Passing on to the next turning but one, we reach Kingsgate Street, where Poll Sweedlepipes—barber and bird-fancier—once had his business location, “next door but one to the celebrated mutton-pie shop, and directly opposite the original cat’s-meat warehouse.”  At this place the immortal Mrs. Gamp had lodgings on the first floor, where she

“Was easily assailed at night by pebbles, walking-sticks, and fragments of tobacco pipes, all much more efficacious than the street-door knocker, which was so constructed as to wake the street with ease, and even spread alarms of fire in Holborn, without making the smallest impression on the premises to which it was addressed.”

The next turning but one, westward, on the right, by the West Central Post Office (No. 126), is Southampton Street, leading to Bloomsbury Square.

Here it will be remembered that lodgings were taken by Mr. Grewgious for Miss Twinkleton and Rosa, of the redoubtable Mrs. Billickin, “the person of the ’ouse,” who, from prudential motives, suppressed her Christian name.

“Mr. Grewgious had his agreement-lines and his earnest-money ready.  ‘I have signed it for the ladies, ma’am,’ he said, ‘and you’ll have the goodness to sign it for yourself, Christian and Surname, there, if you please.’

“‘Mr. Grewgious,’ said Mrs. Billickin in a new burst of candour, ‘no, sir! You must excuse the Christian name.’

“Mr. Grewgious stared at her.

“‘The door-plate is used as a protection,’ said Mrs. Billickin, ‘and acts as such, and go from it I will not.’

“Mr. Grewgious stared at Rosa.

“‘No, Mr. Grewgious, you must excuse me.  So long as this ’ouse is known indefinite as Billickin’s, and so long as it is a doubt with the riff-raff where Billickin may be hidin’, near the street-door or down the airy, and what his weight and size, so long I feel safe.  But commit myself to a solitary female statement, no, Miss!  Nor would you for a moment wish,’ said Mrs. Billickin, with a strong sense of injury, ‘to take that advantage of your sex, if you were not brought to it by inconsiderate example.’

“Rosa reddening as if she had made some most disgraceful attempt to overreach the good lady, besought Mr. Grewgious to rest content with any signature.  And accordingly, in a baronial way, the sign-manual Billickin got appended to the document.”

And we may here recall the incidental passage of arms between the worthy landlady and Miss Twinkleton, Mrs. B. being always in direct antagonism with the schoolmistress, against whom she “openly pitted herself as one whom she fully ascertained to be her natural enemy.”  Witness “the B. enveloped in the shawl of State,” as she remarked to Miss Twinkleton that

Southampton Street is not a long one, and is now chiefly occupied by solicitors and architects; but there is reason to believe that the Billickins’ residence was, aforetime, to be found at No. 18, which is situated next door but one to an archway.  As Mrs. B. herself candidly pointed out,

“The arching leads to a mews; mewses must exist.”

The mews aforesaid is now superseded by a factory.  Mrs. Billickin has long since relinquished the cares of housekeeping and retired from public life.  The present amiable landlady conducts the business on different principles, and will be at all times disposed to give her patrons satisfaction, whether they be of the scholastic persuasion or otherwise.

Southampton Street leads immediately northward into Bloomsbury Square.  This place is mentioned in “Barnaby Rudge” as the locality in which Lord Mansfield’s residence was situated at the period of the Gordon Riots.  In chapter 66 its destruction by the rioters is thus described:—

“I limit myself to saying—better known, because I will not believe that, in a Christian community of fathers and mothers, and brothers and sisters, it can fail, being better known, to be well and richly endowed.”

We may here recall the scene narrated in chapter 9 of “Our Mutual Friend,” when Johnny makes his will and arranges his affairs, leaving “a kiss for the boofer lady”—

“The family whom God had brought together were not all asleep, but were all quiet.  From bed to bed, a light womanly tread and a pleasant fresh face passed in the silence of the night.  A little head would lift itself into the softened light here and there, to be kissed as the face went by—for these little patients are very loving—and would then submit itself to be composed to rest again. . . .  Over most of the beds, the toys were yet grouped as the children had left them when they last laid themselves down, and in their innocent grotesqueness and incongruity they might have stood for the children’s dreams.”

