occasionally you hear of them in the Police Reports in connection with a murder or robbery.
The foreign artistes in London again compose a society which, in one sense and more especially at one period of the year, lives apart. In the season, however, of course you will meet with the chief singers from the two operatic establishments at the great houses of London. It is as much a part of their profession to sing at such places for a money reward as it is to make their appearance in front of the foot-lights at the Haymarket or in Covent Garden. Those persons again whose names throughout the season you see duly recorded every day in the advertisement columns of the “Times” are, by the very exigency of their position, driven out into the world to seek for a connection. For the most part they give lessons on the piano, or in singing, and a concert once or oftener in the season. The less considerable professors—ladies as well as gentlemen—generally succeed in obtaining the use for the day of the rooms of Mrs. , in Harley Street, or some locality of that kind. Those who feel that they are treading upon safer ground boldly engage the Hanover Square Rooms, and support themselves by their own strength. Amongst this class you will commonly meet with most agreeable additions to any social circle. You will find them living for the most part Brompton way. They are generally economical in their habits, and put by money, which is intended as the fund for their future support at Paris, or Berlin, or Dresden. English people who are accustomed to consider large establishments with a multitude of servants, &c., as the test of comfort and respectability, would be astonished at the smallness of the income with which persons of this class are in the main content. When they have earned what they deem enough for their purposes they quietly retire from the exercise of their profession, and decline further labour merely for the purpose of accumulating money. Some of the leading teachers have indeed realised considerable fortunes; but in the main their earnings are not very large. During their stay amongst us, if they are not precisely fish out of water, they are at least longing for a change of stream.
I have never had any personal acquaintance with the great operatic singers, but I have been told by those who have cultivated their society that they are most agreeable companions. Surely it cannot be any great strain upon human credulity to suppose that Madame Grisi, and Alboni, and Titiens, and Csillag must be charming in society. Were we not all ready to put on crape for Malibran, and Sontag, and poor Madame Bosio, who but last year at this very time was warbling her sweet strains amongst us, and by the mere influence of her graceful presence converting Mr. Gye’s theatre into her own drawing-room? The curtain fell upon her, to the apprehension of the writer of these remarks, as Zerlina in the “Don John,” and now of all that music, and grace, and genius there is an end! I should almost grudge to hear any other singer take the part. Surely Mario must be a genial companion; and if Ronconi could not keep a dinner-table in a roar, the science of Lavater is a mere imposition upon the good sense of the public.
The ladies and gentlemen and wealthy merchants of whom I have hitherto been speaking are all too respectable, and too well hedged in by all the appliances and fences which money can purchase, to afford material for touching upon the ridiculous side of a foreigner’s visit to London. Many of those poor people at whose disembarcation at Dover we recently assisted, will have their trials before they become free of the town. Their first difficulty is with the class of cabmen. Even we Londoners who know something about London, and the situations of the various streets and squares, and have a general idea of the laws and regulations affecting public carriages, know to our cost that the London cabby is not always an individual of a placable and disinterested character. I remember meeting one evening at about 10.30 p.m. with an unfortunate French gentleman, who had thrust his head out of a cab, and was calling out “Rue du Duc” at the top of his voice. This was in the neighbourhood of Cavendish Square. It appeared upon inquiry that he had been driven away at about 2 p.m. by the cabman under whose guardianship I found him, from the Custom House, and had spent all the afternoon and evening driving about the town in search of Duke Street. Cabby had taken him to every Duke Street in London except the right one, which was Duke Street, Portman Square, and had now a small bill against him of 1l. 18s. 6d., or some sum of that kind. This was a good many years ago, and I hope that things have got better since. But let us suppose our French friend safely deposited at the Sablonnière in Leicester Square, or some humbler hostelry in that classical locality—what shall he do with himself?
His first idea—a very proper one—is to go and have a bath in order to wash off the impurities of the journey: that is not a very difficult matter under the auspices of the garçon at the inn where he may have taken up his abode. Breakfast of some kind is to be procured either in the house or in some of the dreary little cafés which have recently been established in and about Leicester Square. But how different is all this from the Boulevards and the Palais Royal! When this is done we will suppose M. Alexis de Corbillard and his friend M. Aristide Canard to sally forth in search of amusement, with the Guide Book to London in their hands. There are no doubt in this great capital many objects well worthy of the attention of our foreign visitors. Westminster Abbey is worth a dozen of Notre Dames. The shipping in the docks and river is what a Frenchman could scarcely conceive as existing even in his dreams. St. Paul’s not only extinguishes all Parisian rivalry, but may challenge comparison even with the great Roman cathedral. The town itself, from Putney to Blackwall, and from Hampstead to Dulwich, is, as far as we know, the largest human hive which has ever existed since we have had any record of man’s presence on the surface of this planet; but I am afraid my two French friends do not care much for these weightier matters. They want to see something corresponding to their own Boulevards; they miss the tap of the drum and the march of a regiment through the public streets.