If, on some November afternoon, we walk into Kensington Gardens, where
they join the Park on the Bayswater side, and, crossing in front of the
ornamental fountain, glance at the semicircular seat let into a dismal
little Temple of the Sun, we shall see a half-moon of apathetic figures.
There, enjoying a moment of lugubrious idleness, may be sitting an old
countrywoman with steady eyes in a lean, dusty-black dress and an old
poke-bonnet; by her side, some gin-faced creature of the town, all blousy
and draggled; a hollow-eyed foreigner, far gone in consumption; a bronzed
young navvy, asleep, with his muddy boots jutting straight out; a
bearded, dreary being, chin on chest; and more consumptives, and more
vagabonds, and more people dead-tired, speechless, and staring before
them from that crescent-shaped haven where there is no draught at their
backs, and the sun occasionally shines. And as we look at them,
according to the state of our temper, we think: Poor creatures, I wish I
could do something for them! or: Revolting! They oughtn't to allow it!
But do we feel any pleasure in just watching them; any of that intimate
sensation a cat entertains when its back is being rubbed; are we
curiously enjoying the sight of these people, simply as manifestations of
life, as objects fashioned by the ebb and flow of its tides? Again, I
think, not. And why? Either, because we have instantly felt that we
ought to do something; that here is a danger in our midst, which one day
might affect our own security; and at all events, a sight revolting to us
who came out to look at this remarkably fine fountain. Or, because we
are too humane! Though very possibly that frequent murmuring of ours:
Ah! It's too sad! is but another way of putting the words: Stand aside,
please, you're too depressing! Or, again, is it that we avoid the sight
of things as they are, avoid the unedifying, because of what may be
called "the uncreative instinct," that safeguard and concomitant of a
civilisation which demands of us complete efficiency, practical and