Proceeding eastward by Great Ormond Street and turning (left) through Lamb’s Conduit Street, to its northern end, we face the entrance of the Foundling Hospital.  This beneficent institution was established by Captain Thomas Coram, about the middle of the last century, and is associated with “No Thoroughfare,” the Christmas number (and last in the series) of “All the Year Round,” 1867.  Visitors attending the morning service of the Foundling Church on Sundays are admitted to the children’s Dining-Hall thereafter, and so may have an opportunity of realising the scene portrayed by Dickens, when the “veiled lady” induced a female attendant to point out Walter Wilding:—

In “Little Dorrit,” too, reference is made to this institution, in re the adoption of Tattycoram by good Papa and Mamma Meagles.  In the times of Barnaby Rudge, the London streets were not greatly extended northward beyond this (now central) neighbourhood.  We may remember that the headquarters of the “Captain,” Sim Tappertit, Hugh, and Dennis were at The “Boot” Tavern, which is described as

“A lone place of public entertainment, situated in the fields at the back of the Foundling Hospital; a very solitary spot at that period, and quite deserted after dark.  The Tavern stood at some distance from any high road, and was only approachable by a dark and narrow lane.”

Proceeding onwards through Guilford Street, we reach Doughty Street, Mecklenburgh Square, running transversely north and south.  On the east side we may note No. 48 Doughty Street, as the house to which Dickens removed from Furnival’s Inn, in the early spring of 1837, and in which he lived two years and a half, previous to his longer residence at No. 1 Devonshire Terrace.  In it “Oliver Twist” and “Nicholas Nickleby” were written; and here, too, the early friendship, which had been for some time steadily developing between Dickens and Forster, became cemented for life.  His biographer says:—

“Nor had many weeks passed before he addressed to me from Doughty Street, words which it is my sorrowful pride to remember have had literal fulfilment.  ‘I look back with unmingled pleasure to every link which each ensuing week has added to the chain of our attachment.  It shall go hard, I hope, ere anything but death impairs the toughness of a bond now so firmly riveted.’”

“In Tavistock Square stands Tavistock House.  This and the strip of garden in front of it are shut out from the thoroughfare by an iron railing.  A large garden, with a grass plat and high trees, stretches behind the house, and gives it a countrified look in the midst of this coal and gas steaming London.  In the passage from street to garden hung pictures and engravings.  Here stood a marble bust of Dickens, so like him, so youthful and handsome; and over a bedroom door were inserted the bas-reliefs of Night and Day, after Thorwaldsen.  On the first floor was a rich library, with a fireplace and a writing-table, looking out on the garden; and here it was that in winter Dickens and his friends acted plays to the satisfaction of all parties.  The kitchen was underground, and at the top of the house were the bedrooms.”

Gower Street has been rearranged since that time (there is now no Gower Street North), and the houses are renumbered.  No. 145, near Gower Street Chapel, and other houses adjoining, are now in the occupation of Messrs. Maple & Co.; and this No. 145 was the house then enumerated as No. 4 Gower Street North.  Mrs. Dickens’s experience, it will be remembered, has been pleasantly referred to in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend;” the stately Mrs. Wilfer therein making a similar experiment, with the same result.  In chapter 4 we read of Rumpty’s return home from business: when

“Something had gone wrong with the house door, for R. Wilfer stopped on the steps, staring at it, and cried ‘Hal-loa?’  ‘Yes,’ said Mrs. Wilfer, ‘the man came himself with a pair of pincers and took it off, and took it away.  He said that as he had no expectation of ever being paid for it, and as he had an order for another Ladies’ School door-plate, it was better (burnished up) for the interests of all parties.’”

On the opposite corner of the street is the Gower Street Station of the Metropolitan Railway, at which train may be taken to Baker Street.  On arrival, we turn to the right, by Marylebone Road, to Devonshire Terrace, consisting of three houses at the northern end of High Street, Marylebone.  No. 1, now occupied by a legal firm, was for twelve years the residence of Charles Dickens (when in town).  It is described by Forster as

To quote the ironical dictum of its future tenant when the choice was made, it was “a house of great promise (and great premium), undeniable situation, and excessive splendour.”  During the period of the author’s residence here several of his best-known books were given to the world—“Master Humphrey’s Clock,” Christmas Books, and “David Copperfield” included.  Proceeding forwards and eastward past Devonshire Place, we may take our way, turning on the right down Harley Street, of which we read in “Little Dorrit” that,

“Like unexceptionable society, the opposing rows of houses in Harley Street were very grim with one another.  Indeed, the mansions and their inhabitants were so much alike in that respect that the people were often to be found drawn up on opposite sides of dinner tables, in the shade of their own loftiness, staring at the other side of the way with the dulness of the houses.  Everybody knows how like the street the two dinner-rows of people who take their stand by the street will be.  The expressionless uniform twenty houses, all to be knocked at and rung at in the same form, all approachable by the same dull steps, all fended off by the same pattern of railing, all with the same impracticable fire-escapes, the same inconvenient fixtures in their heads, and everything, without exception, to be taken at a high valuation—who has not dined with these?”

