it were a cartwhip; and I could not help
fancying that his name must have been
something like Captain Prosser, formerly R.N.,
that he had been governor of some jail, and
that he was a hard man, fond of the crank.
Altogether I became uneasy and dissatisfied;
was almost concluding that my dinner had
disagreed with me.

But I came upon the music-platform at
last, the Guards' band standing in a circle
and blowing manfully, the adjacent refreshment-
room, the chairs, the price of which had
been judiciously reduced from sixpence to
one penny, and surrounding all, a compact,
earnest, eager crowd,* listening with pleased
ears to the music. The fine gentlemen, the
beautiful ladies, the titled and happy of the land,
were there in great force: their empty
carriages waited for them at the gate as
in the old time; but the immense mass of
those present were toilers—working-people of
every rank; nor is it necessary to draw any
minute distinction between them, for the
bank-clerk, the curate, the tradesman, have
to work quite as hard, and find it quite as
difficult to make both ends meet as the
carpenter, the bricklayer, and the journeyman
tailor. I do not think I am called upon
to descant at length upon the good behaviour,
the quiet inoffensiveness of the vast assemblage
here collected; upon the absence of
broils, or violence, or ribald talk. I am one
of those who think that an English crowd
is the best behaved, quietest, best humoured
crowd in Europe. I think so still, though
among those thousands in Kensington Gardens
at least a tithe formed part of that ominous
well-dressed throng whom, not many
Sundays back, I had heard yelling at the
same noble and happy personages they
associated so comfortably with to-day; whom I had
seen lashed to frenzy by the pig-headed
exhibition of a mis-directed police force, and which
frenzy, but for the oil thrown a few days
afterwards upon the waves, would have
grown into a tempest such as not all the
trails of all the six-pounders in Woolwich
Arsenal, served by all the young gentlemen who
have not the least business to be in the House
of Commons, would have been able to quell.

*The total number of persons who entered Kensington
Gardens on Sunday August the nineteenth, was sixty
one thousand, four hundred and fifty-eight.

The same crowd; the same Toms, and
Dicks, and Harries; and see what a little is
required to keep them in good humour. A
circular refreshment room, with ices, ginger-
beer, and Banbury cakes; some scores of
garden chairs at a cheaper rate than usual,
and a platform where my friends the red-
jackets are operating upon ophecleide,
trombone, and kettle-drum, and this was all. I
even remarked that the tunes the musicians
played were of the dreariest, most lachrymose,
most penitential tunes that could be
well heard,—still secular music, no doubt,—
selections from popular operas, of course, but
so long-winded and melancholy, that I could
not help fancying that the band-master himself
was one of the principal objectors to Sunday
music, and had made a compromise with his
conscience by providing the most mournful
pieces in the regimental repertoire. A patient
public— a placable monster—a good-
natural rabble, this same English nation.
Here they seemed quite satisfied, pleased,
nay, grateful, for the Lifeguards' band, with
their "Tunes that the Cow died of."  They
asked not (at least audibly) for more than
this, with the permission of walking about
under the trees, and of seeing their children
sporting on the grass. Yet but two Sundays
before I had seen another public, far away
beyond the Straits of Dover,—a patient public,
too: good-natured, long-suffering, but not
always quite contented. For that public
were provided, as special Sunday treats,
military bands, not one or two, but half a
dozen; a whole concert of drums; miles of
picture galleries, and museums, and antiquities,
and palatial saloons to walk about in,
free; and a Great Palace full of marvels of
art and industry, for which the whole world
had been ransacked, to be explored for four
sous—twopence!

On the whole, I should like our Sunday
to be quiet, cheerful, English, with a
little more out-of-doorishness,— a little more
harmony—there, I have said it!—a little
more sitting down at tables, or strolling
about grassy swards to hear good music.
Don't stop short at Kensington Gardens,
good Mr Chief Commissioner.  Don't stop
short at the bank of the Life Guards.
Remember there are such places as Hyde Park,
Saint James's, the Green, Victoria, and
Battersea Parks.  One volunteer is worth a
dozen pressed men.  Let the soldiers have
their afternoon holiday if they choose one,
or let them have extra pay if that is what
they desire. We won't object to the rate.
But let us have bands of our own in our
public gardens to discourse sweet music to
us on Sunday afternoons and Sunday evenings.
There will be far more brotherly love,
and far less liquor, and far fewer night-charges
on Monday.

A little before six o'clock the musicians
played Partant pour la Syrie and God save
the Queen; then the crowd dispersed quietly.
I saw not one policeman, and not one policeman
was needed. The wheezy, red-
waistcoated park-keepers were quite sufficient to
quell the somewhat too exuberant animal
spirits of the London boys, who are to be found
in every London crowd, making noises where
they ought to be silent, and clambering over
railings where they have no business to be.
Walking home, much elevated in spirits
from the cheerful scene I had witnessed, and
quite forgetting Captain Prosser and his
boots, and the disagreeable children, I thought
to myself, This is not much, but it is some
relief for the toiling many.