MODERN BABYLON. [From the "Britannia," Nov. 16.]

New Zealander, Volume 7, Issue 521, 12 April 1851, Page 4

MODERN BABYLON. [From the "Britannia," Nov. 16.]

The advertisement sheets of a leading journal have with justice been characterised as the miniature of the wants, the wishes, anil the employments of the nation, of whkh a perfect directory would be the daguerreotype. Such a sun-painting of living London now lies before m, compri ed in a mass of paper and print that fright \6 to behold. More than two thousand pages of cloic panting, and many columns in each page, are required te chronicle the residences and the occupations not of London en masse, but merely of her upper and middle elates. All will aeree with us in designating the well-known " Post qffi.e Directory as a most useful book, if not nn actual necessary to the man of business. We must however go further, and speak or it as one as full of instruction ns of infoimation,and more profitable for useful consideration, than many n book filled from cover to cover with statistics of men and things. In its ma«s of type we have Londcn laid cut before us, in the social relations «f her people, as clearly as the best of panoramas has tver depicted the brick and stone of her outward gaib. She is here, living, breathing London, represented by the classes who form tbe strength of her population, who not only consume, hut by themselves and their subordinates cieate the wealth of which she boasts. Let us consider the various divisions of our higher and middle classes, as they are mapped out before vi. Within her boundaries, as the mart of commerce, at well a 9 the 6eat of Royalty and Government— the emporium of trade, as well as the centre of professional exertion and talent — officials, courtiers, merchants., professionals, and tradesmen, are gathered in perfect masses. When we speak of these boundaries, we speak not of the narrow, closely packed city, within its ancient line of walls, wheuce the great aggregate of the metropolis takes its name, but of that aggregate of life and life's abodes, that forms the practical metropolis We speak of a city of upwards of seven thou. sand streets, and more than one hundred and fifteen thousand houses, inhabited by the upper and middle classes. We spe.tk of a city, in which more than two uthosand different trades are carried on, where commerce musters upwards of seventy-six thousand followers — where thirty thousand officials are daily at work— and wheie upwaids of sixteen hundred barns'* ters hope for business, with the encouraging knowledge that were all metropolitan attornies there among them there would be just abrace for each member of the other branch of the profession. For five miles from nor thto Bouth for nearly eight from cast to we-t, this city extends with little more space uncovered by homes, than suffices for the daily traffic of its masses, and some half dozen tiny lungs for their weekly respiration. When we bear in mind that these numbers refer ouly to the upper and middle classes of our metropolitan hive, we shall not be surprised at the numbers of masters whom we find arranged under each separate head of those divisions of tcience or art into which we must now sub-divide London. Indeed, their numbers, more especially wl.en due regard is paid to the numbers of the section* by which the necessaries of life are furnished, form the best evidence of the swarming 1 masses of our working population which go to fill up the complement of its myriads. Large as is the population accounted for among the list ot the "respectables," it sinks into insignificance when compared with that living swarm for which the purveyors of food in London buy and sell. Our capitalists require 500 architects, and 800 builders to devise and build houses for them, and spo>l streets ; as well as »" equal number of artists to paint their forms, and faces. Our delicate eaters rejoice in the presence of 480 pastry cooks ; with the comforting- and consoling knowledge that the chemists and druggists muster 200 more. Our lovers of smoke fear no tobaccco famine' whilst 800 shops temain open for the sale of the noxious weed. Our ladies have 800 linen draj-ers' shops at their command — good, bad, and indifferent; besides 240 haberdashers, and upwards of 300 ljoiser* and glovers. For their brighter ornaments other 300 jewellers labour, whilst nearly 1,000 milliners form the delicate coverings on which the jewesl are to sparkle. It we turn from luxuries to necessaries, from tbe adornment of the body and the gratification of the tastes, to its necesiary support and the coverings that nature demands, the supply of master traders is equally unbounded. More than fifteen hundred butchers keep shops for our jepasts, aided by a thousand greengrocers to supply vegetables; two thousand Jour hundred other grocerb udd ihiir useful condiments to our meals ; as many bakers pray to supply the family with that mixture tailed London bread ; whilst hard upon two thousand publicans, aided by half a thousand reiailers, Will send in the requisite supply of tnnlt at a moment's notice. Two thousand ti.c hundred professor* of tailoring await your orders, suppoited by Jour huvdied natters, to defend from the weather the locks or iue wigs which any of tbe seven hundred professors of hairu ,•.-, ing, let alone the poor barbers, will gladly dress oi biipply. Six hundred and odd coal merchanth— real and brass-plate— will lupply coals to boil the kettle for the tea, which eight hundred avd eighty manulacturerb of milk will weaken, and slightly discolour with their patent-composition.

Let us turn from the body to the intellect and the soul. For the mighty mass four hundaed and fifty public and national schools proffer education, mostly free ; whilst seven hundred and fifty other private academies will supply a similar article according to the price. By the National Church one hundred and forty-nine churches are provided for tha people, more than half of which aie practically closed to the poor, by reason of their being private property. The rest of the religious accommodation is divided among the sections and bubsections of Dissent, numbeiing one hundred and eighty in all. This is a sad picture. How long will it be ere the painting is altered ? The body is indeed cared for in disease at well as in health ; besides more than 300 physicians, awaiting to be called in, little less than seventeen hundnd surgeons ore prepared to act as their pioneers. Such is London — living London — lespectable London— on eh of whose inhabitants depend so many of their fellow denizens of the Monster Hive.