John asked him about the Squares. "Are they barracks?" he said, "or workmen's dwellings?"
"_Mais, non_," answered our guide, looking shocked, "they are the dwellings of the most respectable people."
Again that mystic word "respectable." Again the atmosphere of dignified dumps and dingy sulkiness. And father had told us that "respectability" was "an honourable nature." London honour seemed a sad thing.
The story of that day's spree ought to be published as a Sunday-school tract. It was the most chastening experience I ever underwent.
A few months later we were in the midst of barricades and street massacres in Paris; but even that weird experience has left no such impression of blank and heavy gloom upon my memory as the dismal reconnaissance into the London Sabbath and British respectability whereof this is the true account.
Those miles of deserted and colourless streets under the narrow glimpses of leaden sky, with the solitary heavy figure of the large British policeman everlastingly in the foreground--_mon Dieu!_ in what clammy, icy bands of unrelieved wretchedness they strangled the exuberance of our boyish hearts upon that dull September Sunday!
The man who spoke French, or who, at least, understood some of John's English, left us at Charing Cross, and we went on alone to the joyous dance and revels of Westminster.
John had mentioned them to the man, so far as his resources would allow; but the man only shook his head and muttered something about Cremorne, which John explained to me, must be the name of the queen of the revels.
And when we got there--oh dear! oh dear!--frosty-faced, dun-coloured, British matrons and virgins with ivory-backed prayer-books were streaming out of the Abbey, and a drizzling chilly rain and mist had begun to fall over the scene, when John, distracted and discomfited, stumbled over the boots of the customary policeman.
"_Milles pardons!_" said John, lifting his hat, "but ve seek vere ze girls and boys dance ze Sunday."
"Daunce!" replied the heavy policeman, "daunce a' Sundays? Nice, respectable little boys you must be, I down't think!"
We didn't understand all he said, but we heard the chilly word "respectable," and didn't get warm again till we had run to the City.