THE CARLYLES AND CHELSEA

Evening Star, Issue 21316, 21 January 1933, Page 19

THE CARLYLES AND CHELSEA

With the disappearance from Cheyne walk of Terrey’s shop, which is marked for demolition in a few months, another link with one of the great Victorians will be severed. For this greengrocer’s shop was closely bound up with the daily London life of, the Carlyles, and on several occasions was the scene of a little tragi-comedy of Mrs Carlyle’s later days. The autumn of 1864 was a severe strain both on Carlyle, whoso work on the closing stages of ‘ Frederick the Great ’ kept him to his garret study save for his daily ride and for Mrs Carlyle, who, ever since her accident in St, Martin’s lane eighteen months before, had suffered from sleeplessness, intense depression, and consequent loss of weight. The pharmacy on Cheyne walk in the ’sixties did not boast an up-to-date weighing machine, but the district was not without the means of gauging the progress of its invalids and its children: Terroy’s potato scales were always available. Towards the end of this strenuous year Carlyle made fcis wife the gift of a carriage, by means of which she was enabled to drive from that famous house in Cheyne row to the shop, there