In this street lived that great financier and swindler Mr. Merdle, who had his residence in one of the handsomest of these handsome houses; but it would be, perhaps, invidious to point out any particular location for the same, Dickens himself having purposely omitted an exact address.  Following the course of Harley Street, we come in due time to Queen Anne Street, running east and west.  Adopting the leftward turning (east), we may find at the next corner—Mansfield Street—on the north side, Mr. Dombey’s House, as described in chapter 3 of “Dombey and Son”—

It will be observed that the position and character of this mansion exactly correspond to the above description, being in its general style noteworthy and unique.  This, then, was the private establishment and “home department” of the Dombey family, where died the gentle Paul; the lonely house in which the neglected Florence grew to lovely womanhood; what time the second wife—the stately Edith—held temporary sway.

Hence a short distance southward leads to Cavendish Square.  In this neighbourhood we read that Madame Mantalini’s fashionable dressmaking establishment was situated, at which Kate Nickleby was for some few weeks engaged, on the recommendation of her uncle.  The house intended was probably in Wigmore Street, No. 11.  In the days of the Mantalini régime the business was advertised

“To the nobility and gentry by the casual exhibition, near the handsomely-curtained windows, of two or three elegant bonnets of the newest fashion, and some costly garments in the most approved taste.”

By the next turning (right) on the north side we come into Wimpole Street; on the east of which, at the corner of the third block, stands The West End Residence—No. 43—aforetime occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Boffin; which became, later on, the property of Mr. John Harmon and his wife.  It is described as “a corner house, not far from Cavendish Square.”  Near this house Silas Wegg—assuming some knowledge of its affairs—kept his street-stall.  He was accustomed to refer to it as “Our House,” its (imaginary) inmates being Miss Elizabeth, Master George, Aunt Jane, and Uncle Parker.

We now come south into the West-end artery of Oxford Street, crossing same to Davies Street, by which we may soon reach Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, running east and west.  On the south-eastern angle of its intersection stands Claridge’s Hotel.  It will be remembered that on Mr. Dorrit’s return from the Continent, after the marriage of his daughter Fanny, “the Courier had not approved of his staying at the house of a friend, and had preferred to take him to an hotel in Brook Street, Grosvenor Square.”  This was doubtless the establishment favoured by the Courier’s preference on that occasion; and where Mr. Merdle paid a state visit to Mr. Dorrit at breakfast-time the next morning; taking him afterwards in his carriage to the City.

Readers of “Dombey and Son” may be reminded that the Feenix Town House was situated in this same Brook Street; but no clue is afforded of its exact whereabouts.  It is described as an aristocratic mansion of a dull and gloomy sort; and was borrowed by the Honourable Mrs. Skewton from a stately relative, on the occasion of her daughter’s marriage.  Here also, in aftertime, the final interview between Florence and Edith took place.

Near at hand, on the eastern corner of the next turning down Piccadilly (Dover Street), is Hatchett’s Hotel, adjoining The White Horse Cellars, once a well-known coaching establishment.  On the opposite side of the way stood in days of yore the old “White Horse Cellars,” of which Hazlitt writes:—

“The finest sight in the Metropolis is the setting out of the mail-coaches from Piccadilly.  The horses paw the ground and are impatient to be gone, as if conscious of the precious burden they convey.  There is a peculiar secrecy and despatch, significant and full of meaning, in all the proceedings concerning them.  Even the outside passengers have an erect and supercilious air, as if proof against the accidents of the journey; in fact, it seems indifferent whether they are to encounter the summer’s heat or the winter’s cold, since they are borne through the air on a winged chariot.”

From this well-known Booking Office, Mr. Pickwick and his friends—accompanied by the fierce Dowler and his fascinating wife—started for Bath, one “muggy, damp, and drizzly morning, by the mail coach; on the door of which was displayed, in gilt letters of a goodly size, the magic name of ‘Pickwick’; a circumstance which seems to have occasioned some confusion of ideas in the mind of the faithful Sam, as evidenced by his indignant inquiry—‘An’t nobody to be whopped for takin’ this here liberty?’”

“I think you must have seen that I was struck with those charms on the day when I waited at the Whytorseller.  I think you must have remarked that I could not forbear a tribute to those charms when I put up the steps of the ’ackney coach.”

For the full narrative, see “Bleak House,” chapter 9.

