List to the curfew's note of death-like gloom—
And drop a tear o'er Flora Hastings' tomb!
—Sequel to Don Juan.
CHAPTER CXCIV.
THE ROYAL BREAKFAST.
Holford did not immediately close his eyes in slumber.
Although his education had been miserably neglected, he possessed good natural abilities; and his reflections at times were of a far more philosophical nature than could have been anticipated.
The gorgeous scenes which he had just witnessed now led him to meditate upon the horrible contrasts which existed elsewhere, not only in the great metropolis, but throughout the United Kingdom,—and many, very many of which he himself had seen with his own eyes, and felt with his own experience.
At that moment when festivity was highest, and pleasure was most exciting in the regal halls, there were mothers in naked attics, dark cellars, or even houseless in the open streets,—mothers who pressed their famished little ones to their bosoms, and wondered whether a mouthful of food would ever pass their lips again.
While the royal table groaned beneath the weight of golden vessels and the choicest luxuries which earth's fruitfulness, heaven's bounty, or man's ingenuity could supply,—while the raciest produce of fertile vineyards sparkled in the crystal cups,—at that same period, how many thousands of that exalted lady's subjects moistened their sorry crust with tears wrung from them by the consciousness of ill-requited toil and the pinching gripe of bitter poverty!
Delicious music here, and the cries of starving children there;—silver candelabra pouring forth a flood of lustre in a gorgeous saloon, and a flickering rushlight making visible the naked and damp-stained walls of a wretched garret;—silks and satins, rags and nudity;—luxurious and pampered indolence; crushing and ill-paid labour;—homage and reverence, ill-treatment and oppression;—the gratification of every whim, the absence of every necessary;—not a care for to-morrow here, not a hope for to-morrow there;—a certainty of a renewal of this day's plenty, a total ignorance whence the next day's bread can come;—mirth and laughter, moans and sorrowing;—a palace for life on one hand, and an anxiety lest even the wretched hovel may not be changed for a workhouse to-morrow;—these are the appalling contrasts which our social sphere presents to view!