floor transformed into a shop, fitted with a counter indeed, but with a large, open, unglazed space where the window ought to be, and furnished inside with little round marble tables and foreign chairs-when they marked the sign-board, on which was painted a wine-glass piled high above the brim with some composition, partly red, partly white-when, finally, the promoters of the establishment announced themselves in long, thin, foreign-looking letters as Tutti and Frutti, from Bologna, manufacturers of penny ices, the British public wondered indeed! Penny ices? Nonsense! Ices were a magnificent luxury for the delectation of the wealthy alone, costing sometimes a shilling, and never less than sixpence! The Hungerford Market frequenting public had stared with curious and longing eyes at countesses eating ices, as they reclined in their carriages opposite Mr. Gunter's or Mr. Grange's shop, and now these delicacies were about to be offered for a penny. It was absurd! Nevertheless, the day of opening came, and those hardy spirits, who had the courage to enter the premises, found themselves received by blackbearded, black-eyed foreigners, unintelligible in speech, but courteous in manner, who ladled out glass after glass, piled up after the manner of the picture on the sign-board, with marvellous rapidity. Perhaps to their great astonishment, the consumers found that there was no doubt about its being ice. The first mouthful settled that! It was very cold, and very succulent, and very nice, and it only cost a penny! Messrs. Tutti and Frutti sprang into great and sudden popularity; their ice-shop was a success. After sweltering in a crowded steam-boat, under a July sun, it was pleasant to cool oneself with a glace à la Vanille (the foreign language giving it quite an additional flavour) in the shady arcades of Hungerford. It sounded rather well for the gentlemen members of a party proceeding per Citizen steamer up the river, to invite the lady members to take a hice" before they embarked. Some of the dashing young bloods of the day (young bloods, be it understood, in a very minor degree) began to speak of the shop as a "caffy," and found that to sit at the marble-topped tables with their hats on one side, and the fringed ends of their Joinville ties well pulled out, was almost as good as going to "Bolong." So that soon the establishment at Hungerford was found to be insufficient for the business, and 66 Tutti and Frutti opened a shop in Holborn, that other great artery of London traffic. When the short-lived English summer was over, and the ice business was of course at an end, they took to selling chocolate, in which, both liquid and solid, they did a very good business. So the whirligig of time went on and brought with it various changes. What became of Frutti, whether he died or whether he retired to his native country, with the fortune he had made out of English pennies, is not known. Another Tutti, a relative of the original, appeared upon the scene, and erected a large music-hall very near the spot upon which the old ice-shop stood, while the original Tutti embarked his savings in the establishment of what is still the largest café restaurant in England. The premises in which he started had been well known to the public, in two or three other forms, for many years. First in our memory as a hall of science, where Perkins's steam-gun poured forth its shower of bullets against the iron target, and where the electrical eel distributed convulsive shocks to those who were weak-minded enough to touch it. Then the building experienced another phase, and became a casino, "an establishment," to quote its description from an excellent farce by Mr. Shirley Brooks, "promoted by the Early Closing Association for the moral improvement of young Holborn," a dancing-hall, where was to be found the best ball band in London, with Henri Laurent for its conductor, and Arban for its cornet. These were the days of the Olga, and the Bridal, and the Valse d'Amour, of the Jupiter and Annen, and the Firefly polkas, of the PostHorn and Sturm-Marsch galops. Do people dance now? Perhaps they do. The subject has ceased to be of the smallest interest to the present writer. After a little time the band and its frequenters moved to more spacious quarters, and the gallery became empty and deserted. From time to time attempts were made to galvanise it into life again. Was it there that we found ourselves one of five, the rest of the audience being composed of three old women and a child in a tartan dress, looking on at Pokey's Paris, and trying hard to believe we were in a balloon overhanging that capital? Was it there that we witnessed "a bottle of champagne uncorked by Horace Plastic,” which probably shared the fate of other bottles of champagne, and was drunk out at once? Was it there that we underwent that driest and most awful ordeal of all, when we looked on while a Scotch gentleman spread out before a very select audience the contents of the Gaberlunzie Wallet—a collection of Northern "wut" and wisdom most superlatively dreary? Then came an entirely dead period, during which Tutti saw his opportunity, and transformed the gallery into what it now is. laugh of triumph, two or three of the large tables in the middle of the upper end of the room are given up to noisy, vivacious, gesticulating Frenchmen, the clatter of whose tongues is as loud as the rattle of the dominoes with which they are playing. During the Franco-Prussian war, the tide of discussion used to run tolerably high between the representatives of the two apart and there is no fusion between them. Entering through the swinging glass-nationalities, and