Rambling reminiscences of a residence abroad. England, Guernsey, etc

Chapter I

London Past and Present I — 12 CHYPTER II. The Dark Side of London Life — The Social Dregs 1 _ ..7 CHAPTFK III. The Kew Gardens and Richmond Park — Ruminations over some of John Bull's Peculiarities 28- iq

CHAPTER IV.

Further Experiences of Richmond — Gypsies — John, Earl Russell, &c. 40 — 48

CHAPTER V.

Windsor Castle. Past and Present — George IV — The Lawless Lord-, of Other Days— The Royal Stables— The Parks, &c 4S— 59

CHAPTER VI.

The Inauguration of the Second World's Fair in London — The Fine Art Department — American Exhibition — Lettertothe "Times" — New-Made Friends 59 — 71

CHAPTER VII.

Letter to the "Times," referred to in Previous Chapter — Gladstone, Bright &c, &c 72- 76 CHAPTERVIII. The Shaw Farm of Prince Albert — English Agriculture — Sto-^k Breeding, &c, — Political Influence of Ihe Landlords — Duk' of Somerset 77— 86

CHAPTER IX.

Hampton Court — Mons. Assolant — Cardinal A'olsley 86 — 101 CHAPTER N. Ilarrow-on-the Hill — Byron'-; Early Days — Hampstead Heath — Rural Sports — Kissing inthe Ring, Highgate, &c, 101 — 1 16

CHAPTER XI

A London Law Court — The English on America — The Duke of Somerset — The Land Laws, &c , — The Courts of Queen's Bench and Exchequer — Nomination of Sheriffs — Lord Mayor's Banquets— The Right Honorable William Cubitt, M. P., Lord Mayor of London — A Village Graveyard — Curious Epitaphs. 117 — 130

CHAPTER XII.

Sanitary Science — House and Town Sewerage — Its Influence on Health and Longevity 131 — 142

CHAPTER XIII.

The Royal Mint — A Distinguished Man and a Club Cub — Sir John Shelley— The Illusions of History 143—150 TABLE OF CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XIV.

The Derby Day— British Love of Sport— The Popularity of the Turf —The Celebrated Racer Eclipse 151—160

CHAPTER XV.

Dover— Fashionable Society on the Seaside — The past and Present —Dangers on the Old Road 160—167

CHAPTER XVI.

Dover — The Cinque Ports — Ancient Customs— Walmer Castle — Deal— Death of the Duke of Wellington— Thp Middle Age Monks — Religious Intolerance 168 — 176

CHAPTER XVII.

Folkestone— Club Life — Martello Towers — Shorncliff Camp and the Organization ofthe British Army — Visit to a Country Hjuse — Lord Ellenborough — Etiquette, &c 17s — 184

CHAPTER XVIII.

Visit to a Country House— Lord Ellenborough — Matters of Etiquette — Osmond Priaulx — Tourists I84 — 188

CHAPTER XIX.

Romney Marsh and Dungenees — The Military Canal — Napoleon — Plans for the Invasion of England — The Origin of English Lighthouses — A Type of the Modern British Politician 189 — 199

CHAPTER XX.

From Folkestone by Dover. Deal and Canterbury to London — The Cathedral — The "Ashes" of Kings — The Fate of Sovereigns, &c. 200 — 208

CHAPTER XXI

Chatham — Faversham — Rochester — Sir Francis Doyle — Gads' Hill — Cobham Hall — Mss Letters of Sir John Peyton, Governor of the Tower and of the Island of Jersey — Edmond Beales The Reformer 208 — 217

CHAPTER XXII.

Seven Oaks — Montreal — The Amhersts — Sir Philip Sidney — Knoll Castle — Showmen— Towbridge Wells — Battle Abbey — Return to London 217 — 231

CHAPTER XXIII.

The Anglo-Norman Isle of Guernsey — Literature &c, — The Sporting Club — The Institutions of the Island, &c. — Hauteville House, Victor Hugo, Private Theatricals, &c. — Public Lectures, &c. — St. John's Readings — Lectures on Electricity — Workingmen's Association — Remarks by Colonel J. L. Peyton — Physical Features, Former State, &c. — The Island One Hundred Years Ago — Religion, Past and Present, &c 23 1 — 268 APPENDICES. Appendix A. — Trees — Lines by Georges Metevier 269 270 Appendix B. — Letters of Dr. Benjamin Franklin 271 — 297 Appendix C. — Prominent Guernseymen since 1600

CHAPTER I. LONDON PAST AND PRESENT.

