ON SEEING LONDON
I see that the _Spectator_, in reviewing a new book on the Tower, says
that, whilst visitors to London usually visit that historic monument,
Londoners themselves rarely visit it. There is, I suppose, a good deal of
truth in this. I know a man who was born in London, and has spent all his
working life in Fleet Street, who confesses that he has never yet been
inside the Tower. It is not because he is lacking in interest. He has been
to St. Peter's at Rome, and he went to Madrid largely to see the Prado. If
the Tower had been on the other side of Europe, I think he would probably
have made a pilgrimage to it, but it has been within a stone's-throw of him
all his life, and therefore he has never found time to visit it.
It is so, more or less, with most of us. Apply the test to yourself or to
your friends who live in London, and you will probably be astonished at the
number of precious things that you and they have not seen--not because they
are so distant, but because they are so near.
Pages:
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183