THE ORIGINAL MRS PARTINGTON.

Evening Star, Issue 4008, 30 December 1875, Page 3

THE ORIGINAL MRS PARTINGTON.

It is not general!}' known that Theodore. Hook’s scries of Rumsbottom Papers were the precursor of all the Yis Yalaprops and Mrs Partingtons of a Inter generation- Let Dorothea Julia Rarashottom speak for herself, in a few sentences from her “ Notes on England and France ” :

“ Having often heard travellers lament not having put clown what they call the memory billions of thcirjournoy I was determined while on my tour to keep a diary (so called from containing the cream of one’s information) and record everything that recurred to me. “Unsolved to take time by the firelock, we left Montague place at seven o’clock by Mr Fulmer’s pocket thermomotor, and proceeded over Westminster bridge to explore the European continent. 1 never pass Whitechapel without dropping a tea)' to the memory of (.diaries the Second, who was decimated after the rebellion of 171-3 opposite the Horse Guards. “ Wo saw the inn where Alexander, the autocrat of all the Russians, lived when ho was there; and as we were going along we mot twenty or thirty dragoons mounted on horses. The ensign who commanded them was a friend of Mr Fulmer ; ho looked at Lavina as ii pleased with her tooting assembly. 1 heard Mr Fulmer say he was a son of Mars. He spoke as if everybody knew his father; so I suppose he must bo the son of the poor gentleman who was so barbarously murdered some years ago near Ratcliffo Highway ; if so, lie is uncommon genteel.

“ Travellers like us, who are mere birds of prey, have no time to waste ; so we went to tbe great church which is called Naughty Dam, where wo saw a piiest doing something at an altar. Mr Fulmer begged me to observe the knave of tlie church, but 1 thought it too hard to call the man names in his own couutrv.”