One of the most frequented resorts of Lost Women in London is the Cremorne Gardens at Chelsea, on the Thames river bank, and distant about four miles from the Post Office and St. Paul's Cathedral.
These Gardens comprise about four acres, which are covered with trees, and ornamented with fountains, flower-beds, and statues. This is the maddest place in London, after ten o'clock in the evening. Until that hour, the middle class of London citizens, shopkeepers, tradesmen, and clerks, and their wives and sweethearts, have possession of the Gardens; but at that hour they leave the place, and from thence until one and two o'clock in the morning Cremorne is in the possession of Lost Women and their male friends and abettors.
The Cremorne is in many respects very like the Mabille at Paris, but decency is better enforced, and the women at Cremorne have not such a debased look as their unfortunate sisters of the Mabille.
At Cremorne there is a circular platform on which a band of music is constantly stationed during the evening, and here the dancing is principally done. Between the dances the girls promenade, or take supper with their male friends in the numerous restaurants, which are always crowded to excess by noisy people of both sexes, drinking Champagne and Moselle, or eating lobster or devilled kidneys. Cold suppers are provided for the girls in an upper saloon, for which they are charged two shillings and sixpence a piece, without wine. Then there are fireworks, two or three theatres and music halls, Japanese jugglers, bowling alleys, shooting galleries, and other modes of diversion and amusement.
Swarms of young fashionables from the Opera, where they have been listening to the enchanting strains of a Tietjens, a Nillson, or a Patti, in evening dress with thin overcoats, may be seen here of a warm night, or perhaps they may have come from the clubs in St. James or Piccadilly, to kill time.
"SKITTLES" AND THE PRINCESS MARY.
"SKITTLES" AND THE PRINCESS MARY.
"Skittles," now dead, who was at one time the most famous woman of her class in London, was very fond of attending Cremorne, where she was in the habit of drinking large quantities of Champagne. "Skittles" was at one time a great personage in London, and bore on her brougham the crest of a Marquis. This audacious woman had the temerity to dispute the way with the Princess Mary of Cambridge, while that member of the Royal family was riding in Rotten Row. "Skittles" was on horseback, being in full riding dress, and the Princess Mary was also on horseback, when they met, and it is said that "Skittles" lifted her dainty little riding whip at the astonished Princess, and demanded that she should give her precedence in the Ride.