d hardly realizing that they are so close to
Aldersgate. The New River itself, which ends its course here, is a
pleasant attraction, with its great basin, and ancient offices by the
edge of the water.

Imitating Elia, I once set out from here, and followed its course and its
many windings far out into the country, taking up the journey on
successive days, going towards its source in Hertfordshire, and a most
pleasant, interesting voyage of discovery it was. For it so winds and
bends, now passing through fields and demesnes, now skirting towns and
villages, that it is just as picturesque as any natural stream. Such
being its attractions, Mr. Pickwick was virtually living in the country
or in the suburbs, and enjoying the fine, keen, inspiring air which the
jaded Londoner from lower districts may, even now, still inhale. There
is no Goswell Street now, but Goswell _Road_--a very noisy, clattering
thoroughfare.

Another remark to be made is this:--how much do we owe to the vivifying
power of Boz's descriptions of these old Towns, Inns, and Streets? The
ordinary provincial town--unsung and undescribed by him--remains what it
is and nothing more. York and Manchester stir no memories, and are
unvisited by pilgrims, because _they are not in Pickwick_. Boz seems to
have found the true _interpretation_ and inner meaning of each place, and
has actually preserved the tone and flavour that existed in his own time.
This continues even now. As we stroll through Rochester or Ipswich, Bath
or Bury, Pickwick and his friends walk with us. And, as if well
contented to rest under the spell, these antique towns have made no
effort at change, but remain much as they were.

And this prompts the question: _Where did Mrs. Cluppins live_? At the
trial we learned that she was a friend and neighbour of Mrs. Bardell's,
one of her _commeres_. She had "looked in" on the momentous morning,
having been out to purchase "kidney pertaties," yet, on their Hampstead
junketting, we find her coming with the Raddles, in their cab, all the
way from Lant Street, Borough. She was clearly Mrs. Raddle's friend and
neighbour. Perhaps she had moved, though this is not likely. The
household gods of such, like Elia's, strike a deep root.

In his descriptions of the Bardell party's journey to Hampstead, which
ended so disastrously, the art of Boz is shown as usual by supplying the
notion of movement--he seems to take us along up the northern heights--we