The Man Who Laughs (Estes and Lauriat 1869)/Chapter 58
BOOK III.
THE BEGINNING OF THE FISSURE.
CHAPTER I.
THE TADCASTER INN.
AT that period London had but one bridge—London Bridge, with houses built upon it. This bridge united London with Southwark, a suburb paved with flint pebbles taken from the Thames, and divided into small streets and alleys, like the city, with a great number of buildings, houses, dwellings, and wooden huts jammed together,—a pell-mell mixture of combustible matter, with which fire might work its will, as 1666 had proved.
Southwark was then pronounced Soudric, it is now pronounced Sousouorc, or near it; indeed, an excellent way of pronouncing English names is not to pronounce them. Thus, for Southampton, say, Stpntn. It was the time when "Chatham" was pronounced je t'aime. The Southwark of those days resembles the Southwark of to-day about as much as Vaugirard resembles Marseilles. It was then a village; it is now a city. Nevertheless, considerable business was carried on there. The long old Cyclopean wall by the Thames was studded with rings, to which the river barges were anchored.
This wall was called the Effroc Wall. York, in Saxon times, was called Effroc, Legend says that a Duke of Effroc was once drowned at the foot of the wall. The water there certainly was deep enough to drown a duke. At low water it was six good fathoms deep. The excellence of this little anchorage attracted many sea vessels, and the old Dutch tub called the "Vograat" came to anchor at the Effroc Wall. The "Vograat" made the crossing from London to Rotterdam, and from Rotterdam to London, punctually once a week. Other barges started twice a day, either for Deptford, Greenwich, or Gravesend, going down with one tide and returning with the next. The voyage to Gravesend, though twenty miles, was made in six hours.
The "Vograat" was of a model no longer seen now, except in naval museums. It was almost a junk. At that time, while France copied Greece, Holland copied China. The "Vograat," a heavy hull with two masts, was partitioned perpendicularly, so as to be water-tight, having a narrow hold in the middle, and two decks, one fore and the other aft. The decks were flush, as in the iron turret-vessels of the present day,—the advantage of which is that in foul weather the force of the waves is diminished, and the disadvantage of which is that the crew is exposed to the action of the sea, owing to there being no bulwarks. There was nothing to save any one on board from falling into the sea. Hence the frequent losses of men, which caused the model to fall into disuse. The "Vograat" went to Holland direct, and did not even stop at Gravesend.
An old ridge of stones, solid rock as well as masonry, ran along the bottom of the Effroc Wall, and being passable at all tides, was used to board the ships moored to the wall. This wall was furnished with steps at intervals. It marked the southern limits of Southwark. An embankment at the top allowed the passers-by to rest their elbows on the Effroc Wall, as on the parapet of a quay. Thence they could look down on the Thames; on the other side of the river Loudon dwindled away into fields.
A little way up the river above the Effroc Wall, at the bend in the Thames which is nearly opposite St. James's Palace, behind Lambeth House, not far from the walk then called Foxhall (Vauxhall, probably), there was, between a pottery in which they made porcelain, and a glass-blower's where they made ornamental bottles, one of those large unenclosed spaces covered with grass, called formerly in France cultures and mails, and in England bowling-greens. Of bowling-green, a green on which to roll a ball, the French have made boulingrin. Folks have this green inside their houses nowadays, only it is put on the table, is a cloth instead of turf, and is called billiards.
It is difficult to see why, having boulevard (boulevert), which is the same word as bowling-green, the French should have adopted boulingrin. It is surprising that anything as sensible as the Dictionary should indulge in useless luxuries.
The bowling-green of Southwark was called Tarrinzeau Field, because it once belonged to the Barons Hastings, who are also Barons Tarrinzeau and Mauchline. From the Lords Hastings the Tarrinzeau Field passed to the Lords Tadcaster, who made a speculation of it, just as, at a later date, a Duke of Orleans made a speculation of the Palais Royal. Tarrinzeau Field afterwards became waste ground and parochial property. Tarrinzeau Field was a kind of permanent fair-ground, frequented by jugglers, athletes, mountebanks, and strolling musicians, and always full of "fools going to look at the devil," as Archbishop Sharpe said. To look at the devil meant to go to the play.
Several inns, which harboured the public and sent them to these outlandish exhibitions, were established in this place, which kept holiday all the year round, and thereby prospered. These inns were simply stalls, occupied only during the day. In the evening the tavern-keeper put the key of the tavern in his pocket and went away. There was but one permanent dwelling on the whole green, the vans on the fair-ground being likely to disappear at any moment, by reason of the absence of any home ties and the vagabond life of all mountebanks. Mountebanks have no roots to their lives.
This inn, called the Tadcaster, after the former owners of the ground, was an inn rather than a tavern, a hotel rather than an inn, and had a carriage entrance and a large yard. The carriage entrance, opening from the court on the field, was the legitimate door of the Tadcaster Inn, which had besides, at the farther end, a small, low door, by which people entered. This small door was the only one used. It opened into a large tap-room, full of tobacco smoke, furnished with tables, and low of ceiling. Over it was a window, to the iron bars of which was fastened and hung the sign of the inn. The principal door was barred and bolted, and always remained closed. It was thus necessary to cross the tavern to enter the courtyard.
At the Tadcaster Inn there was a landlord and a boy. The landlord was called Master Nicless; the boy, Govicum. Master Nicless—Nicholas, doubtless, which the English habit of contraction had made Nicless—was a miserly widower, but one who respected and feared the laws. As to his appearance, he had bushy eyebrows and hairy hands. The boy, aged fourteen, who poured out drink, and answered to the name of Govicum, wore a merry face and an apron. His hair was cropped close,—a sign of servitude. He slept on the ground-floor, in a nook in which they formerly kept a dog. This nook had for a window a bull's-eye looking out on the green.