On the 22nd os November, 1861, after a boisterous voyage across the South Atlantic from Charleston, S. C, bythe Burmuda and Azore Islands, in the Confederate man-of-war, Nashville, Capt. Robert W. Pegram, commanding, we found ourselves comfortably ensconced in a West-end (London) Hotel. — Every one has heard of London and its November fogs — Few Americans know what either exactly is. Daniel Web ster, after his return to the LTnited States, was asked what he thought of London, and replied, "I have not yet done wonder ing." This language gives expression to the sentiment with which it has always inspired us, and we are sure we shall never cease to wonder at London or a genuine London fog, dim, dreary, sullen as it is, particularly in November, when it is a vile, double distilled fog ofthe most intolerable kind.

Winter has already scattered his shafts, and this penetrating fog conies like a demon in search ofthe dead strewn in town and country, through forest and field. It is cold, it is wet, it is dark, it shrouds all things in a ghostly gloom, a smoke hke darkness. But for the gas lights it would be black as the ninth plague of Egypt at mid-day. Looking out of our window in Trafalgar Square, the morni"g after our arrival, we saw the town wrapped in a vast winding sheet of gray mist and yellow smoke. It was eleven o'clock, still there was no sign of day ; gas blazed in street lamps and shop windows. The smoke was thick, the mist thicker, the sky black ; few persons were abroad ; fewer cabs, and the drivers of these few shouted appar ently at the darkness through which they slowly groped their way.

About one o'clock the fog for a few moments cleared up, and seemed sneaking off into the country. The blackened sky became yellow, and the sun loimed as through a glass darkly.— Our spirits were reviving when the sun quickly covered himself again with the clouds of night and sailed unseen across the sky. Stiff in every limb, with tender feet and heavy head, the effects ofa winter voyage across the ocean, a tour round our chamber contented us on this our first day in the great metropolis. Look ing out on the cloudy, muggy, dark and wretched streets,strangely illuminated with flickering gas-lights, if the writer did not for the first time in his life, wish himself another man, he certainly wished himself in another place. The vitality of our youth was not to be quenched, however, by such surroundings, and substi tuting the philosophy of maturer years for any depressing heavi ness under which we were suffering, we soon plucked up spirits, and in a few weeks commenced those explorations which have left us ever since, like Mr. Webster, "wondering."

Let us take a glance at this grim old metropolis : There is no romance about the London ofthe present ; tourists have rummaged it from end to end — it is known the world over from Belgravia to Bethnel Green, from Camberwell to Campdentown. Yet it still in terests and fills the stranger with astonishment. The more he knows of it, the more hewishes to know. Widely understood as it may be the number familiar with that great capital is infinitesimal when compared with the sedentary world who are almost totally ignorant of all but its name. This is some excuse tor re-telling the old story of its wonders and mysteries. The stranger in London is bewildered at its extent, its gloomy grandeur, its grim magnificence He sees before him a labyrin thine confusion of streets, straight, broad and spacious, narrow, crooked and filthy, according to locality, and intersecting each other at every possible angle.

With a correct general idea ofthe metropolis, gathered from a chart, he cannot find his way from one quarter toanother without the aid of a guide, or even retain his knowledge ofthe points of the compass, unless he remains in the vicinity of such leading thoroughfares as the Strand, Oxford Street or Piccadilly. He may spend weeks with all the ardour of an explorer, perambulating the side-walks and visiting the principal objects of curiosity, and still have an imperfect idea of the place. The mass of highways and byways is still as intricate as a Chinese puzzle, though during the last decade large sums have been ex pended in straightening old and opening new avenues for the purpose of simplifying the system of streets, and more readily ac commodating the traffic. The city of London proper commences at Temple Bar, and covers an area of little more than one square mile, and contains a population of 111,784 persons only.

As the gateway is without beauty and obstructs the most crowded of London's thoroughfares, its retention is a striking illustration of the conservative character ofthe English mind, ofthe tenacity with which our an cestors cling to whatever is old. Passing this so-called barrier, we are in the city proper. It is not the city of former times, full of densely inhabited houses and fine residences, belonging to the chief merchants, the landed gentry and the nobility — the great landlords of the country ; the city, as it once was, of small and narrow streets, of mean lath and plas ter houses on rickety wooden frames and of all imaginable sizes and shapes ; the city of badly cleaned and foully smelling streets, and of desolating plagues bursting forth from time to time and carrying off myriads of people.

