ENGLISH PHOTOGRAPHS.*
So many American writers have placed on record in recent years their impressions of English character and society, that there seems hardly a place left for the lively critic who has contributed these Photographs — now republished in a handsome volume — to Tinsky's Magazine. The book, however, has some qualities of its own which we have not met in many more pretentious or in some abler works on the same subject ; the author, probably because he looks from a lower intellectual level, sees common things more clearly than the men of genius have seen them. Of the most obvious features of English life, at least in cities and among the prosperous classes, these Photographs give a more real and striking picture than Emerson's philosophizings or Hawthorne's lofty strain of sentiment. On the other hand, they do not _pretend to the character of a journal or guide-book, and they avoid, for the most part, the vulgar indelicacy of that backstairs' personal gossip concerning statesmen, and poets, and dukes, and prime donne with which the late Mr. N. P. Willis and Mrs. H. B. Stowe filled their crude "travel talk " about England and English people.
The most salient features of society in England, or those which lie nearest the surface, are taken by the author of these Photographs, whose name appears by the signature at the foot of the preface to be Mr. Stephen Fiske, as the subjects of a genial and intelligent criticism. The disagreeable conditions under which travelling is effected in this country impress foreigners, and especially Americans, at the outset of their experience with a mingled feeling of annoyance and contempt for the unreasoning conservatism both of railway companies and of their victims. The chapters in this volume on " English Steamers," " English Railways," " English Travellers," " English Hotels," and " English Cabs " abound with shrewd suggestions, and keen but usually too welldeserved censures. The English Railway system in particular is open to attack in so many places, that our American critic finds himself without space to complete his bill of indictment. In the United States, he says, the drivers and firemen, who work the engine, are protected from the weather by a glass roof and case ; in England they are exposed to rain, snow, or biting wind. In the United States the size and power of the engines and the build of the cars are proportioned to the nature of the traffic and the distance to be done by the trains ; in England nothing of the kind is attempted. The Metropolitan Railway, for example, observes the author of these Photographs, " which ought to be the best-paying company in the world, runs engines and cars that are fit for service on the largest and roughest overground railroads." The luggage system on English lines is another source of cost to the companies and of continual inconvenience to travellers. The useless and greedy crowd of porters might in a great measure be dispensed with by the introduction of the American plan of duplicate checks.
But it is against the English arrangements of the carriages that Mr. Fiske, like his countrymen in general, makes the loudest protest. He has no objection to raise against the first-class carriages, in which, for day travelling at least, every essential of comfort and privacy is secured ; but for the second and third-class carriages he strongly recommends the American model of rail-car, as permitting a considerable economy in space combined with increased comfort for the passengers, improved ventilation, easy collection of tickets, and security against outrage. Other Yankee inventions in the interest of the travelling community deserve notice :
introduced, and which are only withheld on account of the fine old British prejudice against novelties. In the United States, a person who is obliged to travel all night pays a few shillings extra for a berth in a steeping-car, and takes his Beat there during the day, having a little extra room and comfort for his money. At night his berth is made up by the waiter, who takes charge of his ticket ; he undresses; he puts out his boots ; he goes to sleep ; be rests undisturbed. In the morning he has arrived at his destination ; his clothes are brushed and his boots are blacked ; he makes his toilet at a dressing-table in a corner of the car ; the waiter will shave him—few Americans shave themselves—if he chooses; he has only to get his breakfast, and go at once to his business. The traveller in England, under the same circumstances, pays a few shillings to the guard for the privilege of having two or three seats instead of one. The guard, who has reduced this means of swindling the railway company to a system, furnishes him with a couple of sticks, and shows him how to place them across the seats and cover them with the cushions, so as to extemporize a bed. Only two persons can occupy a compartment in this way, when there are really seats for six or eight. And so additional cars have to be put on at the various stations. But what does that matter to the guard, who has secured his shillings ? Then, when night comes, the traveller stretches out his legs ; corers himself as well as he can; goes to sleep if possible ; is waked up a dozen times during the night ; gets up in the morning frowsy, drowsy, and with a cold in his head, and is compelled to go to a hotel and spend a couple of hours in freshening himself up before ho is fit even to think of the business which he is in no condition to transact that day. Why in world cannot the English railways have sleeping-cars? Railway corporations have no souls, of course ; but in America independent companies seized the idea, built the cars, paid the railway companies for the right to attach them to the regular night trains, and have realized fortunes from the enterprise. Transporters of furniture are aisle to secure special cars for their goods in England, and surely any one can obtain the right to run a sleeping-car, if ho pay enough for it? That there is money to be made by such a speculation must be evident to those who have journeyed in England and observed the efforts which passengers make to pass the night without actual suffering, and the amount of extra fare which they vainly pay to guards, to refreshment-saloons, and for drinks and cigars, in order to achieve this result."
