TOP HATS AND TEAPOTS

Shannon News, 25 June 1929, Page 3

TOP HATS AND TEAPOTS

STORIES OF OLD LONDON. A delightful article in the Nation describes London 30 years ago as J. 8.5.8. remembers it, the London of "top hats and silver teapots* of kings and courtesans, of cockades and cobblestones. In the course of it ho ■says: — - it was a grim London, the London L knew as a child, despite all that happened to myself, of which I could write affectionately. I was early unchained from the leash, allowed a shilling for my pocket money, on a Saturday afternoon,'' and would spent! sixpence of it on a bus fare to .Trafalgar) square and back.' There was in those 1 days an A.8.C.. tea. shop ■immediately' overlooking tho square—and for threepence, being the price of a cup of tea and a piece of .uuch cake, one could obtain a window set for .in indefinite time to watch the trailic and the walkers on. the .pj.v,;::ir.it:i. Tiiis was a never-ending iiapphiesrs—and if tho jourtiev backwards gave one an opportunity of sitting in the front .seat of the bus by the driver, Hying, pi-'r.liap.s, Lord Rothschild's colours, ■ then'might one get, as 1 did many times, that rich, leisurely commentary on buildings and people as wc passed them which was the basis of the truest scholarship in London lit'e. The flicker of the whip, the most cheerful pointer that any lecturer evei had, would fly out towards some club house in Piccadiljy: "Naval; and Mili tary"—they call that the "In nn< Out" because of the signs on the gat* —during the war ■someone wanted, t( know how many guns they'd got ~ii L'.ulysmith. so "they telegraphed back "In and Out;'' The old Boers cb'ul. " uot get that, but our officers tvvigge ;.li right—it meant 94—that's th j number of the house—9l, Pieei.diil) J i.'here's Lord Rothschild's,, God blcs mi; he gives us a brace of pheasant every year. That's Apsley 11 mis; | 'vhat a grateful country gave to th | j:d Dook of Wellington, and ]u?t t show how grateful they really, wc they came one day and smashed hi windows for him. That's all the toil >oing into the Park for their bit c carriage exercise—^that's" what koej hem healthy, that and eating 'cart; Woa, my ,lasses,-'ere we 'as a shgl nterval for refreshments." Then tl ■onductor fronv behind would shoi •' Knightsbridge, Albert 'All, Ken ington 'lgh street, Addison road, ai 'Ammersmith."

Why, then, grim? It is very • dif ;ult to say. Our suburb, though bor ering on a royal borough and itse very genteel, was surrounded I squalor. It was undoubtedly a Londi m which poverty was an acceptj fact, as one may see it accepted ai tolerated in some Latin countries t

day. Poor, misshapen half idi begged openly in the streets; "c: gers," as they were called, were

nearly every street corner" ready to f errands for a few pence. Old gent men in seedy grey frock coats were c served to be making their twico-da journeys to be gin palace at the eoi or—characters/ no doubt, but M amiable characters to the young. O cannot help feeling that the colourh patterned London of to-day, thou .still stony-hearted enough, must be kmdiier and a better place. It. 'mains A however, always an astonii ment that those , of us who consii ourselves still young can remember London so different and so remote.