even now they keep doors, we will take the staircase immediately on our left and descend into the lower regions. A long and narrow hall, spacious enough to contain fifteen billiard-tables, three being set aside for pool, and all being generally engaged throughout the evening. The floor above is a very grand hall, lofty, spacious, and handsome, plentifully decorated with looking-glass, and fitted from end to end with a row of divans and of marble-topped tables on either side, and with a double row of both down the middle. While nearly all these seats and tables are filled by a tacit though thoroughly wellunderstood agreement amongst the frequenters of the room, different portions of it are set aside for different purposes. Thus, while the tables on the right-hand side are occupied by the chess-players, who are gathered together in force (Tutti's being the acknowledged head-quarters of the game, and frequented by its most skilful exponents and their admiring friends), the tables on the left-hand side are generally patronised by such visitors as may have dropped in for the purpose of conversation, or by those who have ladies with them. And when we say ladies we use the word in its integrity. A glance round Tutti's would convince any one in a moment that it was not at all the place where Madame Lais or Fraulein Phryne would be amused or even at her ease. During the daytime Tutti's is generally patronised by ladies, and after the morning performances of pantomimes it is, we understand, a sight to see the mothers and the children regaling themselves on chocolate and bread-and-butter, preparatory to departure homeward by suburban trains. At night, lady visitors are much fewer in number, but of the same thoroughly respectable class, and then, as we have observed, they generally sit on the left-hand side of the room. Another thing to be noticed is, that while the chess-tables and draught-boards are principally occupied by solid Britishers, or more solid Germans, silent mostly, bending over their game and emitting every now and then thick puffs of smoke, a grunt of perplexity, or a deep short Tutti's has its celebrities, and some of them are here to-night. That handsome old man with high forehead, aquiline nose, white hair, and soft white beard is Herr Steinmetz, at one time the finest chessplayer in Europe. The matches that he has won against fearful odds; how he has held his own against several players at the same time; the games which he has played with bandaged eyes, or with his face turned to the wall, are they not written in the chronicles of the sporting press and in the hearts of his admirers? He is an old man now, and does not play nearly so much as formerly, contenting himself with looking on at the prowess of his successors, and occasionally giving advice, which is always followed. Yon black-bearded, bright-eyed, olive-skinned little man with the closecropped head, who is expelling smoke from his mouth, his nostrils, and apparently his ears, as he rattles the dominoes with quick, lithe movements, is Etienne Didot, Parisian journalist, and hero of the Commune, who boasts of having recommended that not merely the hostages, but that everybody else should be shot, but who was glad enough at the restoration of order to lie hidden in a picture-dealer's garret, and to make his escape to England disguised as a peasant. And here, bending over the most doughtily contested chess match, is a somewhat worn, shrewd face, which comes upon you in connexion with other associations, with the Park and the Row, with the Bellona Club and Skindle's, with a life as different as may be from that passed at Tutti's. The shrewd-looking man is Stewart of Pitcairn, whose knowledge of the world is varied and extensive: at Eton, in a cavalry regiment, as a Highland laird, as a wanderer throughout the old world and the new world; who has been soldier, traveller, sportsman, and landed proprietor; petted by women, liked by men, reverenced by his clan, and who in the autumn of his life finds the greatest amusement in smoking his meerschaum pipe and playing chess, or watching chess played, at Tutti's; not that he has less money or less position, only he has seen enough of the world, too much his friends say, and has found that simple amusements are the most lasting. On an average Tutti's has three thousand visitors a day, the majority English, but with a large sprinkling of foreigners from all parts of the Continent. Coffee, chocolate, and aërated waters are the liquors consumed, while for edibles there are delicious bread-and-butter, wonderful omelettes, and all the simpler kinds of food. The entire establishment is conducted with liberality and decorum, and is, as it most fully deserves to be, perfectly successful. THE BURN AMONG THE HEATHER. NURSED on the bosom of the Ben, I rise refreshed, to trace once more Thy wanton waters to the shore, And never weary as I go; Blue sky above, green earth below; Now soft and sweet, now loud and strong, I know the old familiar strain! I've sung it and will sing again, CHRONICLES OF LONDON STREETS. CLARE MARKET. IN Clare House-court, a not very inviting passage on the left hand as you go up Drury-lane, stood, during the Civil Wars, the town house of the Earls of Clare. John Holles, the second earl, during the troubles of Charles's time, listened from his windows to the threatening hum of 66 the noisy mob which shouted rejoicings at Cromwell's victories, and wondered what good or evil would result therefrom to the title he bore. "There is," says Howell, writing in 1657, " towards Drury-lane, a new market called Clare Market; there is there a street and palace of