attention to ruins under moonlight. Nor does any one cause to be built
in his garden a broken turret, for the evocation of sensibility in
himself and his guests. There used to be one such turret near the
summit of Campden Hill; but that familiar imposture was rased a year
or two ago, no one protesting. Fuit the frantic factitious
sentimentalism for ruins. On the other hand, the sentiment for them is
as strong as ever it was. Decrepit Carisbrooke and its rivals annually
tighten their hold on Britannia's heart.

I do not grudge them their success. But the very fact that they are so
successful inclines me to reserve my own personal sentiment rather for
those unwept, unsung ruins which so often confront me, here and there,
in the streets of this aggressive metropolis. The ruins made, not by
Time, but by the ruthless skill of Labour, the ruins of houses not old
enough to be sacrosanct nor new enough to keep pace with the demands
of a gasping and plethoric community--these are the ruins that move me
to tears. No owls flutter in them. No trippers lunch in them. In no
guide-book or leading-article will you find them mentioned. Their
pathetic interiors gape to the sky and to the street, but nor gods nor
men hold out a hand to save them. The patterns of bedroom wall-papers,
(chosen with what care, after how long discussion! only a few short
years or months ago) stare out their obvious, piteous appeal to us for
mercy. And their dumb agony is echoed dumbly by the places where doors
have been--doors that lately were tapped at by respectful knuckles; or
the places where staircases have been--staircases down whose banisters
lately slid little children, laughing. Exposed, humiliated, doomed,
the home throws out a hundred pleas to us. And the Pharisaic community
passes by on the other side of the way, in fear of a falling brick.
Down come the walls of the home, as quickly as pickaxes can send them.
Down they crumble, piecemeal, into the foundations, and are carted