St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1898-01-14
PLEASURE IN LONDON.

Mrs. Elizabeth Robins Pennell COIL
tributes to The Century an article on
"Play In London" After speaking OF
Vauxhall Gardens and Cremorne Mrs
Pennell says:
Everybody knows what the old gar
den was like-Thackeray has seen to
tbat-with the hundred thousand lamps
always lighted, the fiddlers who made
ravishing melodies, the singers, the
/ dancers, the Nine. Saquis on the slack
rope ascending to the stars, the hermit
in the illuminated hermitage, the dark
walks SO favorable to lovers, the pots OF
stout, the dinners and suppers-ln
word, the sort of combination Of cafe,
music hall, restaurant aud Fourth OF
July that nowhere else has been brought
to such perfection that to Sir Roger
had seemed long before Thackeray's
day I" kind of Mohammedan paradise.
But what everybody does not know so
we'll is that London still has its garden,
called by another name, to be sure, lg-
nored by Murray and Baedeker and Offer
ing another programme, Nine. Saquls
and hermits gone from it apparently
forevermore, but precisely the same in
principle and practice.
Vauxhall has vanished; Cremorne
sends up no more rockets skyward to
fill the night with beauty; the Crystal
palace is only for the suburb and the
country cousin, but every summer
Earl's court has its exhibition-an ex-
hibition only by courtesy, only out OF
Difference to The present fashion of gath
ering our knowledge or pretending to
while we play. One year it was called
Italian, and there were macaronl and
chianti in the restaurants, and a nice
new pasteboard forum Another year
it was German, and the air was heavy
with the fragrance Of schnitzel and
wurst. Then it was American, for
change, and cowboys and red Indians
staggered across the scene, and soda
water and maple sugar figured on the
menu. Now it happens to be Indian,
with fine oriental flavor, but by the
time this is published it will be some
thing else, and it really matters very
little. The exhibition, attributed to any
nation, would be as gay. Nobody cares
save perhaps, few tradesmen and
mummers, who smell the commercial
battle from afar. 1t is an open secret
that the semblance Of show is there
merely to court avoidance. The years
in passing have turned it into big
bazaar, but not even in this guise can it
prove the chief attraction.
No; the great thing, the only thing,
that counts is the garden, where one
may walk under pleasant trees; where
one may ape the continental and drink
tea or coffee at little tables-but most
ly tea, in capacious pots-to the accom-
paniment of thick slabs of cake; where
one may be still more un-English and
eat ones dinner outdoors-not like a
wild beast in cage, as in the old
"box" at Vauxhall. but in company,
OH low, broad veranda, where there
are side shows more diverting than
Pepys ever dreamed of; where one may
loaf away the summer evening, listen
ing to music which is at least as good
as the honest Briton likes it. For the
truth is the garden furnishes just that
form of amusement which Mr.. Henry
{ James has lamented was not to be
found in London, and so long as it is
open one need not, as he thought "give
up the idea of going to sit somewhere il
: the open air, to eat an ice and listen tt
band of music. " Only the amusement
must be shared with SO big a Grove
that one will have to scramble for {
chair, engage a dinner table full /:
: hours beforehand, and struggle to ge
4 home by underground or bus as furi
: ously as the mob fights to push into thu
g pit Of popular theater.
!. To provide the Englishman with {
4 crowd, to give him the chance to us
y his elbows, is to convince him that h
i is enjoying himself. And the old gar
). dens questionable features, its jewellers
;, its jockeys and courtesans and gam
r blers-where are they? Where are tn
=, SHOWS of yesteryear? All gone wit
other times and other morals. TIL
world of Earl's court and Kensingto
& has taken the exhibition under its pre-
;, lection, and there sits in stately spler
, dor magnificent example of respects
- bility, within an Enclosure humorousl
- called the Welcome club, because &C
- mission is refused to all but the cleo
~ ~ Where the west end condesoends
80 spend its afternoons and evenings thel
~, surely every one may venture in safe,
y by night as by day Indeed there is
:, strong domestic element about the e:
We hibtion, 1t is place for the family,
- playground for the decorous.
'" He Would Not Deny 1t.
~ A fo1arnl ,rJ,,a lo, al ,ho,c,oJ 4, 49,