London at the End of the Century:A Book of Gossip
a Beckett, Arthur William
1900
THE ROTTEN ROW CURE.
Very often one receives orders to take to riding. Of course, if you happen to have a banking account which never sinks to less on the credit side in the pounds column than five figures in your pass-book, the | |
294 | matter is as simple as possible. All you have to do is to find a horse up to your weight. Having done this (which you generally can manage with the assistance of a friend), you can ride to your heart's content in Rotten Row. But supposing you have neglected to take the necessary biscuits, or your build is hereditarily stalwart, or from some other unaccountable reason, you turn the scales at the club at twenty-two stone, why, then you must travel further north. I believe by arrangement you can always secure a nice ride in the early morning at the Zoo on the back of an elephant, but the mount naturally has to be ordered well in advance. |
And here let me suggest that there can be no sight more instructive and amusing to the Intelligent Foreigner than a review of in the early morning. When the shadows of the trees bordering Rotten Row are still of measurable length, it is delightful to watch the riders as they pass and repass, now singly, now in couples, now in groups. Here comes a famous artist in black and white, looking like a farmer in his workaday clothes. He is followed by an eminent Q.C. much in the same costume. They are succeeded by judges, editors, statesmen, and now and again by a bishop. Pot hats, caps, even straw hats are used as a headgear. Collars turned up, and suits of the loudest material. If the various celebrities could be put as they are | |
295 | in the scenes of their daily professional exploits they would certainly cause a profound sensation. For instance, how could the Q.C. cross-examine in grey dittos and a red necktie? How could deliver judgment in an old woollen comforter? How could the ecclesiastic preach in a cap calculated to capture the taste of a costermonger? But in Rotten Row everything is acceptable. I believe Buffalo Bill, when he was last in England, frequently appeared beneath the trees in his professional toggery. If he did I am quite sure that his eminence as a Society lion, and not the unconventionality of his costume, attracted attention. Were a North American Indian, of the old-fashioned Cooper novel sort, to gallop through the Row, he would attract little or no attention. All that would be said would, no doubt, be uttered by the eminent artist in black and white to whom I have already referred. my talented friend would observe, |
