Amongst the very many famous people who either live or have lived at Hampstead may be mentioned Mr. Gerald du Maurier, Constable, Lord Byron, Lord Leverhulme, John Masefield, Joe Beckett, the younger Pitt, Miss Marie Lloyd, Keats, Madame Pavlova, Romney, Claude Duval and Richard Turpin, the last of whom, I believe, bequeathed his spurs to the borough in grateful memory of all that it had done for him. There are no highwaymen to be met at Hampstead Heath now, but the solicitor and house-agent of the man from whom I am trying to lease Number——but there, perhaps I had better not go into that just now. I cannot however omit to say a few more words about Keats, because the nation is trying to buy his house, although it has not yet been decided which of them is to live in it if they get it. In the garden of this house the poet is said to have written his celebrated "Ode to a Nightingale," and the nightingale may still be heard on Hampstead Heath in June. Presumably it is the same bird, and the lines,
"Thou wast not born for death, immortal bird;
No hungry generations tread thee down,"
must be taken as a remarkable instance of literary foresight, for crowds of people have for years been trying in vain to trample the brave bird down and have evidently been hungry, or they would never have left so much sandwich-paper about.
Oh, and there is yet one more notable resident of Hampstead, as you have doubtless just gathered, and that is myself, or will be if those accurséd——but another time, perhaps.
Evoe.
Conductor (to alighting passenger, who has rung the bell several times). "That'll do, my banana queen. One ring is sufficient—not 'The Blue Bells of Scotland.'"