Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1879-09-17
THE PAUPER GRAVEYARD.
Description Of a Scene of Desolatton In
the Great City Of London.

Description Of a Scene Of Desolatton In
the Great City Of London.
London Cor. of the N. Y. Tribune.
I have spoken of the story of the pur-
suit of Lady Dedlock in the BLEAK
House," The climax of that remarka-
BILE narrative is the finding of the fugi-
tive, cold and dead, with one arm
around a rail of the dark little grave
yard where they buried the mysterious
law.copyist, "Nemo," and where poor
10, the crossing sweeper, came at night
and swept the stones as his last tribute
to the friend who "was very good" to
him. There are three striking descrip-
tions of this place in the novel. GA
hemmed-in church yard, pestiferous and
obscene-a beastly scrap Of ground
which Turk would reject as savage
abomination, and Caffre would shudder
at. With houses looking, on every side,
save where a reeking little tunnel of
court gives access to the iron gate-with
every villainy of life in action close on
death, and every poisonous element of
death in action close on life; here they
lower our dear brother down foot or
two; here SOW him in corruption to be
raised in corruption; an avenging ghost
at many a sick bedside; shameful
testimony to future ages how civil
cation and barbarism walked this boast
full island together" The exact situa-
ton of the graveyard is not defined in
the novel, but it is evident that it cannot
have been very far from Lincoln's Inn,
and had been told that it was in the
neighborhood of Drury Lane. So
strangely hidden away is it among close
and dirty houses that it was only after
three long searches through all the courts
thereabouts that [ found the "reeking
little tunnel" and twice | passed the
entrance without observing it. Opening
out of Drury Lane, at the back and side
of the theatre, is network Of narrow
tagged passages built up with tall tene.
ments. There are rag and waste paper
shops in this retreat, two or three dread
full little green grocer's stalls, pawn
brokers', a surprising number Of cobblers,
and in the heart of the place, where the
alley widens into the semblance of a
dwarfed court, colony Of dealers in
theatrical fnery, dancing shoes, paste
board rounds of beef and outlets, stage
armor and secondhand play books
Between the Marquis Court on the one
hand, Russell Court on the other, and a
miserable alley called Cross Court which
connects them, is what appears at frs.
sight to be a solid block Of tenements.
The door of one of these houses stood
open, and through barred staircase
window at the back of the entry / caught
q glimpse of a patch of grass-a sight so
strange in this partof London that went
around to the other side of the block to
examine further. There l found the
"reeking little tunnel" It is merely a
stone paved passage abous four feet wide
through the ground floor of a tenement.
House doors open into it. A rusty iron
gate closes it at the further end. Here
is the pestiferous and obscene church
yard" completely hemmed in by the
habitations of the living. Tombstones
are set up against the walls of the houses,
and most of the graves seem to have been
made without any such memorial
Perhaps a church stood there once, but
there is none now. When the people Of
the block shut their doors at night they
shut the dead in with them. Inside the
gate lay various rubbish-a woman's
boot, broken coal-scuttle, the foot of 8
tin candle stick, fragments of paper
sticks, bones, straw-unmentionable
denominations. Burials are no longer
allowed there, but the dishonoring of the
old graves seems to 60 on briskly. 4
dark and smoke-laden, fog-dripped
moisture hung over the city as I turned
away from the black and muddy
cemetery and picked my way through
the foul courts into the mists of Chancery
Lane.