On the contrary, it is the city pur excellence ofthe trade, business and commerce ofthe modern world. The city of the Bank, the Mint and the exchange of Lombard Street, Cornhill and Mincing Lane, of warehouses and Counting rooms, of vaults and offices, in a word, of those great commercial houses whose extended operations embrace the entire globe. The city where the Bankers, brokers, merchants, stock jobbers, money changers, Jew and Gentile, most do love to con gregate, and where they regularly cast up the accounts of the world. Fleet street and the Strand are the great arteries of the city, and, passing by Temple Bar from Charing Cross, extend to Ludgate Hill, where St. Paul's rears its towering front. Here making the circuit ofthe Cathedral and thence branching into Cheapside, Poultry, Cornhill and Cannon streets These are a few only of the great arteries through which the tide of population and business flows.

Thousands of others in all directions are daily ehoaked with vehicles and myriads of human beings who swarm like bees on every spot. Around this focus or centre of business have grown up, with incredible rapidity, the different quarters known as Brompton, Hammersmith, St. John's Wood, etc , which with the "city" constitute what is known as the Metropolis, or the Metropolitan district, spreading over an area 18 miles long by 14 wide, and containing a population of about 3,800,000 souls. This is the monster London which. has been so well styled a province covered with houses. The houses are built almost entirely of brick and are generally inferior in size, architectural ornament and imposing appearance. They inspire no idea, indeed, that they are the palaces ofthe rich and great. The humid atmosphere, causing the smoke to settle down upon the dwellings, soon changes their color, the brick becoming of a dingy gray, the whole assuming a dreary and dismal appearance.

Buckingham Palace, the residence ofthe Queen, and on which vast sums have been lavished, during the reign of George IV and since, is not equal to many ofthe country seats of the nobility, and St. James' Palace, where the Royal Drawing-rooms or re ceptions are held, and which was the town residence ofthe royal family until the accession of Queen Victoria, is a low, red brick building resembling a lying-in hospital, for which purpose it was originally intended. Excepting St. Paul's Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, the New Parliament Houses, Somerset House, the British Museum, the University of London, the principal club houses, and some ofthe fine old historical residences, such as Northumberland and Chesterfield houses and the new hotels, there is little in the way ofarchitectural beauty or symmetry of which London can boast.

It is a monotonous wilderness of brick and mortar, where, the stranger sees little evidence, save upon stated occasions of solemn processions, ofthe existence (fan opulent aristocracy and brilliant court, 'she paucity of fine private residences in this great city, the seat ofthe wealthiest of commercial empires, is striking, and can only be explained upon the hypothesis that the money which would embellish any other capital is elsewhere expended. And this is, indeed, the fact. In England the proprietorship of landed property carries with it greater dignity and influence than in any olher country. Hence the nobleman directs his attention special ly to the improvement of his country estates. On these he spends the chief part of his time, his talents and capital in making agricultural experiments, in rearing fine stock, and in growing large crops.

Here, if he belongs tothe old nobility, he keeps upa baronial castle or a stately hall, dispensing a princely hospitality. If he is ofthe class of new rich, he builds a spacious mansion and endeavors to rival "my lords." These large estates have grown out ofthe feudal system and the law of primogeniture, which Dr. Johnson rather justified, because "that it makes but one fool in a family," and constitutes one ofthe peculiar features of England. — Among the most magnificent we remember to have seen, during a long residence in the country, may be mentioned in passing — those ofthe Marquis of Breadalbane, whose property extends on a straight line from his mansion a distance of ioo miles, and the Duke of Sutherland's, which covers a whole county in Scotland, extending from sea to sea. The Duke of Norfolk's park in Sus sex, is fifteen miles in circuit, and the Island of Lewis, containing 500,000 acres, is owned by a single individual ! she process of absorption is still going on, the larger domains growing larger and larger as the number of proprietors decrease.

