influence on the Eastern question. In fact, some 
 of the very Englishmen who huzzaed heartily for the 
 Sultan had contributed largely to sustain the Cretan 
 rebellion against the Sultan. What the Sultan was 
 to Englishmen, the Prince of Wales was to Ameri- 
 cans—a show, a curiosity, a guest; something to 
 be stared at, and followed about, and treated with 
 Anglo-Saxon hospitality. But unquestionably there 
 was also in his reception a sentiment of sincere 
 respect for the Queen of England, who is so much 
 esteemed personally in the United States, that to hear 
 her Majesty referred to slightingly, and even scandal- 
 ously, by her own professedly loyal subjects, and by 
 journals published in her own realm, is one of the 
 first shocks that an American receives when sojourn- 
 
 ing in England. Nobody would venture to refer to 
 
276 English Photographs. 
 
 her Majesty in that tone in America; and if the 
 Prince of Wales was greeted somewhat more warmly 
 than the heir-apparent to the French, or the Russian, 
 or the Prussian throne would have been, it was solely 
 for his mother’s sake; for although Americans cannot 
 appreciate the blessings of a Monarchy, they do know 
 how to appreciate a Good Woman. 
 
 How the anti-British sentiment in the United 
 States was increased and intensified by the conduct 
 of England during the Southern Rebellion, is now a 
 matter of history. The recognition of the belligerent 
 rights of the South was like an unexpected slap in 
 the face. While we were still discussing the possi- 
 bility of a peaceable solution of our difficulties, and 
 had not lost all hope that the Southern politicians 
 would consent to an equitable compromise, England 
 suddenly stepped in between us, and informed us 
 that the Union was dissolved, and that we were 
 really two hostile nations in a state of war. The 
 exasperation of the North was intense. Had the 
 Government at once declared war against Great 
 Britain, and ordered the immediate invasion of 
 Canada, it would have been sustained by the popular 
 voice. Many politicians still think that this would 
 have been the best policy at that crisis; and believe 
 that the South, always inimical to England on ac- 
 count of the anti-slavery crusade, and not yet fully 
 committed to the fight with the North, would have 
 
England and America. DEE 
 
 been ready to turn her arms against a foreign foe, 
 and forget all disputes in a common campaign, just 
 as the ill-feeling caused by the nullification rebel- 
 lion in South Carolina was completely obliterated 
 when Northern and Southern soldiers came to fight 
 shoulder to shoulder against the Mexicans. As the 
 Rebellion progressed, it required all the tact, saga- 
 city, and strength of the statesmen in power to re- 
 strain the popular animosity towards England. Had 
 not the President and his advisers been more cautious, 
 or more timid, or more wise than the people, no- 
 thing could have averted a conflict with England at 
 the time of the Trent affair. The people were ready 
 and eager to fight; but President Lincoln settled 
 the matter by his quaint remark, ‘‘One war at a 
 time,” and the people submitted, because they be- 
 lieved that the quarrel was only postponed. Never 
 was any government subjected to a more severe test, 
 and never could there be a more perfect refutation 
 of the slander, that a democratic government is a 
 government of the mob, than the contrast between 
 the official action of the United States and the will 
 of the people in regard to Mason and Slidell. Hvery 
 American felt personally humiliated when those men 
 were given up without a battle, and yet all remained 
 loyal to the Government. Compare with this spe- 
 cimen of what is called mob-rule the conduct of Italy 
 during the late Garibaldian crusade, when the very 
 
278 LEinglish Photographs. 
 
 foundations of the constitution seemed to give way 
 before a popular pressure not half so great as that 
 in America; and when the Rattazzi ministry were 
 forced to bestow arms upon the very men whom 
 they denounced as traitors, and the King, trembling 
 in his palace, professed to be friendly both to Gari- 
 baldi and the Pope. 
 
 Throughout the Rebellion, it is undeniable that 
 most of the American people bore all their burdens 
 more patiently, because they understood that they 
 were to have a war with Hngland as soon as the 
 Rebellion was suppressed. Many thousands of Irish- 
 men enlisted under this impression. Englishmen, 
 who believe that they really did act with impartial 
 neutrality during our civil war, cannot comprehend 
 how indescribably irritating the conduct of their 
 Government seemed to the Americans, both at the 
 North and the South. If England had openly es- 
 poused either side her policy would have been in- 
 telligible, and it would have been at least respected. 
 To declare for the North, and thus efface all preju- 
 dices, and form a friendship that would have ren- 
 dered England able to defy the world, and rule it— 
 this would have been a statesmanlike policy. To 
 declare for the South, and assist to break up the 
 American Union, destroy a commercial rival, and 
 secure the gratitude and the control of the only 
 
 cotton-producing nation—that would have been a 
 
Lingland and America. 279 
 
 policy wise in its generation, and for its generation, 
 although not so far-sighted as the former. But to 
 play fast and loose with both sections; to stab the 
 North in the back while professing to be neutral, 
 and to encourage the Southern people just enough 
 to render their ruin utter and complete—that was a 
 policy which had not a single argument, either of 
 interest or principle, to recommend it, and which 
 has resulted in embittering both belligerents against 
 England. 
 
