It is somewhat remarkable that two books should have appeared almost at the same time on the Pleasure Gardens of London—that of Messrs. Warwick and Edgar Wroth, and that of Mr. H. A. Rogers. I refer the reader who desires exact and special knowledge on the subject to these two books. For my own part I have only to speak of two or three of these gardens, and shall confine myself to certain sources of information neither so exact nor so detailed as those from which Messrs. Warwick and Wroth have drawn the material for their excellent work.

The Pleasure Gardens grew out of the old Bear Baiting Gardens. The London citizen loved sport first and above all things: next, he loved the country: to sit under the shade of trees in the summer: to walk upon the soft sward; to smell the flowers: to rest his eyes upon country scenes. He has always yearned for the country while he remained in town. With these things he desired, as a concomitant of the entertainment, good eating, good drinking, the merry sound of music not softly but loudly played: the voices of those who sang: and a platform or floor for dancing. All these things he could get in Paris Gardens so long as that place existed, together with its bears and dogs. When the bears disappeared, what followed? The Gardens continued without the bears. There were also the Mulberry Gardens on the site of Buckingham House, and the Spring Gardens at Charing Cross. In the month of July 1661 Evelyn visited the new garden of Foxhall, afterwards{284} Vauxhall, and in June 1665, the year of the Plague, Pepys spent the evening at the same place, for the first time, and with great delight.
VAUXHALL GARDENS VAUXHALL GARDENS
(From the Engraving by J. S. Müller)

The Pleasure Garden apart from the sport of Bear and Bull Baiting was then beginning. Before long it became a necessity of life—at least, of the gregarious and social life of which the eighteenth century was so fond. Many things are said about that century, now so nearly removed from us by the space of another century, but we cannot say that it was not social, and that it was not gregarious. It had its coffee houses: its clubs: its taverns: its coteries: its societies: it loved the theatre: the opera: the concert: the oratorio: the masquerade: the Assembly: the card-room: but most of all the eighteenth century loved its Pleasure Gardens. It took every opportunity of getting away from the quiet house to crowds and noise and the scene of merriment.
VAUXHALL JUBILEE ADMISSION TICKET VAUXHALL JUBILEE ADMISSION TICKET

Many things were required to make a Pleasure Garden. There must be, first, abundance of trees—at first cherry trees, but these afterwards disappeared: if possible, there should be avenues of trees: aisles and dark walks of trees. There must be, next, an ornamental water with a fountain and a bridge: there must be a row of rustic bowers or retreats in which tea and supper could be served: there must be a platform for open-air dancing and promenading: there must be card-rooms: there must be a long room for dancing and for promenading, with a gallery for the orchestra and the singers. Add to these things a crowd every night including all classes and conditions of men and women. The eighteenth century was by no means a leveller of distinctions, but all classes met together without levelling. Distinctions were preserved: each party kept to itself: the nobleman wore his star and sash: he did not pretend to be on a level with the people around him: they liked him to keep up the dignity of aristocratic separation: he brought Ladies to the Gardens, sometimes in domino, sometimes not. They were not expected to speak to the ladies outside{285} their set: they danced together in the minuets: after the minuets they withdrew. The main point about the company of the Gardens was that each party was separate and kept separate. In the Park, either in the morning or the afternoon, it was not difficult to make acquaintances. The reason was that in the Park were only to be found in the morning or the afternoon those people who were not engaged in earning their livelihood. Accordingly, all professional men—lawyers, physicians,{286} attorneys, surgeons, artists, architects, literary people: all those engaged in trade, from the greatest merchant to the smallest shopkeeper, were excluded: they were occupied elsewhere. Therefore, the servants and footmen not being allowed in the Park, but compelled to wait outside, the people of position had the place to themselves, and access was easy. In the Gardens it was different: all could enter who paid the shilling for an entrance fee. Among them were the gentlemen in the red coat who bore His Majesty's Commission: the young fellows about town, a noisy disreputable band with noisy and disreputable companions: the plain citizen with his wife and daughter, the young fellow who was courting her: the young tradesman taking a holiday for once: the highwayman: the common pickpocket, and whole troops of the customary courtesan. All were here enjoying together—but separated into tiny groups of two or three—the strings of coloured lamps, the blare of the orchestra, the songs, the dances, and the supper. As for the last, it seems to have been always a cold collation: it generally consisted of chicken and a thin slice of ham, with a bowl of punch and a bottle of Port. There was no affectation of fine or polite behaviour; everybody behaved exactly as he pleased: the citizen was not gêné by the presence of the great lady: he prattled his vulgar commonplaces without being abashed: nor did the great lady put on 'side,' or behave among her own company with any affectation of dignity or reserve in the presence of the mercer of Ludgate Hill in the next box. Perhaps the recognition of rank made them all behave more naturally. After all, the mercer had his own rank. He could look forward to becoming Alderman, Sheriff, and Lord Mayor: he understood very well that he was already a good way up the ladder: the social precedence which belongs to the possession of money and the employment of many servants had already placed him in front of a vast crowd of inferiors: he was perfectly satisfied with his own position, although he could certainly{287} never become a noble earl or wear a star upon his breast, or hope to consort on equal terms with the jewelled lady in silks which he knew (professionally) to be beyond all price, with her rouged face and high-dressed head, who laughed so loud and talked so fast with the noble lords her companions, one of whom was blind drunk and the other was a little mincing beau who walked on his toes with bent knees and carried his hat under his arm, and spoke under his breath as if every word was to be listened to. Do you think the honest mercer was indignant at the manners of the great? Not he: he called for another bowl of punch and tied his handkerchief over his wig to keep off the damp. In the box on the other side of the citizen from Ludgate Hill was a party also taking supper and punch, with plenty of the latter. They were under the lead of an extremely fine gentleman: his white coat was covered with gold lace: his hat was laced in the same way: his waistcoat was of flowered silk: his ruffles were of white lace—lace of Valenciennes. The ladies with him were dressed with a corresponding splendour. Everybody knew that the gentleman was a highwayman: his face was perfectly well known: he had been going on so long that his time must soon be up. In a few months at most he would take that fatal journey in the cart to Tyburn, there to meet the end common to his kind. A good many people in the Gardens knew, besides, that the ladies with him—ladies of St. Giles in the Fields—were dressed from the stores of a receiving house for stolen goods. Perhaps the consciousness of this cheap and easy way of getting one's clothes made the ladies so buoyantly and extravagantly happy, with their sprightly sallies and their high-bred courtesy of adjectives. But the mercer troubled himself not at all about them.