A hundred years ago there were 250,000 proprietors in England and now there are only 30,000. This is a great evil certainly and must be remedied. Urgent necessity there is oi nationalizing the land, as the present state of affairs both in England and Ireland show. Against this increasing evil John Bright, the late J. S. Mill and the Manchester party generally, have raised their voices and are proceeding to "agitate" the country. The English nobility and the landed gentry only know Lon don during the season. What the metropolitan mansions lack, however, in exterior ornament' is more than compensated by the expensive and luxurious style of their interior decorations and furniture. In the inside, everything is of a sumptuous and elegant description. Nothing is wanting which refinement, taste and cultivation can suggest or gold purchase.

Costly paintings adorn the walls — they are often more costly than meritorious. Every niche has its statue. A simple list of the houses ofthe principal nobility and gentry where valuable collections of art treasures may be seen by any one taking the trouble to make application, would cover pages. The finest of these is Stafford House (St. James' Park) which was built by the Duke of York, second son of George III. It is at present owned and occupied by the Duke of Sutherland, who is little else than a titled booby. In Bridgewater House, the residence of the Earl of Ellesmere, the collection of paintings at the death of the Duke of Bridgewater in 1803 were valued at $750,000. The collection now contains three hundred and twenty-two paintings of the estimated value of #1,500,000. We give these figures because the English are a people whose imaginations are not transported by figures of rhetoric.

They are a people with whom, not excepting glory itself, everything ends in money * If offered to the competition of connoisseurs this collec tion would doubtless fetch a larger sum. In no country in Eu rope are the arts so patronized and encouraged by the wealthy classes. It is impossible for the stranger, amidst the confusion produced by the multiplicity of objects and images that dance before his eyes and glide away, to take a comprehensive view of the whole capital. A description of each quarter and all the wonders presented to his contemplation, would exceed our limits — require volumes. We shall content ourself with giving the result of a coup d'cil ofthe capital from the most commanding spot in the city, the summit of St. Paul's Cathedral. Beyond question this *The British government votes to her victorious generals and officers of in ferior grade, under guise of public testimonials and swords of honor, magnificent pensions and huge sums of ready money.

After Sir Garnett Woolsey's successful campaign in Ashantee land, he was rewarded by a lump sum of ,£25.000 sterling, and on his return from Egypt raised tothe peerage, with prob ably a further sum of money by way of supplying him the means to keep up the state and dignity of his Barony. Lord de Sausmarez, after his brilliant naval victories, was voted $10,000 a year for his life and that of his son and grandson. These are only a few instances which occur to memory among those whose families are known to the writer. All the world knows the large grants in the way of money, lands and houses made by Parliament to such heroes as Marl borough and Wellington. is the most eligible position for seeing the metropolis, and the stranger no sooner mounts to the djzzy heights than he is dazzled and bewildered by the extent and variety of objects spread out befoiehis eyes — one illimitable expanse of streets, courts, alleys, squares and parks, alive with restless activity and teeming millions.

In the section immediately surrounding this centre, all the financial transactions of the country are carried on, principally in Lombard street, the resort of the bankers, and Capel Court, the haunt of the money brokers and stock jobbers. Here, beneath the surface of the streets, the private bankers have their vaults, which with those of the Mint and the Bank of England contain the treasure ofthe Kingdom. In the circumjacent streets the wholesale business is conducted. In a word, it is the heart or core of that busy world ofLondon, belonging to the toiling millions, and in which a drone is rara avis in terris. Sweeping across the southern horizon the eye takes in those populous districts to the south ofthe river, Camberwell, Lambeth and Peckham. These are crowded with artizans and the laboring classes generally, and it is from the lofty chimnies of this region that thick volumes of smoke constantly arise and spread like a pall over the scene.

To the east appear the lofty spires and gilded domes of Greenwich, surrounded by the deep green ofthe wooded heights, while midway between the Northern and South ern limits ofthe city the river flows. This is crowded with forests of masts, smoke-stacks and funnels far as the eye can reach. Along the Thames the eye wanders from Westminster Bridge to Victoria Docks, a distance of more than ten miles, which com prehends the entire line connected with the harbour and the naval and commercial operations of the kingdom. All the streets and wharves on the line are crowded with vehicles carrying oft" the goods which have been landed, or bringing down cargoes for vessels to be freighted. The busy crowd which gathers here is entirely different from that seen near the Bank and Exchange, and is composed of another class of those enterprising men who contribute so much by their labor to extend the commerce and add to the wealth and glory of England.

