Counsel to the Sea-going.
London, Tuesday, May 6th, 1851.
I desire to address a few words of advice to persons about to cross the Atlantic or any other ocean for the first time. I think those who follow my counsel will have reason to thank me.
I. Begin by providing yourself with a pair of stout, well-made thick boots—the coarser and firmer the better. Have them large enough to admit two pair of thick, warm stockings, yet sit easily on the feet. Put them on before you leave home, and never take them off during the voyage except when you turn in to sleep.
II. Take a good supply of flannels and old woolen clothes, and especially an overcoat that has seen service and is not afraid of seeing more. Should you come on board as if just out of a band-box, you will forget all your dandyism before your first turn of sea-sickness is over, and will go ashore with your clothes spoiled by the salt spray and your own careless lounging in all manner of places and positions. Put on nothing during the voyage that would sell for five dollars.
III. Endure your first day of sea-sickness in your berth; after that, if you cannot go on deck whenever the day is fair, get yourself carried there. You may be sick still—the chance is two to one that you will be; but if you are to recover at all while on the heaving surge this is the way.
IV. Move about as much as possible; think as little as you can of your sickness; but interest yourself in whatever (except vomiting) may be going forward—the run of the ship, the management of her sails, &c. &c. Keep clear of all sedentary games, as a general rule; they may help you to kill a few hours, but will increase your headache afterwards. Talk more than you read; and determine to walk smartly at least two hours every fair day, and one hour any how.
V. As to eating, you are safe against excess so long as you are sick; and if you have bad weather and a rough sea, that will be pretty nearly all the way. I couldn't advise you, though ever so well, to eat the regular four times per day; though my young friend who constantly took five hearty meals seemed to thrive on that regimen. In the matter of drink, if you can stick to water, do so; I could not, nor could I find any palatable substitute. Try Congress Water, Seidlitz, any thing to keep clear of Wines and Spirits. If there were some portable, healthful and palatable acid beverage devoid of Alcohol, it would be a blessed thing at sea.
VI. Finally, rise early if you can; be cheerful, obliging, and determined to see the sunny side of everything whereof a sunny side can be discovered or imagined; and bear ever in mind that each day is wearing off a good portion of the distance which withholds you from your destination. The best point of a voyage by steam is its brevity; wherefore, I pray you, Mr. Darius Davidson, to hurry up that new steamer or screamer that is to cross the Atlantic in a week. I shall want to be getting home next August or September.
VII. Don't bother yourself to procure British money at any such rate as $4.90 for sovereigns, which was ruling when I came away. Bring American coin rather than pay over $4.86. You can easily obtain British gold here in exchange for American, and I have heard of no higher rate than $4.87.
VIII. Whatever may be wise at other seasons, never think of stopping at a London hotel this summer unless you happen to own the Bank of England. If you know any one here who takes boarders or lets rooms at reasonable rates, go directly to him; if not, drive at once to the house of Mr. John Chapman, American Bookseller, 142 Strand, and he will either find you rooms or direct you to some one else who will.
IX. If the day of your embarkation be fair, take a long, earnest gaze at the sun, so that you will know him again when you return. They have something they call the sun over here which they show occasionally, but it looks more like a boiled turnip than it does like its American namesake. Yet they cheer us with the assurance that there will be real sunshine here by-and-by. So mote it be!
V.
THE FUTURE OF LABOR—DAY-BREAK.
London, Friday, May 9, 1851.
I have spent the forenoon of to-day in examining a portion of the Model Lodging-Houses, Bathing and Washing establishments and Cooperative Labor Associations already in operation in this Great Metropolis. My companions were Mr. Vansittart Neale, a gentleman who has usefully devoted much time and effort to the Elevation of Labor, and M. Cordonnaye, the actuary or chosen director of an Association of Cabinet-Makers in Paris, who are exhibitors of their own products in the Great Exposition, which explains their chief's presence in London. We were in no case expected, and enjoyed the fairest opportunity to see everything as it really is. The beds were in some of the lodging-houses unmade, but we were everywhere cheerfully and promptly shown through the rooms, and our inquiries frankly and clearly responded to. I propose to give a brief and candid account of what we saw and heard.
