Onze Stam. Jaargang 1907

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London.

A traveller who goes to London prefers descending at Charing Cross Station, this being situated in the European quarter. Every stomach is not fond of English cookery and English ale and feels better served with dishes and beverages of the French, German or Dutch kind.

The map of London points out very different quarters, corresponding to the needs of the population. In the midst of the city flows the Thames crowded with large steamers, pleasure boats and sailing vessels carrying to the English metropolis the products of the whole world.

Let us take the' bus to Westminster abbey. Westminster does not only mean a cathedral, but also the Parliament (House of Commons and House of Lords) and last not least Westminster Quarter or the political quarter of London. The members of parliament have but to cast a look through the windows of their House to judge of the needs of the working classes. The quarter one has before one' seyes when being on Westminster Bridge, is Southwark, announced by the numerous chimney pipes of factories representing the Industry of Great Britain. One finds indeed at this place all sorts of factories: soap works, cotton-mills as at Manchester and Leeds, iron works as at Birmingham, paper mills as at Bath, cutleries as at Sheffield.

The working classes in England have organized themselves in trade-unions and succeeded in obtaining guarantees as to the number of hours and the amount of wages. Cooperative movement in England is no political one.

From Southwark one arrives at Billingsgate, crossing Tower Bridge; Tower Bridge and Westminster Bridge are both a terminus of London. The Tower is one of the most interesting buildings of the English metropolis. There is firstly the White Tower dating from William the Conqueror and commenced in 1078. Further one observes the Beauchamp Tower, where famous statesmen have been imprisoned. Inscriptions on the

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walls explain the retreat of many interesting persons. In the Bloody Tower were strangled the two children of king Edward, Tyrol having been instigated by Glocester, who took possession of the throne under the name of Richard III. In Wakefield Tower one admires the regalia, the crowns, sceptres and other jewels of late Kings and queens.

The gigantic Tower Bridge has been built from 1886-1894, after a plan of John Bary. It was intended to diminish the bustle and traffic across London Bridge It has been stated that an average number of thirty thousand foot-passengers and ten thousand carriages are going daily over Tower Bridge. London Bridge has cost about L 2.000.000 More than hundred thousand foot-passengers go over that bridge and about twenty thousand vehicles and other means of conveyance.

The traffic is simply enormous near Billingsgate. The fish market as well as other markets of the metropolis assumes gigantic proportions. An army of workmen carrying on their heads heavy burdens of lobsters, plaices, herrings, haddocks, salmon etc. warn the passengers to keep their distance for fear of being overthrown or causing accidents.

From the special fish trade's quarter one enters the general commercial quarter that is especially witnessed in the circle of crowded streets as the Strand, Cheapside and Ludgate Hill.

In the centre of this part of London stands Saint Paul's Cathedral. It is like an emblem of rest and eternity in a place of feverous activity. The erection of this monumental church took about two hundred years. It has been destroyed in 1666 by the great fire outburst, when more than ten thousand houses were burnt down. This cathedral has been built after S^t Peters at Rome. A visit to the whispering gallery is worth being paid. In the interior, one meets with many chapels and burial places of famous Englishmen; John Howard, the reformer of prisons lies buried here and also D^r Johnson, the writer of the first Great Dictionary improved later on by Webster and Murray. The tombs of Sir Jos. Reynolds, the English Rubens, and of Turner,

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the celebrated painter of landscapes are to be greeted. Nelson lies buried in the crypt; one reads on the monument the names of all his victories. The duke of Wellington is buried here since 1852 and is announced by the following fine verses;

Under the cross of gold
That shines over city and river,
There He shall rest for ever
Among the wise and the bold.

The numerous steps leading to this holy place and the splendid cupola recall once more S^t Peter's at Rome.

On Trafalgar Square one can enter the national gallery begun in 1832 and having cost about L. 100.000. It has been built in the Greek style. On thursdays and fridays it is not accessible, for on these days students are allowed to copy the pictures of the celebrated masters. The gallery numbers twenty two rooms with more than sixteen hundred paintings. The Flemish, Dutch and Italian schools stand on the same artistic level. The monument to Nelson on the summit of the column can be seen from every street and corner.

Guildhall is the town hall of London. The Lord Mayor and the sheriffs are appointed here annually. On the 9th of November an annual banquet takes place here and then the Lord Mayor and the Prime Minister are delivering speeches, in which there is never anything worth noticing,

In Kensington Gardens, has been elevated the Albert Memorial. It is an eloquent homage to the late Prince Consort, a remembrance of the world's fair of 1851. This monument cost about L. 120.000. Under the dome is the gilt statue of Prince Albert, hundred seventy three feet high. On the corners are the monuments of Industry, Commerce, Agriculture and Mechanics. On the pedestal stand the illustrious writers and other celebrated men paying their homage as well as ‘Queen Victoria and her People to the Memory of Albert Prince Consort’

The Kensington Museum is especially devoted to Natural Sciences. This museum has received a part of the collections of the Britsh Museum that is far more interesting.

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British Museum that cost more than L. 1.000.000 when it has been built, is according to Ruskin the most splendid collection of human knowledge in the whole world. It contains a vast Reading Room, where the readers are sitting in a circular sense. To be allowed to enter the Reading Boom, one ought to apply for an entrance ticket to the chief librarian, at least a fortnight before one's visit. There are eight transepts in the British Museum. The Manuscript Room is a mere treasure. Writers as John Milton, Byron and a lot af many other celebrated poets and philosophers are admired in their original texts. Samples of the Egyptian, Greek, and Assyrian arts can be witnessed here.

After this visit, one feels inclined to see again Westminster Abbey, where lie buried Chaucer, the English Maerlant, Robert Browning, Tennyson, the admirable bards of the XIX^th century; as to Shakespeare, he has a monument here, but his tomb is at the parish church of Stratford on Avon. Under a large blue stone rests for ever Charles Dickens who is only announced by his name, the date of his birth and his death, a fitting epitaph for the democratic writer of Oliver Twist and David Copperfield. A few miles from London lies Sydenham with its Crystal Palace. It has been entirely built of glass and iron. On Bank Holidays, on Saturday afternoons, for instance, more than 100.000 people crowd the gardens and concert rooms of Crystal Palaces. One sees all sorts of cunning artists showing their skilfulness. Balloons ascend, looping the loop is performed, all sorts of popular amusements take place. Crystal Palace is at the same time a theatre, a fair, a pleasure garden and an exhibition.

When I was at London, during the past holidays of August and September, I was in the opportunity of attending the performance of the ‘Winter's Tale’ by William Shakespeare at ‘His Majesty's Theatre’ This is one of the best of the forty London theatres, where the actors are simply faultless and where pronunciation is a standard one.

The chief fact that is to be kept in mind is namely that one has when entering London, on the right hand, the commercial

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quarter announced by the fishtrade, in face the city or aristocratic quarter which is the transition to the political quarter of Westminster and finally on the left side the industrious quarter of Southwark. In the midst flows the Thames spanned by fine bridges as Westminster Bridge, Blackfriars' Bridge, London Bridge and Tower Bridge. One travels through London by steamers or by the underground metropolitan railways or motor-cars which for three pence carry one from Kensington to Royal Exchange, from Hyde Park to the Bank.

F.V.