I'm not going to compare London, as Englishmen often do, with Paris or Vienna. I won't do two great towns that gross injustice1. And, indeed, comparison here is quite out of the question. You don't compare Oxford2 with Little Peddlington, or Edinburgh with Thrums, and then ask which is the handsomest. Things must be alike in kind before you can begin to compare them. And London and Paris are not alike in kind. One is a city, and a noble city; the other is a village, and a squalid village.
No; I will not even take a humbler standard of comparison, and look at London side by side with Brussels, Antwerp, Munich, Turin. Each of those is a city, and a fine city in its way; but each of them is small. Still, even by their side, London is again but a squalid village. I insist upon that point, because, misled by their ancient familiarity with London, most Englishmen have had their senses and understandings so blunted on this issue, that they really don't know what is meant by a town, or a fine town, when they see one. And don't suppose it's because London is in Britain and these other towns out of it that I make these remarks: for Bath is a fine town, Edinburgh is a fine town, even Glasgow and Newcastle are towns, while London is still a straggling, sprawling3, invertebrate4, inchoate5, overgrown village. I am as free, I hope, from anti-patriotic6 as from patriotic prejudice. The High Street in Oxford, Milsom Street in Bath, Princes Street in Edinburgh, those are all fine streets that would attract attention even in France or Germany. But the Strand7, Piccadilly, Regent Street, Oxford Street—good Lord, deliver us!
One more caveat8 as to my meaning. When I cite among real towns Brussels, Antwerp, and Munich, I am not thinking of the treasures of art those beautiful places contain; that is another and altogether higher question. Towns supreme9 in this respect often lag far behind others of less importance—lag behind in those external features and that general architectural effectiveness which rightly entitle us to say in a broad sense, "This is a fine city." Florence, for example, contains more treasures of art in a small space than any other town of Europe; yet Florence, though undoubtedly10 a town, and even a fine town, is not to be compared in this respect, I do not say with Venice or Brussels, but even with Munich or Milan. On the other hand, London contains far more treasures of art in its way than Boston, Massachusetts; but Boston is a handsome, well-built, regular town, while London—well, I will spare you the further repetition of the trite11 truism that London is a squalid village. In one word, the point I am seeking to bring out here is that a town, as a town, is handsome or otherwise, not in virtue12 of the works of art or antiquity13 it contains, but in virtue of its ground-plan, its architecture, its external and visible decorations and places—the Louvre, the Boulevards, the Champs Elysées, the Place de l'Opéra.
Now London has no ground-plan. It has no street architecture. It has no decorations, though it has many uglifications. It is frankly14 and simply and ostentatiously hideous15. And being wholly wanting in a system of any sort—in organic parts, in idea, in views, in vistas—it is only a village, and a painfully uninteresting one.
Most Englishmen see London before they see any other great town. They become so familiarised with it that their sense of comparison is dulled and blunted. I had the good fortune to have seen many other great towns before I ever saw London: and I shall never forget my first sense of surprise at its unmitigated ugliness.
Get on top of an omnibus—I don't say in Paris, from the Palais Royal to the Arc de Triomphe, but in Brussels, from the Gare du Nord to the Palais de Justice—and what do you see? From end to end one unbroken succession of noble and open prospects17. I'm not thinking now of the Grande Place in the old town, with its magnificent collection of medi?val buildings; the Great Fire effectively deprived us of our one sole chance of such an element of beauty in modern London. I confine myself on purpose to the parts of Brussels which are purely18 recent, and might have been imitated at a distance in London, if there had been any public spirit or any public body in England to imitate them. (But unhappily there was neither.) Recall to mind as you read the strikingly handsome street view that greets you as you emerge from the Northern Station down the great central Boulevards to the Gare du Midi—all built within our own memory. Then think of the prospects that gradually unfold themselves as you rise on the hill; the fine vista16 north towards Sainte Marie de Schaarbeck; the beautiful Rue19 Royale, bounded by that charming Parc; the unequalled stretch of the Rue de la Régence, starting from the Place Royale with Godfrey of Bouillon, and ending with the imposing20 mass of the Palais de Justice. It is to me a matter for mingled21 surprise and humiliation22 that so many Englishmen can look year after year at that glorious street—perhaps the finest in the world—and yet never think to themselves, "Mightn't we faintly imitate some small part of this in our wealthy, ugly, uncompromising London?"
I always say to Americans who come to Europe: "When you go to England, don't see our towns, but see our country. Our country is something unequalled in the world: while our towns!—well, anyway, keep away from London!"
With the solitary23 and not very brilliant exception of the Embankment, there isn't a street in London where one could take a stranger to admire the architecture. Compare that record with the new Boulevards in Antwerp, where almost every house is worth serious study: or with the Ring at Cologne (to keep close home all the time), where one can see whole rows of German Renaissance24 houses of extraordinary interest. What street in London can be mentioned in this respect side by side with Commonwealth25 Avenue or Beacon26 Street in Boston; with Euclid Avenue in Cleveland, Ohio; with the upper end of Fifth Avenue, New York; nay27, even with the new Via Roma at Genoa? Why is it that we English can't get on the King's Road at Brighton anything faintly approaching that splendid sea front on the Digue at Ostend, or those coquettish white villas28 that line the Promenade29 des Anglais at Nice? The blight30 of London seems to lie over all Southern England.
