Travels in England in 1782 | Page 7

as a sailor, unless, indeed, he should be found at any suspicious place. A singular invention for this purpose of pressing is a ship, which is placed on land not far from the Tower, on Tower Hill, furnished with masts and all the appurtenances of a ship. The persons attending this ship promise simple country people, who happen to be standing and staring at it, to show it to them for a trifle, and as soon as they are in, they are secured as in a trap, and according to circumstances made sailors of or let go again.
The footway, paved with large stones on both sides of the street, appears to a foreigner exceedingly convenient and pleasant, as one may there walk in perfect safety, in no more danger from the prodigious crowd of carts and coaches, than if one was in one's own room, for no wheel dares come a finger's breadth upon the curb stone. However, politeness requires you to let a lady, or any one to whom you wish to show respect, pass, not, as we do, always to the right, but on the side next the houses or the wall, whether that happens to be on the right or on the left, being deemed the safest and most convenient. You seldom see a person of any understanding or common sense walk in the middle of the streets in London, excepting when they cross over, which at Charing Cross and other places, where several streets meet, is sometimes really dangerous.
It has a strange appearance--especially in the Strand, where there is a constant succession of shop after shop, and where, not unfrequently, people of different trades inhabit the same house--to see their doors or the tops of their windows, or boards expressly for the purpose, all written over from top to bottom with large painted letters. Every person, of every trade or occupation, who owns ever so small a portion of a house, makes a parade with a sign at his door; and there is hardly a cobbler whose name and profession may not be read in large golden characters by every one that passes. It is here not at all uncommon to see on doors in one continued succession, "Children educated here," "Shoes mended here," "Foreign spirituous liquors sold here," and "Funerals furnished here;" of all these inscriptions. I am sorry to observe that "Dealer in foreign spirituous liquors" is by far the most frequent. And indeed it is allowed by the English themselves, that the propensity of the common people to the drinking of brandy or gin is carried to a great excess; and I own it struck me as a peculiar phraseology, when, to tell you that a person is intoxicated or drunk, you hear them say, as they generally do, that he is in liquor. In the late riots, which even yet are hardly quite subsided, and which are still the general topic of conversation, more people have been found dead near empty brandy-casks in the streets, than were killed by the musket- balls of regiments that were called in. As much as I have seen of London within these two days, there are on the whole I think not very many fine streets and very fine houses, but I met everywhere a far greater number and handsomer people than one commonly meets in Berlin. It gives me much real pleasure when I walk from Charing Cross up the Strand, past St. Paul's to the Royal Exchange, to meet in the thickest crowd persons from the highest to the lowest ranks, almost all well-looking people, and cleanly and neatly dressed. I rarely see even a fellow with a wheel-barrow who has not a shirt on, and that, too, such a one as shows it has been washed; nor even a beggar without both a shirt and shoes and stockings. The English are certainly distinguished for cleanliness.
It has a very uncommon appearance in this tumult of people, where every one, with hasty and eager step, seems to be pursuing either his business or his pleasure, and everywhere making his way through the crowd, to observe, as you often may, people pushing one against another, only perhaps to see a funeral pass. The English coffins are made very economically, according to the exact form of the body; they are flat, and broad at top; tapering gradually from the middle, and drawing to a point at the feet, not very unlike the case of a violin.
A few dirty-looking men, who bear the coffin, endeavour to make their way through the crowd as well as they can; and some mourners follow. The people seem to pay as little attention to such a procession, as if a hay-cart were driving past. The funerals of people of distinction, and of