Our first visit was paid to the original or primitive Model Lodging-House, situated in Charles-st. in the heart of St. Giles's. The neighborhood is not inviting, but has been worse than it is; the building (having been fitted up when no man with a dollar to spare had any faith in the project) is an old-fashioned dwelling-house, not very considerably modified. This attempt to put the new wine into old bottles has had the usual result. True, the sleeping-rooms are somewhat ventilated, but not sufficiently so; the beds are quite too abundant, and no screen divides those in the same room from each other. Yet these lodgings are a decided improvement on those provided for the same class for the same price in private lodging-houses. The charge is 4d. (eight cents) per night, and I believe 2s. (50 cents) per week, for which is given water, towels, room and fire for washing and cooking, and a small cupboard or safe wherein to keep provisions. Eighty-two beds are made up in this house, and the keeper assured us that she seldom had a spare one through the night. I could not in conscience praise her beds for cleanliness, but it is now near the close of the week and her lodgers do not come to her out of band-boxes.—Only men are lodged here. The concern pays handsomely.
We next visited a Working Association of Piano Forte Makers, not far from Drury Lane. These men were not long since working for an employer on the old plan, when he failed, threw them all out of employment, and deprived a portion of them of the savings of past years of frugal industry, which they had permitted to lie in his hands. Thus left destitute, they formed a Working Association, designated their own chiefs, settled their rules of partnership; and here stepped in several able "Promoters" of the cause of Industrial Organization of Labor, and lent them at five per cent. the amount of capital required to buy out the old concern—viz: $3,500. They have since (about six weeks) been hard at work, having an arrangement for the sale at a low rate of all the Pianos they can make. The associates are fifteen in number, all working "by the piece," except the foreman and business man, who receive $12 each per week; the others earn from $8 to $11 each weekly. I see nothing likely to defeat and destroy this enterprise, unless it should lose the market for its products.
We went thence to a second Model Lodging House, situated near Tottenham Court Road. This was founded subsequently to that already described, its building was constructed expressly for it, and each lodger has a separate apartment, though its division walls do not reach the ceiling overhead. Half the lodgers have each a separate window, which they can open and close at pleasure, in addition to the general provision for ventilation. In addition to the wash-room, kitchen, dining-tables, &c., provided in the older concern, there is a small but good library, a large conversation room, and warm baths on demand for a penny each. The charge is 2s. 4d. (58 cents) per week; the number of beds is 104, and they are always full, with numerous applications ahead at all times for the first vacant bed. Not a single case of Cholera occurred here in 1849, though dead bodies were taken out of the neighboring alley (Church-lane) six or eight in a day. So much for the blasphemy of terming the Cholera, with like scourges, the work of an "inscrutable Providence." The like exemption from Cholera was enjoyed by the two or three other Model Lodging-Houses then in London. Their comparative cleanliness, and the coolness in summer caused by the great thickness of their walls, conduce greatly to this freedom from contagion.
