Proclamation of Peace.—The English do not understand Pageantry.—Illumination.—M. Otto’s House.—Illuminations better managed at Rome. Friday, April 30.
The definitive treaty has arrived at last; peace was proclaimed yesterday, with the usual ceremonies, and the customary rejoicings have taken place. My expectations were raised to the highest pitch. I looked for a pomp and pageantry far surpassing whatever I had seen in my own country. Indeed every body expected a superb spectacle. The newspaper writers had filled their columns with magnificent descriptions of what was to be, and rooms or single windows in the streets through 86which the procession was to pass, were advertised to be let for the sight, and hired at prices so extravagant, that I should be suspected of exaggeration were I to say how preposterous.
The theory of the ceremony, for this ceremony, like an English suit at law, is founded upon a fiction, is, that the Lord Mayor of London, and the people of London, good people! being wholly ignorant of what has been going on, the king sends officially to acquaint them that he has made peace: accordingly the gates at Temple Bar, which divide London and Westminster, and which stand open day and night, are on this occasion closed; and Garter king at arms, with all his heraldic peers, rides up to them and knocks loudly for admittance. The Lord Mayor, mounted on a charger, is ready on the other side to demand who is there. King Garter then announces himself and his errand, and requires permission to pass and proclaim the good news; upon which the 87gates are thrown open. This, which is the main part of the ceremony, could be seen only by those persons who were contiguous to the spot, and we were not among the number. The apartment in which we were was on the Westminster side, and we saw only the heraldic part of the procession. The heralds and the trumpeters were certainly in splendid costume; but they were not above twenty in number, nor was there any thing to precede or follow them. The poorest brotherhood in Spain makes a better procession on its festival. In fact, these functions are not understood in England.
The crowd was prodigious. The windows, the leads, or unrailed balconies which project over many of the shops, the house tops, were full, and the streets below thronged. A very remarkable accident took place in our sight. A man on the top of a church was leaning against one of the stone urns which ornament the balustrade; it fell, and crushed 88a person below. On examination it appeared that the workmen, instead of cramping it with iron to the stone, or securing it with masonry, had fitted it on a wooden peg, which having become rotten through, yielded to the slightest touch. A Turk might relate this story in proof of predestination.
If, however, the ceremony of the morning disappointed me, I was amply rewarded by the illuminations at night. This token of national joy is not, as with us, regulated by law; the people, or the mob, as they are called, take the law into their own hands on these occasions, and when they choose to have an illumination, the citizens must illuminate to please them, or be content to have their windows broken; a violence which is winked at by the police, as it falls only upon persons whose politics are obnoxious. During many days, preparations had been making for this festivity, so that it was already known what houses and what public buildings 89would exhibit the most splendid appearance. M. Otto’s, the French ambassador, surpassed all others, and the great object of desire was to see this. Between eight and nine the lighting-up began, and about ten we sallied out on our way to Portman Square, where M. Otto resided.
In the private streets there was nothing to be remarked, except the singular effect of walking at night in as broad a light as that of noon-day, every window being filled with candles, arranged either in straight lines, or in arches, at the fancy of the owner, which nobody stopped to admire. None indeed were walking in these streets except persons whose way lay through them; yet had there been a single house unlighted, a mob would have been collected in five minutes, at the first outcry. When we drew near Pall Mall, the crowd, both of carriages and of people, thickened; still there was no inconvenience, and no difficulty in walking, or in crossing the carriage road. Greater expense had been bestowed 90here. The gaming-houses in St James’s street were magnificent, as they always are on such occasions; in one place you saw the crown and the G. R. in coloured lamps; in another the word Peace in letters of light; in another some transparent picture, emblematical of peace and plenty. Some score years ago, a woman in the country asked a higher price than she had used to do for a basket of mushrooms, and when she was asked the reason, said, it was because of the American war. As war thus advances the price of every thing, peace and plenty are supposed to be inseparably connected; and well may the poor think them so. There was a transparency exhibited this night at a pot-house in the city, which represented a loaf of bread saying to a pot of porter, I am c............