Grosvenor Place

“ He walked quickly now; for in place of those vague anticipations and reveries, a more definite purpose was forming in his brain; and there was a certain joyousness in the prospect. The very next morning he would come up to this little thoroughfare, and see if he could secure lodgings for himself, perhaps opposite the house where the old man and his granddaughter lived. It was time he was devoting himself more vigorously to study; there were too many people calling at the big mansion in Grosvenor Place; the frivolities of the fashionable world were too seductive. ”

“ Mechanically, seeing nothing, he walked down Grosvenor Road, and on into Victoria Street, [197] where, though the omnibuses had ceased to run, cabs still wandered, or passed one another at full speed, while an occasional motor-car shot amongst them. As he turned out of the street into the stillness of Carlisle Place, his eyes fell upon the Cathedral tower, majestic against the night sky sown with stars. Like Cecily, he felt its quietude, but only as something which accentuated the restless, uneasy tumult of his thoughts. Upstairs, when he reached the flat, the light was burning in the hall. ”

“ He hopes his readers may have that enjoyment in the perusal of the following History which was had in the providing of it for them.
St. Paul’s Schools, Knightsbridge, June, 1859.
p. vCONTENTS. PERSONS. PLACES. MISCELLANEOUS. ILLUSTRATIONS. p. xiiERRATUM
Page 235, line 19, for “Grosvenor Row” read “Grosvenor Place.” [0]
p. 1CHAPTER I.
“Instructed by the Antiquary Times,
We are, we must, we cannot but be wise.”
Shakspeare.
Knightsbridge and Pimlico form the only suburbs west of the metropolis, whose history remains unwritten. ”

“ After that all the adventurers were eager to go upon exploring parties, to make friends with the Indians, and to [108] build a town. The colonists were ready to set their homes almost any place upon the borders of this summer sea. So the city of the port of the Great River was begun, settled, and stockaded as the Sieur La Salle had prophesied that some day it would be.
It was better not to have all his resources in one place to tempt a buccaneer attack, and so Sieur de Iberville built another fort on Ship Island and one at Biloxi inlet on the north coast. ”

“ Groggery. An Americanism for a “grog shop” where 126spirituous liquors only are purveyed; answering to our “Gin Palace.”
Grosvenor Square. The centre of the London estate of the Grosvenor family. Sir Richard Grosvenor was Grand Cup-bearer to George II. The word Grosvenor is Norman-French--i.e. Le Gros Veneur, “the chief hunter.”
Groundlings. The common spectators at the plays referred to by Hamlet in his “Advice to the Players.” The earliest London playhouses were the inn-yards, whose galleries corresponded to our box tiers, while the yard itself was given up to the audience generally. ”

“ Grosvenor could not but notice the striking resemblance which she bore to those lovely features of the miniature, which was found within the golden band. The child was growing to resemble her unknown mother, and were there any who had ever known the parents, to see their child, they could not but have discovered her descent. As the thought came to Mrs. Grosvenor's mind, she shuddered; and she asked herself if it could ever be that her darling should be torn from her? if another cloud would arise, hiding one more cherished one from her sight? ”

“ The time was night, and the more important shops were shut, but the great houses in Grosvenor Square revealed at this moment their fullest and most brilliant life, for this was the time when the great receptions of the season were given.
Before one of the largest and most important of these mansions a small crowd had collected. It was the sort of crowd who are fond of getting peeps inside the lovely palaces which they must not enter. Rough-looking boys, eager, pinched women, a few men, and even some babies were present. ”

“ Over the churchyard wall we can see the upper portion of the Grosvenor School, a charitable institution, erected and endowed by the first Lord Westminster, but now supported by voluntary contributions. Farther still to the right is the Rectory House, abutting upon Love Street and Barker’s Lane, neither of which possesses any charms for us sightseers.
Turning away to the right from the Church door, a few paces will bring us to a decayed and half-ruined wall, in the centre of which is a small pointed arch, known as the entrance-gate to the Priory. ”

