It certainly is satisfactory to have so scientific an explanation of the origin of our spleen.
Another French writer in 1784—M. La Combe—published a book, entitled 'A Picture of London,' in which, inter alia, he says: 'The highroads thirty or forty miles round London are filled with armed highwaymen and footpads.' This was then pretty true, though the expression 'filled' is somewhat of an exaggeration. The medical student of forty or fifty years ago seems to have been anticipated in 1784, for M. La Combe tells us that 'the brass knockers of doors, which cost from 12s. to 15s., are stolen at night if the maid forgets to unscrew them'—a precaution which seems to have gone out of fashion. 'The arrival of the mails,' our author says, 'is uncertain at all times of the year.... Persons who frequently receive letters should recommend their correspondents not to insert loose papers, nor to put the letters in covers, because the tax is sometimes treble, and always arbitrary, though in a free country. But rapacity and injustice are the deities of the English.' M. La Combe does not give us a flattering character. 'An Englishman,' he says, 'considers a foreigner as an enemy, whom he dares not offend openly, but whose society he fears; and he attaches himself to no one.' Perhaps it was so in 1784, but such feelings have nearly died out—at least, among educated people. M. La Combe, in another part of his book, exclaims: 'How are you changed, Londoners! ... Your women are become bold, imperious, and expensive. Bankrupts and beggars, coiners, spies and informers, robbers and pickpockets abound.... The baker mixes alum in his bread ... the brewer puts opium and copper filings in his beer ... the milkwoman spoils her milk with snails.'
Do more recent writers judge of us more correctly? We shall see.
I have lying before me a French book, the title of which, translated into English, runs, 'Geography for Young People.' It is in its eighth edition, and written by M. Lévi, Professor of Belles-Lettres, of History and Geography in Paris. The date of the book is 1850. The Professor in it describes London, and if his pupils ever have, or rather had, occasion to visit our capital, they must have been unable to recognise it from their teacher's description of it. Among the many blunders he commits, there are some which are excusable in a foreigner, because they refer to matters which are often misapprehended even by natives; but to describe London as possessing a certain architectural feature which a mere walk through the streets with his eyes open would have shown him to have no existence at all is rather unpardonable in a professor who takes on himself to teach young people geography. But what does M. Lévi say? He says: 'In London you never see an umbrella, because all the streets are built with arcades, under which you find shelter when it rains, so that an umbrella, which to us Parisians is an indispensable article, is perfectly useless to a Londoner.' M. Lévi evidently, if ever he was in London, visited the Quadrant only, before the arcade was pulled down, and thereupon wrote his account of London. Yet he must have looked about a bit, for he tells us of splendid cafés to be met with in every street; the nobility patronize them; 'one of them accidentally treads on the toes of another, a duel is the consequence, and to-morrow morning one of them will have ceased to live.'
M. Lévi reminds us of the Frenchman who came over to England with the object of writing a book about us. He arrived in London one Saturday night, and being tired, at once went to bed. At breakfast next morning he asked for new bread; the waiter told him they only had yesterday's. Out came the Frenchman's note-book, in which he wrote: 'In London the bread is always baked the day before.' He then asked for the day's paper, but was again told they had yesterday's only. A memorandum went into the note-book: 'The London newspapers are always published yesterday.' He then thought he would present the letter of introduction he had brought with him to a private family, so having been directed to the house, he saw a lady near the window, reading. Not wishing to startle or disturb her, he gave a gentle single rap. This not being answered, he had to give a few more raps, when at last a servant partly opened the door and asked his business. He expressed his wish to see the master of the house. 'Master never sees anybody to-day, but he will perhaps to-morrow,' replied the servant, and shut the door in his face. Another memorandum was added to the previous ones: 'In London people never see anyone to-day, but always to-morrow.' Having nothing to do, he thought he would go to the theatre. He inquired for Drury Lane, and was directed to it. The doors being shut, he lounged about the neighbourhood till they should open. As it grew later and later, and there was no sign of a queue, he at last addressed a passer-by, and asked him when the theatre would open. 'It won't open to-day,' was the reply. This was the last straw that broke the camel's back. Our Frenchman hurried back to his hotel, wrote in his note-book, 'In London there are theatres, but they never open today,' took a cab, caught the night mail, and hastened to leave so barbarous a country.
This description of London life is about as correct as that recently given in Max O'Rell's 'John Bull and his Womankind.' What kind of people did O'Rell visit?
I look at another book before me, written in Italian, and entitled: 'Semi-serious Observations of an Exile on England.' The book was published at Lugano in 1831, but the author—Giuseppe Pecchio—dates his preface from York in 1827.
He speaks thusly of the approach to London by the Dover road: 'If the sky is gloomy, the first aspect of London is no less so. The smoky look of the houses gives them the appearance of a recent fire. If to this you add the silence prevailing amidst a population of a million and a half of inhabitants, all in motion (so that you seem to behold a stage full of Chinese shadows), and the uniformity of the houses, as if you were in a city of beavers, you will easily understand that on entering into such a beehive pleasure gives way to astonishment. This is the old country style, but since the English have substituted blue pills for suicide, or, still better, have made a journey to Paris—since, instead of Young's "Night Thoughts," they read the novels of Walter Scott, they have rendered their houses a little more pleasing in outward appearance. In the West End especially they have adopted a more cheerful style of architecture. But I do not by this mean to imply that the English themselves have become more lively; they still take delight in ghosts, witchcraft, cemeteries, and similar horrors. Woe to the author who writes a novel without some apparition to make your hair stand on end!'
In speaking of the thinness of the walls and floors of London houses, he says: 'I could hear the murmur of the conversation of the tenant of the room above and of that of the one below me; from time to time the words "very fine weather," "indeed," "very fine," "comfort," "comfortable," "great comfort," reached my ears. In fact, the houses are ventriloquous. As already mentioned, they are all alike. In a three-storied house there are three perpendicular bedrooms, one above the other, and three parlours, equally so superposed.' We know how much of this description is true.
'Why are the English,' he asks, 'not expert dancers? Because they cannot practise dancing in their slightly-built houses, in which a lively caper would at once send the third-floor down into the kitchen. This is the reason why the English gesticulate so little, and have their arms always glued to their sides. The rooms are so small that you cannot move about rapidly without smashing some object,' or, as we should say, you cannot swing a cat in them.