 Curiously enough, it is a favourite position of 
 several eminent English authorities, that the dissatis- 
 faction of both North and South is the best possible 
 proof that England was really neutral. “If we had 
 not been neutral,” they argue, “only one section 
 vould have any cause of complaint against us. Since 
 both North and South complain, we must have been 
 very impartial.” That is to say, if you see two men 
 fighting, and stand by, encouraging the weaker com- 
 batant to persevere every time he is inclined to give 
 in; if, during the fight, you manage to deprive the 
 stronger party of his chronometer and other valu- 
 ables, and deal him an occasional kick or cuff; and 
 if when it becomes evident that, unless you inter- 
 fere more actively, the weaker party will be terribly 
 whipped, you run away with your spoils and leave 
 him to his fate, then you are at liberty to claim 
 that you were entirely neutral during the conflict, 
 
280 ee nglish Photographs. 
 
 and that the anger of both men—the one at the 
 loss of his watch and the extra trouble you made 
 for him; and the other at your coaxing him to con- 
 tinue the fight without staying to help him out—is, 
 in fact, evidence that you deserve reproaches from 
 neither! Such logic can only be rivalled, from an 
 American point of view, by that which proves that 
 a horse-chestnut is a chestnut horse. 
 
 What hopes, what aspirations, what courage, 
 were nurtured at the South by the conduct of the 
 British Government; how often the reports of their 
 representatives in England revived the drooping 
 spirits of the leaders when all seemed lost, and in- 
 duced them to persevere in what they had just felt 
 to be a hopeless cause; how English sympathy, and 
 the tone of the English press, and the speeches of 
 English statesmen, sustained and inspired the South- 
 ern people; how timely supplies of English arms, 
 ammunition, artillery, blankets, medicines, and cloth- 
 ing enabled them to prolong the war when all other’. 
 resources failed; and how the ravages of privateers, 
 built, equipped, and manned in England, assisted to 
 fire the Southern heart and cripple and harass the 
 North,—will be recorded some day in detail, to- 
 gether with the abject despair and sullen indignation 
 of the South when it became evident that England 
 would do no more than give these driblets of aid, 
 
 and that any peace short of entire submission was 
 
England and America. Daal 
 
 impossible. To you, all this was a mere matter of 
 business, or of blockade-running, or of nice inter- 
 pretations of international and maritime law, or of 
 delays in enforcing the neutrality proclamation; but 
 to the Americans it was a matter of life or death. 
 At the North we felt that we were fighting with 
 two enemies, both of whom were wounding us, while 
 we could only hit back at one of them. We saw 
 our commerce swept from the seas, our merchant- 
 vessels forced to sail under foreign flags, and our 
 opponents put in possession of-a fleet of iron-clads 
 and privateers, although they had not a single open 
 port. The blockade which we had established was 
 broken, not by the rebels, but by neutrals, who were 
 exchanging with us diplomatic civilities while assist- 
 ing the forces that were struggling to divide and 
 destroy the country. Such a state of affairs seemed 
 incomprehensible. The policy of the Emperor Na- 
 poleon, and especially his expedition to Mexico, we 
 could understand. As the Methodists say, “he 
 walked according to his lights,” and boldly took 
 advantage of our distracted condition to carry out 
 projects which had at least the merit of being am- 
 bitious. The consequence is that America has no 
 ill-feeling towards France, and never had any during 
 the worst crises of the war, when the open violation 
 of the Monroe doctrine was most galling. We felt, 
 to be sure, that we must fight the French, unless 
 