the same name, built by the Earl of Clare, who lives there in a princely manner, having a house, a street, and a market both for flesh and fish, all bearing his name." London at those times was full of such picturesque contrasts, for gentlemen of position dwelt in places like Shire-lane (Temple Bar), or the slums of Whitefriars, maintaining, as best they might, a solitary dignity amidst low taverns, the haunts of tipsy soldiers, and the dens of thieves, bullies, and assassins. Day by day their gilt coaches must have rolled forth from their court-yards, giving the idlers and scamps of the localities in which they lingered tempting glimpses of rich furniture, costly plate, and fine clothes. In 1720, Strype describes Clare Market as very considerable, and well served with provisions, both flesh and fish, for, besides the butchers in the shambles, it is much resorted to by the country butchers and higglers. The market-days are Wednesdays and Saturdays. The toll belongs to the Duke of Newcastle (Pelham Holles), as ground landlord thereof." The son of the second earl (probably the donor of the blackamoor holding a dial in the garden of Clement's Inn) died in 1689; his son, created Marquis of Clare and Duke of Newcastle, died in 1711, when all his honours perished in the grave with him. Careless of earl or marquis, the street venders still, however, continue the market traffic, won for them from the City by the first earl, and hoarsely bawling their wares, their rough faces gleaming out through fiery gusts of gas, or showing pale by dim flickers of paper lamps, contrive to carry on a busy though humble traffic, as briskly as when Hogarth used to wander here on his way to his adjacent club, or when Colley Cibber, in a richly laced coat, sought the nearest way to the Spiller's Head. This Spiller was a celebrated actor of Queen Anne's reign, and his greatest character was Mat o' the Mint, in the Beggars' Opera. The butchers, whose red faces and blue frocks were always conspicuous in the gallery of the Portugal-street Theatre, adored Spiller, and induced an equally enthusiastic publican of the neighbourhood to take down his sign of the Bull and Butcher, and put up the Spiller's Head in its place. When Spiller died in 1729, some wag Down with your marrow-bones and cleavers all, The Spiller's Head became a great resort of artists and actors, and Tom D'Urfey, who used to sing duets with Charles the Second, and long after him Colley Cibber, Pope's troublesome antagonist, were in turn presidents. At the Bull's Head in Clare Market, the Shepherd and his Flock Club met, and also an Artists' Club, of which Hogarth was a member. It was at this club that Doctor Radcliffe, the great physician, was enjoying himself, when the damping news came that he had dropped some five thousand pounds in the South Sea Bubble. "Never mind," said the philosophic doctor, "tis but going up five thousand more pairs of stairs." This latter club, a local antiquary, to whom we are largely indebted, says was first instituted by the actors of the Lincoln's-inn-fields Theatre. Of Rich, the manager and famous harlequin, a story is told, which is probably the original of several almost similar ones, with the advantage of being true. One night, returning from the Portugal-street Theatre in a hackney-coach, he ordered the man to drive him to the Sun Tavern, Clare Market. Passing one of the parlour windows that was invitingly open, Rich sprang out of the coach into the room. The coachman just then halting, and finding the vehicle empty, slammed the steps, cursed the cheat who had bilked him, and mounted his box to drive off. At this moment Rich jumped back, and putting out his head told the man to turn the coach and Iset him down. After he got out, Rich swore at the stupid fellow, and offered him his fare. Jarvey declined; he did not like the look of things, and said stoutly his master had ordered him not to take any money at all that night. Rich replied, "Your master is a fool, here is a shilling for yourself." But the man was resolute, regained his box, and as he drove off shouted, "No, no, Mr. Devil, I know you in spite of your shoes, and so you're made a fool of for once." This story is usually told of an actor who, on being set down at his destination in the dark, kept getting out at one door of the vehicle and going in at the other, till the coachman, astonished at such an endless procession, fled for terror. Mr. Diprose, who has all his life been collecting the memorabilia of the odd nooks of St. Clement's parish, has a curious account of some old pictures that were long in the possession of Mr. Smith, of the Hope Tavern, Blackmoor-street, Clare Market. They were always said to be the original portraits of Jack Sheppard and his mother, painted by Hogarth's father-in-law, Sir James Thornhill, and the story went, in 1845, that they had been sold to Mr. Merivale of Gray's Inn for ninety-seven guineas. Below the moulding of the frame of Mrs. Sheppard's portrait were found seven guineas and several copper coins, between the moulding and lining of the other were several curious papers and " documents relating to the rebellion of 1745, all bearing the post-mark of the time, and probably secreted there by some wary Jacobite in a moment of peril. There were also discovered a cheque for seventeen pounds and a note for ten pounds. Among the papers was a printed notice for turning the Lincoln's-inn-fields Theatre into a guard-house, and suspending a certain performance. Now Jack being a favourite in Clare Market, it was not unnatural that the Black Jack Tavern, at the corner of Portsmouthstreet, which had been the favourite haunt