The Rambler can now take an eastward course up Piccadilly, and may casually observe, on the left, past Burlington House, The Albany, where Mr. Fledgby had chambers.  The next turning on the same side is Sackville Street, in which it may be recollected that Mr. and Mrs. Lammles resided during the short term of their social prosperity.  Mention of these localities in such connection will be found in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”  Passing onwards on the same side, we arrive at No. 28, St. James’s Hall.  It was at this well-known place of assembly that several of those popular Readings were given by Charles Dickens, which always commanded the attention and sympathetic interest of his audience.  On these occasions he invariably adopted the extreme of fashionable evening attire, being dressed in irreproachable style, with, perhaps, more of shirt-front than waistcoat; and so “got up” as to present a staginess and juvenility of appearance, possibly somewhat out of keeping with his time of life.  Some of his hearers may have desired a more natural and less conventional mode; but they knew that beneath the big shirt and fashionable coat, there throbbed the genial heart of the man they loved, as he read of the sorrows of “Little Emily,” or stood with them in spirit at the bedside of “Paul Dombey.”  On the occasion of his final Reading, given here in March 1870, he tendered his last public farewell to his London audience in the following words:

On the right-hand side of Piccadilly, adjacent to the Prince’s Hall and Institute of Painters, there may be noted, en passant, the premises No. 193, now occupied by the Boys’ Messenger Co.  This, for many years, was the address of Messrs. Chapman and Hall, the publishers of the works of Dickens.  Previous to 1850, the earlier books—“Pickwick” to “Martin Chuzzlewit” inclusive—together with the first issue of their cheaper edition, were published by this well-known house at 186 Strand, the site now occupied by the premises of W. H. Smith and Son.  The firm have, for many years past, removed their offices to No. 11 Henrietta Street, Covent Garden.

“It is one of the squares that have been—a quarter of the town that has gone down in the world, and taken to letting lodgings.  Many of its first and second floors are let, furnished, to single gentlemen, and it takes boarders besides.  It is a great resort of foreigners.  The dark-complexioned men who wear large rings and heavy watch-guards, and bushy whiskers, and who congregate under the Opera Colonnade, and about the box-office in the season between four and five in the afternoon, when they give away the orders—all live in Golden Square, or within a street of it.  Two or three violins and a wind instrument from the opera-band reside within its precincts.”

We read in the same book of the whereabouts of Mr. Kenwigs as being in this neighbourhood—

“A bygone, faded, tumble-down street, with two irregular rows of tall meagre houses, which seem to have stared each other out of countenance years ago; the very chimneys appear to have grown dismal and melancholy from having had nothing better to look at than the chimneys over the way.”

There are many streets in the district of Soho, in this vicinity, which will in some respects correspond with the description given; but much alteration has taken place during the last sixty years.  Recollecting that Newman Noggs lodged in the upper part of the same house, it must have been conveniently near Golden Square.  In Carnaby Street (immediately north of the Square) there may be remarked a white-fronted, old-fashioned house (No. 48), which, being in proximity to Ralph Nickleby’s Office, may be assigned as aforetime comprising the apartments of the Kenwigs Family.

“If you ever want a shelter in London, . . . they know where I live at the sign of the Crown, Golden Square.  It is at the corner of Silver Street” [now Beak Street] “and James Street, with a bar door both ways.”

In this neighbourhood, also, Martha’s Lodgings were situated, in the days of David Copperfield, who says:—

“She laid her hand on my arm, and hurried me on to one of the sombre streets of which there are several in that part, where the houses were once fair dwellings, in the occupation of single families, but have, and had, long degenerated into poor lodgings let off in rooms.”

Such a house may be found in Marshall Street, No. 53, close at hand.  But at this distance of time it is difficult to assign the exact locality intended by Dickens.  We are all familiar with the welcome episode in David’s history when Martha rescued Little Emily, bringing her to these lodgings, and Mr. Peggotty’s dream came true.—See chapter 50.

Proceeding half-way up Marshall Street, we turn (right) through Broad Street, to (left) Poland Street, by which we again attain the main thoroughfare of Oxford Street.  Turning eastward, on the north side, we come at a short distance (by No. 90) to Newman Street, in which was situated Mr. Turveydrop’s Dancing Academy, “established in a sufficiently dingy house, at the corner of an archway” (Newman Passage), with Mr. Turveydrop’s great room built out into a mews at the back.  The house intended is No. 26, on the east side of the street.  Here Caddy Jellyby resided with her husband, Prince Turveydrop, in the upper rooms of the establishment, leaving the better part of the house at the disposal of Mr. Turveydrop, senior; that “perfect model” of parental and social “deportment.”  Returning to Oxford Street and passing onwards on the south side, we shortly arrive at Dean Street, leading southward.

“A quainter corner than the corner where the Doctor lived was not to be found in London.  There was no way through it, and the front windows of the Doctor’s lodgings commanded a pleasant little vista of street that had a congenial air of retirement on it.  There were few buildings then, north of the Oxford Road, and forest-trees flourished, and wild flowers grew, and the hawthorn blossomed, in the now vanished fields.”

