With the unpurposed toil of many years.
But once—ah, once!—the accordion's wheezy strains
Led my poor heart to April-smelling lanes.
A SUNDAY NIGHT
ANYWHERE
There is something almost freakish in the thoughtful calm of the London Sunday. During the night the town seems to have cleaned and preened itself, and the creamy, shadow-fretted streets of the Sabbath belong more to some Southern region than to Battersea or Barnsbury. The very houses have a detached, folded manner, like volumes of abstruse theological tracts. From every church tower sparks of sound leap out on the expectant air, mingling and clashing with a thousand others; and the purple spires fling themselves to heaven with the joy of a perfect thought. In the streets there is an atmosphere of best clothes and best manners. There is a flutter of bright frocks. Father, in his black coat and silk hat, walks seriously, as befits one with responsibilities, what time mother at home is preparing the feast. The children, poor darlings, do not skip or jump or laugh. They walk sedately, in their starchy attire, holding father's arm and trying to realize that it really is Sunday, and therefore very sinful to fling oneself about. The people taking their appetite stroll before midday dinner look all so sleek and complacent that one would like to borrow money from them. The 'buses rumble with a cheeriness that belongs not to weekdays; their handrails gleam with a new brightness, and the High Street, with shops shuttered and barred, bears not the faintest resemblance to the High Street you know so well, even as policemen, with helmets and tunics, look surprisingly unlike human beings. The water-carts seem to work with cleaner, lighter water, and as the sun catches the sprayed stream it whips it into a thousand drops of white fire. It is Sunday. The roads are blazing with white ribbons under the noon sun. A stillness broods over all, a stillness only accentuated by the brazen voice of the Salvation Army band and the miserable music of winkles rattling on dinner-plates. The colours of the little girls' dresses slash the grey backgrounds of the pavement with rich streaks. Spears of sunshine, darting through the sparse plane-trees, play all about them, and ring them with radiance; and they look so fresh and happy that you want to kiss them. It is Sunday.
Yes, it is Sunday, and you will realize that as the day wears on. These pleasant people are walking about the streets for a very definite reason. What is that? It is that there is nothing else to do. That is the tragedy of the London Sunday; there is nothing else to do. Why does the submerged man get drunk on Sunday? There is nothing else to do. Why does the horse-faced lady, with nice clothes, go to church on Sunday? There is nothing else to do. Why do people overeat themselves on Sunday? There is nothing else to do. Why do parents make themselves stiff and uncomfortable in new clothes, and why do they get irritable and smack their children if they rouse them from their after-dinner sleep? Because there is nothing else to do. Why does the young clerk hang around the West End bars, and get into trouble with doubtful ladies? Because there is nothing else to do.
And in the evening you feel this more terribly. If it is summer, you may listen to blatant bands in our very urban parks, which have been thoughtfully and artistically "arranged" by stout gentlemen on the London County Council, whose motto seems to be: "Let's have something we all know!" or you may go for a 'bus-ride to Richmond, Hampton Court, St. Albans, or Uxbridge, or Epping Forest. If you want to know, merely for information, to what depths London can sink in the way of amusing itself on Sundays, then I recommend the bands in the parks. Otherwise there is something to be said for the 'bus-ride. You cannot enjoy yourself in London on the Lord's Day, but you can take London with you into some lonely spot and there re-create it. Jump on the Chingford 'bus any Sunday evening, and let yourself go with the crowd. Out in the glades of the Forest things are happening. The dappled shades of the wood flash with colour and noise, and, if you are human, you will soon have succumbed to the contagion of the carnival. Voices of all varieties, shrill, hoarse, and rich, rise in the heavy August air, outside "The Jolly Wagoners," and the jingle of glasses and the popping of corks compete with the professional hilarity of the vendors of novelties. Here and there bunches of confetti shoot up, whirling and glimmering; elsewhere a group of girls execute the cake-walk or the can-can, their van sustaining fusillade after fusillade of the forbidden squirters, their rear echoing to "chi-ikes," catcalls, and other appreciations, until an approaching motor-'bus scatters them in squealing confusion. By the bridge, the blithe, well-bitten Bacchanalians offer to fight one another, and then decide to kiss. The babble of talk and laughter becomes a fury; the radiant maidens and the bold boys become the eternal tragedy. Sometimes there is a dance, and the empurpled girls are "taken round" by their masterful squires, the steps of the dance involving much swirling of green, violet, pink, and azure petticoats.