of taciturn Joe Miller, should be a place he frequented, and from the first-floor window there he once leaped to avoid a sudden rush of Jonathan Wild's myrmidons. The Jump, as the tavern was afterwards called, was, and we believe still is, a great resort of medical students. The Jump was also the place where the "Pop-gun" plot of 1794 was supposed to have been concocted. At the time of the Horne Tooke and Thelwall trials, two men, named Higgins and Smith, and a third, named Lemaitre, were arrested on a charge of plotting to kill the king with a poisoned arrow. Lemaitre, a watch-case maker, only eighteen, was for three days closely examined by the Privy Council, then confined for thirty-two weeks in Coldbath Fields, and finally discharged. During this time his mother had died of grief. Some months after he was again arrested, tried, and acquitted. Mr. Warburton and Lord Dacre kept the poor fellow's case for years before parliament, but failed to obtain for him any redress. Clare Market seems always to have been much frequented by actors in search of traits of low humour, and of them many traditions still exist. That idol of her day, Mrs. Bracegirdle, used frequently to visit the stalls in Clare Market, and give money to the poor unemployed basket-women whom she found moping in corners hungry and disconsolate. She became so well known to them at last, that she could not pass that way to the theatre without being loudly greeted by their thanks and benedictions. Bannister once met with a young and gay spendthrift, who was lamenting his folly in having run through the handsome fortune left him by his father, a tripe-seller in Clare Market. "Never mind," was the reply; "you only lost by your gallopers what your father gained by his trotters." This reminds us of Douglas Jerrold's remark to another lamenting prodigal, who was regretting his pair of exquisite bays: "Well, my boy, but only think of your duns!" Our local antiquary reminds us of two celebrated Clare Market worthies: Pett, the miser, and Brutus Billy, the crossingsweeper in Fleet-street. Pett was a Warwickshire man, who came to London at ten years of age, with only a shilling in his pocket. An old woman who sold pies helped him till he could earn a living. Apprenticed to a butcher in Southwark, in due time he became a journeyman in Clare Market. For the first few years he was paid twenty-five pounds a year, with meat and drink. Early thrift had turned him to flint; to get money and save it became the ruling passion of his life. One night, when very thirsty after work, he rashly swore, says Mr. Diprose (into whose records we again dip), to treat himself to a pint of porter every Saturday, as soon as he had saved a thousand pounds. He achieved this weekly feast after tremendous mortifications. Winter after winter he never lit a fire or went to bed by candle-light. For forty-two years he slew and dissected oxen, and for thirty years occupied the same miserable room. He never treated man, woman, or child to a glass, never lent or borrowed a penny, never spoke ill or well of any one, and never ate a morsel at his own expense. The glorious result of this agreeable life was that our prudent journeyman butcher died in June, 1803, leaving two thousand four hundred and seventyfive pounds in the Three per Cents to distant relations, not one of whom he had ever seen. About half an hour before he died, he was seen trying to bargain for a cheap coffin. Brutus Billy was of quite another species, and under his black skin flowed the richest and warmest life-blood. He was an old Jamaica negro, who for years swept the crossing at the Fleet-street corner of Ludgate-hill, opposite the shop of Alderman Waithman. Brutus was short and thickset, jet black, and with very silvery hair, trained into a fashionable toupee over his forehead. His industry and civility won him friends, and Mr. Waithman frequently gave him money, and at last provided him with a regular Sunday dinner. Brutus Billy lived in White Horse - yard, Stanhope - street, Drury-lane, and was universally respected, the more so, that he was known to have money in the Funds; report, always magnifying, said thousands upon thousands. Tim-buc-too, as he was sometimes irreverently called, when he had shut up shopthat is, swept mud over the crossing, the goodwill of which he eventually sold for a large sum-used to carry nuts and fruit round to places of entertainment. By such diligent and frugal ways, Brutus (perhaps introduced into Moncrieff's Tom and Jerry, as the original type of the black man who is disgusted to see turkey without sassengers" at the beggars' supper) made a fortune. Brutus Billy died in Chapel-court in 1854, aged eighty-seven, and tradition says he left seven thousand pounds to his kind benefactress, Miss Waithman. slight per centage may perhaps be taken from this amount, but there is no doubt of his having really left that lady a legacy. A Among other legends of Clare Market, collected by the local antiquary, we may mention one of a Mohock Club, held at a tavern close to the Tennis Court playhouse. The wild members were chiefly lawyers' clerks from Chancery-lane and Lincoln'sinn-fields. The first who entered the club was chairman for the evening, and he had the right to nominate two or three couples of mad fellows, who, between ten and eleven, were sent forth to torment inoffensive people. Their plan was to lie in ambush till they heard a solitary man coming. They would then raise a shout of " That's he! that's he! that's he!" and drawing their swords give chase. If they caught the poor wretch, and he was not too brave or stubborn, they surrounded him in a circle |