The garden behind the house, referred to in the above-mentioned book, has been converted to the uses of a warehouse, a glass roof having been long ago built over the same.  A paved court now exists at the side for the convenience of foot-passengers, giving egress at the end of Carlisle Street, so that the “wonderful echoes” which once resounded in this “curious corner” are now no longer to be heard.

It may be interesting to note that a thoroughfare leading from No. 119 Charing Cross Road to No. 6 Greek Street, Soho, is now named Manette Street; in remembrance of the worthy Doctor, whose London residence in Carlisle Street, as indicated, was near at hand.

We may return to Oxford Street through Soho Square, conveniently terminating the ramble at Tottenham Court Road, just beyond.  From this central point there is omnibus communication to all parts of London; and a commodious resting-place may be here recommended to those disposed for dinner, at The Horseshoe Restaurant; which stands in a prominent position near at hand, on the east side of the street.

The Bank; Dombey and Son, Tom Pinch—George and Vulture Inn; Mr. Pickwick’s Hotel—“The Green Dragon,” alias “The Blue Boar,” Leadenhall Market; Tony Weller’s Headquarters—Newman’s Court (alias Freeman’s Court), Cornhill; The Offices of Messrs. Dodson and Fogg—House of Sol Gills, Leadenhall Street; The Wooden Midshipman—St. Mary Axe; Pubsey and Co.—House of Sampson Brass in Bevis Marks—“The Red Lion;”  Mr. Dick Swiveller’s recommendation—Bull Inn, Aldgate; Starting-place of the Ipswich Coach—The Minories—Aldgate Pump; Mr. Toots’s Excursions—Mincing Lane; Messrs. Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles—Boarding House of Mrs. Todgers, King’s Head Court—London Bridge; Meeting-place of Rose Maylie and Nancy—“The White Hart Inn”; its Pickwickian Associations—The Marshalsea Prison; The Dorrit Family—St. George’s Church; Little Dorrit’s Night Refuge and Marriage—Lant Street; Dickens and Bob Sawyer’s Lodging—King’s Bench Prison—Horsemonger Lane Gaol—Mr. Chivery’s Shop—St. George’s Obelisk; “the long-legged young man”—The Surrey Theatre; Fanny Dorrit and Uncle—Bethlehem Hospital; “Uncommercial Traveller”—Astley’s Theatre; visit of the Nubbles Family—Millbank; Poor “Martha”—Church Street, Smith Square; the Dolls’ Dressmaker—Julius Handford—Westminster Abbey—The Red Lion, Parliament Street; the “Genuine Stunning”—The Horse Guards’ Clock—St. James’s Park; Meeting between Martin and Mary—Her Majesty’s Theatre.

Our starting-point is now the Bank of England, Dombey and Son’s

“Magnificent neighbour; with its vaults of gold and silver, ‘all among the dead men, underground.’”

Tom Pinch, diffident of requesting information in London, resolved that, in the event of finding himself near the Bank of England,

Adopting the route viâ Lombard Street, we come, on the left (No. 56), to George Yard, traversing which, there will be found, at the corner of Castle Court (No. 3), the George and Vulture Inn, at which Mr. Pickwick resided when in London, subsequent to his removal from Goswell Street; and which has honourable mention in the history of the Pickwickians.

Through Lombard Street, and turning left into Gracechurch Street, we shortly arrive, on the right, at Bull’s Head Passage (turning by the Branch Post Office, No. 82), in which, at No. 4, is the Green Dragon Tavern, in close proximity to Leadenhall Market.  This is, in all probability, the house mentioned in “Pickwick” as “The Blue Boar,” Leadenhall Market, a favourite house of call with the elder Weller, and the place where Sam indited his “Valentine” to Mary, the pretty housemaid, afterwards Mrs. Sam.  But the neighbourhood of the Market has undergone considerable renovation since the old coaching-days, and it is difficult to fix the locale of the tavern with certainty.

Passing onwards in Cornhill, past Bishopsgate Street, we come into Leadenhall Street, and may be interested to note, at No. 157 (now an outfitting establishment), the original position of the House of Sol Gills, ships’ instrument maker, at whose door was displayed the figure of

“The Wooden Midshipman; eternally taking observations of the hackney coaches.”

