At the Pavilion
A Sidewalk Artist
THE first and most natural question asked of any city is “Show us your people.” In answer to this, London may safely begin by pointing to its parks, and especially so on any Sunday during the season, for on that day you can best see how caste has assorted and parcelled the city off into so many exhibits, as carefully arranged as the specimens in the British Museum.
The walks in Hyde Park have their special social value, as much so as the walks in life; and in the park or in life, whichever path an Englishman uses, it is safe to suppose that his ancestors walked there before him. The parks of London are handy. From a Piccadilly club window can be seen sheep enough to fill a barn-yard, and a stone’s throw from the Horse Guards is St. James’s Park with its duck island, where all kinds of rare birds flock together; and their relatives in far-away countries are no better fed than these happy exiles in the heart of the great city, and the peacocks that ornament the banks of the Serpentine are as happy as the boys who sail the toy-boats on that toy river.
Sunday Morning near Stanhope Gate
Sunday is Hyde Park’s day “At Home,” and in the shape of a blue sky she sends her invitation to all London, and her popularity is easily shown by the number and variety of her friends. By long odds the best-looking exhibit is to be seen during church-parade. It extends from Hyde Park Corner to Stanhope Gate, and consists of the well-to-do, most of whom probably first came to the park with their nurses and a little later with their tutors, and they now come grown up and with white hair to pay their respects to the good doctor of their childhood. They form what is distinctly a Sunday gathering, and one as serious as a wedding. Seldom a loud voice is heard. There is a feeling of rest throughout the whole scene, and it is impossible to be there without entering into the spirit of it. In the solemn throng that pass and repass I have seen a noisy steamer acquaintance thoroughly subdued and looking like an undertaker in a long coat and high hat. Everyone else seemed to have been there from childhood. The old gentleman in the Row undoubtedly first appeared there on Shetland ponies under the watchful eye of the groom. It is not a thing to tire of, and Sunday after Sunday these well-dressed people attend church-parade as seriously as they attend church. A little farther into the park are the shopkeepers and domestics listening to the band. Here you are likely to meet the real estate agent and tailor with whom you have already had dealings. They are a distinct class, and very different from the first exhibit. They keep their frock-coats carefully buttoned, and are apparently not so much at their ease.
