They reach their places of destination, and the taverns are
crowded; but there is no drunkenness or brawling, for the class of
men who commit the enormity of making Sunday excursions, take their
families with them: and this in itself would be a check upon them,
even if they were inclined to dissipation, which they really are
not. Boisterous their mirth may be, for they have all the
excitement of feeling that fresh air and green fields can impart to
the dwellers in crowded cities, but it is innocent and harmless.
The glass is circulated, and the joke goes round; but the one is
free from excess, and the other from offence; and nothing but good
humour and hilarity prevail.
In streets like Holborn and Tottenham Court Road, which form the
central market of a large neighbourhood, inhabited by a vast number
of mechanics and poor people, a few shops are open at an early hour
of the morning; and a very poor man, with a thin and sickly woman
by his side, may be seen with their little basket in hand,
purchasing the scanty quantity of necessaries they can afford,
which the time at which the man receives his wages, or his having a
good deal of work to do, or the woman's having been out charing
till a late hour, prevented their procuring over-night. The
coffee-shops too, at which clerks and young men employed in
counting-houses can procure their breakfasts, are also open. This
class comprises, in a place like London, an enormous number of
people, whose limited means prevent their engaging for their
lodgings any other apartment than a bedroom, and who have
consequently no alternative but to take their breakfasts at a
coffee-shop, or go without it altogether. All these places,
however, are quickly closed; and by the time the church bells begin
to ring, all appearance of traffic has ceased. And then, what are
the signs of immorality that meet the eye? Churches are well
filled, and Dissenters' chapels are crowded to suffocation. There
is no preaching to empty benches, while the drunken and dissolute
populace run riot in the streets.
Here is a fashionable church, where the service commences at a late
hour, for the accommodation of such members of the congregation--
and they are not a few--as may happen to have lingered at the Opera
far into the morning of the Sabbath; an excellent contrivance for
poising the balance between God and Mammon, and illustrating the
ease with which a man's duties to both, may be accommodated and
adjusted. How the carriages rattle up, and deposit their richly-
dressed burdens beneath the lofty portico! The powdered footmen
glide along the aisle, place the richly-bound prayer-books on the
pew desks, slam the doors, and hurry away, leaving the fashionable
members of the congregation to inspect each other through their
glasses, and to dazzle and glitter in the eyes of the few shabby
people in the free seats. The organ peals forth, the hired singers
commence a short hymn, and the congregation condescendingly rise,
stare about them, and converse in whispers. The clergyman enters
the reading-desk,--a young man of noble family and elegant
demeanour, notorious at Cambridge for his knowledge of horse-flesh
and dancers, and celebrated at Eton for his hopeless stupidity.
The service commences. Mark the soft voice in which he reads, and
the impressive manner in which he applies his white hand, studded
with brilliants, to his perfumed hair.