This is the peculiar haunt of shippers and importers. About midway in this line stands that huge edifice known as Somerset House, where all accounts ofthe Kingdom are audited and affairs connected with the internal revenues ofthe Empire are settled, and on a line with it, but further down the river, is the Custom House, the never failino barometer of the national prosperity, on which fleet after fleet bears down and whose ponderous cranes are perpetually at work transfering to the gaunt and dreary looking ware houses, which cover this quarter, the immense stores contributed by the world to the wealth and energy of the British people. Also the coal exchange and Fish Mongers Hall, the latter the headquarters of one ofthe most ancient and wealthy guilds in the Kingdom. Here also is "Shameless Billingsgate," the famous fi«h market, the resort of drunken sailors and oyster wenches so celebrated for its vulgar wrangles and intolerable stenches.

On the same inclined plane but higher up the river, in striking contrast to the Fish Market, are those quiet and delightful gar dens extending in sloping greens to the water's edge which be long to the inner and middle Temple Inns of Court, wherein a large portion of practising barristers have chambers, wherein also, as in colleges and universities, so many young men live to gether upon terms of easy freedom, and are supposed to be en gaged in the study of law, but are in too many cases engrossed with the pursuits of pleasure. Lower down again stands that remarkable monument of antiquity, the Tower, the chief object of curiosity with the majority of strangers. "The Tower of Julius, London's lasting shame, With many a foul and midnight murder fed." This ancient fortress cannot be visited without awakening in the mind the recollection of memorable scenes and tragic stories.

Hard by is that lofty monument erected in remembrance of the great fire of 1666, of which Pope said, in allusion to the inscription it bears, accusing the Catholics of burning this Protestant city, "London's high column, pointing to the skies, Like a tall bully, lifts its head and lies." On this line also, are found those extensive docks constructed upon a scale to accommodate the shipping ofthe world and which are without a parallel among the public works of this or any other country, and near by, burrowing beneath the bed of the river, is the Thames tunnel, that wonderful triumph of modern engineering skill. Diverted from its original purpose it is now used by the Chatham and Dover railway, numerous trains daily passing through it from the two sides ofthe river. In the opposite direction, two miles from St. Paul's, is Trafalgar Square, and the Royal Academy.

Sir Robert Peel once declared in a moment of patriotic enthusiasm, that this was "The finest site in Europe." The most important work of art in this square is the column dedicated to Nelson, which rises alone in solitary ma jesty, with its base at once decorated and guarded by the bronze lions of Sir Edward Landseer. Here the famous West-end begins, in which are grouped the Parliament Houses, the Abbey of West minster, the Royal Palaces, the Home and Foreign offices, the Headquarters of the Army, the Admiralty and the Government offices generally. Also the Club Houses, the residences of Court retainers and all those most distinguished for rank and wealth, and who make up the fashionable world. This is the quarter whence issue those endless lines of showy equipages which roll with stately grandeur along Rotten Row through Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens.

To the north of Hyde Park lies Tyburnia, a handsomely built modern city, principally occupied by successful merchants and bankers, the noveaux riche ; all those who are undergoing, in the significant language of the club houses, the transitorial state be tween commerce and fashion. Tyburnia is a sort of Hades or purgatory where aspirants for Belgraviaand Mayfair are prepared to enjoy those Elysian fields. The health, beauty and comfort ofthe West-end are increased by three grand parks, the largest of which, Hyde Park with Ken sington Gardens, contains 688 acres. In the district, popularly known as Bayswater and Nottinghill, there are likewise many noble squares, and it is in reference to these squares and parks which, indeed, exist in every quarter ofthe metropolis, that it has been truly said, they are the nostrils and the lungs of London.

There are few meritorious statues in the public places of Lon don ; a peculiarity due, the Londoner will tell you, to the English climate, which quickly destroys such works of art when exposed to its action, but which a stranger is more disposed to attribute to a want of appreciation ofthe fine arts — sculpture more especially. Notwithstanding its extraordinary size, the health of London is better, as the bills of mortality show, than that of any large city in Europe. This fact is rightly attributed to the excellent, but still inadequate, system of drainage. The rapid increase of the Me tropolis has made the subject of drainage one of growing difficulty and embarrassment, especially since it became evident that the sewers could no longer be discharged into the river. Under this system the river itself was but a vast sewer, and the banks were all but insupportable.

