There is a certain “framework” to one of Dickens’s Christmas Stories which, I suppose, is not as well known as many of his occasional works. It is called “Somebody’s Luggage,” and is, as a framework, tolerably artificial. The scheme of it is, that a certain unknown traveller comes to an old fashioned London Inn, situated (I gather) in Holborn or the Strand, writes a great deal in the coffee-room, sends the porter on errands to publishing quarters, stays a night, and vanishes the next evening, leaving all his luggage behind him. Christopher, the head waiter, a most delightful character, becomes curious about this abandoned luggage. He buys it from the proprietress for the amount of the unknown’s bill, and discovers that the luggage is full of manuscripts.
“He had crumpled up this writing of his everywhere, in every part and parcel of his luggage. There was writing in his dressing-case, writing in his boots, writing among his shaving tackle, writing in his hat box, writing folded away down among the whalebones of his umbrella.”
Christopher first of all disposes of the luggage to a dealer not far from St. Clement Danes in the Strand. “On my remarking that I should have thought these articles not quite in his line, he said; ‘No more ith a manth grandmother, Mithter Chrithtoper; but if any man will bring hith grandmother here, and offer her at a fair trifle below what the’ll feth with good luck when the’th thcoured and turned — I’ll buy her.’”
And then Christopher disposes of the Writings to the Editor of the All the Year Round, otherwise Mr. Dickens, and the Christmas Number begins with the manuscript that was found in the traveller’s boots — and I am afraid that it had been better to have left it in his boots.
But what concerns me for the moment with “Somebody’s Luggage,” is the Bill of the man who went away. It is entered under the heading: “Coffee Room, No.4 — the number of the box occupied by the traveller — Feb. 2nd, 1856.” It contains some curious items.
Item ￡ s. d.
Pen and Paper 6
Port Negus 2 0
Ditto 2 0
Pen and Paper 6
Tumbler Broken 2 6
Brandy 2 0
Pen and Paper 6
Anchovy Toast 2 6
Pen and Paper 6
Bed 3 0
Feb. 3rd ￡ s. d.
Pen and Paper 6
Breakfast 2 6
Broiled Ham 2 0
Eggs 1 0
Watercresses 1 0
Shrimps 1 0
Pen and Paper 6
Blotting Paper 6
Messenger to Paternoster Row and back 1 6
Again, when No Answer 1 6
Brandy, 2s. Devilled Port Chop, 2s 4 0
Pens and Paper 1 0
Messenger to Albemarle Street and back 1 0
Again (detained), when No Answer 1 6
Salt-cellar broken 3 6
Large Liqueur glass Orange Brandy 1 6
Dinner, Soup, Fish, Joint, and Bird 7 6
Bottle old East India Brown 8 0
Pen and Paper 6
Total ￡2 16 6
The oddest item is the charge for breakfast. Nominally this was half-a-crown, but this sum covered, it is evident, merely the tea or coffee, the bread and toast and the butter. Everything else is an extra, and these bring the total up to seven-and-sixpence; the profits to the establishment amounting to about 1000 per cent. or more; since I do not believe that the water-cress cost more than a penny. The breakages were also charged excessively, but the bed is cheap at three shillings, and the dinner most reasonable — provided that the dishes were good of their kind. Unfortunately, it is impossible to compare Christophers’ inn with any hotel of our day, since the old kind has ceased to exist, save, perhaps, in a few old hostelries, lingering in small out-of-the-way country towns.
I have stayed at all sorts of houses of entertainment in my day in all parts of this island. I have lodged at small country “pubs” and have been very comfortable; I have stayed at Palatial Hotels in big towns and have been hideously uncomfortable. I remember especially one of these latter. It had a Louis Quatorze, or Quinze, or Seize Tea room, furnished with the utmost luxury. There was marble everywhere, and hot air and cold air, and bathing arrangements that recalled the later Romans at their worst. And they kept me waiting twenty-five minutes for the bacon and eggs at breakfast; and when this rar............