A MYSTERY OF LONDON.
A drizzling mist begins to fall. The clock of St. Clement's strikes seven. A November fog lowers its invidious veil over the bright face of London. I hurry on, impatient to listen to the rival strains of the cricket and kettle, who, I know from a mysterious singing in my ears, are gaily carolling on my hearth in Clare Market. "There is no place like home!"
With these thoughts I redouble my speed, even as the jaded cab-horse quickens his broken knees when he sees in his mind's eye, through distant streets, the door of the livery stable. The fog has the thickness of repeated blankets. It is no light task for a blind dame to thread a needle in the dark. That task, however, is as light as the sun with 20,000 additional lamps on its birthday, compared to the difficulty of threading Temple Bar in a fog! But patience, like the boy Jones, will get through anything.
I have shaken off the mud of the city: I breathe the balmy smoke of Westminster. My high-low, or rather my high-lows (for I have two) heat once more the proud Strand. I pass the antique apple-woman on my left; on my right I leave Holloway and his far-famed leg of twenty years' standing—that Wandering Jew of advertisements which is perpetually running through the papers. I drop a sympathetic pill to the memory of Aldborough. Proud Earl! Never did mortal lay the flattering ointment to his soul as thou hast done! I hurry onward.
But what fragrant perfume, stolen or strayed from Araby the Blest, plays round my nostrils? It cannot be the fog, for it is so like stewed eels. It salutes my nose with all the warmth of a long-absent friend. I follow it, as Hamlet did the Ghost. An invisible attraction pulls me gently on, even as the magnetic duck which a child leads where he will by applying a load-stone to its nasal organ. I neither see, nor feel, nor hear; I only smell. My whole nature is standing on the bridge of my nose. How blind is man! In my ardour I have nearly upset a respectable stranger: I beg his most unadulterated pardon a hundredfold; but he heeds me not. A rich necklace of pies, Twickenham's fairest jewellery, dazzles his weak vision, and fastens, as with a golden hook, all his eyes. He is under a Savory spell, longing for More. A hundred appetites glisten from his cavernous brows. Epicurus and Dando seem to have chosen his high cheek-bones for their respective thrones. His mouth opens and shuts a thousand times, just like the Strand Theatre opposite; but, alas! takes in nothing by each new motion. Hunger could not well have spared a leaner Frenchman. Poor Monsieur! I have disturbed thy joyous reverie, and would fain make amends for it. "Here is sixpence to buy thyself luscious pies, freighted with all the boundless wealth of the generous eel." But he is as deaf as a relation that is rich. His thoughts are seated at the rich banquet within.
The parish engine is pulled along by a lusty beadle, like an invalid chair at Brighton by one of the plethoric Sons of Plush. Six little boys subscribe their voices and their strength, but there is more of the former than the latter. There is merriment in Drury Lane; loud cries of "Fire" play gaily upon the ear. Even a policeman—that rarest object of vertu—is seen. He illuminates for two seconds the busy scene with the "light in his laughing eye" of bull. The fire-escape is unrolled, like a tall mummy, from its dark slumber of ages, and stretches its spider limbs high into the air as it yawns again into life. It crawls, like a centipede on its hind leg, as far as Temple Bar, and there draws itself up, like a big note of exclamation, and makes a full stop. Peradventure it reaches the fire three days afterwards. There is a time for all things.
But whose is that ecstatic figure? It is as familiar to my vision as Cooper in George Barnwell. Who can it be? Yes—no—yes! It cannot be! By St. Jullien, it is the dismal Child of France! The clock of St. Clement's strikes ten. What! Monsieur, hast thou for three foggy hours been poring over those self-same pies? Thy admiration smacks, methinks, of the bigot. Thou art indeed an enthusiast. Hie thee to Soyer! Catch him between a poem and a pâté, bursting with the richest stuffing of the goose—I mean the pâté. Perform the same rites before his household pans of stew; let thy every limb speak thy admiration, and my head of hair, bought but yesterday at Truefitt's, he will give thee, for half such prodigal worship, thy weight in pies, be they of gooseberry or mutton, or the ham and veal dedicated to Thespis, or even the delicate eel, the dear object of thy silent love! Concealment has indeed fed upon thy damask cheek, and picked it—would I could say clean!—to the bone. "Voici, mon Noble Seigneur, de quoi te régaler." He sees not the proffered Joseph; he hears not my tones, sweet with charity. He stirs not: he stands on holy pavement. Poor Frenchman, I would tarry with thee, but I must rush me home to supper. Haven't I tripe waiting kindly for me! My clay, too, points to heavy wet; and my pewter will lose its head if I am not quickly with it. Adieu.