THE "BULL" 107 



prejudiced Briton, after sundry offensive remarks 

 about foreigners in general and Germans in particular, 



adds, " They are everywhere, d n them ! " But I 



must confess that the following surprised me, even 

 after a long acquaintance with the inanities of visitors' 

 books. Some one had remarked " How like Rochester 

 Cathedral was to a Catholic Church," whereupon some 

 other idiot adds, " Of course it is Catholic, but not 

 Roman Catholic." Really one scarcely knows whom 

 to pity most. 



The " Bull " inn (how remarkably like its frontage 

 is to that other " Bull " at Dartford) is much the 

 same now as when Dickens wrote of it ; only there 

 .are portraits of Dickens hanging on the staircase 

 now, and the ball-room, with its " elevated den," is 

 a place of solitude. They still show j^ou the rooms 

 where Winkle and Mr. Pickwick slej^t, as though 

 they were real people, and so great an affection do 

 the members of the Pickwick Club command, that, 

 while pointing out where Tracy Tupman and 

 Mr. Snodgrass danced, the rooms occupied by the 

 Princess Victoria are clean forgotten. So literature 

 scores a success for once ; but I wdsh a too earnest 

 loyalty had not altered the sign from the " Bull Inn " to 

 the " Victoria and Bull Hotel " ! The hall is still 

 " a very grove of dead game and dangling joints 

 of mutton," and the " illustrious larder, with glass 

 doors, developing cold fowls and noble joints and 

 tarts, wherein the raspberry jam coyly withdraws 

 itself, as such a precious creature should, behind a 

 lattice- work of j^astry," still whets the appetites of 

 incoming guests, just as though England stood where 

 she did, and as if our trades were not ruined by 

 foreign competition, our industries decayed, the army 

 gone to the dogs, the navy to Davy Jones, the farmer 

 to the workhouse, and the shoi^keeper to the Bank- 

 ruptcy Court, as we are told they have. No doubt all 

 these things have happened, or are in course of 

 fulfilment, and I suppose the hotel-keepers keep up 