Here our eccentric friend Captain Cuttle remained in charge during the absence of old Sol Gills and his nephew; here Florence, accompanied by the faithful Diogenes, found asylum; and here Walter Gay returned after shipwreck, to make everybody happy and marry the gentle heroine of the story.  (See “Dombey and Son” for information in extenso.)  Until recent years, these premises were in occupation of Messrs. Norie and Wilson, ships’ instrument makers and chart publishers.  They have removed to the Minories, No. 156, where the quaint effigy of the Wooden Midshipman, with his cocked hat and quadrant complete, may now be seen, as bright and brisk as in old days.  “When found, make a note of.”

Farther on, on the same side of Leadenhall Street, we reach St. Mary Axe, turning northward at No. 117, which we notice en passant as the thoroughfare in which Pubsey and Co. had their place of business; “a yellow overhanging plaster-fronted house”—reconstructed, with many others, some years since—at the top of which Riah (the manager) arranged his town garden; where the Dolls’ Dressmaker invited Fascination Fledgby to “come up and be dead.”  All of which is duly set forth in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”  The position of the house cannot now be localised.

On the north side of the street there still flourishes the old Red Lion Inn, an establishment patronised in his time by Mr. Richard, and once eulogised by that gentleman on the occasion of his specifying “the contingent advantages” of the neighbourhood.  “There is mild porter in the immediate vicinity.”

For these and the other associations of this spot the tourist is referred to the pages of the “Old Curiosity Shop.”

Following downwards through Bevis Marks and Duke Street beyond, we come into Aldgate, keeping still on the left-hand side of the way to Aldgate High Street, where at a short distance we pass the Station of the Metropolitan Railway.  At No. 24, just ahead, is the Bull Inn Yard, once the City Terminus of Coaches travelling north-east.  From this point Mr. Pickwick started per coach for Ipswich, accompanied by the red-haired Mr. Peter Magnus; Mr. Tony Weller officiating as driver.  On which occasion we read that Mr. Weller’s conversation, “possessing the inestimable charm of blending amusement with instruction,” beguiled “the tediousness of the journey during the greater part of the day.”

The tourist will now soon arrive at (No. 42) Mincing Lane, leading to Great Tower Street.  This short street is entirely occupied by wholesale merchants and brokers, and it will be remembered that Messrs. Chicksey, Veneering, and Stobbles, wholesale druggists, flourished in this locality in the days of the “Golden Dustman.”  The fourth house on the left from Fenchurch Street, next to Dunster Court, has been indicated as the probable whereabouts of the firm.  We may remember that R. Wilfer’s office was on the ground-floor, next the gateway.

Here, then, in this prosaic neighbourhood, John Rokesmith, following Bella Wilfer, came to the warehouse where Little Rumty was sitting at the open window at his tea, and much surprised that gentleman by a declaration of love for his daughter; what time “The Feast of the Three Hobgoblins” was so agreeably celebrated.  This place is also associated with other pleasant episodes connected with the history of the Wilfer family, the details of which are fully furnished in the pages of “Our Mutual Friend.”

“These stairs are a part of the bridge; they consist of three flights.  Just below the end of the second, going down, the stone wall on the left terminates in an ornamental pilaster, facing towards the Thames.”

And it will be remembered that Noah Claypole here ensconced himself as an unseen listener.

As we come to the Surrey side of the Thames, a passing thought may be given to Mrs. Rudge and her son Barnaby, who lived near at hand “in a by-street in Southwark, not far from London Bridge”; and we may recall the incident of Edward Chester being brought hither by Gabriel Varden, having been found wounded by a highwayman on the other side of the river.  But it is altogether impossible to locate the house, the neighbourhood having so entirely changed during the present century.  Onwards by the main thoroughfare of the Borough, we shall find, on the left-hand side of the way (No. 61), the (former) location of “The White Hart,” described in “Pickwick” as

The old inn has been pulled down some years since; the original gateway only remains, leading to White Hart Yard.  A tavern and luncheon-bar of modern erection now occupy one side of the old coach-yard in which Messrs. Pickwick, Wardle, and Perker made their first acquaintance with Mr. Samuel Weller, on that memorable occasion when Mr. Jingle had eloped from Dingley Dell with Miss Rachael Wardle, and had brought the lady to this establishment.  Farther on, towards the end of the Borough, we arrive at Angel Place, a narrow passage near to St. George’s Church.  It leads into Marshalsea Place, of which Dickens writes as follows in his preface to “Little Dorrit”:—

“Whoever goes into Marshalsea Place, turning out of Angel Court, leading to Bermondsey, will find his feet on the very paving-stones of the extinct Marshalsea jail; will see its narrow yard to the right, and to the left, very little altered if at all, except that the walls were lowered when the place got free; will look upon the rooms in which the debtors lived; and will stand among the crowding ghosts of many miserable years.”

