Letter from M. P. Shiel to his sister, Augusta Horsford,
June 1885
...consider the temptation that your philosophical biped
who walks the streets of busy London-town has of becoming Egotistical when he
writes others who walk on tiniest West Indies' emphatically not
philosophy-engendering. Or, to put it
shortly, one is tempted to write of one's self overmuch.
I was even now thinking, whether I might not give you a
sketch of any one day in my London-town-life—of this day, for instance,
Well, I live in such a sweet little castle, so thoroughly
all-my-own that you could not possibly imagine it. A little bed-room with a little sitting-room with sloping-roof
looking out on a back-garden; in which former is bed, & presses,
wash-stand, fire-place, & utensil or pot or, as we say po or poe; in which
latter is table, trunks, chair and easy-chair in which may I not sit perfectly
secure all the evening smoking philosophical pipe? In this latter too, I now write you: it is my palace, or as was
said, my castle, home, ain fireside, or whatever comfortable name
you choose to give it. Had it some
little, bright, good, loving creature of female persuasion in it to welcome me
home, or still better, had it my dear old father in it, you might even name it
"earthly paradise."
In this, then, I sat me last night till late, (I can read
without light of lamp till about nine o'clock) and at last went off to bed
without hope of sleep, my light burning on into the small hours of
morning. (By the way, if anybody else
that I know in the W.I. dies, any ordinary person I mean, you need not bother
to mention it in your letters. A woman
called Grace Wheatland used to lock me up in a dark room of Corkhill in
Montserrat when I was a boy and my sisters were sick with sore-throat and I am
suffering the consequences of that woman's idiotcy & cruelty today.) Consequently, I sleep late in the morning
and am roused by a great knocking at my door: it is the old lady who has
brought up my breakfast in a tea-tray, has placed it on a stand just outside my
door and has knocked to give me warning of it, Stand quickly on terra firma,
though laziest one, heedless of half-opened eyes cast around thy form thy
blood-red gown, intrude thy feet into hose whose cleanness is doubtful, pray
unto thy Father in secret whose hearing of thee is not doubtful —now mayest
thou eat heartily frugal philosophic breakfast composed of limited bacon &
unlimited bread, coffee, Devonshire butter, and W. Indian jelly!
Whither now wilt thou tend? First, sit down all-radiant in they blood-red and read Dickens,
then Longfellow, then the Bible.
Hast thou done this? Then
envelope thee in clothes— not of dandy kind today in high silk hat, maroon
gloves, & choking masher—but in humblest pepper-&-salt, ordinary felt,
& gloves too doubtful to be put on.
But whither wilt thou tend?
First, sit down
all-radiant in thy blood-red and read Dickens, then Longfellow, then the Bible. Hast thou done this? Then envelope thee in clothes—not of dandy
kind today in high silk hat, maroon gloves, & chocking masher—but in
humblest pepper-&-salt, ordinary felt, & gloves too doubtful to be put
on. But whither wilt thou tend? "Take us thought": a pleasant day
is always to be spent in London if you know how. I walk for 5 mins. to the Haggerston Ry. Station, pay my 1˝, and
fly thro' air to Broad Street; for I never feel that I have spent a day unless
I go into the City. Broad St: is so
called from its extreme narrowness, and is about the same in breadth as the
Broad St: in Bridgetown, B/dos, exemplifying an instinct in the English people
to call things by their wrong names: what they call the Opera Comique is a
theatre—not an opera, what they call Covent Garden Theatre is an opera, not a
theatre; what they call "pavement" is not "pavement" but the
very opposite—the only part that is a pavement (the middle of the street)
they don't call so and so on. Well we
come to "Broad St:" (not the one down Seven Dials: the one near
Thread-needle) pouch & pipe in breast-pocket, Longfellow in hand. What now?
Why, stroll leisurely down towards thy Street—the Strand, having, (before you
have gone three paces) a man who leans against a wall looking into thy face
& saying with all coolness—"You look well, you do." As thou passes under it, Bennett's clock
with endless hammering and fuss strikes 1.
Bathe today. Stop before your
New Law Courts (thy frequent place of resort by day) ascend a stair in which
thou mayest behold thy form with several hats on, and take solacing warm
bath. Be honest, pay thy shilling, &
depart. Now for dinner. By dint of observation and
London-town-experience hast thou not discovered a retreat in the very heart of
the City, even down Essex Street before New Law Courts, whither thou mayest
go—and get roast beef, potatoes (all new & excellent) bread, half-bitter,
apple-pie—all, all for one shilling. What though the spoon with which thou eatest thy pie be not
silver! Though philosophic Uncle!—is not
the pie itself excellent—that which stands upon the torn cloth good? What carest thou for the outside of a thing,
the appearance of it? Thou thyself art
a reality—is it not then thy duty when thou meetest a reality to open thy arms and embrace it in very
friendliness?
