M. Grosley was much struck with the fogs: “We may add to the inconvenience of the dirt the fog-smoke which, being mixed with a constant fog, covers London and wraps it up entirely.... On the 26th of April, St. James’s Park was incessantly covered with fogs, smoke, and rain, that scarce left a possibility of distinguishing objects at the distance of four steps.”
He speaks at another place of—
“This smoke being loaded with terrestrial particles and rolling in a thick, heavy atmosphere, forms a cloud, which envelopes London like a mantle, a cloud which the sun pervades but rarely, a cloud which, recoiling back upon itself, suffers the sun to break out only now and then, which casual appearance procures the Londoners a few of what they call glorious days.”
In regard to the main streets and squares in the West End, the greatest difference noticeable between the London of 1811 and of the present time would be the network of dirty and mean buildings over-spreading the part where is now Trafalgar Square. In the middle of these stood the King’s Mews, which had been rebuilt in 1732, and was not done away with until 1829. At the corner where Northumberland Avenue joins Charing Cross, was the splendid mansion of the Duke of Northumberland, which remained until 1874.
Another great difference lay in the fact of there being no Regent Street, for this street was not begun until two years after Jane’s 1811 visit. Bond Street was there and Piccadilly, and across the entrance to the Park, where is now the Duke of York’s column, was Carlton House, the home of the obstreperous Prince of Wales.
In M. Grosley’s time, Leicester House, in Leicester Fields, was still standing, but in 1811 it had been pulled down. Grosley lodged near here, and his details as to rent, etc., are interesting.
He says that the house of his landlord was small, only three storeys high, standing on an irregular patch of ground, and rented at thirty-eight guineas a year, with an additional guinea for the water supply, which was distributed three times weekly. In this house two or three little rooms on the first storey, very slightly furnished, were let to him at a guinea a week.
The touch about the water supply points to another deficiency; all the present admirable system of private taps and other distributing agencies, also the network of drains, sewers, etc., had yet to be evolved, for sanitation was in a very elementary condition.
Many of the shops were still distinguished by signs, for though the custom of numbering, in place of signs, had been introduced, it had made way but slowly, thus we find Jane referring to “The tallow chandler is Penlington, at the Crown and Beehive, Charles Street, Covent Garden.”
It would be particularly pleasant to know where she did her own shopping in which she was femininely interested, but it is difficult to infer. But beyond the fact that “Layton and Shears” was evidently the draper whom she patronised, and that “Layton and Shears is Bedford House,” and that “Fanny bought her Irish at Newton’s in Leicester Square,” we do not get much detail. But we glean a few particulars from this visit, and one of a later date.