The third and last of the Model Lodging-Houses we visited was even more interesting, in that it was designed and constructed expressly to be occupied by Families, of which it accommodates forty-eight, and has never a vacant room. The building is of course a large one, very substantially constructed on three sides of an open court paved with asphaltum and used for drying clothes and as a children's play-ground. All the suits of apartments on each floor are connected by a corridor running around the inside (or back) of the building, and the several suits consist of two rooms or three with entry, closets, &c., according to the needs of the applicant. That which we more particularly examined consisted of three apartments (two of them bed-rooms) with the appendages already indicated. Here lived a workman with his wife and six young children from two to twelve years of age. Their rent is 6s. ($1.50 per week, or $78 per annum); and I am confident that equal accommodations in the old way cannot be obtained in an equally central and commodious portion of London or New York for double the money. Suits of two rooms only, for smaller families, cost but $1 to $1.25 per week, according to size and eligibility. The concern is provided with a Bath-Room, Wash-Room, Oven, &c., for the use of which no extra charge is made. The building is very substantial and well constructed, is fire-proof, and cost about $40,000. The ground for it was leased of the Duke of Bedford for 99 years at $250 per annum. The money to construct it was mostly raised by subscription—the Queen leading off with $1,500; which the Queen Dowager and two Royal Duchesses doubled; then came sundry Dukes, Earls, and other notables with $500 each, followed by a long list of smaller and smaller subscriptions. But this money was given to the "Society for Bettering the Condition of the Laboring Classes," to enable them to try an experiment; and that experiment has triumphantly succeeded. All those I have described, as well as one for single women only near Hatton Garden, and one for families and for aged women near Bagnigge Wells, which I have not yet found time to visit, are constantly and thoroughly filled, and hundreds are eager for admittance who cannot be accommodated; the inmates are comparatively cleanly, healthy and comfortable; and the plan pays. This is the great point. It is very easy to build edifices by subscription in which as many as they will accommodate may have very satisfactory lodgings; but even in England, where Public Charity is most munificent, it is impossible to build such dwellings for all from the contributions of Philanthropy; and to provide for a hundredth part, while the residue are left as they were, is of very dubious utility. The comfort of the few will increase the discontent and wretchedness of the many. But only demonstrate that building capacious, commodious and every way eligible dwellings for the Poor is a safe and fair investment, and that their rents may be essentially reduced thereby while their comfort is promoted, and a very great step has been made in the world's progress—one which will not be receded from.
I saw in the house last described a newly invented Brick (new at least to me) which struck me favorably. It is so molded as to be hollow in the centre, whereby the transmission of moisture through a wall composed of this brick is prevented, and the dampness often complained of in brick houses precluded. The brick is larger than those usually made, and one side is wedge-shaped.
We went from the house above described to the first constructed Bathing and Washing establishment, George-st. Euston-square. In the Washing department there are tubs, &c., for one hundred and twenty washers, and they are never out of use while the concern is open—that is from 9 A. M. to 7 P. M. There is in a separate Drying Room an apparatus for freeing the washed clothes from water (instead of Wringing) by whirling them very rapidly in a machine, whereby the water is thrown out of them by centrifugal force or attraction. Thence the clothes, somewhat damp, are placed in hot-air closets and speedily dried; after which they pass into the Ironing-room and are finished. The charge here is 4 cents for two hours in the Washing-room and 2 cents for two hours in the Ironing-room, which is calculated to be time enough for doing the washing of an average family. Everything but soap is supplied. The building is not capacious enough for the number seeking to use it, and is to be speedily enlarged. I believe that the charges are too small, as I understand that the concern merely supports itself without paying any interest on the capital which created it.
The Female part of the Bathing establishment is in this part of the building, but that for men is entered from another street. Each has Hot and Vapor Baths of the first class for 12 cents; second class of these or first-class cold baths for 8 cents; and so down to cold water baths for 2 cents or hot ditto for 4 cents each. I think these, notwithstanding their cheapness, are not very extensively—at least not regularly—patronized. The first class are well fitted up and contain everything that need be desired; the others are more naked, but well worth their cost. Cold and tepid Plunge Baths are proffered at 6 and 12 cents respectively.
I must break off here abruptly, for the mail threatens to close.
VI.
BRITISH PROGRESS.
London, Thursday, May 15, 1851.
Apart from the Great Exhibition, this is a season of intellectual activity in London. Parliament is (languidly) in session; the Aristocracy are in town; the Queen is lavishly dispensing the magnificent hospitalities of Royalty to those of the privileged caste who are invited to share them; and the several Religious and Philanthropic Societies, whether of the City or the Kingdom, are generally holding their Anniversaries, keeping Exeter Hall in blast almost night and day. I propose to give a first hasty glance at intellectual and general progress in Great Britain, leaving the subject to be more fully and thoroughly treated after I shall have made myself more conversant with the facts in the case.
A spirit of active and generous philanthropy is widely prevalent in this country. While the British pay more in taxes for the support of Priests and Paupers than any other people on earth, they at the same time give more for Religious and Philanthropic purposes. Their munificence is not always well guided; but on the whole very much is accomplished by it in the way of diffusing Christianity and diminishing Human Misery. But I will speak more specifically.