There are a few points, however, in which our American critic admits exceptions to the general deficiency of comfort and convenience in English travelling. He has a word of praise for our massive and capacious stations, for the prudence with which most lines are protected from trespassers, for the care and thoroughness with which the permanent way is commonly laid down ; and he condemns very fairly the absence of these merits in the railways of the United States. It is, perhaps, more surprising to,find that he says a good word for the London cabs, a plea which originates, we should say, in an involuntary but unfair contrast with the cabless desolation of New York. Another contrast less favourable to England is drawn in the chapter on English hotels. Public opinion has not yet succeeded in reaching the obstinacy and obtuseness of the hotel-keeping mind, but that it will ultimately reach it we cannot doubt ; and such attractive pictures of American hotels as Mr. Frisk presents are likely to rouse, if anything can rouse, the patient British public to a sense of its rights and its wrongs.
"But—lodgings, eating and drinking aside—much more remains• An American hotel contains a large billiard-saloon, a hair-dressing saloon, a telegraph office, a bulletin for the latest news, an office for the hire of carriages and horses, a bar-room for those who drink, a cigarstand and smoking-room for those who smoke, a news-stand with the latest periodicals, a reading-room with the city and provincial papers on file, bath-rooms upon every floor, ticket-offices for those who wish to go to the railways or the theatres, a stock list for those who take an interest in speculations, a hat and cloak room, an office for surplus luggage,—a thousand conveniences for the comfort and gratification of the guests. Few English hotels have any of these advantages and improvements ; none have them all. You soon tire of dining in the ' coffee-room '—so called upon the lucus-a-non-lucendo principle, because so few persons take coffee there—off of the inevitable joints which seem to he the same every day ; but if you order special dinners your expenses are trebled. You must go outside the hotel for a bath. If you want to play billiards you must tramp over the town until you discover a table unengaged. To despatch a telegram you must employ a commissionnaire. A porter must be sent to order your horse or carriage. Another is necessary to procure your tickets for the theatres. If you desire to learn the news a boy must be employed to buy your papers, or you must patiently await your turn to pore over the advertisement sheet of the coffee-room journals. If you like ice in your drinks the fact is reprovingly mentioned in the bill. It is impossible to get supper later than eleven o'clock, and so you are driven out to Evans's. Unless you hire a private parlour you have no place in which to receive your friends, except you take them into the coffee-room, where other people are eating, or into the smoking-room, where everybody else is drinking. The menu consists of about twenty dishes furnished with remarkable but wearisome regularity all the year round. To procure a good cigar inside a London hotel is a miracle. Everything is admirably contrived to perpetually remind you that the hotel is !imply a building in which to sleep. There is nothing homelike about it. As for cheapness, all the luxuries and comforts of an American hotel could be obtained before the civil war for two dollars a day— about eight shillings English. Now, in consequence of the depreciated currency, the price is doubled. Where could you live so well in England for eight shillings a day ?"