“ Close by Grosvenor and Manchester Squares, and lying between them and Bond Street, are a number of places in which it was dangerous, as the writer once found to his cost, for a respectably-dressed person to set his foot. There, congregated tier above tier, in small, dark, unwholesome rooms, are whole classes of people, in comparison with whom the denizens of Saint Giles's may be looked upon as aristocracy. ”

“ Those at the upper end of the room represent Sir Gilbert le Grosvenor, who came over from France at the time of the Norman invasion, with his uncle, Hugh Lupus, and Joan or Jane Lady Grosvenor, heiress of Eaton in the reign of Edward the Fourth. The room contains full-length portraits of the late Marquis and Marchioness of Westminster, by p. 101Jackson, R.A.; Abigail meeting David, by Rubens; and the Judgment of Paris, after Rubens, by Peters. The walls of the dining-room are richly ornamented.
The ante-drawing-room is very elegant ”

“ The night was wild, and the voices of the breakers rose loud, as if responding to the angry aspect of nature; yet peace sat beneath the roof of Mrs. Grosvenor's dwelling. The evening lamps were lit, and as Mrs. Grosvenor produced a small casket and laid it on the centre-table, she thought within herself,--it was much such a storm only a few days after our dear one came to us. Mr. Alboni sat with bowed head, as the mother proceeded to bring forth evidences which should identify her darling child as being of the descent and lineage of another line of ancestors than hers ”

“ The aforesaid house, which is the very last in London, one way, being rebuilt, a gentleman asked another, Who lived in it? His friend told him, Sir Robert Grosvenor. I don’t know, said the first, what estate Sir Robert has, but he ought to have a very good one; for nobody lives beyond him in the whole town.
70. Two gentlemen disputing about religion, in Button’s Coffee-house, said one of them, I wonder, sir, you should talk of religion, when I’ll hold you five guineas you can’t say the Lord’s Prayer. Done, said the other, and Sir Richard Steele shall hold stakes. ”

“ We may glance up Bond Street, the Rue de la Paix of London, at the house occupied by Messrs. Agnew. Bond Street is specially devoted to the craze for picture exhibitions, where there are a half-dozen, including the Grosvenor and Doré Galleries. The portico of the Grosvenor Gallery was originally that of some palace in Italy, and is admired for its elegance. It was purchased by the owner, and set up here. In the South Kensington Museum is the screen and balcony of a church, a beautiful work, which had been torn down and condemned, and was rescued in the same manner. ”

“ Lord Arthur had another engagement, which prevented him coming with us, and so I went with them.
They had a private brougham in waiting, which took us to Grosvenor Square.
A. very sedate and elderly footman ushered us upstairs to a dressing-room, which formed part of the Earl's own special apartments, a suite of six or seven rooms, rigorously set apart from the rest of the house, where none but his confidential servants and pages were ever allowed to enter. ”

“ On my arrival in Grosvenor Square I told my parents that I must go home to Glen, as I felt suffocated by the pettiness and conventionality of my late experience. The moderate teaching and general atmosphere of Gloucester Crescent had depressed me, and London feels airless when one is out of spirits: in any case it can never be quite a home to any one born in Scotland. ”

“ Beal "only laughed at them," but in a few minutes the Grosvenor's keel struck, and "as she beat very hard, every soul on board instantly ran on deck."
WRECK OF THE "GROSVENOR."
These souls, predoomed to destruction, were very many—nearly two hundred, including, alas! both women and children and sick. If the position of those who are well and strong in such circumstances is pitiable, what must be that of the weak? ”

“ He really spent the greater part of the next day in hunting up the owner of an apartment that had neither steam heat nor an elevator, but was otherwise perfect, and trying to get him to take less than the agent asked. By a curious psychical operation he was able, in the transaction, to work himself into quite a passionate desire for the apartment, while he held the Grosvenor Green apartment in the background of his mind as something that he could return to as altogether more suitable. ”

