From the Lakes of Killarney to the Golden Horn. Field Henry Martyn

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СКАЧАТЬ any impression upon it, deserves the support of all good men. I hope fervently that the present movement may leave a moral result that shall remain after the actors in it have passed away.

      CHAPTER V.

      TWO SIDES OF LONDON. – IS MODERN CIVILIZATION A FAILURE?

June 15th.

      It is now "the height of the season" in London. Parliament is in session, and "everybody" is in town. Except the Queen, who is in the Highlands, almost all the Royal family are here; and (except occasional absences on the Continent, or as Ministers at foreign courts, or as Governors of India, of Canada, of Australia, and other British colonies) probably almost the whole nobility of the United Kingdom are at this moment in London. Of course foreigners flock here in great numbers. So crowded is every hotel, that it is difficult to find lodgings. We have found very central quarters in Dover street, near Piccadilly, close by the clubs and the parks, and the great West End, the fashionable quarter of London.

      Of course the display from the assemblage of so much rank and wealth, and the concourse of such a multitude from all parts of the United Kingdom, and indeed from all parts of the earth, is magnificent. We go often to Hyde Park Corner, to see the turnout in the afternoon. In Rotten Row (strange name for the most fashionable riding ground in Europe) is the array of those on horseback; while the drive adjoining is appropriated to carriages. The mounted cavalcade makes a gallant sight. What splendid horses, and how well these English ladies ride! Here come the equipages of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Edinburgh, with their fair brides from northern capitals, followed by an endless roll of carriages of dukes and marquises and earls, and lords and ladies of high degree. It seems as if all the glory of the world were here. In strange contrast with this pomp and show, whom should we meet, as we were riding in the Park on Saturday, but Moody (whom John Wanamaker, of Philadelphia, was taking out for an airing to prepare him for the fatigues of the morrow), who doubtless looked upon all this as a Vanity Fair, much greater than that which Bunyan has described!

      But not to regard it in a severe spirit of censure, it is a sight such as brings before us, in one moving panorama, the rank and beauty, the wealth and power, of the British Empire, represented in these lords of the realm. Such a sight cannot be seen anywhere else in Europe, not in the Champs Elysées or the Bois de Boulogne of Paris, nor the Prater at Vienna.

      Take another scene. Let us start after ten o'clock and ride down into "the city," – a title which, as used here, belongs only to the old part of London, beyond Temple Bar, which is now given up wholly to business, and where "nobody that is anybody" lives. Here are the Bank of England, the Royal Exchange, and the great commercial houses, that have their connections in all parts of the earth. The concentration of wealth is enormous, represented by hundreds and thousands of millions sterling. One might almost say that half the national debts of the world are owned here. There is not a power on the globe that is seeking a loan, that does not come to London. France, Germany, Russia, Turkey, all have recourse to its bankers to provide the material of war, or means for the construction of the great works and monuments of peace. Our American railways have been built largely with English money. Alas, that so many have proved unfortunate investments!

      It is probably quite within bounds to say that the accumulation of wealth at this centre is greater than ever was piled up before on the globe, even in the days of the Persian or Babylonian Empires; or when the kings of Egypt built the Pyramids; or when Rome sat on the seven hills, and subject provinces sent tribute from all parts of the earth; or in that Mogul Empire, whose monuments at Delhi and Agra are still the wonder of India.

      Can it be that a city so vast, so populous, so rich, has a canker at its root? Do not judge hastily, but see for yourself. Leave Hyde Park Corner, and its procession of nobles and princes; leave "the city," with its banks and counting-houses, and plunge into another quarter of London. One need not go far away, for the hiding-places of poverty and wretchedness are often under the very shadow of the palaces of the rich. Come, then, and grope through these narrow streets. You turn aside to avoid the ragged, wretched creatures that crouch along your path. But come on, and if you fear to go farther, take a policeman with you. Wind your way into narrow passages, into dark, foul alleys, up-stairs, story after story, each worse than the last. Summon up courage to enter the rooms. You are staggered by the foul smell that issues as you open the doors. But do not go back; wait till your eye is a little accustomed to the darkness, and you can see more clearly. Here is a room hardly big enough for a single bed, yet containing six, eight, ten, or a dozen persons, all living in a common herd, cooking and eating such wretched food as they have, and sleeping on the floor together.

      What can be expected of human beings, crowded in such miserable habitations, living in filth and squalor, and often pinched with hunger? Not only is refinement impossible, but comfort, or even decency. What manly courage would not give way, sapped by the deadly poison of such an air? Who wonders that so many rush to the gin-shop to snatch a moment of excitement or forgetfulness? What feminine delicacy could stand the foul and loathsome contact of such brutal degradation? Yet this is the way in which tens, and perhaps hundreds of thousands of the population of London live.

      But it is at night that these low quarters are most fearful. Then the population turns into the streets, which are brilliantly lighted up by the flaring gas-jets. Then the gin-shops are in their glory, crowded by the lowest and most wretched specimens of humanity – men and women in rags – old, gray-headed men and haggard women, and young girls, – and even children, learning to be imps of wickedness almost as soon as they are born. After a few hours of this excitement they reel home to their miserable dens. And then each wretched room becomes more hideous than before, – for drinking begets quarrelling; and, cursing and swearing and fighting, the wretched creatures at last sink exhausted on the floor, to forget their misery in a few hours of troubled sleep.

      Such is a true, but most inadequate, picture of one side of London. Who that sees it, or even reads of it, can wonder that so many of these "victims of civilization," finding human hearts harder than the stones of the street, seek refuge in suicide? I never cross London Bridge without recalling Hood's "Bridge of Sighs," and stopping to lean over the parapet, thinking of the tragedies which those "dark arches" have witnessed, as poor, miserable creatures, mad with suffering, have rushed here and thrown themselves over into "the black-flowing river"2 beneath, eager to escape

      "Anywhere, anywhere,

      Out of the world!"

      Such is the dreadful cancer which is eating at the heart of London – poverty and misery, ending in vice and crime, in despair and death. It is a fearful spectacle. But is there any help for it? Can anything be done to relieve this gigantic human misery? Or is the case desperate, beyond all hope or remedy?

      Of course there are many schemes of reformation and cure. Some think it must come by political instrumentality, by changes in the laws; others have no hope but in a social regeneration, or reconstruction of society, others still rely only on moral and religious influences.

      There has arisen in Europe, within the last generation, a multitude of philosophers who have dreamed that it was possible so to reorganize or reconstruct society, to adjust the relations of labor and capital, as to extinguish poverty; so that there shall be no more poor, no more want. Sickness there may be, disease, accident, and pain, but the amount of suffering will be reduced to a minimum; so that at least there shall be no unnecessary pain, none which it is possible for human skill or science to relieve. Elaborate works have been written, in which the machinery is carefully adjusted, and the wheels so oiled that there is no jar or friction. These schemes are very beautiful; alas! that they should be mere creations of the fancy. The apparatus is too complicated and too delicate, and generally breaks to pieces in the very setting up. The fault of all these social philosophies is that they ignore the natural selfishness of man, his pride, avarice, and ambition. Every man wants the first place in the scale of eminence. If men were morally right – if they had Christian humility or self-abnegation, and each were willing to take СКАЧАТЬ