We have seen in the course of these chapters some of the associations of South London. I confess that, for my own part, I am not happy in considering associations connected with rows of terraces and villas. Here, you say, was once the house, with the park, of such and such a great man. Really! I dare say. But it is now covered with gentility. If I am taken to a slum--such a slum as that on the west of St. Mary Overies, and am told that in this place was Winchester House, I am at once interested. Why should the memory of the past appeal to our imagination more in a slum than in a brand new, spick and span collection of pleasant country villas? Is it from a feeling that all things tend to decay, and that the new suburb speaks not of decay? Who, for instance, stepping from the south-east corner of Tooting Common into the place which was once Streatham Park, can think of Mrs. Thrale and Dr. Johnson among these roads and villas? At Tooting itself, one might remember, were it not for the houses, Daniel De Foe, who founded the first Independent chapel there. At Wandsworth, if it were not so much built upon, I might see Voltaire walking about. At Putney, but for the villas, I should look for Pitt. Oh! there are a thousand people once living, and walking, and playing their parts in their villages, whose wraiths and spectres would willingly haunt them still, but cannot for the bricks and the walls, the chimneys and the smoke, the roads and the trams.
We have destroyed the beauty of South London: we have also made its historical associations impossible.
[Illustration: RED CROSS GARDENS, Southwark]
The first settlers or colonisers of this region, apart from its rural folk, came from London about the time when roads began to be tolerable; that is to say, late in the seventeenth century; they were the great folk, the leisured folk, the Quality, who had suburban houses in addition to their town houses and their country houses. They sought shelter in the quiet retreats of Clapham, Streatham, or Norwood. These people did not come, however, to settle, but only remained, as a rule, for a year or two, for a few months, for a season. When the roads became so far improved as to make driving easy and pleasant, the city merchants came and built or bought big houses, and drove in and out every day in their carriage and pair. They did not buy estates, as a rule: they bought a substantial house and grounds, and sat down therein. They had large gardens behind, with greenhouses where they grew early strawberries; they had in front a broad lawn with a carriage drive; they liked to have on the lawn two stately cedars, whose branches swept the grass. They brought their friends down from Saturday to Monday. In course of time other people came; but the first comers--these merchants--were the aristocracy, the first families of the suburbs. In the newer places there are still to be found the first families; in the older suburbs they have all disappeared from the place. Thus Clapham, I believe, knows no longer a Macaulay, a Wilberforce, a Venn. These were people of national distinction. Of course there were not in other suburbs first families who rose to the giddy heights attained by these fortunate aristocrats of the suburbs; but there were many which had among them ex-Lord Mayors and Aldermen; there were many persons among them of dignity and authority. Alas! the first families are gone: there is now no aristocracy of the suburb left. It is a pity. There should be in every community some whose position entitles them to respect and authority; there should be some to take the lead naturally; there should be some who should maintain the standards of conduct, ideas, and principles. Especially is this the case when by far the greater part of the people in a community are engaged in trade.