22. 'Tis what you
call a blind street, with no thoroughfare, and then you go
down an alley. Can you recollect that?"
"Fear not."
"No. 22 Hunt Street, going out of Silver Street. Remember the
alley. It's an ugly neighbourhood; but you go of your own
accord."
"Yes, yes. Good night."
Book 5 Chapter 6
Urged by Sybil's entreaties the cab-driver hurried on. With
all the skilled experience of a thorough cockney charioteer he
tried to conquer time and space by his rare knowledge of short
cuts and fine acquaintance with unknown thoroughfares. He
seemed to avoid every street which was the customary passage
of mankind. The houses, the population, the costume, the
manners, the language through which they whirled their way,
were of a different state and nation to those with which the
dwellers in the dainty quarters of this city are acquainted.
Now dark streets of frippery and old stores, new market-places
of entrails and carrion with gutters running gore, sometimes
the way was enveloped in the yeasty fumes of a colossal
brewery, and sometimes they plunged into a labyrinth of lanes
teeming with life, and where the dog-stealer and the pick-
pocket, the burglar and the assassin, found a sympathetic
multitude of all ages; comrades for every enterprise; and a
market for every booty.
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