Whosoever had gone out of
Fleet Street into the Temple at the date of this history, and had wandered disconsolate about the Temple until he stumbled on a dismal churchyard, and had looked up at the dismal windows commanding that churchyard until at the most dismal window of them all he saw a dismal boy, would in him have beheld, at one grand comprehensive swoop of the eye, the managing clerk, junior clerk, common-law clerk, conveyancing clerk, chancery clerk, every refinement and department of clerk, of Mr Mortimer Lightwood, erewhile called in the newspapers eminent solicitor.
I think of
Fleet Street and Lincoln's Inn now with a shudder of disgust.
Then there is the Fortune Theatre near Cripplegate, and, most charming of all, two views--street and river fronts--the Duke's Theatre, Dorset Garden, in
Fleet Street, designed by Wren, decorated by Gibbons--graceful, naive, dainty, like the work of a very refined Palladio, working minutely, perhaps more delicately than at Vicenza, in the already crowded city on the Thames side.
The hackney-coach jolted along
Fleet Street, as hackney- coaches usually do.
In Wellington Street my brother met a couple of sturdy roughs who had just been rushed out of
Fleet Street with still- wet newspapers and staring placards.
There is yet a drowsiness in its courts, and a dreamy dulness in its trees and gardens; those who pace its lanes and squares may yet hear the echoes of their footsteps on the sounding stones, and read upon its gates, in passing from the tumult of the Strand or
Fleet Street,
Apply in person on Monday, at eleven o'clock, to Duncan Ross, at the offices of the League, 7 Pope's Court,
Fleet Street."
I went on along
Fleet Street, but could not shake off the idea.
Malone and his filthy
Fleet Street crew may be all yelping our praises yet.
To him, as he flatly declared,
Fleet Street, in the midst of the hurry of London life, was the most interesting place in the world.
And I dare say he would have bought something very handsome for Amelia; only, getting off the coach in
Fleet Street, he was attracted by a handsome shirt-pin in a jeweller's window, which he could not resist; and having paid for that, had very little money to spare for indulging in any further exercise of kindness.
For three hours we strolled about together, watching the ever-changing kaleidoscope of life as it ebbs and flows through
Fleet Street and the Strand.
Fleet Street - a street in central London where newspaper offices are situated