The Religious Anniversaries have mainly been held, but few or none of them are reported—indeed, they are scarcely alluded to—in the Daily press, whose vaunted superiority over American journals in the matter of Reporting amounts practically to this—that the debates in Parliament are here reported verbatim, and again presented in a condensed form under the Editorial head of each paper, while scarcely anything else (beside Court doings) is reported at all. I am sure this is consistent neither with reason nor with the public taste—that if the Parliamentary debates were condensed one-half, and the space so saved devoted to reports of the most interesting Public Meetings, Lectures, &c., after the New-York fashion, the popular interest in the daily papers would become wider and deeper, and their usefulness as aids to General Education would be largely increased. To a great majority of the reading class, even here, political discussions—and especially of questions so trite and so unimportant as those which mainly engross the attention of Parliament—are of quite subordinate interest; and I think less than one reader in four ever peruses any more of these debates than is given in the Editorial synopsis, leaving the verbatim report a sheer waste of costly print and paper.—I believe, however, that in the aggregate, the collections of the last year for Religious purposes have just about equaled the average of the preceding two or three years; some Societies having received less, others more. I think the public interest in comprehensive Religious and Philanthropic efforts does not diminish.
For Popular Education, there is much doing in this Country, but in a disjointed, expensive, inefficient manner. Instead of one all-pervading, straight-forward, State-directed system, there are three or four in operation, necessarily conflicting with and damaging each other. And yet a vast majority really desire the Education of All, and are willing to pay for it. John Bull is good at paying taxes, wherein he has had large experience; and if he grumbles a little now and then at their amount as oppressive, it is only because he takes pleasure in grumbling, and this seems to afford him a good excuse for it. He would not be deprived of it if he could: witness the discussions of the Income Tax, which every body denounces while no one justifies it abstractly; and yet it is always upheld, and I presume always will be. If the question could now be put to a direct vote, even of the tax-payers alone—"Shall or shall not a system of Common School Education for the United Kingdoms be maintained by a National Tax?"—I believe Free Schools would be triumphant. Even if such a system were matured, put in operation, and to be sustained by Voluntary Contributions alone or left to perish, I should not despair of the result.
But there is a lion in the path, in the shape of the Priesthood of the Established Church, who insist that the children shall be indoctrinated in the dogmas of their creed, or there shall be no State system of Common Schools; and, behind these, stand the Roman Catholic Clergy, who virtually make a similar demand with regard to the children of Catholics. The unreasonableness, as well as the ruinous effects of these demands, is already palpable on our side of the Atlantic. If, when our City was meditating the Croton Water Works, the Episcopal and Catholic Priesthood had each insisted that those works should be consecrated by their own Hierarchy and by none other, or, in default of this, we should have no water-works at all, the case would be substantially parallel to this. Or if there were in some city a hundred children, whose parents were of diverse creeds, all blind with cataract, whom it was practicable to cure altogether, but not separately, and these rival Priesthoods were respectively to insist—"They shall be taught our Creed and Catechism, and no other, while the operation is going on, or there shall be no operation and no cure," that case would not be materially diverse from this. In vain does the advocate of Light say to them, "Pray, let us give the children the inestimable blessing of sight, and then you may teach your creed and catechism to all whom you can persuade to learn them," they will have the closed eyes opened according to Loyola or to Laud, or not opened at all! Do they not provoke us to say that their insisting on an impossible, a suicidal condition, is but a cloak, a blind, a fetch, and that their real object is to keep the multitude in darkness? I am thankful that we have few clergymen in America who manifest a spirit akin to that which to this day deprives half the children of these Kingdoms of any considerable school education whatever.
I think nothing unsusceptible of mathematical demonstration, can be clearer than the imperative necessity of Universal Education, as a matter simply of Public Economy. In these densely peopled islands, where service is cheap, and where many persons qualified to teach are maintaining a precarious struggle for subsistence, a system of General Education need not cost half so much as in the United States, while wealth is so concentrated that taxes bear less hardly here, in proportion to their amount, than with us. Every dollar judiciously spent on the education of poor children, would be more than saved in the diminution of the annual cost of pauperism and crime, while the intellectual and industrial capacity of the people would be vastly increased by it. I do not see how even Clerical bigotry, formidable as it deplorably is, can long resist this consideration among a people so thrifty and saving, as are in the main the wielders of political power in this country.