What now? Go and
spend thy day at Aquarium, Invention Exhibition at South Kensington, Crystal
Palace? Nay—thou hast done this often
enough and art quite tired and sick of them.
But canst thou tire of God's sky? Can'st thou not stroll down to thy St. James Park, thy Green
park, and lie thee down flat upon the grass & extend thy arms like Him who
was crucified for thee, looking upward into Heaven with philosophic pipe in
mouth? There, peeping through the
umbrageous trees is a tower of St. Stephens, there too the Abbey, & St:
Margaret's; down yonder thou canst just see the walls of Buckingham Palace
& perhaps of Marlborough House, & at thy back is Carlton Terrace. Art thou not perfectly, perfectly happy? What more canst thou desire: does not the
God give thee meat & water, nay even cause thee to gulp down tea, coffee,
guk-guk (or beer), and envelop thee in clouds of tobacco-smoke? Better still, doesn't He not make thy
conscience light, causing thee to feel like a free and brave man, making thee
satisfied with his works—thyself inclusive? Consider, too, how thou, in returning from
this same Park, passest the very door (with "To Let" printed on it)
behind which that unaccountable Jones sits with long struggling legs stuck
crookedly beneath prosiest writing-desk all the day long beholding bare walls,
gazing into the face of his fellow-prisoners (called
"fellow-clerks",) while thou thyself art free and singing:
"Oh Light and Love! Oh throng
Of thoughts whose only speech is song;
O Heart of Man! Canst thou not be
As light as air is & as free!"
And so walking back
looking into girl's faces & smiling with them, stopping at a shop window to
gaze at a particularly wicket picture of Mrs. Langtry that by this time I
regard as my own, buying ˝ lb of Strawberries which I eat as I go along, I
reach (by train) my "ain fireside," or house, or castle to sit to
write you....
Don't think, however, that I have got used to London
without meeting some strange things: I remember the first morning I woke up at
Wild's ...Hotel. I had not become quite
an Englishman yet, consequently I was not so dirty as I am now—so I wanted a
bath. Call pretty little servant-maid.
Servant-maid
(teeth chattering terribly): Yes, sir, sir, sir, sir. Please sir, yes sir, sir, sir.
Half-green
West Indian:
I want a bath—is there one on the premises?
Servant-maid
(chattering): Oh yes, sir, sir—many.
Half-green: Will you shew me to one, please?
S. M.: Oh, sir—I will bring it in to your,
sir, please, sir.
Half-green: (nearly fainting with astonishment)
Bring it to me! Oh-ho-oo—in W.I. we usually go to ours, but here they seem to bring
'em to you. Very well, don't strain
yourself.
S. M.: Hot or Cold, sir, sir, sir, etc.
H. G. (in an evil moment): Cold!
What was my surprise instead of seeing her bring up a
large stone bath like yours in your yard (not knowing what to expect, I half
expected that) to see her bring in a beastly little tin basin with a
tea-spoonful of ice-cold water in it, put it on the floor of my bedroom, close
the door, and leave me to my horror!
Shall I ever forget the miseries of that bath? Echo answers, "Shall I," but I answer "No,
never." They charged me sixpence
for it in the bill, tho'!
So too when my old lady first sent me in a plate of
shrimps. "Now what on earth are
these things!" thought I; "if they are cock-roaches (as they seem to
be) I am
not going to eat 'em."
I was perplexed. I tried
one. Liked it. It was not a cockroach for it had a shell:
but now the question arose in my mind—"do you eat the shell?" If you do, this stomach won't manage the digestion of
'em: if you don't
it will take you some days to pick one out of the shell, & then you will
get a piece of flesh approaching in size a pin's head. So I determined to leave them till I had
acquired more experience on the subject of shrimps....
18 Culford Road,
Southgate Road, Kingsland N.
[HRC
Collection, published in Billings, Harold, "The Shape of Shiel: A
Biography of the Early Years, 1865-1895" Morse, A, Reynolds, ed, M. P. Shiel
in Diverse Hands, Cleveland:
The Reynolds Morse Foundation, 1983, 90-92.]
Return to M.P. Shiel at Selected Authors of Supernatural Fiction