{"product_id":"2940013763494","title":"London in my Time","description":"That is the London I saw and felt when I first became consciously\u003cbr\u003eaware of London.  I had been running about it for some years before\u003cbr\u003ethat, but it is from the Diamond Jubilee that I date remembered\u003cbr\u003edetail.  It was a London that still held many of the fixtures and\u003cbr\u003emuch of the atmosphere of what has come to be known as the Dickens'\u003cbr\u003eLondon.  A London of horse-trams with halfpenny fares, and of\u003cbr\u003ehansom cabs; of crystalline bells and spattering hoofs.  A London\u003cbr\u003ewith winters of slush and fog of a richer sort than any known to-\u003cbr\u003eday, and summers of dust and clam; the slush and dust being its\u003cbr\u003eheritage from the horse-traffic.  A London of silk hats, frock-\u003cbr\u003ecoats, beards, curled moustaches, \"choker\" collars, leg-of-mutton\u003cbr\u003esleeves, veils, bonnets, and, threading through these gigmanities,\u003cbr\u003eas herald of revolt, an execrated vixen in bloomers riding a\u003cbr\u003ebicycle.  A London of solid homes, which regarded the introduction\u003cbr\u003eof flat-life as something Not Quite Nice; in fact, Fast.  A London\u003cbr\u003ein which the head of the house still carved the joint at his Sunday\u003cbr\u003etable in the presence of his six or seven sons and daughters.  A\u003cbr\u003eLondon of low buildings against which Queen Anne's Mansions was a\u003cbr\u003esky-scraper.  A London of lost corners; of queer nooks and\u003cbr\u003erookeries; of curling lanes and derelict squares, unknown to the\u003cbr\u003erest of London, and often, it seemed, forgotten by their local\u003cbr\u003eCouncils.  A London which, away from the larger streets, held pools\u003cbr\u003eof utter darkness, and terraces of crumbling caverns, and\u003cbr\u003einfinitudes of mist which called one as surely as the ranges to\u003cbr\u003epenetrate their fastness.  A London whose roads were mainly granite\u003cbr\u003esetts, and therefore a London of turmoil and clatter.  A London in\u003cbr\u003ewhich the more prosperous business men drove to their offices in\u003cbr\u003etheir broughams.  A London in which the first cars were appearing,\u003cbr\u003eto the puzzled scorn of the majority of the brougham-owners.\u003cbr\u003e\"Never make a Do of those things.  People never give up horses for\u003cbr\u003eTHOSE.\"  A London in which particular trades and callings still\u003cbr\u003ewore particular clothes, and which still nourished public\u003cbr\u003e\"characters\" and eccentrics.  A London in which strong language, of\u003cbr\u003ea strength that would blanch these outspoken times, was used by\u003cbr\u003ecertain men of all social classes.  A London where entertaining in\u003cbr\u003erestaurants was just beginning to displace the more pleasant but\u003cbr\u003e(for the hostess) more troublesome custom of entertaining at one's\u003cbr\u003eown table.  A London in which paper money, save in the five-ten-\u003cbr\u003etwenty series, was unthought of.  A London in which a golden\u003cbr\u003esovereign would give you a quiet evening's entertainment of a kind\u003cbr\u003ewhich five pound-notes could not buy to-day.  A London which, as\u003cbr\u003ebefitted a great metropolis, had nine evening papers against to-\u003cbr\u003eday's meagre three.  A London which was the centre of an Empire,\u003cbr\u003eand knew it.  And a London which, in a few of its nerves, was\u003cbr\u003ebeginning to be aware of the end of an epoch and of the New this\u003cbr\u003eand the New that.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDistricts then were emphatically themselves; little islands washed\u003cbr\u003eby various alien waters which never penetrated inland.  East was\u003cbr\u003eEast and West was West.  The foreign quarters WERE foreign.  Soho\u003cbr\u003ewas beginning to be anybody's country, but ordinary Londoners were\u003cbr\u003eseldom seen in the Italian streets of Back Hill, Eyre Street Hill\u003cbr\u003eor Warner Street; or in the recesses of the Ghetto, or in Limehouse\u003cbr\u003eor the Dutch streets of Spitalfields.  Few of them knew the inner\u003cbr\u003ecourts of Notting Dale and Hoxton, and artists and poets were never\u003cbr\u003eseen in the taverns of Bankside or Shadwell.  All these places were\u003cbr\u003ethen enclosed communities.  So were many of the central districts.\u003cbr\u003eChelsea was Chelsea and Streatham was Streatham.  Cromwell Road\u003cbr\u003eknew nothing of Barnsbury, nor Stratford of Dulwich Village; and\u003cbr\u003eonly a few cyclists had ever discovered the end of Finchley Road.\u003cbr\u003eRegent Street was then an \"expensive\" street, and even Oxford\u003cbr\u003eStreet had not yet become the rendezvous of suburban housewives.\u003cbr\u003eEach district had its own perceptible key and maintained it.  If a\u003cbr\u003eman lived in a mews he was a working-man, and if he lived in Mount\u003cbr\u003eStreet he was a man of quality.  If he lived in Bloomsbury he was\u003cbr\u003ehard-up, and if he lived in Prince's Gate he was wealthy.\u003cbr\u003eKensington was notably Kensington and had little to do with the\u003cbr\u003eother side of the Park, the not-quite Bayswater; and a young man of\u003cbr\u003eJermyn Street would not know of the existence of a place called\u003cbr\u003eIslington.  The West End was still the West End.  Change was being\u003cbr\u003efelt, and, in a small way, its seclusion was, by its own\u003cbr\u003einvitation, being invaded by people who could be \"used.\"  But\u003cbr\u003ecommercial establishments had not disrupted the stateliness of its\u003cbr\u003esquares and streets.","brand":"WDS Publishing","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47152783589616,"sku":"2940013763494","price":3.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013763494_p0.jpg?v=1763589954","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013763494","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}