The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1894-06-14
CHEAPSIDE, LONDON.
A CORRESPONDENT CALLS 1T THE
WORLDS BUSIEST STREET.


Excitement Has Not Seen Londor
Until He Has Seen Cheapside.
Cheapside is a street, and busy ont
the busiest / dare say, of the whole
world of streets. 1t is not long; it is no
beautiful; it is not the resort of the
fashionable; it is business thorough
fare from first to last, and it has more
history crammed into its short stretch
than other great thoroughfares have il
their combined long ones. Cheapside be-
ing not at the side of anything in the
present era, but at the heart of all things,
| being in the heart of London, has very
important place in civic affairs. 1t is
what they call ian artery of traffic, 81
asphalted into the bargain and afford,
I ing ingress and exit as between the city
| and the regions west. If it has a quarter
of mile to its length, it has as much
as it can legitimately claim, and even
that includes a little slice at the eastern
end called the Poultry" title which
signifies local purpose in the pictur-
esque past.
Cheapside has at one end the Poultry,
but this need not be counted as a sepa-
rate entity. And at the Poultry end is
the Mansion House, where lives the lord
mayor in gold lace state. Cheapside
bumps into Threadneedle street, up to
the steps of the Royal Exchange and
against the walls of the Bank of Eng
land, institutions which are both useful
and ornamental. At the other end of
Cheapside there is statue of Sir Robert
Peel. But venture to say that half the
people who pass there every day do not
know whose statue it is and of the 9TH
er half an uncomfortable fraction will
have some accurate notion as to who Sir
Robert Peel really was, the balance be-
ing able to suggest only that he had
something to do with the police. "
Cheapside is to London what lower
Broadway is to New York, between the
postOffice and Wall street Shops, Shops
shops, insurance companies, great mer-
camille houses, restaurants, a church
Dick Whittington's-th is to say,
Bow church, where the bells still tingle
these are the stationary ingredients of
Cheapside. Omnibuses, human beings,
cabs and carriers vans are the movable
ones. Cheapside is like the channel of
tidal river-at one time of the day the
current sets in one direction, and at an
other time it GIBBS to the opposite course.
The street has many funny little trib-
utarles, with funny little names, Bread
street, Friday street, Ironmonger lane
and Old Jewry being some of these
narrow passages where in days more
primitive than our own opposite neigh
bOrs leaned out of windows and shook
hands across the street, while from the
pavement they could scarcely have seen
the sky, so closely did the overhanging
stories approach to the roofs thereof.
But there are no dwellings in Cheapside
now, nor i'll the adjacent tributaries.
The buildings are all for business pur-
poses only. The old vogue of overhang
has been long dispensed with, and a
sprightly modern air is Worn by the
architecture.
One kind of commodity Cheapside has
in more abundance than any other place
on the whirling footstool-jewelry. 1t
may not be the most sumptuous jewelry
that ever was made, it may not compare
with the golden filigree work of Ia
mara, but it is jewelry nevertheless and
Of good sort for the moderate classes.
And there is so much of it that it over
flows the contracted emporiums and
lows i'll cascades and Niagaras of watch
chains necklaces, fantastic guards, be-
hind the plate glass windows.
1t seems to be trick of Cheapside's
shops to display all their treasures to
the preoccupied eyes of those who here
march i'll legions along the pavement. |
They pour their wares into their win
lows with a reckless profusion suggest
i've OF the orient-that is to say, the
orient you read about, not the orient |
which actually exists. The iewelrv of
Jheapside is mainly silver jewelry and !
.he radiance of the windows is the white |
'adiance which furnishes with such hap |
less result in the London fog.
Cheapside is best seen between 9 |
md i'll the morning or between and |
III the afternoon, either when every |
body is coming to or going from his oc-
3upation But all day long the street is
provided from end to end so crowded |
hat you cannot anywhere cross it in
safety, except at the points where con-
stables are stationed to regulate the traf-
-ic.
One of the odd features of Cheapside |
IS the line of pedestrians who stand in |
either gutter, stringing along the curbs |
md vending catchpenny toys. These
merchants are an amusing lot in their
way. Their harangues are endless and |
lot wholly lacking in wit, although |
heir language is not altogether parlia-
mentTy. They sell the most wonderful |
assortment Of ingenious toys that you
AN imagine and every week Or two |
hey produce some new thing. Variety |
IS the spice of their trade The wonder |
-ul toys that can be bought of them for |
1 penny allure all kinds of people who |
90 cltyward. know men on the Stock |
Exchange who make it a point to buy |
very new penny toy that appears on |
~heapsldc. Their collections have al |
ready tbn o1pnor,r,, 90 . l.--.- &, , |