William Harrison Ainsworth

The Old London Merchant

A Sketch

Warsaw 2022

Contents

THE OLD LONDON MERCHANT A SKETCH

THE OLD LONDON MERCHANT A SKETCH

Flos Mercatorum.–Epitaph on Whittington

AT that festive season, when the days are at the shortest, and the nights at the longest, and when, consequently, it is the invariable practice of all sensible people to turn night into day; when the state of the odds between business and pleasure is decidedly in favour of the latter; when high carnival is held in London, and everything betokens the prevalence and influence of good cheer; when pastrycooks are in their glory, and green trays in requisition; when porters groan beneath hampers of game, and huge tubs of Canterbury brawn; when trains arriving from the eastern counties are heavy laden with turkeys and hares; when agents in town send barrels of oysters to correspondents in the country; when Christmas-box claimants disturb one’s equanimity by day, and Waits (those licensed nuisances, to which even our reverence for good old customs cannot reconcile us) break one’s first slumber at night; when surly Christians “awake,” and salute the band of little carollers with jugs of cold water; when their opposite neighbour, who has poked his nightcapped head from his window, retires with a satisfactory chuckle; when the meat at Mr. Giblett’s in Bond Street, which, for the last six weeks, has announced the approach of Christmas by its daily-increasing layers of fat, as correctly as the almanack, has reached the ne-plus-ultra of adiposity; when wondering crowds are collected before the aforesaid Giblett’s to gaze upon the yellow carcass of that leviathan prize ox–the fat being rendered more intensely yellow by its contrast with the green holly with which it is garnished–as well as to admire the snowy cakes of suet with which the sides of that Leicestershire sheep are loaded; when the grocer’s trade is “in request,” and nothing is heard upon his counter but the jingling of scales and the snapping of twine; when the vendor of sweetmeats, as he deals forth his citron and sultanas in the due minced-meat proportions to that pretty housemaid, whispers something in a soft and sugared tone about the misletoe; when “coming Twelfth Nights cast their shadows before,” and Mr. Gunter feels doubly important; when pantomimes are about to unfold all their magic charms, and the holidays have fairly commenced; when the meteorological prophet predicts that Thursday the 1st will be fair and frosty, and it turns out to be drizzling rain and a sudden thaw; when intelligence is brought that the ice “bears,” the intelligence being confirmed by the appearance of sundry donkey-carts, containing ice an inch thick, and rendered indisputable by the discharge of their crystal loads upon the pavement before Mr. Grove’s, the fishmonger’s; when crack performers in paletots, or Mackintoshes, with skates in their hands, cigars in their mouths, and tights and fur-topped boots on their lower limbs, are seen hastening up Baker Street in the direction of the Regent’s Park; when a marquee is pitched upon the banks of the Serpentine, and a quadrille executed by the before-mentioned crack skaters in tights and fur-topped boots upon its frozen waters; when the functionaries of the Humane Society begin to find some employment for their ropes and punt; when Old Father Thames, who, for a couple of months, appears to have been undecided about the colours of his livery–now inclining to a cloak of greyish dun, now to a mantle of orange tawny–has finally adopted a white transparent robe with facings of silver; when, as you pass down Harley Street, the lights in the drawing-room windows of every third house, the shadows on the blinds, and, above all, the enlivening sound of the harp and piano, satisfy you that its fair inmate is “at home”; when

House-quakes, street-thunders, and door-batteries

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