DEAR Agatha,—Mrs. D. and I have been exploring Soho this afternoon. I started out with the intention of localising certain houses in certain streets associated with men of letters, but, alas! it was a question of "change" (without decay) "in all around I see". Old landmarks gone, and brand new buildings, mostly offices, in their place. Still, there is enough left to make a visit well worth while, and the weather was perfect. Frowsy old Soho was almond-scented from the great bunches of mimosa in the costers' barrows, whilst the streets smiled under the light of a January afternoon into which Spring had wandered.
There are moods to fit different districts. A mood for the City, one for Piccadilly, a Chelsea mood, one for the East End, and one for Soho. Soho was the one spot in the world for me this afternoon, and Mrs. Darling, who is not subject to moods, said it was "all the same to her where we went so long as it wasn't a lunatic asylum or a prison".
Soho has an atmosphere distinct from any other spot in London. Blindfold, you would be aware of the fact directly you crossed its borders. Its restaurants smell of savoury dishes and its narrow streets echo gaily to the jangle of piano organs. Its language is cosmopolitan, and its postcards and paper-covered novels have to be taken with a tolerant shrug of the shoulders for the odd taste of "those foreigners". Its shops are dingy, but they get there all the same. There is an art in their very carelessness. They invite search and have an air of being at the mercy of the customer.
Mrs. Darling was obviously hoodwinked by this stratagem, and remarked that she supposed you could get "one er them necklaces" (referring to a string of real amber beads in a jeweller's window) for about "'alf a crown". I explained to her that the beads were probably worth £10, to which she replied that perhaps the shopkeeper didn't know it! I got her away from the window with difficulty, and I have no doubt she will go to her grave thinking she might have bought that necklace for a song but for my impatience.
The unusual mildness of the afternoon was indicated in the number of figures seated on the benches in St. Anne's Churchyard. Drink has stamped its sinister hall-mark on most of them. Dirt and disease, the companions of drink, are there too. Despair, which one might reasonably look for, is absent. Despair argues sensibility, and these human wrecks seem to have got beyond that stage. They exist in a comatose state, feeling perhaps a momentary amelioration of their misery in this hour of Spring, and not looking beyond it.
They have a companion in adversity in the royal pauper, Theodore, King of Corsica, who died in Soho, and who, as Edward Walford says in his "Old and New London," was buried at the cost of a small tradesman who had known him in the days of his prosperity.
We found the tablet without difficulty at the base of the church tower, close to that of William Hazlitt. The epitaph is by Horace Walpole, and runs:—
"The grave, great teacher, to a level brings
Heroes and beggars, galley slaves and kings,
But Theodore this moral learn'd ere dead;
Fate pour'd its lesson on his living head—
Bestow'd a kingdom and denied him bread."
Unfortunate Theodore, who, on leaving the prison without a sixpence in his pocket, took refuge with a tailor in Soho, where three days later he died. Who out of those passing through the churchyard pause to give a thought to Theodore or to ponder Walpole's reflections on "The grave, great teacher".
We found we should have to make a detour to get inside the church, which lies at a level below the churchyard and is shut off by an iron railing. So we retraced our steps along Shaftesbury Avenue and into Dean Street. The church door was open and some one inside was practising on the organ. The sound came faintly as we entered the porch, and rushed out to meet us with a burst of melody as we pushed back the inner door. The player was performing to an empty church, and I recognised the rhythm of the tumbling notes as Bach's. How many times have I clambered the gallery stairs of this same old church to listen to the music of John Sebastian! Strangely enough, it was the recollection of those occasions which had prompted my visit this afternoon. Good old John! who can sweep away the cobwebs like a March wind with one of his fugues, set one smiling at the tender grace of a pastorale, or thrill one with that solemn and awful summons to Calvary in the dramatic opening of the Passion Music.