hand, should he be planted
in a busy thoroughfare--the noise of many vehicles, the hurry of quick
footsteps, the swift current of anxious humanity are out of harmony
with the atmosphere of a second-hand bookshop. Some suggestion of
external repose is absolutely necessary; there must be some stillness
in the air; yet the thing itself belongs essentially to the city--no
one can imagine a second-hand bookshop beside green fields--so that
there should be some murmur and perceptible hum of mankind always
present in the ear. Thus there are half-a-dozen bookshops in King
William Street, Strand, which seem to enjoy every possible advantage
of position, for they are in the very heart of London, but yet are not
exposed to the full noise and tumult of that overflowing tide which
surges round Charing Cross. Again, there are streets north of Holborn
and Oxford Street most pleasantly situated for the second-hand
bookseller, and there are streets where he ought not to be, where he
has no business, and where his presence jars. Could we, for instance,
endure to see the shop of a second-hand bookseller established in
Cheapside?

Perhaps, however, the most delightful spot in all London for a
second-hand bookshop is that occupied by Emblem's in the King's Road,
Chelsea.

It stands at the lower end of the road, where one begins to realize
and thoroughly feel the influences of that ancient and lordly suburb.
At this end of the road there are rows of houses with old-fashioned
balconies; right and left of it there are streets which in the summer
and early autumn are green, yellow, red, and golden with their masses
of creepers; squares which look as if, with the people living in them,
they must belong to the year eighteen hundred; neither a day before
nor a day after; they lie open to the road, with their gardens full of
trees. Cheyne Walk and the old church, with its red-brick tower, and
the new Embankment, are all so close that they seem part and parcel of
the King's Road. The great Hospital is within five minutes' walk, and
sometimes the honest veterans themselves may be seen wandering in the
road. The air is heavy with associations and memories. You can
actually smell the fragrance of the new-made Chelsea buns, fresh from
the oven, just as you would a hundred years ago. You may sit with
dainty damsels, all hoops and furbelows, eating custards at the
Bun-house; you may wander among the rare plants of the Botanic
Gardens. The old great hou