it came on to rain. The worst of it was, that
you were placed in perplexing association with
the driver, who was often a ruffian. I believe,
however, that the drivers of those days knew
their way about London; which is more than
can be said of their successors. I have, indeed,
been forced by grevious experience into the
belief that the existing cabmen all raw from
the country; that they have only vague ideas
of the bearing of Temple Bar; and that they
are perplexed in their minds as to whether the
Bank lies in the direction of Paddington or of
Peckham-rise. But the oddest vehicles Thirty
Years Ago were the hackney-coaches, of which I
have already spoken. They were broken-down
gentlemen's carriages, drawn by broken-down
gentlemen's horses, two to each carriage, and
were miracles of slowness and discomfort. The
coachman looked as decayed as that which he
drove, and was a strange lumbering mystery of
coats and capes. His very whip was old, and
came down feebly on the feeble beasts he
guided. If you progressed at the rate of three
miles an hour, you considered yourself lucky;
and all the way the crazy windows chattered
with imbecile garrulity, and the springs kept
protesting that they were too old for work.
With the introduction of more convenient cabs,
these musty anatomies gradually disappeared;
but they were lingering about the town in some
numbers as late as 1840, and one or two even
held possession of the streets at a still more
recent period.

Then, "the New Police" really were new at the
time of which I write. They began duty in September,
1829; but the "Charlies" maintained their
ground for some time after. I have often heard
them coming up that long Soho street in the
dead of the night, calling the hour and the state
of the weather, and have felt the safer for their
wakeful presence. At a distance, the cry was
slumberous and lulling, and it was pleasant to
hear it growing in power as the old fellow came
slowly on, swinging his ancient lantern, and
projecting his voice out of the recesses of his
multitudinous wrappings; but just under the window
it was not so agreeable, sounding too sharp,
menacing, and imperative. Does it not seem as
if I were writing of the middle ages? Does it
not appear incredible that at that time Old London
Bridge was standing; that the Haymarket
was really a market for hay (I remember seeing
the carts there till they were removed in 1831);
that the anti-Popish inscription was yet
remaining on the Monument (that, too, was
removed in 1831); that, four days before the
death of George the Gentleman, a man stood in
the pillory in the Old Bailey for perjury, though
he was the last sufferer in that way that London
has ever seen; that the postal system was in a
state which we should now regard as savage;
and that all England was in a fever of apprehension
lest the agitation tor Reform should lead
to revolution and civil war? On the last-named
subject my personal recollections are vivid. The
talk was of riots; of the military being under
arms; of the shops being shut up in the
daytime. William the Fourth, from having been
highly popular at the commencement of his
reign when he appeared to favour Reform,
became the very reverse when it was thought he
had sided with the Tories. The walks used to
be chalked over with the phrase "Silly Billy;"
while the amiable Queen Adelaide was frequently
alluded to as "Addlehead." There is no reason
now-a-days why the very poor joke should not be
stated. For, her admirable conduct, and the
simple, reasonable, and beautiful directions which
she left touching her funeral, will embalm her
memory for all time, and be remembered when
the poor quibble on her name shall be forgotten.
But thirty years ago party feeling ran high,
and was often unjust, simply because it was
unthinking. It was an era when the mob had not
ceased to be a dangerous element in the body
politic. On the Reform Bill passing, there
something like a compulsory illumination; and
I remember a general exhibition of candles in
the windows, and the prevalence of considerable
doubt and uneasiness as to whether that concession
to public opinion would be deemed sufficient.
The newspaper writing of that period would be
thought vulgar now. Personality was its leading
characteristic; violence its main strength. The
Times of 1831-2 would not bear a comparison
with the penny press of today.

From politics I turn to lighter matters. We
have seen some strange variations of fashion
since the era of the Reform Bill. Cravats after
the manner of George the Fourth— dress coats
with enormous collars coming up to the base of
the skull, and generally buttoned across the
chest—hair curled so as to look as much like a
First Gentleman's wig as possible, and trousers
rigorously strapped down over the boots—such
was the male attire. The ladies wore the waists of
their dresses under the arms, and favoured caps
and bonnets of such prodigious size and
elaboration, that they seemed to have been built up
like pieces of architecture, or the set scenes in a
play. We should think both the ladies and the
gentlemen "Guys" if we saw them now. When
they met at an evening party, they were (I
conceive) somewhat sedate and formal.
No polka, no schottische, no varsoviana then; and but
little waltzing in steady-going families. Mammas
and aunts could not readily forget Byron's
audacious poem on the most graceful of dances; and
so it found but a grudging place, or no place at
all. The quadrille was the staple measure, and,
being in its nature somewhat stiff and mechanical,
appeared to develop in its patrons an air
of amazing frigidity. The gentlemen at that
time used to wear dancing-pumps, and seemed
to execute the figures with an oppressive sense
of their shoes. I rather think they went in
dread of the old ladies in turbans who sat on the
sofas at the sides of the room, with an aspect
remorselessly critical; but this may be open to
discussion. Another feature of those old-world
parties was very trying. Some one was sure to
sing "The Sea," and to become offensely
patriotic under the inspiration of the words and
melody; and then some one else would languish