282 English Photographs. 
 
 they withdrew from Mexico; but that it would be 
 an open fight with a fair foe. On the other hand, 
 there was nothing open, nothing fair, in an enemy 
 who manned privateers to burn unarmed merchant- 
 men and capture chronometers, and who had adopted 
 blockade-running as a regular commercial pursuit. 
 In truth, the exasperation of the North against 
 England was gradually transformed into ridicule; 
 and when the Deerhound ran off with our prisoners, 
 after the sinking of the Alabama by the Kearsarge, 
 we were able to laugh heartily at the modern Eng- 
 lish ideas of fair-play, just as we had done when 
 the American champion was refused the trophy and 
 rewards of victory after the battle between Heenan 
 and Sayers. The rebel raids from Canada, organised 
 as military. expeditions, and ending in bank-rob- 
 beries, were included in the same category of ridi- 
 culous incidents. But only those who know how, 
 at one time, the North longed for the sympathy of 
 Iimgland, as a man in trouble craves a kind word 
 even from a stranger, can accurately estimate the 
 depth of the animosity against England when we 
 nnally found that we must get along, not only with- 
 out her sympathy, but in spite of her opposition. 
 ihe war for the Union was actually changed into 
 an anti-slavery crusade as a bid for English support. 
 The politicians then in power were of the Massa- 
 
 1 aiethe = 
 causetts school, and under the influence of Massa- 
 
England and Ameriea. 288 
 
 chusetts ideas; and they thought that they could 
 gain the countenance of the British Government vid 
 Hixeter Hall. The scheme failed; but it incidentally 
 freed the negro. Thus Providence ordained that a 
 war, which began with solemn official pledges on the 
 part of Congress and the President that the status 
 of the slave would not be disturbed, should end 
 with emancipation; and that England, after repu- 
 diating all her philanthropic theories and siding with 
 the slaveholders during the war, should have an 
 indirect share in the abolition of slavery. Never- 
 theless, it is a share for which England will hardly 
 ask or receive much credit from Americans. 
 Although, as has been shown, the dishke of 
 America towards England has always existed, and, 
 being justified and intensified by various events, has 
 grown with the growth of the country, yet it is a 
 great mistake to identify the Americans with the 
 Fenian movement. The Americans are a practical 
 people, and they have never pecuniarily assisted the 
 impracticable Fenian leaders. That they would like 
 to see Ireland a republic is certain; but they had 
 much rather see Great Britain a republic, and they 
 believe that there is rather a better chance of the 
 latter than of the former consummation. Lnglish- 
 men often declare, “Ah! It is your large Irish 
 element that renders your politicians so inimical to 
 England.” Not at all. The Irish have never been 
 
284 English Photographs. 
 
 popular with the Americans, and are not likely to 
 become so. The anti-English feeling is by no means 
 a pro-Irish feeling. Irish immigrants are welcome 
 in the United States because the country needs their 
 labour, and they are cajoled on election-days because 
 the politicians need their votes; but otherwise, they 
 are estranged from the main body of the American 
 people, partly by their religion and partly by their 
 national characteristics. A few facts will prove that 
 in America the anti-Irish sentiment is as strong as 
 the anti-English sentiment, although there is this 
 
 difference—that the one is directed against Irishmen, 
 and not against Ireland, while the other is directed 
 against England, and not against Englishmen. The 
 South was, of course, always opposed to the Irish, 
 having no use for them, and finding slave-labour 
 cheaper and better adapted to the climate. At the 
 North, the entire anti-slavery movement was, by a 
 curlous paradox, also anti-Irish, being vehemently 
 opposed by them under the impression that emanci- 
 pation would bring the slaves to the Northern States 
 to compete with the white labourers. The hatred of 
 the Irish for the negroes has this origin, and has 
 resulted in many desperate riots, murders, and 
 arsons. Now, the anti-slavery movement was in 
 progress for over thirty years. 
 
 But the power of this anti-Irish feeling is best 
 illustrated by the formation of what was called the 
 
England and America. 285 
 
 American, or Know-Nothing, party. The native 
 Americans, discovering that they were overwhelmed 
 at the polls by the number of ignorant, uneducated, 
 newly naturalised voters, organised a secret political 
 party to which no voter not born in America was 
 allowed to belong. The members were called Know- 
 Nothings; because, in reply to all questions concern- 
 ing their organisation, they declared that they knew 
 nothing about it. Their programme was to elect 
 none but native Americans to office, and to extend 
 the legal period of residence previous to naturalisa- 
 tion from three years to twenty-one years, on the 
 principle that a foreigner ought to reside in the 
 country as long as a native-born citizen was com- 
 pelled to do before he acquired the right to vote. 
 This party was universally popular; and at the local 
 elections, North and South, it beat the Irish party 
 tremendously. Even in New York, where there are 
 so many Irish that the Herald insists that the city 
 must be renamed New Dublin, the Know-Nothings 
 elected their candidates. But when the Presidential 
 election occurred, this party split upon the slavery 
 
 question —that rock which has wrecked so man 
 | Ni 
 
 political organisations—and the opposition triumphed. 
 Had the slavery question been avoided, or treated 
 more fairly, the Know-Nothings would have carried 
 the national, as they had already carried the local, 
 
 elections. In a country where such a party is pos- 
 
286 English Photographs. 
 
 sible, and is successful, the Irish cannet be considered 
 popular. 
 