This, then, was The Marshalsea Prison, in which, during Dickens’s youthful days, his father was imprisoned for debt; and the place is intimately associated with the story of Little Dorrit and her family.  We must be all familiar with the Father of the Marshalsea, his brother Frederick, Maggie, and the several others of the dramatis personæ of that charming tale.

“A back attic was found for me at the house of an insolvent-court agent, who lived in Lant Street, in the Borough, where Bob Sawyer lodged many years afterwards.  A bed and bedding were sent over for me, and made up on the floor.  The little window had a pleasant prospect of a timber-yard; and when I took possession of my new abode, I thought it was a Paradise.”

This opinion of his boyhood seems to have been somewhat modified fifteen years later, when the “Pickwick Papers” were written, and Mr. Robert Sawyer had taken residence in the locality.  We read—

“There is an air of repose about Lant Street, in the Borough, which sheds a gentle melancholy upon the soul.  A house in Lant Street would not come within the denomination of a first-rate residence, in the strict acceptation of the term; but it is a most desirable spot, nevertheless.  If a man wished to extract himself from the world, to remove himself from within the reach of temptation, to place himself beyond the possibility of any inducement to look out of the window, he should by all means go to Lant Street.”

Walking onwards from “this happy valley” past Suffolk Street, to the westward, turning off Borough Road, we may note on the north corner the site of the old King’s Bench Prison, in which Mr. Micawber was detained—in the top storey but one—pending the settlement of his pecuniary liabilities.  Later on in the Copperfield history, Micawber appointed a meeting for David and Tom Traddles as follows:—

See chapter 49 for particulars of the subsequent interview.  This “dead wall” of the prison is also mentioned in the same book as the place where young David requested “the long-legged young man”—who had charge of his box for conveyance to the Dover coach-office—to stop for a minute while he (David) tied on the address.  It will be remembered that poor David lost his box and his money on this occasion, when he started for Dover,

“Taking very little more out of the world, towards the retreat of his aunt, Miss Betsy, than he had brought into it on the night when his arrival gave her so much umbrage;”

the total sum of his remaining cash amounting to three half-pence.—See chapter 12.

The first reference of our author to King’s Bench Prison will be found in “Nicholas Nickleby” (chapter 46), on the occasion of the hero’s first visit to Madeline Bray, who resided with her father in one

“Of a row of mean and not over cleanly houses, situated within ‘the rules’ of the King’s Bench Prison; . . . comprising some dozen streets in which debtors who could raise money to pay large fees—from which their creditors did not derive any benefit—were permitted to reside.”

We learn from Allen’s “History of Surrey” that these rules comprehended all St. George’s Fields, one side of Blackman Street, and part of the Borough High Street, forming an area of about three miles in circumference.  They could be purchased by the prisoners at the rate of five guineas for small debts, eight guineas for the first hundred pounds of debt, and about half that sum for every subsequent hundred.

The site of the prison is now occupied by workmen’s model dwellings named “Queen’s Buildings,” divided, north and south, by Scovell’s Road.

“When the sun rose brightly—as it did—it gilded thousands upon thousands of upturned faces, so inexpressibly odious in their brutal mirth or callousness, that a man had cause to shrink from himself as fashioned in the image of the devil.  When the two miserable creatures who attracted all this ghastly sight about them, were turned quivering into the air, there was no more emotion, no more pity, no more thought that two immortal souls had gone to judgment, no more restraint in any of the previous obscenities, than if the name of Christ had never been heard in this world, and there was no belief among men but that they perished like the beasts.  I have seen, habitually, some of the worst sources of general contamination and corruption in this country, and I think there are not many phases of London life that could surprise me.  I am solemnly convinced that nothing that ingenuity could devise to be done in this city, in the same compass of time, could work such ruin as one public execution; and I stand astounded and appalled by the wickedness it exhibits.”

Mr. Chivery resided with his family in Horsemonger Lane, in close proximity to the old prison, and kept a tobacconist’s shop for the supply of his Marshalsea customers and the general public of the neighbourhood—

In the little back-yard of the premises, “Young John”—disappointed in love—was accustomed to sit and meditate; taking cold among the “tuneless groves” of the newly-washed family linen, and composing suitable epitaphs to his own memory, in melancholy anticipation of an early decease.

Proceeding along the Borough Road, we arrive in due course at St. George’s Obelisk, which stands at the meeting-point of six roads.  In the twelfth chapter of “David Copperfield” we read of the Obelisk as the place near to which the “long-legged young man with a very little empty donkey-cart” was standing, whom David engaged to take his box to the Dover coach-office for sixpence.  And we all remember the sad dénouement of that engagement, as previously mentioned.  Near at hand, at the top of Blackfriars Road, stands The Surrey Theatre, at which Fanny Dorrit was engaged as a dancer, while her Uncle Frederick played the clarionet in the orchestra.

