Page:Doom of the Great City - Hay - 1880.djvu/22

20 London; yet there were deeds of love and kindness done in the obscurity of that city, that breathed the true spirit of the religion erst preached on the shores of Galilee; and it was often the poor man who was his fellow’s best and only benefactor. God knows what it all might have come to under a different train of circumstances; even the lamb-like reverence for his “superiors” of the Briton might have been worn out at last. Already Republicanism was whispered in the public-houses, and Socialism was not unknown in London, though these were chiefly of exotic growth; while there were men of a different type—men who dared to think for themselves, who looked for the coming of some social cataclysm, and who were heard to compare the “Great City” to those Cities of the Plain that the old Biblical legend tells of as being destroyed by fire from heaven.

Enough! Even a great-grandfather’s garrulity must be checked in its reminiscent flow.

On the 1st of February, 1882, I left business early, about half-past three in the afternoon, if I remember aright, and went home. The next day being my birthday, I had resolved, with my employer’s permission, to make it a holiday; and in order that we might all enjoy it to the best advantage, a little excursion had been planned among us. My mother, my sister, and I, had agreed to accept the invitation of some of our few friends, and to go out to their house on the evening of the 1st, remaining with them until late on the following day. As our friends resided in a locality called Lordship Lane, not far from the suburb of Dulwich, we anticipated no little pleasure from the excursion, and it was consequently with feelings of delighted expectation that I hurried home from business that afternoon, to carry off my two dear