Once, on going down into the lavatory to wash my hands, I became aware of a notice newly set up above the row of basins.It ran somehow thus: "Readers are requested to bear in mind that these basins are to be used only for casual ablutions." Oh, the significance of that inscription! Had I not myself, more than once, been glad to use this soap and water more largely than the sense of the authorities contemplated? And there were poor fellows working under the great dome whose need, in this respect, was greater than mine.I laughed heartily at the notice, but it meant so much.
Some of my abodes I have utterly forgotten; for one reason or another, I was always moving--an easy matter when all my possessions lay in one small trunk.Sometimes the people of the house were intolerable.In those days I was not fastidious, and I seldom had any but the slightest intercourse with those who dwelt under the same roof, yet it happened now and then that I was driven away by human proximity which passed my endurance.In other cases I had to flee from pestilential conditions.How I escaped mortal illness in some of those places (miserably fed as I always was, and always over-working myself) is a great mystery.The worst that befell me was a slight attack of diphtheria--traceable, I imagine, to the existence of a dust-bin UNDER THE STAIRCASE.When I spoke of the matter to my landlady, she was at first astonished, then wrathful, and my departure was expedited with many insults.
On the whole, however, I had nothing much to complain of except my poverty.You cannot expect great comfort in London for four-and-sixpence a week--the most I ever could pay for a "furnished room with attendance" in those days of pretty stern apprenticeship.And I was easily satisfied; I wanted only a little walled space in which I could seclude myself, free from external annoyance.Certain comforts of civilized life I ceased even to regret; a stair-carpet Iregarded as rather extravagant, and a carpet on the floor of my room was luxury undreamt of.My sleep was sound; I have passed nights of dreamless repose on beds which it would now make my bones ache only to look at.A door that locked, a fire in winter, a pipe of tobacco--these were things essential; and, granted these, I have been often richly contented in the squalidest garret.One such lodging is often in my memory; it was at Islington, not far from the City Road; my window looked upon the Regent's Canal.As often as Ithink of it, I recall what was perhaps the worst London fog I ever knew; for three successive days, at least, my lamp had to be kept burning; when I looked through the window, I saw, at moments, a few blurred lights in the street beyond the Canal, but for the most part nothing but a yellowish darkness, which caused the glass to reflect the firelight and my own face.Did I feel miserable? Not a bit of it.The enveloping gloom seemed to make my chimney-corner only the more cosy.I had coals, oil, tobacco in sufficient quantity; I had a book to read; I had work which interested me; so I went forth only to get my meals at a City Road coffee-shop, and hastened back to the fireside.Oh, my ambitions, my hopes! How surprised and indignant I should have felt had I known of any one who pitied me!
Nature took revenge now and then.In winter time I had fierce sore throats, sometimes accompanied by long and savage headaches.
Doctoring, of course, never occurred to me; I just locked my door, and, if I felt very bad indeed, went to bed--to lie there, without food or drink, till I was able to look after myself again.I could never ask from a landlady anything which was not in our bond, and only once or twice did I receive spontaneous offer of help.Oh, it is wonderful to think of all that youth can endure! What a poor feeble wretch I now seem to myself, when I remember thirty years ago!