 More than this, the Republican party, which has 
 now been in power since 1860, is an anti-frish party. 
 For years, the immigrants to America have instinc- 
 tively separated themselves 
 
 the Irish joining the 
 Democrats, and the Germans joining the Republi- 
 cans. ‘The reasons for this it is unnecessary to detail 
 further than to state that the Republicans are refor- 
 mers, who believe in anti-slavery and anti-rum, and 
 that they are also Protestants, which pleases the 
 Germans. The Irishman clings to his liquor and 
 religion, and goes with the Democrats. The Repub- 
 licans generally nominate either native Americans 
 or Germans for office, practically placing upon their 
 tickets the motto which American ladies used to add 
 to their advertisements for servants, “‘ No Irish need 
 apply.” The Democrats, who depend upon the Irish 
 vote, are very fond of candidates whose names begin 
 with Mc or O’, and some shrewd politicians have 
 been known to change their names, by Act of the 
 Legislature, in order to secure one of these magical 
 exponents of Irish nativity. It is only fair to add 
 that, as the Lish immigrants become settled in the 
 country, they often have their names Americanised. 
 There is at present a coalition between the Irish and 
 Germans in several of the States in opposition to 
 
 odious excise and Sunday liquor laws; and this 
 
England and America. 287 
 
 explains, in some degree, the victories of the Demo- 
 crats at the October and November elections in 1867; 
 but as the general Government and most of the State 
 Governments have been in the hands of the anti- 
 Irish party during the Fenian troubles, you may be 
 sure that there have been few Fenian sympathisers 
 among the American officials, as there have certainly 
 been few among the American people. 
 
 No; the American dislike to England did not 
 display itself in the Fenian movement. That was 
 supported and managed by the Irish themselves, 
 and, under all the circumstances, it must be admitted 
 that they did their work well. What with donations 
 to their churches, and contributions to their Fenian 
 funds, and remittances to their poor relatives at home, 
 one wonders how the Irish labourers and servant- 
 girls in America live, dress well, and save money. 
 Outside of the class of professional politicians, who 
 are always ready to purchase popularity, there are 
 few Americans who subscribed a dollar to assist the 
 Fenian invasion of Canada, or the Fenian uprising 
 in Ireland. The poor Irish themselves raised all the 
 millions of dollars expended. The promptness with 
 which the United States Government marched troops 
 to the Canadian frontier, seized the Fenian stores of 
 arms and ammunition, stopped the Fenian recruits, 
 and arrested the Fenian invaders last year, cannot 
 
 so soon have escaped the memory of Englishmen. 
 
288 English Photographs. 
 
 Those concerned will not readily forget it, since it 
 cost the President and his party the control of the 
 great State of New York at the subsequent election ; 
 for the Fenian voters either stayed away from the 
 pols, or went over to the Republicans. To the 
 Republicans; for this party, which is regarded as 
 most friendly to England, and is often referred to 
 here as only a wing of the English Liberal party, 
 issued circulars to the Irish labourers of New York 
 denouncing President Johnson as the “ally of Queen 
 Victoria” and “the tool of British tyranny.” Thus 
 both political parties play upon the Irish, pretty 
 much as English politicians do; but the only Ame- 
 ricans who took part in the Canadian invasion were 
 a number of ex-Confederate soldiers, who seized that 
 opportunity of revenging themselves upon England ; 
 and this may be called a very just retaliation. 
 