Getting a little further below the surface of English society than the track of the mere traveller, we can still agree with a large part of Mr. Fiske's criticism on the externals of our social life. Take, for example, his graphic sketch of the bewilderment into which the first view of many-sided and boundless London casts the stranger
"The metropolis of London is composed of numerous detached and different parts, like a dissecting map. Two cities, four counties, several boroughs, and over thirty parishes, townships, and villages are comprised within its boundaries. There is not one of these places to which your can take a stranger and say, 'This is London.' The metropolis is country in itself, and there is just as much difference between the various parts of it, their architecture, inhabitants, government, and customs, as there is between Liverpool, Manchester, Canterbury, and Brighton. Many Americans suppose that the streets of London are dull and gloomy. Set down one of these Americana in Belgravia, and after a glance at the tall, splendid, Mansard-roofed houses, wide streets, and frequent squares, be would declare, 'This is not London ; it is Paris.' Transport him to St. John's Wood, and show him circuitous miles of beautiful villas, all embowered in trees and flowers, and he would exclaim, This is not London ; it is some lovely country town, like an English Now Haven.' Dive with him into the tangled lanes, courts, and alleys of the City, and ho will observe, This is not London ; it is the old quarter of Vienna.' Ride with him through Tyburnia, and, mistaking the stucco for brown stone, he will remark, 'Ali! New York above Madison Square.' Only when you bring him to a narrow, long street, edged with low houses of dark brick, and ending with a curtain of fog, will the London of his imagination be reached at last."
Mr. Fiske's observations on English journalism will be read with the more interest because he admits that he has himself worked as a journalist. He hits many blots in the English system, especially the one radical and unpardonable sin of neglecting the use of the telegraph. It is the telegraph, skilfully employed and at any cost, that gives the American journals so great an advantage in point of news over their English rivals. Mr. Fiske tells us how, at the most critical period of the Abyssinian war, the London daily papers were indebted to the London staff of the New York Herald for copies of telegrams containing the only non-official intelligence then received in England from the advance brigade of Sir R. Napier's army. So far we can accept Mr. Fiske's criticism as sound and based on unimpeachable facts. But in many of his comments on the actual conduct of London journals he leaps too hastily to strange conclusions. In his description of the Times,. for instance, ho introduces the following doubtful interpretation of its policy in regard to the Westminster election : In its mechanical department the Times is almost perfection ; but, although it uses Hoe's American presses, I should like to see it adopt that new invention by which both sides of the paper are printed simultaneously. Its method of publication is quite provincial. Like most of the other London journals, it is terribly in the power of Mr. \V. IL Smith, M.P., the newedealer, who purchases a large proportion of its daily issue. Mr. Smith is a Conservative, and the Times is now Liberal in politics; but while Mr. Smith was canvassing Westminster against Mr. John Stuart Mill, the favourite Liberal philosopher, you vainly looked in the Timer for any opposition to the Conservative candidate. Most of the other Liberal organs, except the Star, were in the same predicament. Mr. Smith could—I do not say he would—have practically suppressed them if they had imperilled his election by their attacks ; and so Mr. Mill was loft to his fate by his journalistic friends. The clubmen, politicians, and gossips of London have had many a laugh and joke over this state of affairs ; but I can only deeply regret it. It is an evil thing for English journalism, and for journalists all over the world, that any man should have, even temporarily, the power over the leading London press that the French Emperor has over the press of France. An organization of special carriers—who receive their papers directly from the office, and deliver them directly to subscribers—like that in successful operation in connection with the Philadelphia Pub lie Ledger, would obviate all difficulties, and render the London press again independent."
The practical suggestion here is worth consideration, though the hypothesis on which it is based is somewhat open to dispute.
Among the other topics of which Mr. Fiske treats, always clearly and pleasantly, and generally in a sensible and moderate spirit, are included English Theatres, English Sports, English Climate, English Houses, English Castes, English Politics, and English Women. This last subject is a large and suggestive one, and Mr. Fiske handles it with both courage and delicacy. Ho does not fail to point out many blots on the boasted chivalry of our nation, or to show how the depressed condition of women has worked a moral reaction of a very dangerous kind. This question, however, it is not easy to discuss plainly. With much of Mr. Fiske's social philosophy we find it impossible to agree, nor can we sympathize with his rather hard and superficial view of politics ; but we have found in him an acute and suggestive critic, as well as a lively companion, in our survey of the surface of English life, and we shall be glad to meet him again in similar fields.
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