) I
philosophically refer it all to the _balance of nature_. Now I know some
very ugly places that have a degree of interest, and here again I fancy a
lady's sceptical ejaculation, "Indeed!" Ay, but it is so; and let us go
no further than Covent Garden. Enter it from Russell-street. What can be
more unsightly,--with its piles of cabbages in the street, and
basket-measures on the roofs of the shops--narrow alleys, wooden
buildings, rotting vegetables "undique," and swarms of Irish
basket-women, who wander about like the ghosts on this side of the Styx,
and who, in habits, features, and dialect, appear as if belonging to
another world. Yet the Garden, like every garden, has its charms. I have
lounged through it on a summer's day, mixing with pretty women, looking
upon choice fruit, smelling delicious roses, with now and then an
admixture of sundry disagreeables, such as a vigorous puff out of an ugly
old woman's doodeen, just as you are about to make a pretty speech to a
much prettier lady--to say nothing of the unpleasant odours arising from
heaps of putrescent vegetables, or your hat being suddenly knocked off by
a contact with some unlucky Irish basket-woman, with cabbages piled on
her head sufficient for a month's consumption at Williams's boiled beef
and cabbage warehouse, in the Old Bailey. The narrow passages through
this mart remind me of the Chinese streets, where all is shop, bustle,
squeeze, and commerce. The lips of the fair promenaders I collate (in my
mind's eye, gentle reader) with the delicious cherry, and match their
complexions with the peach, the nectarine, the rose, red or white, and
even sometimes with the russet apple.
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