His mother
said, half-jealously when she read them, that he seemed
tremendously taken up with the old country; and of course
she expressed the thing exactly, as she always did: he
was tremendously taken up with it. The old country fell
into the lines of his imagination, from the towers of
Westminster to the shops in the Strand; from the Right
Hon. Fawcett Wallingham, who laid great issues before
the public, to the man who sang melancholy hymns to the
same public up and down the benevolent streets. It was
naturally London that filled his view; his business was
in London and his time was short; the country he saw from
the train, whence it made a low cloudy frame for London,
with decorations of hedges and sheep. How he saw London,
how he carried away all he did in the time and under the
circumstances, may be thought a mystery; there are
doubtless people who would consider his opportunities
too limited to gather anything essential. Cruickshank
was the only one of the deputation who had been "over"
before; and they all followed him unquestioningly to the
temperance hotel of his preference in Bloomsbury, where
bedrooms were three and six and tea was understood as a
solid meal and the last in the day. Bates would have
voted for the Metropole, and McGill had been advised that
you saw a good deal of life at the Cecil, but they bowed
to Cruickshank's experience.
Pages:
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181