SOME PALL MALL MEMORIES AND ASSOCIATIONS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2651, 4 January 1905, Page 72

SOME PALL MALL MEMORIES AND ASSOCIATIONS.

It is nearly 100 years" since Lamb wrote to Hazlitt— "Wasn't you sony for Lord Nelson? I have followed him in fancy ever since I saw him walking in Pall Mall (I was prejudiced against him before), looking as a hero should look ; and I have been very much cut about it indeed. H© was the only pretence of a great man we had " i Lamb and Nelson on the Pall Mall pavement ! A hundred years earlier Defoe had! wiitten: "I am lodged in the street called' Pall Mall, the ordinary residence of all strangers because of its vicinity to the Queen's Palace, the Park, the Parliament House, the theatres, the chocolate and coffee houses, where the best company frequent." Pall Mall had long existed as v, highway when Dan O'Neale, groom of the bedchamber to Charles 11, obtained from the King a piece of ground and "Our war- [ rant for the building of a ne\y street to St.

' James's.'' There was an attempt to call ( the street Catherine street, m honour of the- Queen. Catherine of Braganza, but the 1 nighbouring enclosure for the game of Pall Mall was a stronger association, and this ; r.&me prevailed. Nell G-wynne was one of the earliest of its residents. Mrs Oldfield, tho actress, was born in Pall Mall in 1683, j and on her death her remains were borne thence to sepulture :n: n Westminster Abbey, j Here Bolingbroke lived, and gathered the wits around him. On the north- sids of ihe street, next to the little passage into King street, Dodsley opened the Tully's J Head, and published for Dr Johnson and ! Gray. Steele lodged at a perfumer's in Pall Mall, and in 1760 Stern© was living here with social engagements for every day and night for three months ahead. Gibbon, lived in Pall Mall until he moved into "the best house in the world,-" No. 7 Bentinck street. Where the XJarlton Hotel j hangs out its banners tne members of the j Kit Kat Cfub stroked their wigs, took snuff, i and were witty. It was in an upper room in the Star ancT Garter that the fifth Lord Bjron killed William Chaworth of Annesley ir; a sword duel fought by the. light of one candle. j At the Smyrna Coffee House, Addison, 1 , Swift, Poior, Steele, "and other avits 'met j, regularly. An alteration iii their club"; arrangements is noted, in- the -"Tatler" No. i i7B "The seat of learning is now removed | if mm the corner of the chimney on the. left »J .hand towards ! the • window to ihe round j !table in' the middle of the^floor,. over against ! ,the .fire ; a resolution much' 'lamented by ( ■the porters and chairmen' 1 ; whe were edified j 'through, a pane of glass , that r remained ! ■broken all-" the '"lksi -summer."' "l" l All y 'i£& ■ .flavours and quiet bustle of those days live in Gray's lines : Oh, bear me to the paths of fair Pell Mell. .Safe-are thy pavements, grateful is thy smell. | At distance rolls llie gilded coach., I Ivor sturdy carmen on the walks encroach. Shops breathe perfume, thro' sashes ribbons ; flow, "■ The mutual arms .of" ladies a:nd the beau. - What. was Lamb doing — to return to" I Lamb — -when he, saw Lord' Nelson .ir Pall j Mall? Had he been to see Coleridge, jvho, ! according" to Rogers, lived yin .Pali Mall;" at, one, timfe.? . - " '\ >*«'•.' _*' ■*. "''. ' ""Wordsworth v and I called u^on i'im on'^-.j foiendo'n "when he' was lodging injTall Sfair.^j He talked "..uninterruptedly for f aßput JrwoCl liburs, during whicli Wordsworth listened, ; to'l Mm ' with* profound'' attention/ every ;no%*' and then nodding his" head as if in assent/! O£ quitting the .lodging I said to^'Wbrdsr'; worth, 'We'll, for. my dwn part I could ridf \ make hea^d or. tail of Coleridge's "oration r, pray, did you understand it?' ,'Not one I syllable of it,' was s Wordsworth's -reply." — *' Academy. ' ' * ' s * '!