LONDON.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 225, 21 September 1940, Page 8

LONDON.

WHO KNOWS IT? CITY OF CONTRASTS. MILLIONS RUB SHOULDERS. So much has London been in our thoughts these past weeks that many of us feel we know the great city well, if not intimately. Since the- vast majority of New Zealanders below middle age have never been to London, this is but an illusory feeling, engendered t>s* sympathy and alfection for the brave ]>eople of the metropolis. It is true, of course, that London's more famous place names —Piccadilly, Kotten Row. the Strand, Leicester Square, the Marble Arch and a score of others —arc known wherever the English language i> spoken. They are famed in song and story. They are part of the language. East Side: West Side. For some obscure reason, the wealthy quarters of nearly ali capitals are situated west of the centre. Nowhere is this tendency more marked than in London, where to the smart or rich the idea of living anywhere el-e would seem fantastic. And this residential West End spreads ever further west, while business and entertainment grows vigorously in the centre. Covent Garden, Lincoln's Inn Fields, Russeil Square, have in their turn l>ecn the heart- of the West End. St. James'.Square had its day, and at present Grosvenor Square and Berkeley Square enjoy the privilege. They are the heart of Mayfair, a name more glamorous than Hollywood or Venice. In London, tl e very rich and the really poor have the privilege of living close to their centres of activity. Thus the smart people of Mayfair have only to walk around the corner to the fashionable chopping streets, hotels and restaurants. In London an addre<ss is a social label.

The City ends abruptly at Aldgatc, and tiie East End begin-. Of most prosaic aspect, this quarter of Loudon is one of the most mysterious places in the world. It looks mean :ul drab, mainly because it has no height. and, apart from it.- main -t;ii-t-, i ; -imply a maze ot alle\-.

Mostly tin- in>ii--e» an- low and built of dark brick. E\cn the main thoroughfares have no distinction. Under various names, two seemingly endless roads traverse it—tho Commercial Load, which leads to the docks, and. further north, the Mile End Koad. It. i- the people who £i\e interest to the East End street*. Limehouse Nighis. 1 lie West-ender needs a park in which to stroll, but the East-ender lives in the street. Thiis gives joy and gaiety- to the East End street*. Here there is a preponderance of foreign elements, with •Tews in the majority—anrl these Eastern Jews adore the life and light, bustle and noise, of the Whitechapel Koad. Smart, if cheaply turned-out girls, gaudily-searved youths in cloth caps, and a h<">st of people of nondescript attire, give character to this famous road.

Then there i* Limehouse. Kut this is disappointing. It i.- full of Chinese, but they wear European clothes. There may be a deal of ""monkey business" going on—opium smoking and the like — but it is all don - behind drab doors which are always closed. Any Hollvwood dirccior can make it n:uch 111 ore mysterious and silii.-tcr than it i.- in actuality! Pubs and Cinemas. The Elephant and Castle, which has been i:i the news of late, ir= one of the ugliest inhabited sputs 011 earth, but it is full of pubs and cinemas, street markets and theatres, and the crowds of good-humoured working people at ni"ht transform the place. There is 110 greater contrast than between the prim respectability of a London middle-class suburb, and tlie roving jollity of populous Eat-t End streets. It is the different character of the clause- which makes London life so varied. Its "l.nv class." life—if the term does nut offend democratic Xew Zealandcysl —is one of the most attractive features 01 London, and certuinlv the most chcerv.

\ isitors from afar are .-ih\a\rattracted to the Edgware Road, which begins in great style between the Marble. Arch and ; iie Regal. Here cinemas and pubs abound. On Saturday nights it is full of soldier? and kitchenmaid*. Straight and endless, it tapers off into glum res|>ec lability in tiie stibtti L>>. \ auxhall Bridge Koad, 011 the other hand, vanishes into slums. In Tottenham Court Road are met foreigners of many colours, and of ail London s streets this is the most cosmopolitan, and the most like a Parisian street of a similar typo. The poorer parts of London are at their brightest at night. Those of the \\ est End shine by day, but by night, when the r-hops have closed—and they close earlv—thev fade into twilight. "Bought in Bond Street." There are streets in the fashionable area which confer quality and rank. Bond Street, which is merely a narrow lane, has small, old-fashioned >11 oj, into which one has to peer closelv Vet nearly every one of these shojw has ;I name of world repute. Here are tho art dealers, jewellers, cigarette manufacturers. leather goods shops, of which, if you have read at all. you have known almost since childhood. Bond Street means quality. To be able to buv its goods stamp.; the shopper as one of Unprivileged classes. After the Strand. Piecadillv i s probacy London s most famous .-licet, but it. i»s oi mixed fjiiirflctor. The City That is Not London. Regent Street, which got it prctn badtv in a recent raid, is now—perhaps too new for Ix>ndon—and is full of welldressed people, but has 110 areat character. Oxford Street i- fidl of great stores. 111 Sloane Street one meetr-.-mart but human jieople who, >011 111 iulit suspect, sometimes rind difih ulty in making ends meet! And a fellow K-elinc makes us wondroins kind. London goes on and on. every residential district having its own main street, so that the city jorever seems to come to an end and then etart over again. That is one of its principal charms. Xo one knows exactly what London is. where it begins, or where it ends, or how many people live in it. There ionly one well defined London, and that is the t itv ot London. And then, paradoxically, the city i# not the real London at all, because it Is merely oilicial and administrative.