The toleration of the mercer ought to endear his memory to us. For in all public assemblies there are things which must be tolerated. Less wise, we shut up the Assembly. We cannot keep out the Lady of the Camellias from the{288} Pleasure Garden. Therefore we shut up the place. In the eighteenth century this lady was told that everybody must behave with a certain amount of restraint: we have improved upon that manner: we cut off our nose to spite our face: we shut up the lovely Garden because we cannot keep her out.

For the same reason we have practically forbidden the youth of the lower middle class to practise the laudable, innocent, and delightful diversion of dancing. Not a single place, except certain so-called clubs, where the young people can now go to dance. Why? Because the magistrates in their wisdom have concluded that vice free and unchecked out of doors is better for the people than vice fettered and restrained by the necessity of behaving decently, and compelled to hide itself under the semblance of virtue. The Pleasure Gardens were shut up one after the other for that reason. When will they return? And in what form?

The Gardens of South London were not so celebrated as those of the North. Against Ranelagh, Cremorne, Marylebone, Bagnigge Wells, the White Conduit House—the South can only point to Vauxhall as a national institution. They were, however, of considerable note in their time, and were greatly frequented. They lay in a half circle, like pearls on a chain, all round South London. There were the Lambeth Wells, the Marble Hall, and the Cumberland Gardens at Vauxhall, besides Vauxhall itself; the Black Prince, Newington Butts; the Temple of Flora, the Temple of Apollo, the Flora Tea Gardens, the Restoration Spring Gardens, the Dog and Duck, the Folly on the Thames; Cuper's Gardens; Finch's Grotto, the Bermondsey Spa, and St. Helena Gardens, Rotherhithe. No doubt there were others, but these were the principal Gardens.

Cuper's Gardens lay exactly opposite to Somerset House. When Waterloo Bridge and Waterloo Bridge Road were constructed the latter passed right through the former site of the Gardens. St. John's Church marks the southern limit of{289} the Gardens. They were opened about the year 1678 by one Cuper, gardener to the Earl of Arundel. He begged such of the statues belonging to his master as were mutilated, and decorated the new gardens with them. Aubrey mentions them as belonging to Jesus College, Oxford; he calls them Cupid's gardens, and speaks of the arbours and walks of the place. There was a tavern connected with the gardens by the riverside, and fireworks were exhibited. These gardens continued until 1753, when they were suppressed as a nuisance. Cunningham quotes the prologue to Mrs. Centlivre's 'Busy Body.'
The Fleet Street sempstress, toast of Temple sparks, That runs spruce neckcloths for attorneys' clerks, At Cupid's Gardens will her hours regale, Sing 'Fair Dorinda,' and drink bottled ale.
THE DOG AND DUCK, BETHLEM THE DOG AND DUCK, BETHLEM