Political Reforms move slowly here. Mr. Hume's motion for Household Suffrage, Vote by Ballot, Triennial Parliaments, &c. was denied a consideration, night before last, by the concerted absence from the House of nearly all the members—only twenty-one appearing when forty (out of over six hundred) are required to constitute a quorum. So the subject lost its place as a set motion, and probably will not come up again this Session. The Ministry opposed its consideration now, promising themselves to bring forward a measure for the Extension of the Franchise next Session, when it is very unlikely that they will be in a position to bring forward anything. It seems to me that the current sets strongly against their continuance in office, and that, between the hearty Reformers on one side and the out-spoken Conservatives on the other, they must soon surrender their semblance of power. Still, they are skillful in playing off one extreme against another, and may thus endure or be endured a year longer; but the probability is against this. To my mind, it seems clear that their retirement is essential to the prosecution of Liberal Reforms. So long as they remain in power, they will do, in the way of the People's Enfranchisement, as near nought as possible.
(——"Nothing could live
Twixt that and silence.")
Their successors, the avowed Conservatives, will of course do nothing; but they cannot hold power long in the Britain of to-day; and whoever shall succeed them must come in on a popular tide and on the strength of pledges to specific and comprehensive Reforms which cannot well be evaded. Slow work, say you? Well, there is no quicker practicable. When the Tories shall have been in once more and gone out again, there will be another great forward movement like the Reform Bill, and I think not till then, unless the Continent shall meantime be convulsed by the throes of a general Revolution.
I should like to see a chance for the defeat of that most absurd of all Political stupidities, the Ecclesiastical Titles Assumption Bill, but I do not. Persecution for Faith's sake is most abhorrent, yet sincerity and zeal may render it respectable; but this bill has not one redeeming feature. While it insults the Catholics, it is perfectly certain to increase their numbers and power; and it will do this without inflicting on them the least substantial injury. Cardinal Wiseman will be the local head of the Catholic Church in England, whether he is legally forbidden to be styled "Archbishop of Westminster" or not, and so of the Irish Catholic prelates. The obstacles which the ministerial bill attempts to throw in the way of bequests to the Catholic Bishops as such, will be easily evaded; these Bishops will exercise every function of the Episcopate whether this Bill shall pass or fail: and their moral power will be greatly increased by its passage. But the Ministry, which has found the general support of the Catholics, and especially of the Irish Catholic Members, very opportune at certain critical junctures, will henceforth miss that support—in fact, it has already been transformed into a most virulent and deadly hostility. Rural England was hostile to the ministry before, on account of the depressing effect of Free Trade on the agricultural interest; and now Ireland is turned against them by their own act—an act which belies the professions of Toleration in matters of Faith which have given them a great hold of the sympathies of the best men in the country throughout the last half century. I do not see how they can ride out the storm which they by this bill have aroused.
The cause of Temperance—of Total Abstinence from all that can intoxicate—is here about twenty years behind its present position in the United States. I think there are not more absolute drunkards here than in our American cities, but the habit of drinking for drink's sake is all but universal. The Aristocracy drink almost to a man; so do the Middle Class; so do the Clergy; so alas! do the Women! There is less of Ardent Spirits imbibed than with us; but Wines are much cheaper and in very general use among the well-off; while the consumption of Ale, Beer, Porter, &c. (mainly by the Poor) is enormous. Only think of £5,000,000 or Twenty-Five Millions of Dollars, paid into the Treasury in a single year by the People of these Islands as Malt-Tax alone, while the other ingredients used in the manufacture of Malt Liquors probably swell the aggregate to Thirty Millions of Dollars. If we suppose this to be a little more than one-third of the ultimate cost of these Liquors to the consumers, that cost cannot be less than One Hundred Millions of Dollars per annum!—a sum amply sufficient, if rightly expended, to banish Pauperism and Destitution for ever from the British Isles. And yet the poor trudge wearily on, loaded to the earth with exactions and burdens of every kind, yet stupifying their brains, emptying their pockets and ruining their constitutions with these poisonous, brutalizing liquors! I see no hope for them short of a System of Popular Education which shall raise them mentally above their present low condition, followed by a few years of systematic, energetic, omnipresent Temperance Agitation. A slow work this, but is there any quicker that will be effective? The Repeal of the Taxes on Knowledge would greatly contribute to the Education of the Poor, but that Reform has yet to be struggled for.
