d with a model of a coal-sack.
The two eating-house keepers exhibited joints of a magnitude, and
puddings of a solidity, which coalheavers alone could appreciate; and the
fruit-pie maker displayed on his well-scrubbed window-board large white
compositions of flour and dripping, ornamented with pink stains, giving
rich promise of the fruit within, which made their huge mouths water, as
they lingered past.

But the choicest spot in all Scotland-yard was the old public-house in
the corner. Here, in a dark wainscoted-room of ancient appearance,
cheered by the glow of a mighty fire, and decorated with an enormous
clock, whereof the face was white, and the figures black, sat the lusty
coalheavers, quaffing large draughts of Barclay's best, and puffing forth
volumes of smoke, which wreathed heavily above their heads, and involved
the room in a thick dark cloud. From this apartment might their voices
be heard on a winter's night, penetrating to the very bank of the river,
as they shouted out some sturdy chorus, or roared forth the burden of a
popular song; dwelling upon the last few words with a strength and length
of emphasis which made the very roof tremble above them.

Here, too, would they tell old legends of what the Thames was in ancient
times, when the Patent Shot Manufactory wasn't built, and Waterloo-bridge
had never been thought of; and then they would shake their heads with
portentous looks, to the deep edification of the rising generation of
heavers, who crowded round them, and wondered where all this would end;
whereat the tailor would take his pipe solemnly from his mouth, and say,
how that he hoped it might end well, but he very much doubted whether it
would or not, and couldn't rightly tell what to make of it--a mysterious
expression of opinion, delivered with a semi-prophetic air, which never
failed to elicit the fullest concurrence of the assembled company; and so
they would go on drinking and wondering till ten o'clock came, and with
it the tailor's wife to fetch him home, when the little party broke up,
to meet again in the same room, and say and do precisely the same things,
on the following evening at the same hour.

About this time the barges that came up the river began to bring vague
rumours to Scotland-yard of somebody in the city having been heard to
say, that the Lord Mayor had threatened in so many words to pull down the
old London-bridge, and build up a new one. At first these rumours were
dis