Quote (gthibault @ Sat, Mar 8 2008, 10:43am)
essaye d'ajuster les lignes stp
I breathed a sigh of relief. Having burned my ships behind
me, I was now free to plunge into that human wilderness of
which nobody seemed to know anything. But at once I
encountered a new difficulty in the shape of my cabby, a
grey-whiskered and eminently decorous personage, who had
imperturbably driven me for several hours about the 'City.'
'Drive me down to the East End,' I ordered, taking my
seat.
'Where, sir?' he demanded with frank surprise.
'To the East End, anywhere. Go on.'
The hansom pursued an aimless way for several minutes,
then came to a puzzled stop. The aperture above my head
was uncovered, and the cabman peered down perplexedly at
me.
'I say,' he said, 'wot plyce yer wanter go?'
'East End,' I repeated. 'Nowhere in particular. Just drive
me around, anywhere.'
'But wot's the haddress, sir?'
'See here!' I thundered. 'Drive me down to the East End,
and at once!'
It was evident that he did not understand, but he withdrew
his head and grumblingly started his horse.
Nowhere in the streets of London may one escape the sight
of abject poverty, while five minutes' walk from almost any
point will bring one to a slum; but the region my hansom
was now penetrating was one unending slum. The streets were
filled with a new and different race of people, short of stature,
and of wretched or beer-sodden appearance. We rolled along
through miles of bricks and squalor, and from each cross
street and alley flashed long vistas of bricks and misery. Here
and there lurched a drunken man or woman, and the air was
obscene with sounds of jangling and squabbling. At a market,
tottery old men and women were searching in the garbage
thrown in the mud for rotten potatoes, beans, and vegetables,
while little children clustered like flies around a festering mass
of fruit, thrusting their arms to the shoulders into the liquid
corruption, and drawing forth morsels, but partially decayed,
which they devoured on the spot.
Not a hansom did I meet with in all my drive, while mine
was like an apparition from another and better world, the
way the children ran after it and alongside. And as far as I
could see were the solid walls of brick, the slimy pavements,
and the screaming streets; and for the first time in my life the
fear of the crowd smote me. It was like the fear of the sea;
and the miserable multitudes, street upon street, seemed so
many waves of a vast and malodorous sea, lapping about me
and threatening to well up and over me.
'Stepney, sir; Stepney Station,' the cabby called down.
I looked about. It was really a railroad station, and he had
driven desperately to it as the one familiar spot he had ever
heard of in all that wilderness.
'Well?' I said.
He spluttered unintelligibly, shook his head, and looked
very miserable. 'I'm a strynger 'ere,' he managed to articulate.
'An' if yer don't want Stepney Station, I'm blessed if I know
wotcher do want.'
'I'll tell you what I want,' I said. 'You drive along and keep
your eye out for a shop where old clothes are sold. Now, when
you see such a shop, drive right on till you turn the corner'
'Won'tcher py me?' he pleaded. 'Tgere's seven an' six
owin' me'
'Yes,' I laughed, 'and it would be the last I'd see of you'
'Lord lumme, but it'll be the last I see of you if yer don't
py me' he retorted
I could see that he was growing dubious of his fare, but
not long afterward he pulled up to the curb and informed
me that an old clothes shop was to be found a bit of the way
back.