Crossing over to the opposite thoroughfare of Lambeth Road, the Rambler will find, at a short distance on the left, the entrance to Bethlehem Hospital, familiarly known as Bedlam.  A reference to this asylum will be found in the pages of “The Uncommercial Traveller,” where our author implies the idea that the sane and insane are, at all events, equal in their dreams—

“Are not all of us outside this Hospital, who dream more or less, in the condition of those inside it, every night of our lives?”

We now come onwards by Westminster Bridge Road, passing beneath the span of the London and South-Western Railway.  Near Westminster Bridge, on the left, is the old site of Astley’s Theatre (non-existent since 1896).  This establishment had cause to bless itself once a quarter, in days gone by, when Christopher Nubbles, Barbara, and friends patronised the performance.  We may here remember the occasion when Kit knocked a man over the head with his bundle of oranges for “scroudging his parent with unnecessary violence;” also the happy evening that followed, when little Jacob first saw a play and learnt what oysters meant (vide the “Old Curiosity Shop”).  On the site formerly occupied by this favourite place of entertainment, there now stand five handsome houses and shops, Nos. 225 to 233 Westminster Bridge Road.

Past a few doors beyond these, above, on the same side, we reach Lambeth Palace Road, turning by which we may walk (or ride by tramcar) a short distance southward.  Leaving on the right the seven handsome buildings of St. Thomas’s Hospital, we pass—on the left—farther on, Lambeth Episcopal Palace, and cross the Thames by Lambeth Suspension Bridge.

On the Middlesex shore we come into Millbank Street, and bestow a brief thought on Poor “Martha,” following her in imagination as she took her melancholy way southward in this same street, towards the waste riverside locality, “near the great blank prison” of Millbank, long since replaced by Tate’s Gallery.

Here it will be remembered that David Copperfield and his trusty friend Mr. Peggotty saved the despairing girl from a self-sought and miserable death.

“In this region are a certain little street called Church Street, and a certain little blind square called Smith Square, in the centre of which last retreat is a very hideous church, with four towers at the four corners, generally resembling some petrified monster, frightful and gigantic, on its back with its legs in the air.”

The house in which Jenny and her father lived is stated to have been one of the modest little houses which stand at the point where the street gives into Smith Square.  The Rambler will observe four houses answering this description on the north side of Church Street; No. 9 has been indicated as the humble home in question, where “the person of the house” and her “bad boy” resided.  Here, also, Lizzie Hexam lodged for some time after the death of her father, during the days when her uncertain lover, Eugene Wrayburn, was yet a bachelor.

We may now return to the main road and continue the northward route by Abingdon Street, crossing Old Palace Yard.  A passing thought may here be given to Mr. John Harmon, the Julius Handford of “Our Mutual Friend,” who furnished the Police authorities with his address—The Exchequer Coffee House, Palace Yard, Westminster.  Such a house of resort no longer exists in this vicinity.

On the west side the Rambler passes the precincts of Westminster Abbey, beneath whose “high embowed roof” repose the sacred ashes of the illustrious dead.  To this venerable fane—the especial resting-place of English literary genius—we will return after our concluding ramble to the birthplace of our greatest English novelist.

Proceeding by Whitehall, and crossing to the opposite side of the street, we shortly arrive at The Horse Guards, and may take passing observation of the Old Clock—famed for its perfection of time-keeping—by whose warning note Mark Tapley regulated the period of the interview next referred to.  Passing through the arched passage beneath, we now attain the eastern side of St. James’s Park.  This locality will be remembered as the place of meeting between Mary Graham and Martin Chuzzlewit, previous to his departure for America.  As the young lady was escorted by Mark in the early morning from a City hotel, we may be certain that the interview must have taken place on this side of the Park, doubtless near the principal gate of the promenade facing the Horse Guards’ entrance.

Leaving the Park northward, by Spring Gardens, we come into Cockspur Street, shortly leading (left) to Pall Mall.  At the first corner of the latter stands Her Majesty’s Theatre.  At this establishment, as reconstructed during the early years of the century, Mrs. Nickleby attended, by special invitation of Sir Mulberry Hawk, Messrs. Pyke and Pluck assisting on that notable occasion, when, by a prearranged coincidence, Kate and the Wititterlys occupied the adjoining box.—Vide “Nicholas Nickleby,” chapter 27.

At this central position, from which we may readily take departure for any point in London, the present Ramble will terminate.  To all those needing reparation of tissue, a visit to Epitaux’s Restaurant, near the Haymarket Theatre, will be satisfactory.