The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1878-05-11
BROADBRIM'S LITTER FROM LONDON.

! ARRIVAL IN LONDON-QUEER LODGINGS
THE GREAT UNIVERSITY RACE SIGHTS
AND SCENES IN LONDON ILFE-BRoTHER
JONATHAN ABROAD, SC, &C.
My last letter was begun and finished
on the sea, in order to get it off by the
earliest ocean mail. Six days of continu
Gus storm had made me long for the sight
of land, and felt perfectly content to leave
the unstable footing and exhiarating air
of the ocean to those romantic young ladies
and gentlemen who delight in
ga life on the ocean wave"
The cry of /" Land!' sent thrill through
the passengers and crew, and all crowded
forward to catch a glimpse of Holyhead,
and the grim Welsh mountains which
| guard the western coast of Albion. The
day was raw and chilly; the fierce easterly
storm, which met US as we were parting
from the American coast, followed us into
the chops of the Channel and up the Mer-
sey, even to the docks of Liverpool. The
| debarkation was quickly made; courteous
Custom House Officers completed their task
with rs little delay as possible. The in
specton passed, jumped into a haDsom
| (cab, and in a few minutes was comfortably
quartered in the Mort hwestern hotel. Liv.
erpoUl has dark, smoky look, which is in
measure relieved by the dazzling bright
ness of the gin shops. Sqnalid misery,
hopeless poverty, wletchedEess unspeak-
able, meet you everywhere; it is not only
in the by-ways and the slums, bnt Oh the
great thoroughfares. You pass tattered
men, women and children, with starvation
cleaning from their eyes. They look as
though they always had been poor, and
there is about them pale, chalky, sort of
look, wherein you can trace the history
of the gin shops, with all the terrible as
sociations made immortal by the pencil of
Hogarth. On every hand are the evidences
of opulence and imperial power. Ships
| from every cline cram her stOrehouses with
the costliest treasures of the earth. At
Birkenhead, across the Mersey, the roar
of blazing furnaces and the thunder of
| Titanic hammers seem to shake the very
earth, as they build those gigantic steamers
which are the wonder and admiration of
the world. Miles and miles of solid ma
sonry from the great docks which have no
parallel on the face OF the globe. Magni-
ficent public buildings surround you, but
look dark and grim and sooty, completely
destroying the sense of beauty which would
| tp1a
and solidity of everything astonishe you;
in the bridges and archways and tremendous
wall of masonry the work looks as though
| it might have been performed by race of
| Titaus long since extinct, Instead of the
Pigmies you see laboriug by the wayslde.
From Liverpool to London the railway runs
through a country which gives you the i'm
preston of being entirely tinshed--it
seems as if there was nothing more to do.
| The fields are all prepared, the lawns are
all moved, the hedges are trimmed, all the
| little bits of straw and hay have been
picked up from the road and the wayside,
and there is nothing left for anybody to do.
There were but few people visible in the
| C0untrS, all were III lEt joWnS.
| Disseminating at the Victoria Station,
found my way to quarters just back of the
Strand and only a short distance from
Waterloo bridge and Somerset House.
Within sight was the building where the
traitor Benedict Arnold died. lily own
quarters were once the abode of the vaga
bond Earl of Rochester. The room | oc-
cupied had an air of faded gentility, of the
gloomy and grand order; and as the gay Earl
is not considered a model by the good people
of Exeter Hall, it was, perhaps, as we'll for
my sweet peace of mind that | know no
more of his history; but as | blew out the
light and jumped into bed, the red glare
from the CRATE lit up the face of a grand
cavalier in high ruff and buff boots, who
hung against the wall, and as | sank into
an uneasy slumber, be seemed to step down
from the canvas, and tell me tumble of
/ Cnur de Leon and William the Conqueror;
Edward the Confessor, Jane Shore and the
great Protector; and Henry the Eighth's
three wives, who come out minus their
heads, and good Queen Bess, with her red