Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1866-12-20

sing song tunes, that ring in your ears for
hours. There come little girls crying with
their shrill, piping tones, "water dresses,
that follow sons of Abraham, proposing to
relieve you of your old clothes, some crying
"apy clo," some cole clo," some only a
sort of croaking grunt, like one of the
frogs of Aristophanes, which he means for
"clo." have seen one of these 80, clo''
men walk for hours along our square, emit
ting at every step his croakiug cry until it
became almost intolerable, and if he thought
you had garment you we're willing to part
with he stuck to you like leech, until you
had almost to call policeman to get rid of
him. There were vendors innumerable OF
matches, leather straps, bottle-washers,
shoe strings, cheap jewelry, nick. nacks aud
notions of every kind, which they thrust in
your face or run beside a carriage and try
to sell you. Then you encounter the shoe
blacks, sweepers Of crossings, beggars and
itineraut characters of all descriptions,
whose vociferatious add to the Babel confu-
sion that mingles in that cataract roar which
meets the ear in all the main thoroughfares
of this great city. At first it almost deaf.
ems and bewilders you; but after while
you cease to notice it, and rather miss it
when you find yourself in the quiet of one
of the secluded parks.
Another thing that strikes one is the
crookedness and narrowness of the streets,
and the absurd custom of changing their
names so capriciously. After the great fire
of London, Sir Christopher Wren tried to
induce the people to rebuild the city after
regular plan, but of course he failed, for
an Englishman iDstiDctively resists change,
even for the better, and "molumsus mutari'
is the key to much of English life and
history. Hence the streets turn and twist,
and end in alleys, and cross each other at
all manner of angles, except right ones ;
and it is like the reading the labyrinth of
Crete, to find ones way among them. And
then as you walk a street a few squares, you
find the name has changed, and a little
further, changed again; and as the houses
are numbered down one side of the street aud
up the other, you find No. 10 facing No. 300
of the same street, thus often confusing you.
The absurd extent to which this changing of
names goes, will be seen, when | give you
the various names assumed by one thorough
fare on its way through the city. 1t takes
successively the following names: Uxbridge
road, High street, then Uxbridge road
again, Oxford street, New Oxford street,
High Holborn, Holborn Hill, Skinner
street, Newgate, Cheapside, Poultre, Lom-
bard, Fenchurch, Whitecbapel road, Mile
end road, Bow road, Stafford road, &C., &c.
This is very puzzliug to a stranger at
first. Another little matter you may have
noticed in addresses of persons in London,
without understanding it: it is two streets
often being given in one address-as e. 6.
our lodgings were Is Ryder street, St.
James; that means the Ryder street that
runs into St. James street, for there may be
several other Ryder streets. They have
multiplied names so much on their streets
that they are obliged to use the same one
several times.
One who has been in Broadway, New
York, can form some notion of the crowded
con dition ofthe London streets. Various ex-
periments have been made to ascertain the
number of persons and vehicles passing a
single point, and it has been found that in
Cheapside 1885 vehicles passed Bow
Church in an hour-more than 20 every
minute! Add to this the foot passengers,
and you can imagine the rush. 1t has been
ascertaiued in the same way that more than
half million of people enter the small
part of London known as the Old City, and
the same number pass out every day, making
more than a million of passers by on these
streets of this small portion of the great
city l tell you these little facts to attempt
to give you some notion of the mighty tide
of life that rushes and roars through this city
during the day and night.
But it is amazing how admirably every
thing is arranged and systematised. A tri-
vial little incident will illustrate this better
than volume. | had letter of introduc-
ton to lawyer, whose Office was near
Temple Bar, and whose residence was in
Westbourue Terrace, nearly four miles
from the Temple 1 called at bookstore
in Fleet street and inquired the way to his
Office, and presume dropped my passport
there, and not finding the gentleman in bis
office, left my letter and card. This was
about l o'clock P NJ. On reaching my
lodgings about sundown, l found my pass
port, which this bookseller must have taken
to the Office of the lawyer, and obtained
there my address (for it was not iu the pass.
port), and then sent me by the parcel de-
livery, nearly two miles distant; and also
found letter from the lawyer, writtea from
bis house, and sent through the mail, and
all these between l and 7 o'clock P NJ,
and in this busy, crowded city When |
remembered the chance of recovering any
thing that one dropped accidently in an
American city, and the length of time that
it often takes drop letters to reach their
destination with US, the return of my pass
port by perfect stranger, who must have
taken no little trouble to find out my address
and the coming of note from such dis
tance in so short time, gave me very