During the summer the air was filled with noxious vapors and fatal fevers generated, notwithstanding the temporary expedients resorted to for correcting the evil, such as scattering lime and other disinfecting agents on the water and over the slimy shores. It was the pressing importance of this question which led, in 1858, to the formation ofa vast system of sewers, or subterranean tunnels, 12 feet wide and 92 feet high, to run by the sides ofthe river to a point 15 miles distant, where they discharge into the river at high tide, that the ebb tide may remove the refuse. The total length ofthe great receiving sewers is 72 miles, and the estimated cost $15,900 000. From this coup d'eil we gather the fact that London so far ex ceeds the capitals of other countries that it may be regarded as, par excellence, the metropolis of the world.

It is not only the most populous, but most wealthy, if not the most enterprising. The population is greater than that ofthe kingdoms of Hanover or Westphalia, and nearly double that of Greece. It is nearly as great as that ofthe City and State of New York, the most populous of the United States, and little less than that of Scotland. London may be likened then to a kingdom concentrated upon the territory of a very small province. Nowhere, in such a space, can there be found gathered such vast interests, so much luxury, so much misery, so much pleasure, such sorrow, so much wealth, such poverty ! A retrospective glance at its mutations will not be uninteresting. Little over two and a half centuries ago, at the accession of James I, the population was 150.000— less than half the population of a dozen modern cities within a day's journey of Pall Mall.

It had increased to only 675,000 in 1700, and in 1801 had just reached 860,000. The progress has since been more rapid, and in 1870, as we have seen, the population exceeded three and a half mil lions. Queen Elizabeth, and subsequently James I and Charles I, were alarmed at the increase of the inhabitants, and sought to retard the progress ofthe population. By royal proclamations Elizabeth prohibited the erection, within three miles ofthe city gates, of any new house or tenement "where no former house hath been known to have been." James I and Charles I, issued similar proclamations, the latter declaring that if larger it could "neither be governed nor fed" Charles was perfectly correct in this opinion. But for the invention of steam, London could not be fed at this day, and to govern it requires an army of 10,000 policemen.

In the time of Charles I the city was without an organized police, and was the receptacle of thieves and robbers who stalked abroad in daylight, setting all authority at defiance. Nor was it lighted at night, nor supplied with water, nor indeed, any of the modern appliances for securing health, comfort or security ; and it is not surprising that royal minds should have been filled with misgiv ings at the prospect of its increase. The Strand, in the time of Henry VIII, was merely a country road leading through green fields to Westminster, and was so full of ruts and holes that the King ordered it to be paved at the expense of the owners ofthe adjoining lands. The Churches of St. Martin's-in-the field and St. Giles'-in-the-field were so called from having been originally erected literally in the fields.

During the reign ois Elizabeth, when it was first rated, the Parish of St. Martins contained only one hundred persons who were liable for poor rates. West of this was the open country, where now stands St. James, Piccadilly, Pall Mall, Regent Street and the West-end quarter. The present fashionable Mayfair was distinguished as a dairy farm, and the region of Dover street and Berkeley square was famous for game. Oxford street, then known as Tyburn road, lay through a country district, of which Pennant wrote about the middle ofthe last century: "I remember Oxford street a deep, hollow road and full of sloughs, wilh here and there a ragged house the lurking place of cut throats; insomuch that I was never taken that way by night, in my hackney coach, to a worthy Uncle's who gave me lodgings in George's street, but I went in dread the whole way."

What a contrast to the brilliant Oxford street of to day. A hundred years ago the inhabitants of Kensington, intending to visit London during the evening, collected in large numbers and marched in a body for defence and mutual protection. The managers of theatres in Islington announced in their play-bills, "A horse patrol will be sent in the new road to-night for the pro tection ofthe nobility and gentry who go from the squares at the end of the town." It was not considered safe to cross Lincoln's Inn Fields on a dark night, or Hounslow heath after dark. The streets were badly lit with oil burners. So much so that links were carried before carriages and foot passengers as late as 1805, and these linkmen and boys were amongst the most numerous and disorderly classes ofLondon. Bethnel Green and Spitalfields were in 1805 rural districts. — Now they are probably the most populous districts of London, and there are miles of spacious streets in even these, which are considered the most inferior town quarters.