Old lamps for new

by E. V. Lucas

A pastor in his native land, he sailed for England alone in May, 1782, bent upon seeing London and, for some unexplained reason, the Peak of Derbyshire. He knew the language perfectly, from books; and he brought to his adventure an open and tolerant mind, courage, determination and humour. As it turned out, he found himself in need of all these qualities. Indeed, no good traveller can be without any of them. He wrote in German: my copy of his work was translated “by a Lady.”

Let us disembark at Dartford on 2 June, 1782, with Mr. Moritz, and proceed with him to London in a postchaise, by way of Greenwich. I have read of postchaises before, but never found them so vividly or informingly described as by this German pastor. It is worth while to pause a moment before going farther and ask ourselves what we know of postchaises in England in 1782. It will make Mr. Moritz the more interesting. Speaking for myself, I certainly did not know that three persons might (by Act of Parliament) ride for the same cost as one, and that the charge was fixed at a shilling a mile. Had you realized that? I had always thought of the postchaise as a luxury for the rich only, but this brings it within reach of much humbler purses. And now for the German: “These carriages are very neat and lightly built, so that you hardly perceive their motion, as they roll along these firm smooth roads; they have windows in front, and on both sides. The horses are generally good, and the postilions particularly smart and active, and always ride on a full trot. The one we had wore his hair cut short, a round hat, and a brown jacket, of tolerable fine cloth, with a nosegay in his bosom. Now and then, when he drove very hard, he looked round, and with a smile seemed to solicit our approbation.” This is quite a picture, is it not? Dickens could have made the postboy look round no less brightly and triumphantly, but he would have given him jokes. This is Dickens without language: Dickens on the cinematoscope.

The road to London is very prettily etched in. “A thousand charming spots, and beautiful landscapes, on which my eye would long have dwelt with rapture, were now rapidly passed with the speed of an arrow. Our road appeared to be undulatory, and our journey, like the journey of life, seemed to be a pretty regular alternation of uphill and down, and here and there it was diversified with copses and woods; the majestic Thames every now and then, like a little forest of masts, rising to our view, and anon losing itself among the delightful towns and villages. The amazing large signs which, at the entrance of villages, hang in the middle of the street, being fastened to large beams, which are extended across the street from one house to another opposite it, particularly struck me; these sign-posts have the appearance of gates, or of gateways, for which I first took them, but the whole apparatus, unnecessarily large as it seems to be, is intended for nothing more than to tell the inquisitive traveller that there is an inn. At length, stunned as it were by this constant rapid succession of interesting objects to engage our attention, we arrived at Greenwich nearly in a state of stupefaction.”

It is very much as a few years ago men wrote of their first motor-car ride, or as Mr. Grahame White’s passengers write now.

In London Mr. Moritz lodged with a tailor’s widow somewhere near the Adelphi. The family consisted “of the mistress of the house, her maid, and her two sons, Jacky and Jerry; singular abbreviations for John and Jeremiah. The eldest, Jacky, about twelve years old, is a very lively boy, and often entertains me in the most pleasing manner, by relating to me his different employments at school and afterwards desiring me, in my turn, to relate to him all manner of things about Germany. He repeats his amo, amas, amavi, in the same singing tone as our common-school boys. As I happened once, when he was by, to hum a lively tune, he stared at me with surprise, and then reminded me it was Sunday; and so, that I might not forfeit his good opinion by any appearance of levity, I gave him to understand that, in the hurry of my journey, I had forgotten the day.... When the maid is displeased with me, I hear her sometimes at the door call me ‘the German’; otherwise in the family I go by the name of ‘the Gentleman.’.” Quite an Addisonian touch.

The tailor’s widow was a woman out of the common, for a favourite author of hers was Milton, and she told her lodger that her “late husband first fell in love with her on this very account: because she read Milton with such proper emphasis.” This endeared her to her lodger too, for a pocket Milton was his inseparable companion during his travels. But I fear that when he proceeds to deduce from the widow a general love of the great authors among even the common English people, he goes too far. He made indeed the mistake that he might make to-day, when cheap reprints of classics are far more numerous than they were then: the mistake of supposing that people read what they possess. Classics are still largely furniture and decoration. For the most part, I fear, the owners of the hundred best books are reading something from the circulating library.

The widow and her servant looked after him well, giving him bread and butter cut as thin as “poppy leaves.” But what he liked even better was their toast: “another kind of bread and butter usually eaten with tea, which is toasted by the fire, and is incomparably good. You take one slice after the other and hold it to the fire on a fork till the butter is melted, so that it penetrates a number of slices at once. This is called toast.”—That seems to be a very pleasant touch. I wonder into how many books of travel in England toast has found its way.

His curiosity took him everywhere, sometimes without any introduction, and sometimes with a letter from the German Minister, Count Lucy. His first experience of the House of Commons, with no influence at his back, was amusing and illuminating. “Above there is a small staircase, by which you go to the gallery, the place allotted for strangers. The first time I went up this small staircase and had reached the rails, I saw a very genteel man in black standing there. I accosted him without any introduction, and asked him whether I might be allowed to go in the gallery. He told me that I must be introduced by a Member, or else I could not get admission there. Now, as I had not the honour to be acquainted with a Member, I was under the mortifying necessity of retreating, and again going downstairs: as I did, much chagrined. And now, as I was sullenly marching back, I heard something said about a bottle of wine, which seemed to be addressed to me. I could not conceive what it could mean, till I got home, when my obliging landlady told me, I should have given the well-dressed man half a crown, or a couple of shillings, for a bottle of wine.

“Happy,” he says, “in this information, I went again the next day; when the same man who before had sent me away, after I had given him only two shillings, very politely opened the door for me, and himself recommended me to a good seat in the gallery.”

Manners in Parliament seem to have improved a little. Mr. Moritz says: “The Members of the House of Commons have nothing particular in their dress; they even come into the house in their great-coats, and with boots and spurs. It is not at all uncommon to see a Member lying stretched out on one of the benches while others are debating. Some crack nuts, others eat oranges, or whatever else is in season. There is no end to their going in or out; and as often as any one wishes to go out, he places himself before the Speaker, and makes him his bow, as if, like a school-boy, he asked his tutor’s permission. Those who speak, seem to deliver themselves with but little, perhaps not always with even a decorous, gravity. All that is necessary is to stand up in your place, take off your hat, turn to the Speaker (to whom all the speeches are addressed), to hold your hat and stick in one hand, and with the other to make any such motions as you fancy necessary to accompany your speech.”