Reminiscences Volume 1 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1899 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER VIII THE EXILE-WORLD OF LONDON In the years from 1860 to 1868 I had many and peculiar opportunities of becoming acquainted with that sort of existence which I called in an essay published more than a quarter of a century ago in New York, 'The Exile-World of London.' Many of the denizens of that exile-world of London made their way to the 'Morning Star' offices to give their views on this or that foreign crisis, to ask a hearing for their grievances, to publish complaints against their home Governments, or it might be against the Government of England. Thus I came to know many men who had led lives of thrilling interest, and some of whose names belong to history. Others there were who did not come to any newspaper office with grievances or complaints, but whom I happened to know more or less intimately in their private lives, and for some of whom I had and have the highest respect and admiration. At that time the foreign exiles of a certain class almost all lived in or haunted the regions of Leicester Square. There was no Alhambra in Leicester Square then, and the bright pretty garden which now exists was represented by a muddy swamp and a riderless statue of a horse, the rider of which had long since fallen off his steed, and then lay on the earth, no one paying him any particular attention. But Leicester Square was only the home of the rank and file, the followers and the understrappers of Continental conspiracy. The exiles whom people in London cared most to see did not find their home in the streets and alleys and courts that ran off Leicester Square. The exiles who have made part of history lived in Kensington, in Brompton, in Hampstead, in the Regent's Park, and a select few had their abodes in Mayfair. Anyone may see to...