I think he got
this notion from Kingsley's "Alton Locke," which, High Churchman
though he for the nonce was, he had devoured as he had devoured
Stanley's "Life of Arnold," Dickens's novels, and whatever other
literary garbage of the day was most likely to do him harm; at any
rate he actually put his scheme into practice, and took lodgings in
Ashpit Place, a small street in the neighbourhood of Drury Lane
Theatre, in a house of which the landlady was the widow of a cabman.
This lady occupied the whole ground floor. In the front kitchen
there was a tinker. The back kitchen was let to a bellows-mender. On
the first floor came Ernest, with his two rooms which he furnished
comfortably, for one must draw the line somewhere. The two upper
floors were parcelled out among four different sets of lodgers:
there was a tailor named Holt, a drunken fellow who used to beat his
wife at night till her screams woke the house; above him there was
another tailor with a wife but no children; these people were
Wesleyans, given to drink but not noisy. The two back rooms were
held by single ladies, who it seemed to Ernest must be respectably
connected, for well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking young men used to
go up and down stairs past Ernest's rooms to call at any rate on
Miss Snow- Ernest had heard her door slam after they had passed.
Pages:
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404
405
406
407
408
409
410
411
412
413