But afar in the Forest there is Sabbath peace, the sound of far bells, the cry of the thrush, the holy pattering of leaves. The beeches, meeting aloft and entwining, fling the light and the spirit of the cathedral to the mossy floors. Here is purity and humanity. The air beats freshly on the face. Away in the soft blue distance is a shadowy suggestion of rolling country, the near fields shimmering under the sweet, hot sky of twilight, and the distant uplands telling of calm and deep peace in other places. Truly a court of love, and truly loved by those who, for an hour or so, dwell in it. Tread lightly, you that pass. It may move you to mirth, but there is nothing mirthful here; only the eternal sorrow and the eternal joy. Perchance you do not make love in this way; but love is love.... Under every brooding oak recline the rapt couples, snatching their moments in this velvety green. Drowsy fragrance is everywhere. The quiet breeze disorders stray ringlets, and sometimes light laughter is carried sleepily to sleepy ears. Love, says an old Malayan chanty which I learned at West India Dock—Love is kind to the least of men. God will it so!
But if it be winter, then the Londoner is badly hit on Sundays. The cafés and bars are miserable, deserted by their habitués and full only of stragglers from the lost parts, who have wandered here unknowingly. The waiters are off their form. They know their Sunday evening clientèle and they despise it; it is not the real thing. The band is off its form. The kitchen is off its form. It is Sunday.
There are no shows of any kind, unless it be some "private performance" of the Stage Society, for which tickets have to be purchased in the week. Certainly there are, in some of the West End and most of the suburban halls, the concerts of the National Sunday League, but the orchestras and the singers are really not of a kind to attract the musical temperament. The orchestras play those hackneyed bits of Wagner and Tchaikowsky and Rossini of which all the world must be everlastingly sick, and the singers sing those tiresome songs which so satisfy the musical taste of Bayswater—baritone songs about the Army and the Navy and their rollicking ways, and about old English country life; tenor songs about Grey Eyes and Roses and Waiting and Parting and Coming Back; soprano songs about Calling and Wondering and Last Night's Dance and Remembering and Forgetting—foolish words, foolish melodies, and clumsy orchestration. But they seem to please the well-dressed crowd that comes to listen to them, so I suppose it is justified. I suppose it really interprets their attitude toward human passion. I don't know.... Anyway, it is sorry stuff.
If you don't go to these shows, then there is nothing to do but walk about. I think the most pathetic sight to be seen in London is the Strand on a Sunday night. The whole place is shut up, almost one might say, hermetically sealed, except that Mooney's and Ward's and Romano's are open. Along its splendid length parade crowds and crowds of Jew couples and other wanderers from the far regions. They look lost. They look like a Cup Tie crowd from the North. They don't walk; they drift. They look helpless; they have an air expressive of: "Well, what the devil shall we do now?" I have a grim notion that members of the London County Council, observing them—if, that is, members of the London County Council ever do penance by walking down the Strand on Sunday—take to themselves unction. "Ah!" they gurgle in their hearts, "ah!—beautiful. Nice, orderly crowd; all walking about nice and orderly; enjoying themselves in the right way. Ah! Yes. We like to see the people enjoy themselves."
And, in their Christian way, they pat themselves on the back (if not too stout) and go home to their cigars and liqueurs and whatever else they may want in the way of worldly indulgence. It is Sunday.
Some years ago there was a delightful song that devastated New York. It was a patriotic song, and it was called: "The sun is always shining on Broadway." At the time, I translated this into English, for rendering at a private show, the refrain being that the sun is always shining in the Strand. So it is. Dull as the day may be elsewhere, there is always light of some kind in the Strand. It is the gayest, most Londonish street in London. It is jammed with Life, for it is the High Street of the world. Men of every country and clime have walked down the Strand. Whatever is to be found in other streets in other parts of the world is to be found in the Strand. It is the homeliest, mateyest street in the world. Let's all go down it!
But not—not, my dears, on Sundays. For a wise County Council has decreed that whatsoever things are gay, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are human and lovely—these things shall not be thought upon on Sundays.
The English Sunday at home is in many cases even worse than the Sunday out. Of course it has considerably improved since the hideous eighties, but there are still survivals of the old Sabbath, not so much among the mass of the people as among the wealthy. The new kindly Sabbath has arisen with the new attitude of children towards parents. The children of the £300-a-year parents are possessed of a natural pluck which is lacking in the children of the £3,000-a-year. They know what they want and they usually see that they get it.
Among the kindlier folk, in the suburbs, Sunday is the only day when Father is really at home with the children, and it is made the most of. It is the children's day. Morning, afternoon, and evening are given up to them. In the summer there is the great treat of tea in the garden. In the winter tea is taken in the room that is sometimes called the "drawing-room" by Mother and the "reception-room" by the house-agent; and there are all manner of delicate cakes and, perhaps, muffins, which the youngsters are allowed to toast themselves.