Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1882-06-07
LIFE IN LONDON.

\ LII IN LUNDON.
The Broad Contrast Between the Zenith and Ma
dir of Social Existence in the Great Metropolis
-.-Horror as a Background for Picture of Re-
Rnement and SpIendor.
[Corr. N. Y. Times.]
Of all the great cities, London is most
essentially city of contrasts. There,
better than in any other place, may be
compared the extremes of riches and
of poverty, of vice and of virtue, OF
work and of idleness, of order and OF
squalor, of great, generous, magnificent
luxury and of abject, absolute, hopeless
misery; of lives filled to overhowing
with every means of enjoyment known to
man, and of existences blacker, more
desolate, and wretched than can be
painted or described. Taking Charing
Cross for center, an ordinary morning
walk will suffice TO show to an observing
visitor at least the outward signs of these
extremes. In one short hour he can go
from the palaces of the West End, SEEM
ing paradises upon earth, to st. Giles or
Whitechapel, or to "the Mint in the
Borough" whose tortuous lanes and
narrow alleyways are foul lurking places
for moral, mental and physical wrecks of
poor humanity.
And still the sun shines bright thy on
Belgravia, on the parks. and the squares.
The windows of many of the houses are
open and soft perfumes from masses of
rare flowers which appear in most of
them ELL the air. Through them, too,
the passer-by may catch gIimpses of the
royal rooms within, of apartments whose
slightest ornament would cost to most
men years hard work; of hangings of
daintiest lace, of satin, and of gold, of
white marble statuary, of bronze figures,
of great urns and vases and jugs and
plaques cunningly devised in majolica,
satsuma, agate, and onyx; of carvings In
ivory, ebony, and amaranth; of pictures
without number and bric-a-brac of rare
beauty and untold worth. Nor are sight
and smell the only senses which are
ravished in this wilderness of luxury.
The sound of soft music steals through
the open windows. Trained musicians
with violins and flutes and oboes and
violoncellos have here and there been
retained to aid the givers of fetes, break
fasts, and morning receptions, while off
Id the parks the more vigorous notes of
military bands may be heard in the dis
lance. 1t is bright day for the lords
and ladies. the earls and barons, the
dukes and duchesses and princes of
proud England. All the west end seems
on the go. Carriages crowd the road
way; fine gentlemen, the nobility of
| Britain, as class the best dressed men
in the world, are upon the sidewalk.
But the west end is not all of London.
The same sun which lights up the silks
and the satins and the velvets and the
laces of Belgravia, the same sun which
is reflected back by the gold and silver
harnesses and polished panels of rich
carriages In the parks, the same sun
which shines upon the jewels, the flow
ers, the uniforms, the liveries, the dukes.
the princes, the mobiles, the beauties, the
ladies, and all the outer manifold glor-
les of the squares, tries also to shine
upon st. Giles, "the Mint in the Bor-
ough and Whltechapel Tries, and
fails to penetrate to the close lanes, the
noisome counts, the fever stricken dens,
the thief-haunted cellars, the reeking,
filthy alleyways, the miasnal cutters,
the slums, the vile pest,holes of those
horrible regions, quarters of the city
| NhASh COOhA SuAoOA Ny NiOu, do buSJ dIG
Stunned by decent men. Yet, in less
than an hour on this bright June day we
go from the falryland of the West End to
this dark hell upon earth. There is no
joy here, no gladness, no brightness, no
buzz of gay voices, no flash of many col
ors, no prancing of blooded steeds, no
echOing of martial music, no flowers, no
light. The scene is changed, terribly
changed. There is misery, poverty.
wretchedness, hunger, vice and want on
every hand. The flower vases of Sevres,
of agate, and alabaster, have given place
to heaps of decaying vegetables, and bits
OF coarse crockery, broken in some re-
cent brawl. For music there is the cry
ing of puny children, the curses of half
drunken men, and the shrieks of bloated
creatures who once bore the likeness of
women; for the fash of gold there is the
dull glare of the three balls on the pawn
brokers', for the glitter of jewels, the
squald splendor of colored glasses in the
corner gin shops, and for the laces and
the silks and the velvets there are dirty
rags.
Do you see that rickety building at
the end of the lane? A scene most
characteristic of Shoreditch was enacted
there this morning. Two weeks ago
"Sleek George" the sneak-thief, and
his Sc Mol. % who saw better days, they
say, went to live in that back room-the
one with the broken window high up
there to the left. She was soon to be
mother. Last night George I" struck it
rich" somewhere, and went up drunk.
He took a quart bottle up with him.
Soon afterward there was row up there,
and woman's voice crying to God for
mercy, which did not come. Then there
was fall, which shook what plaster
there was left from the ceiling below.
After that George" was heard singing
a song for a while, and then all was still
enough. This morning, somehow, the
police heard of the row and the fall. It
may be that they have kept sharper
eye on 'sthe court - since the night that
"Jew Isaac" was found dead. locked in
his own cellar and half eaten nv the rats