Of Social Reform in England, the most satisfactory agency at present is the Society for improving the Dwellings of the Poor. This Society has the patronage of the Queen, is presided over (I believe) by her husband, and is liberally patronized by the better portion of the Aristocracy and the higher order of the Clergy. These, aided by wealthy or philanthropic citizens, have contributed generously, and have done a good work, even though they should stop where they are. The work would not, could not stop with them. They have already proved that good, substantial, cleanly, wholesome, tight-roofed, well ventilated dwellings for the Poor are absolutely cheaper than any other, so that Shylock himself might invest his fortune in the construction of such with the moral certainty of receiving a large income therefrom, while at the same time rescuing the needy from wretchedness, disease, brutalization and vice. Shall not New-York, and all her sister cities, profit by the lesson?
Of the correlative doings of the organized Promoters of Working Men's Associations, Coöperative Stores, &c., I would not be justified in speaking so confidently, at least until I shall have observed more closely. My present impression is that they are both far less mature in their operations, and that, as they demand of the Laboring Class more confidence in themselves and each other, than, unhappily, prevails as yet, they are destined to years of struggle and chequered fortunes before they will have achieved even the measure of success which the Model Lodging and the Bathing and Washing Houses have already achieved. Still, I have not yet visited the strongest and most hopeful of the Working Men's Associations.
I spent last evening with the friends of Robert Owen, who celebrated his 80th birthday by a dinner at the Cranbourne Hotel. Among those present were Thornton Hunt, son of Leigh Hunt, and one of the Editors of "The Leader;" Gen. Houg, an exile from Germany from Freedom's sake; Mr. Fleming, Editor of the Chartist "Northern Star;" Mons. D'Arusmont and his daughter, who is the daughter also of Frances Wright. Mr. Owen was of course present, and spoke quite at length in reiteration and enforcement of the leading ideas wherewith he has so long endeavored to impress the world respecting the absolute omnipotence of circumstances in shaping the Human Character, the impossibility of believing or disbelieving save as one must, &c. &c. Mr. Owen has scarcely looked younger or heartier at any time these ten years; he did not seem a shade older than when I last before met him, at least three years ago. And not many young men are more buoyant in spirit, more sanguine as to the immediate future, more genial in temper, more unconquerable in resolution, than he is. I cannot see many things as he does; it seems to me that he is stone blind on the side of Faith in the Invisible, and exaggerates the truths he perceives until they almost become falsehoods; but I love his sunny, benevolent nature, I admire his unwearied exertions for what he deems the good of Humanity; and, believing with the great Apostle to the Gentiles, that "Now abide Faith, Hope, Charity: these three; but the greatest of these is Charity," I consider him practically a better Christian than half those who, professing to be such, believe more and do less. I trust his life may be long spared, and his sun beam cloudless and rosy to the last.
VII.
LONDON—NEW-YORK.
London, Monday, May 15, 1851.
I have now been fifteen days in this magnificent Babel, but so much engrossed with the Exhibition that I have seen far less of the town than I otherwise should. Of the City proper (in the center) I know a little; and I have made my way thence out into the open country on the North and on the West respectively, but toward the South lies a wilderness of buildings which I have not yet explored; while Eastward the metropolitan districts stretch further than I have ever been. The south side of Hyde Park and the main line of communication thence with the City proper is the only part of London with which I can claim any real acquaintance. Yet, on the strength of what little I do know, I propose to say something of London as it strikes a stranger; and in so doing I shall generally refer to New-York as a standard of comparison, so as to render my remarks more lucid to a great portion of their readers.
