Well, you will say, all this proves what a vast improvement we have
achieved. Yes; but we must remember that Macaulay was writing on that
side of the question. Are we not more self-indulgent, more fond of our
flowers, villas, carriages, etc., than we need be; less hard working and
industrious; more desirous of getting the means of indulgence by some
short and ready way--by speculation, gambling, and shady, if not
dishonest dealing--than our fathers were? I need not follow at further
length Macaulay's description of these earlier times--of the black
rivulets roaring down Ludgate Hill, filled with the animal and vegetable
filth from the stalls of butchers and greengrocers, profusely thrown to
right and left upon the foot-passengers upon the narrow pavements; the
garret windows opened and pails emptied upon the heads below; thieves
prowling about the dark streets at night, amid constant rioting and
drunkenness; the difficulties and discomforts of travelling, when the
carriages stuck fast in the quagmires; the travellers attacked by
highwaymen. He narrates how it took Prince George of Denmark, who
visited Petworth in wet weather, six hours to go nine miles. Compare
this to a journey in a first-class carriage or Pullman car upon the
Midland Railway, and think of the luxuries demanded by the traveller on
his journey if he is going to travel for more than two or three hours:
the dinner, the coffee, the cigar, the newspaper and magazine, etc., etc.

There is a passage in the beginning of _Tom Brown's School Days_ in which
the author ridicules the quantity of great coats, wrappers, and rugs
which a modern schoolboy takes with him, though he is going to travel
first class, with foot-warmers. Then, in our houses, what stoves and hot-
water pipes and baths do we not require! How many soaps and powders,
rough towels and soft towels! Sir Charles Napier, I think, said that all
an officer wanted to take with him on a campaign was a towel, a tooth-
brush, and a piece of yellow soap. The great excuse for the bath is that