About two or three o'clock decent working men in their best clothes
emerge from the houses in such streets as Nassau Street. It is part
of their duty to go out after dinner on Sunday with the wife and
children. The husband pushes the perambulator out of the dingy
passage, and gazes doubtfully this way and that way, not knowing
whither to go, and evidently longing for the Monday, when his work,
however disagreeable it may be, will be his plain duty. The wife
follows carrying a child, and a boy and girl in unaccustomed apparel
walk by her side. They come out into Mortimer Street. There are no
shops open; the sky over their heads is mud, the earth is mud under
their feet, the muddy houses stretch in long rows, black, gaunt,
uniform. The little party reach Hyde Park, also wrapped in
impenetrable mud-grey. The man's face brightens for a moment as he
says, "It is time to go back," and so they return, without the
interchange of a word, unless perhaps they happen to see an omnibus
horse fall down on the greasy stones. What is there worth thought or
speech on such an expedition? Nothing! The tradesman who kept the
oil and colour establishment opposite to us was not to be tempted
outside. It was a little more comfortable than Nassau Street, and,
moreover, he was religious and did not encourage Sabbath-breaking.
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