The Buildings here are generally superior to those of our City—more substantial, of better materials, and more tasteful. There are, I think, as miserable rookeries here as anywhere; but they are exceptions; while most of the houses are built solidly, faithfully, and with a thickness of walls which would be considered sheer waste in our City. Among the materials most extensively used is a fine white marble[A] of a peculiarly soft, creamy appearance, which looks admirably until blackened by smoke and time. Regent-street and several of the aristocratic quarters west of it are in good part built of this marble; but one of the finest, freshest specimens of it is St. George's Hospital, Piccadilly, which to my eye is among the most tasteful edifices in London. If (as I apprehend) St. Paul's Church, Somerset House, and the similarly smoke-stained dwellings around Finsbury Oval were built of this same marble, then the murky skies of London have much to answer for.
Throughout the Western and Northern sections of the Metropolis, the dwellings are far less crowded than is usual in the corresponding or up-town portion of New-York, are more diverse in plan, color and finish, and better provided with court-yards, shrubbery, &c. In the matter of Building generally, I think our City would profit by a study of London, especially if our lot-owners, builders, &c., would be satisfied with London rates of interest on their respective investments. I think four per cent. is considered a tolerable and five a satisfactory interest on money securely invested in houses in London.
By the way: the apostles of Sanitary Reform here are anticipating very great benefits from the use of the Hollow Brick just coming into fashion. I am assured by a leading member of the Sanitary Commission that the hollow brick cost much less than the solid ones, and are a perfect protection against the dampness so generally experienced in brick houses, and often so prejudicial to health. That there is a great saving in the cost of their transportation is easily seen; and, as they are usually made much larger than the solid brick, they can be laid up much faster. I think Dr. Southwood Smith assured me that the saving in the first cost of the brickwork of a house is one-third; if that is a mistake, the error is one of misapprehension on my part. The hollow brick is a far less perfect conductor of heat and cold than the solid one; consequently, a house built of the former is much cooler in Summer and warmer in Winter. It is confidently and reasonably hoped here that very signal improvements, in the dwellings especially of the Poor, are to be secured by means of this invention. Prince Albert has caused two Model Cottages of this material to be erected at his cost in Hyde Park near the Great Exhibition in order to attract general attention to the subject.
The Streets of London are generally better paved, cleaner and better lighted than those of New-York. Instead of our round or cobble stone, the material mainly used for paving here is a hard flint rock, split and dressed into uniform pieces about the size of two bricks united by their edges, so as to form a surface of some eight inches square with a thickness of two inches. This of course wears much more evenly and lasts longer than cobble-stone pavements. I do not know that we could easily procure an equally serviceable material, even if we were willing to pay for it. One reason of the greater cleanness of the streets here is the more universal prevalence of sewerage; another is the positive value of street-offal here for fertilizing purposes. And as Gas is supplied here to citizens at 4s. 6d. ($1.10) per thousand feet, while the good people of New-York must bend to the necessity of paying $3.50, or more than thrice as much for the like quantity, certainly of no better quality, it is but reasonable to infer that the Londoners can afford to light their streets better than the New-Yorkers.
But there are other aspects in which our streets have a decided superiority. There are half a dozen streets and places here having the same name, and only distinguished by appending the name of a neighboring street, as "St. James-place, St. James-st.," to distinguish it from several other St. James-places, and so on. This subjects strangers to great loss of time and vexation of spirit. I have not yet delivered half the letters of introduction which were given me at home to friends of the writers in this city, and can't guess when I shall do it. Then the numbering of the streets is absurdly vicious—generally 1, 2, 3, 4, &c., up one side and down the other side, so that 320 will be opposite 140, and 412 opposite 1, and so throughout. Of course, if any street so numbered is extended beyond its original limit, the result is inextricable confusion. But the Londoners seem not to have caught the idea of numbering by lots at all, but to have numbered only the houses that actually existed when the numbering was undertaken; so that, if a street happened to be numbered when only half built up, every house erected afterward serves to render confusion worse confounded. On this account I spent an hour and a half a few evenings since in fruitless endeavors to find William and Mary Howitt, though I knew they lived at No. 28 Upper Avenue Road, which is less than half a mile long. I found Nos. 27, 29, 30, and 31, and finally found 28 also, but in another part of the street, with a No. 5 near it on one side and No. 16 ditto on the other—and this in a street quite recently opened. I think New-York has nothing equal to this in perplexing absurdity.
