Where were the magnificent buildings he
expected to see in the emporium of the world? Where that cleanliness,
and those tokens of greatness and splendor, which had been the
admiration and boast of travellers? He could nowhere discover them;
all seemed parts of a dark, gloomy, common-looking city.
Hardly heeding whither he went, he approached the Horse-Guards; a
view of the Park, as it appears through the wide porch, promised him
less unpleasantness than the dirty pavement, and he turned in, taking
his way along the Bird-Cage Walk. [Footnote: The young readers of
these few preceding pages will not recognize this description of St.
Martin's Lane, Charing Cross, and St. James's Park, in 1794, in what
they now see there in 1844. St. Martin's noble church was then the
centre of the east side of a long, narrow, and somewhat dirty lane of
mean houses, particularly in the end below the church. Charing Cross,
with its adjoining streets, showed nothing better than plain
tradesmen's shops; and it was not till we saw the Admiralty, and
entered the Horse-Guards, that anything presented itself worthy the
great name of London. The Park is almost completely altered. The
lower part of the lane has totally disappeared; also its adjunct, the
King's Mews, where now stands the royal National Gallery, while the
church of St. Martin's rears its majestic portico and spire, no
longer obscured by its former adjacent common buildings; and the
grand naval pillar lately erected to the memory of Britain's hero,
Nelson, occupies the centre of the new quadrangle now called
Trafalgar Square.
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