 The reader will have observed that during this 
 analysis of the American sentiment towards England 
 I have not treated the Irish sentiment as a factor in 
 the account. This omission has been intentional. 
 Powerful as the Irish may be in the United States, I 
 do not believe that their views influence in any per- 
 ceptible degree the policy of the national govern- 
 ment. They may sometimes control certain towns, or 
 cities, or even States; but America is still governed 
 by the Americans, in spite of the flood of immigrants 
 that often seems destined to sweep away the bul- 
 
England and America. 289 
 
 warks of the Constitution. Let us have no miscon- 
 ceptions upon this point. It would be as fair to 
 estimate English opinions from those of the people 
 of Guernsey, as American opinions from those of the 
 immigrants from Ireland. If the Irish in America 
 were to be united in any important political cam- 
 paign by their hatred of England, they would be 
 at once confronted with a union of the Germans, 
 who outweigh them in numbers, in wealth, in influ- 
 ence, and who do not hate England. If you pre- 
 sented yourself as a candidate for alderman in New 
 York, it might be worth your while to conciliate the 
 Irish vote; if in St. Louis, it would be an advan- 
 tage to conciliate the German vote; but when you 
 deal with the United States as a nation, you deal 
 with the American, and not with the foreign, ele- 
 ment. 
 
 Now Americans, notwithstanding their anti-Eng- 
 lish education, are very easily pleased. The buncombe 
 about a common language and a common literature 
 they appreciate at its true value. The burglar who | 
 breaks into your house may speak the same English 
 language as yourself, and may read the same English 
 journal, but that does not prevent. you from punish- 
 ing him for his crime. But, nevertheless, the com- 
 mon sympathy between friendly nations is stronger 
 than treaties ; and such a sympathy underlies all the 
 relations between England and America. The Ame- 
 
 U 
 
290 English Photographs. 
 
 ricans had been taught to dislike the Autocrat and 
 the serfdom of Russia; but the simple friendly visit 
 of a Russian fleet during our Civil War has led to an 
 alliance between a democracy and a despotism that 
 seems unnatural, but will endure for a century. The 
 British North-American squadron would have done 
 England a service almost as important as that of 
 Nelson at Trafalgar had it imitated the Russian 
 example. That opportunity was neglected, but 
 others remain. The old true proverb assures us 
 that “a soft answer turneth away wrath,” and it also 
 cements alliances. England is too fond of patron- 
 ising; America too full of independence. Each 
 country has something to forget and forgive, but let 
 us trust that each will do its share. ‘The Liverpool 
 merchants broke our blockade to make money; but 
 the Lancashire weavers cheerfully consented to starve 
 from the cotton-famine rather than permit the Ene- 
 lish Government to intervene with France and assist 
 to dissolve the Union. Surely this heroic sacrifice— 
 erander than any that the world ever saw before, 
 because it was offered to secure the integrity of a 
 foreign country—is more than a compensation for 
 all pecuniary wrongs. If to Englishmen the Ameri- 
 cans often seem arrogant and grandiloquent, remem- 
 ber what a territory.we have to govern, what a des- 
 tiny we have already fulfilled, what homes we assure 
 to the outcasts of the Old World! 
 
England and America. 291 
 
 * 
 
 As I close this volume the familiar words ring 
 in my ears, and, like most other Americans, I am 
 proud to admit that England is the Mother Coun- 
 try. “An unnatural parent,” say some, and it was 
 said so long ago as the Revolution; but still the 
 Mother Country! “Too slow for this age,” say 
 others, ‘“‘and the cause of all our household quar- 
 rels, and only kind to us when we are too strong 
 to need her help;” but still the Mother Country! 
 We cannot shut our ears nor blind our eyes to the 
 fact; we cannot harden our hearts nor steel our 
 minds against it. If there is ever to be a national 
 family on the earth, we two must form that family 
 England and America, not England and France, not 
 
 America and Russia.. Notwithstanding all our pecu- 
 liarities and eccentricities, we are travelling the same 
 road towards the same goal, and why should we sepa- 
 rate on the journey? Distance? The Atlantic cable 
 has annihilated that. Disputes? They will all he 
 speedily arranged when our diplomatic representa- 
 tives really represent their countries. War? We 
 shall doubtless have many battles to fight, but let 
 us have faith that we shall always fight on the same 
 side, since it is certain that we shall always fight for 
 the same cause, so long as ustice does not change its 
 essence. 
 
 The Mother Country! That is the charm of 
 peace and hope to conjure with, although Minister 
 
292 English Photographs. 
 
 Johnson has used it imperfectly, like the too-eager 
 brother in the fairy-tale, and may find that it has 
 brought him ruin. But this charm will never exer- 
 cise its full powers to bless mankind until England 
 feels and owns that the words are as dear to her 
 heart as they would once have been, and may again 
 be, to ours. At present the sentimentalism seems all 
 on one side; and nothing is more annoying, more 
 painful, and more dangerous than unrequited affec- 
 tion, whether personal or international. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 LONDON : 
 ROBSON AND SON, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W. 
 
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