Paris looks like the capital of a world-wide empire. London, looks like a shapeless neglected suburb, allowed to grow up by accident anyhow. And that's just the plain truth of it. 'Tis a fortuitous concourse of hap-hazard houses.
"But we are improving somewhat. The County Council is opening out a few new thoroughfares piecemeal31." Oh yes, in an illogical, unsystematic, English patchwork33 fashion, we are driving a badly-designed, unimpressive new street or two, with no expansive sense of imperial greatness, through the hopelessly congested and most squalid quarters. But that is all. No grand, systematic32, reconstructive plan, no rising to the height of the occasion and the Empire! You tinker away at a Shaftesbury Avenue. Parochial, all of it. And there you get the real secret of our futile34 attempts at making a town out of our squalid village. The fault lies all at the door of the old Corporation, and of the people who made and still make the old Corporation possible. For centuries, indeed, there was really no London, not even a village; there was only a scratch collection of contiguous villages. The consequence was that here, at the centre of national life, the English people grew wholly unaccustomed to the bare idea of a town, and managed everything piecemeal, on the petty scale of a country vestry. The vestryman intelligence has now overrun the land; and if the London County Council ever succeeds at last in making the congeries of villages into—I do not say a city, for that is almost past praying for, but something analogous35 to a second-rate Continental36 town, it will only be after long lapse37 of time and violent struggles with the vestryman level of intellect and feeling.
London had many great disadvantages to start with. She lay in a dull and marshy38 bottom, with no building stone at hand, and therefore she was forecondemned by her very position to the curse of brick and stucco, when Bath, Oxford, Edinburgh, were all built out of their own quarries39. Then fire destroyed all her medi?val architecture, leaving her only Westminster Abbey to suggest the greatness of her losses. But brick-earth and fire have been as nothing in their way by the side of the evil wrought40 by Gog and Magog. When five hundred trembling ghosts of naked Lord Mayors have to answer for their follies41 and their sins hereafter, I confidently expect the first question in the appalling42 indictment43 will be, "Why did you allow the richest nation on earth to house its metropolis44 in a squalid village?"
We have a Moloch in England to whom we sacrifice much. And his hateful name is Vested Interest.
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1
injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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2
Oxford
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| n.牛津（英国城市） | |
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3
sprawling
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| adj.蔓生的，不规则地伸展的v.伸开四肢坐[躺]( sprawl的现在分词 )；蔓延；杂乱无序地拓展；四肢伸展坐着（或躺着） | |
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4
invertebrate
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| n.无脊椎动物 | |
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inchoate
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| adj.才开始的，初期的 | |
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patriotic
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| adj.爱国的，有爱国心的 | |
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7
strand
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| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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8
caveat
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| n.警告； 防止误解的说明 | |
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9
supreme
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| adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的 | |
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undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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trite
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| adj.陈腐的 | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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hideous
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| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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16
vista
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| n.远景，深景，展望，回想 | |
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17
prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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rue
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| n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔 | |
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20
imposing
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| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
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21
mingled
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| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
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22
humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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24
renaissance
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| n.复活，复兴，文艺复兴 | |
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commonwealth
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| n.共和国，联邦，共同体 | |
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beacon
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| n.烽火，（警告用的）闪火灯，灯塔 | |
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nay
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| adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者 | |
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28
villas
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| 别墅，公馆( villa的名词复数 )； （城郊）住宅 | |
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29
promenade
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| n./v.散步 | |
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30
blight
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| n.枯萎病；造成破坏的因素；vt.破坏，摧残 | |
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31
piecemeal
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| adj.零碎的；n.片，块；adv.逐渐地；v.弄成碎块 | |
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32
systematic
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| adj.有系统的，有计划的，有方法的 | |
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33
patchwork
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| n.混杂物；拼缝物 | |
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34
futile
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| adj.无效的，无用的，无希望的 | |
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35
analogous
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| adj.相似的；类似的 | |
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continental
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| adj.大陆的，大陆性的，欧洲大陆的 | |
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37
lapse
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| n.过失，流逝，失效，抛弃信仰，间隔；vi.堕落，停止，失效，流逝；vt.使失效 | |
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38
marshy
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| adj.沼泽的 | |
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39
quarries
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| n.（采）石场( quarry的名词复数 )；猎物（指鸟，兽等）；方形石；（格窗等的）方形玻璃v.从采石场采得( quarry的第三人称单数 )；从（书本等中）努力发掘（资料等）；在采石场采石 | |
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40
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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41
follies
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| 罪恶，时事讽刺剧； 愚蠢，蠢笨，愚蠢的行为、思想或做法( folly的名词复数 ) | |
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42
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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43
indictment
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| n.起诉；诉状 | |
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44
metropolis
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| n.首府；大城市 | |
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