The Police here is more omnipresent and seems more efficient than ours. I think the use of a common and conspicuous uniform has a good effect. No one can here pretend that he defied or resisted a policeman in ignorance of his official character. The London police appears to be quite numerous, is admirably organized, and seems to be perfectly docile to its superiors. Always to obey and never to ask the reason of a command, is the rule here; it certainly has its advantages, but is not well suited to the genius of our people.
The Hotels of London are decidedly inferior to those of New-York. I do not mean by this that every comfort and reasonable luxury may not be obtained in the London inns for money enough, but simply that the same style of living costs more in this city than in ours. I think $5 per day would be a fair estimate for the cost of living (servants' fees included) as well in a London hotel as you may live in a first-class New-York hotel for half that sum. One main cause of this disparity is the smallness of the inns here. A majority of them cannot accommodate more than twenty to forty guests comfortably; I think there are not four in the entire Metropolis that could find room for one hundred each. Of course, the expense of management, supervision, attendance, &c., in small establishments is proportionably much greater than in large ones, and the English habit of eating fitfully solus instead of at a common hour and table increases the inevitable cost. Considering the National habits, it might be hazardous to erect and open such a hotel as the Astor, Irving or New-York in this city; but if it were once well done, and the experiment fairly maintained for three years, it could not fail to work a revolution. Wines (I understand) cost not more than half as much here, in the average, as they do in New-York.
In Cabs and other Carriages for Hire, London is ahead of New-York. The number here is immense; they are of many varieties, some of them better calculated for fine weather than any of ours; while the legal rates of fare are more moderate and not so outrageously exceeded. While the average New-York demand is fully double the legal fare, the London cabman seldom asks more than fifty per cent. above what the law allows him; and this (by Americans, at least) is considered quite reasonable and cheerfully paid. If our New-York Jehus could only be made to realize that they keep their carriages empty by their exorbitant charges, and really double-lock their pockets against the quarters that citizens would gladly pour into them, I think a reform might be hoped for.
The Omnibuses of London are very numerous and well governed, but I prefer those of New-York. The charges are higher here, though still reasonable; but the genius of this people is not so well adapted to the Omnibus system as ours is. For example: an Omnibus (the last for the night) was coming down from the North toward Charing Cross the other evening, when a lady asked to be taken up. The stage was full; the law forbids the taking of more than twelve passengers inside; a remonstrance was instantly raised by one or more of the passengers against taking her; and she was left to plod her weary way as she could. I think that could not have happened in New-York. In another instance, a stage-full of passengers started eastward from Hyde Park, one of the women having a basket of unwashed clothes on her knee. It was certainly inconvenient, and not absolutely inoffensive; but the hints, the complaints, the slurs, the sneers, with which the poor woman was annoyed and tortured throughout—from persons certainly well-dressed and whom I should otherwise have considered well-bred—were a complete surprise to me. In vain did the poor woman explain that she was not permitted to deposit her basket on the roof of the stage, as it was raining; the growls and witticisms at her expense continued, and women were foremost in this rudeness. I doubt that a woman was ever exposed to the like in New-York, unless she was suspected of having Ethiopian blood in her veins.
The Parks, Squares and Public Gardens of London beat us clean out of sight. The Battery is very good, but it is not Hyde Park; Hoboken was delightful; Kensington Gardens are and ever will remain so. Our City ought to have made provision, twenty years ago, for a series of Parks and Gardens extending quite across the island somewhere between Thirtieth and Fiftieth streets. It is now too late for that; but all that can be should be done immediately to secure breathing-space and grounds for healthful recreation to the Millions who will ultimately inhabit New-York. True, the Bay, the North and East Rivers, will always serve as lungs to our City, but these of themselves will not suffice. Where is or where is to be the Public Garden of New York? where the attractive walks, and pleasure-grounds of the crowded denizens of the Eastern Wards? These must be provided, and the work cannot be commenced too soon.