With my Wife to a Pic-nic Party. I to content her more than to please myself, and to think how I always study her Pleasure more than my own, and sacrifice my own Inclinations to hers always. For I prefer to eat good Things off a Plate or a Table, and not upon my Knees. Besides, the Fly hired to carry us from Home and back, cost me three Guineas. The Pic-Nic in my Lord Bilberry's Park, where the Ruins of an old Abbey, open by my Lord's Allowance, People come to see from all Parts, gipsying, and making merry and dancing basely among the Ruins. These with mouldering Arches and Stones overgrown with Moss, and Lichen, and Ivy, mighty venerable, and set off by a Youth with long Hair and turned-down Collar, leaning on a broken Pillar, striking an attitude and staring at the Sky, as though musing on Infinity but in Truth fancying himself an Object of Admiration. But, he wrapt up in that Mistake, and forgetting his Meals, the rest intent altogether on the good Things from Fortnum and Mason's and the Pastry Cook's; and good Lack to see how they, to the Number of nigh forty Men, Women, and Girls, pitch into the Ham and Chicken, and the Cold Meat and Lobster Salad, and Pigeon and Veal and Ham Pie, and therewith drink bottled Ale and Stout, whereof a fat Serving Man in Livery, hardly drawing a Quart Bottle, mighty comical, and also a Page, who, carrying Plates, kick against a Wasps' Nest and raise the Wasps about his Ears and there he stand fighting them with a Knife, his Face in the Centre of the swarm the Image of Horror. The Younger Men mostly mighty Polite, they, and especially one with a fine slim Figure and hooked Nose, with constrained Postures, making Obeisance as they serve the Girls with Beer and Wine, whereof they as well as the Men mostly drink their Whack, and pretty to see how one most elegant Damsel seem falling into a happy Dream and how with her Hair flowing all adown she droop her Eyelids, muzzy. But some did get full of Fun, and a little Rogue I see pour the Heel-tap of a Champagne Glass into the Face of a Youngster, who, lying on his Back, had fallen on Sleep. The Managers of the Collection also mighty attentive, doing the Honours, and rare to see one of them, a fine portly Man, carve Slices off Great Round of Beef, in high Glee. But another rising from his Camp Stool to hand a Plate to a fine fat Dame, she and her pretty Daughter suddenly frighted by a Toad and Frog, which crawl and hop towards them out of some Flags by the Water, start back in Horror, and startle him and make him upset several Wine Glasses and the Water Can, and stamp on and smash a Plate. Among the Elders worth noting a lean old Professor, and his Neighbour a smug Lawyer how they gave their whole minds to most serious Eating, and also one or two of the younger Men did nought but stuff themselves; but most made Love; and pretty to see a loving Couple clink Glasses together, while other Pairs having had enough, saunter and strut about among and outside the Ruins. Good Lack to think what a Deal we ate and drank between us, and how famished on one Hand looked a lean old Labourer in a Smock Frock with a chubby but hungry little Clown, eyeing the picked Bones, while a Cur on the other did, in his Mouth, run away with the Wing of a Fowl.
VAUXHALL.
Monday, July 15, 1850.
This Evening to Vauxhall, where a Gala Night and much Company, mostly of the middling Sort, except the worse. Very few Gentlemen of any Condition do now visit this Place, but plenty of the whippersnapper Sparks that Shopmen used to call Gents, and a very good Word to distinguish them, although a vile, as much as to say Snobs. The better Sort of all there chiefly Medical Students. No Place for Ladies, but here and there a respectable but stupid Farmer from the Country with his Wife or Daughter. A bare, faded kind of a Garden, patched with shabby Trees, variegated Lamps hanging to their Branches among smoky Leaves. The Lamps do seem the main Attraction, the Bill of Entertainments advertise 10,000 additional every Night, which seems great Folly. However, the Outlines of all the Buildings picked out with parti-coloured Lamps mighty gay. A wooden Building on one Side called the Rotunda, where an Orchestra and they sing, and opposite an Alcove where a Band in Uniform play at the same Time Tunes which the Gents and their Partners dance to, waltzing and spinning round like Teetotums, droll to look upon. The Partners some pretty but nearly all ill-looking, and one or two horribly ill-favoured, and to see the People sit and look on, and among them a fat Country Wife, and prim starched old Maid very thin, make me ashamed. Also a fat singing Woman sung a Song, not at all to my Liking, and did throw herself about and make faces. Another Alcove hung with Lamps in Festoons, and in the Middle a Circus Theatre and a Crowd at the Door crowding to See a Dancing Girl jump through Hoops and dance upon Horseback. Other Alcoves with Seats for Eating and Drinking, and they eat Ham and Chicken, and I a Plate cost me 2s. 6d., and the Ham mighty thin, which is Vauxhall Fashion, and they drink Arrack, a Spirit I was curious to taste, and did and never shall again. But what did please me was a Drink newly come in from America, and called Sherry Cobbler, made of Sherry and Orange and lumps of Ice, and sucked up into the Mouth with a Straw, which to see two Gents do for the first Time did take me mightily, and I did do likewise, mighty cool and refreshing and did delight me much, and three Cobblers cost me 3 Shillings. Amused to see the Gents strut about so jaunty smoking Cigars, I think Cabbage Leaf steeped in Tobacco-Juice. They also drink Rhubarb Wine they call Champagne cost them 10s. a bottle, and bottled Stout, and good Lack to see the Lots of empty Bottles on the by-Tables! An old Fellow with a Pot-Paunch that had had too much Drink fallen asleep, a comical Sight, whilst pretty to see the Waiters dance Attendance with the Refreshments, and hear the hollaing and shouting, and altogether a good Deal of Fun, but dreary; but a Family of little Boys and Girls with their fat Father mighty merry, and clap their Hands to see the Balloon go up in another Part of the Gardens. A grand Display of Fireworks to conclude diverted me too, and so Home and to Bed, hoping after my Evening's Entertainment I shall not wake with a Headache in the Morning.
