The transportation in the center of London is confined entirely to busses and cabs. There is too much traffic and the streets are too narrow for street railways. In the outer parts of the city a number of street cars, or “trams” as they are called, are operated. Every bus and every tram has seats on the roof, and they are the choice seats on the vehicle. From one of these top seats is the place to see London, and the traveler has the advantage of not only being able to note the sights on the pavement and the walks, but he can look in the second-story windows and see how people live. There are no great skyscrapers in London, the business houses usually being six stories or less in height. The residences are nearly always three or four stories, and either built flush to the street, with a garden or court in the rear, or back from the street and the yard inclosed by a high stone wall. The Englishman goes on the old principle that an Englishman’s house is his castle, and puts up high walls between himself and his neighbors. A front porch, or an open lawn in front of a private house, would be regarded as freakish or an evidence of insanity. On the other hand, there are many public parks and pretty green squares in London which are breathing-spots for the congestion of humanity within this great city.
The “City of London” which has a Lord Mayor is the little old city which is the hub of the whole business. It is the section of the banks and the great institutions of finance, and is about the size of Hutchinson, but a solid mass of stone structures and narrow streets. Only about 30,000 people reside there. The London of the present is London County, covers about 900 square miles and is therefore about the size of Reno county. That is the area in which 8,000,000 people live. It is governed by a County Council, elected by the taxpayers, which is a very active body and is doing much to improve the conditions. London has fine water and visitors are even urged to drink it—something new in Europe. Taxes, or “rates” as they are called, are high, and include everything from real estate and personal to income tax and a stamp tax on receipts and drafts. The great problem of improving a city is to get the money without distressing the people. It requires large sums to make and care for parks, streets, schools, paving, water-works, light, and the other things that the city must have in order to be modern, healthful, and comfortable. The citizens everywhere groan under the weight of taxation, and yet they should not if the money is properly spent. These streets, police, schools, fire departments and such are as necessary as the walls of our homes, which also require money to build and maintain. The certainty of death and taxes is proverbial. There is no way to avoid the former and the only way to dodge taxes is to go to an uninhabited island and live by yourself. And then if some other individual comes along, the first thing the original tax-dodger will do is to tax the other fellow.
The ordinary English home has the front room of the house for the dining-room. The “drawing-room” is at the rear and the kitchen quite a distance from the dining-room. The drawing-room is used only on special occasions and the dining-room is the family living-room. The English are great home-makers, and their houses are always well furnished and look as if folks lived there. On the continent the fashion is to go out for the evening meal to restaurant or café, but the Englishman comes home and stays there. The table is spread with the family and intimate friends around, and supper is served at 8 o’clock or later. You see the Englishman has already had three meals—breakfast, luncheon, and tea; so the evening meal is late. To me the most attractive part of English life is that in the home. The Englishman gathers his family about him, pulls down the blinds, reads his newspaper and is in his castle, which no lord or duke can enter without his consent. This simple virtue of home-living is rare in Europe, and in the family circle which gathers at the table and at the altar the young Englishman gets the habit of thought and manner which marks him wherever he goes, and which has made his country the greatest of all the nations.
The North of Ireland
Londonderry, Ireland, September 8.
Crossing the Irish Sea from Fishguard in southern Wales to Rosslare in southern Ireland, I met a jolly Irishman from Cork. When I told him I was going to the North of Ireland he remonstrated. “Don’t do it, mon. Every Irishman up there is a Scotchman!” But I had seen the beautiful South of Ireland and we had to come to Londonderry to take the ship for home, so the warning of the Corker was in vain. I found that he was right. Soon after we left Dublin we came upon linen factories and distilleries and Presbyterian churches, people too busy to jolly a stranger, and cannily seeking the surest way to a sixpence. In the South of Ireland no one is too busy to talk with the stranger and to tell him all the legendary lore of the country, while in the North one shrinks from stopping the busy worker, even to ask him which way is straight up. The people of both ends of Ireland are pleasant and the American dollar is greatly admired, but the process of extracting it is painless, even pleasant, in Cork, while it hurts enough to notice in Belfast. The South is almost entirely agricultural and is social, while the North is filled with factories and notices not to allow your heads to stick out of the windows. The people of the South are poorer but happier; the people of the North are busier and more worried in their looks. The Irishman in the South smiles pleasantly without an apparent thought of the money he is going to make, the Irishman in the North smiles after he gets the money.
All of this Emerald isle is green, and picturesque scenery with lakes and falls, glens and fields, rugged coasts and beautiful beaches is to be found from Queenstown to Portrush.