The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

180
THE BRITISH ISLES.
a desire of concentrating the transactions of commerce in this quarter that
causes the resident population to diminish, for the City authorities, by opening
wide thoroughfares through the districts inhabited by the poor, work towards the
same end. When Farringdon Street was extended through the old valley of the
Fleet, nearly 8,000 workmen's families found themselves homeless at a single
blow, and their humble dwellings made room for public buildings, railways, and
piles of offices. In the course of the last forty years at least 50,000 workmen
have in this manner been driven out of the City, and compelled to herd
together in the adjoining districts. The number of paupers has grown small
in the City, but it has increased all the more rapidly in the neighbouring
parishes.
The very poorest quarters of London have immediate contact with that wealthy
Citv, which not many years hence will count only employes and housekeepers
amono-st its resident population. The labyrinth of streets around the Tower and the
Docks is dreaded by the stranger, and not often entered by the Londoner residing
in more favoured districts. The mud is carried from the streets into the passages
of the houses ; the walls are bespattered with filth ; tatters hang in the windows ;
a fetid or rancid odour fills the atmosphere ;
while most of the men and women you
meet in the streets have sunken eyes and emaciated limbs. The soiled garments
which they wear have originally belonged to the fine ladies and gentlemen of the
West-end ;
they have changed hands ten times since their original owners parted
with them, and finish as rags upon the bodies of the inhabitants of Shadwell and
Wapping. Certain narrow streets in Rotherhithe, Bermondsey, and Lambeth, to
the south of the Thames, are likewise the seats of misery, and it is with a feeling
of relief we emerge from them, and obtain a sight of the Thames, of some wide
thoroughfare, or of a public park. How vast is the contrast between these wretched
how great the difference in the modes of life
quarters and the sumptuous suburbs ;
of the inhabitants and the burdens they are called upon to carry ! The annual
death rate varies between 14 and 60 to every 1,000 persons living, according to
the streets, and death gathers its harvest most rapidly where want of work, of
bread, and of other necessaries facilitates its task. The misery London hides is
indescribable.
The districts which bound the City to the north and east, such as Spitul-
fields, Bethnal Green, and Clerkenwell, are principally inhabited by artisans, and
separate the- poorest qiiarters of London from those mainly occ\ipied b}' the lower
middle classes. The houses there are for the most part of the common English
type. An area, 6 to 10 feet deep, and bounded by railings, separates the
street from the house. A flagstone or " steps," thrown across this " ditch " like a
drawbridge over the moat of a fortress, lead to the entrance of what has very
appropriately been described as the Englishman's " castle." Separate steps
usually lead down into the area and to the kitchen and coal cellar. There are no
"spy-glasses," such as may frequently be seen in the Low Countries, and the sash-
windows towards the street remain obstinately closed. Flowers usuallv ornament
the rooms. Init cannot be seen from the street, for thov arc there for the jrratifica-