In the 'Sunday Ramble' (1794) the Dog and Duck is one of the last places visited in the course of that very remarkable Sunday 'out,' which began at four o'clock in the morning and ended at one o'clock next morning, such was the zeal of the ramblers. The place was a tavern in St.{290} George's Fields. On its site now stands Bethlehem Hospital. It was first built for the accommodation of those who came to this spot in order to drink the waters of a spring supposed to possess wonderful properties, especially in the case of cutaneous disorders and scrofula. The spring, like so many other medicinal springs, has long since been forgotten. Where is Beulah Spa? Who remembereth Hampstead Spa? Yet in its day the spring in St. George's Wells had no small reputation. It was especially in vogue between 1744 and 1770. Dr. Johnson advised Mrs. Thrale to try it. When the Spa declined, the tavern looked out for other attractions; it found them by day in certain ponds on the Fields close to the tavern: these ponds especially on Sunday were used for the magnificent sport of hunting the duck by dogs. All the ponds around London, especially those lying on the east side of Tottenham Court Road, were used for this sport. The gallant sportsmen, their hunt over, naturally felt thirsty: they were easily persuaded to stay for the evening when on week days there was music, with dancing, singing, supper, and more drink, and on Sundays the organ, with a choice company of the most well-bred gentlemen and ladies of similar breeding and taste.

Like Ranelagh and Bagnigge Wells, and indeed all the Pleasure Gardens, the Dog and Duck was a favourite place for breakfasts. The fashion of the public breakfast, now so completely forgotten, was brought to London from Bath, Tunbridge Wells, and Epsom. Tea and coffee were served at breakfast. After breakfast the people stayed on at the gardens, very often all day and half the night at the Dog and Duck. There was a bowling green for fine weather, there was also a swimming bath—I believe, the only one south of the Thames. About three or four in the afternoon there was dinner, with a bottle or several bottles of wine. One of the ponds not then employed for duck-hunting was in the garden, and served as an ornamental water, with alcoves or{291} bowers round it; a band played at intervals during the day. In the long room there was an organ, with an excellent organist. In the evening, there was generally a concert; the Dog and Duck maintained its own poet and its own composer. All this sounds very innocent and Arcadian, but in truth the place was acquiring a most evil reputation. In 1787 it was closed on Sunday, and in 1799 it was suppressed. In the 'Sunday Ramble' (1794) the Dog and Duck is open, but the Ramble may have taken place before 1787. Let us see what is going on. Remember that it is Sunday evening. But there is not the least trace of any respect for the day, and the place—to speak the truth—is full of the vilest company in the world, whose histories are described in the greedy fulness and with the hypocritical indignation against the wickedness of the people which were common among such writers a hundred years ago. I suppose they would not venture to set down what they did, but for the pretence of indignation. Thus, there is a certain City merchant, once a Quaker and formerly a bankrupt, but now rich and flourishing again. His companion is an ex-orange-girl, his mistress. Observe that the writer is certainly airing some City scandal of the day, and that his readers know perfectly well who was meant. There is a certain Nan Sheldon, who seems to have been a lady of some conversational powers with a considerable fund of information about the shady side of town life. There is also present a young lady described as the mistress of the 'Rev. Dr. D——s, of St. G.' Here, no doubt, we have a piece of contemporary humour which enables us to have a slap at the Church. There is other company of the like kind, but this specimen must suffice. As to the men, they are chiefly 'prentices and shopmen. At the Dog and Duck the license to sell drink had been withdrawn. The manager, however, met the difficulty by engaging a free vintner, i.e. a member of the Vintners'{292} Company, for whom no license was required. He therefore came to sell the drink to the visitors. It is a curious illustration of City privileges. Leaving the Dog and Duck, the Ramblers visited the Temple of Flora, dropped a tear over the Apollo Gardens, deserted and falling into ruins, and visited the Flora Tea Garden. The company here was more respectable, in consequence of some separation among the ladies; it was not, however, very orderly, and political argument ran high.

From this Tea Garden they drove to the Bermondsey Spa Gardens. Let me extract this account of this place, which was once so popular:

'We found the entrance presents a vista between trees, hung with lamps, blue, red, green, and white; nor is the walk in which they are hung inferior (length excepted) to the grand walk in Vauxhall Gardens. Nearly at the upper end of the walk is a large room, hung round with paintings, many of them in an elegant and the rest in a singular taste. At the upper end of the room is a painting of a butcher's shop, so finely executed by the landlord that a stranger to the place would cheapen a fillet of veal or a buttock of beef, a shoulder of mutton or a leg of pork, without ............