“ She took an elegant suite of apartments in Brook-street, Grosvenor-square, and having ample means at her disposal, she lived in good style, and in the due course of time contrived to get introduced into society, as it is termed—​that is, she became acquainted with people who moved in the upper circles. ”

“ He walked from his rooms in Jermyn Street to Grosvenor Square every night, and paced the pavements within view of Lady Perivale's windows, steering clear of the houses where there were parties, with awnings, and blocks of bystanders, and policemen, and linkmen. He saw the lighted windows of the morning-room, and sometimes saw a graceful shadow flit across the blind, and knew that she was there, and alone. No masculine form ever passed between the lamp and the windows. ”

“ They sat at the well-spread dessert-table in Grosvenor Square, those two gentlemen, the sole partners of almost the wealthiest house in London; keen, honourable, first-rate men of business, yet presenting somewhat of a contrast in themselves. He at the table head, Francis Grubb, was fine and stately, wearing in his countenance, in its expression of form and feature, the impress of true nobility—nature's nobility, not that of the peerage—and young yet. ”

“ No Drawnes, but the Earls of Warbeck. And now this Cattle person is to have them all—and Grosvenor Square, too!" This was her magnificent manner of referring to the town mansion, as though only one house in London could justly claim that address. "Grosvenor Square, too," she repeated; "and you with no roof over your head. Fifteen thousand a year? What is that? Far more than you need? It is not a question of need, it is a question of what you require—what is decent. And as for calling this Cattle person, Lady Jane—" Words failed her.
Her grandson smiled patiently ”

“ Nature, lineage and Willet have done well," he said to himself.
More of the fashion of New York came in and then a group of British officers, several of whom nodded to Grosvenor.
"The tall man with the gray hair at the temples is my colonel, Brandon," he said. "Very strict, but just to his men, and we like him. He spent some years in the service of the East India Company, in one of the hottest parts of the peninsula. That's why he's so brown, and it made his blood thin, too. He can't endure cold. ”

“ In 1723 Grosvenor was elected a trustee of Dr. Williams's foundations. On 29 May 1730 the university of Edinburgh made him D.D. At Salters' Hall he lectured against popery in 1735, taking persecution as his theme; and he was a coadjutor in the ‘Old Whig,’ conducted (1735–8) by Avery. In 1749 he resigned his congregation and his lectureship. His repute as a ‘polite practical preacher’ had suffered no diminution, and he retained his ‘tuneable voice,’ though an operation for the removal of the uvula in 1726 had somewhat affected his pronunciation. ”

“ Before closing her eyes she took fully into her mind the friendly porter's assurance there would be no need to change her carriage between Millway and the end of her journey.
When she opened her eyes they had arrived at Grosvenor Road, where tickets are taken up for Victoria. She was conscious of being shaken by the shoulder; she awoke and saw opposite her a stout, kind-faced countrywoman, with a basket on her arm. The woman said: "This is Grosvenor Road. We are just at Victoria. They want your ticket." ”

“ All these have solicited the honour of our young friend's presence, and now is the moment of decision. It does not take long to repudiate Prince's Gate; there will be the best band in London, and ortolans for supper, but there will be no one there that one ever saw before, and it is too sickening to be called "My boy" by that bow-windowed bounder, the master of the house. There remain Grosvenor House and Piccadilly, and happily these can be combined in a harmonious perfection. ”

“ Clerks and business people generally were travelling homewards, newspaper boys were calling out the special editions of the evening papers, and the traffic rushed bewilderingly through the crowded streets. Leaning back in the brougham, Patricia’s head seemed to swim, for the roads and shops and people had apparently magnified themselves tenfold, and loomed large and vast through the gloom of the evening twilight. She was thankful when the carriage slackened pace, and pulled up before the familiar door. But even Grosvenor Square seemed to have extended in area. ”

“ I keep the boards standing, just to let people know that the ground is to let,—though, as I say, it won’t be for another twenty years, when it’ll be for the erection of high-class mansions only, same as there is in Grosvenor Square,—no shops or public houses, and none of your shanties. ”