squares, which never were fashionable, nor ever aimed to be
such; and then there are squares which were once fashionable, but now are
sadly gone out of repute. One of the chief of these is Leicester-square.
Do our readers remember how Queen Caroline found time to be the mother of
seven promising children, of whom the eldest, Frederick, Prince of Wales,
was a continual source of sorrow and vexation to both his parents? "He
resembled," writes Horace Walpole, with his usual sneer, "the Black
Prince only in dying before his father." Well, there was a house built
before the Commonwealth, called Leicester-house. Hither came this young,
dissipated, short-lived Prince, and fixed his court. When he passed
away, and the wits wrote--

"Here lies Fred,
Who was alive,
And is dead,"

still the place had the prestige of fashion. It gradually assumed the
shape of a square, and became the dwelling-place of men truly great. Sir
Isaac Newton resided near the square, in a house yet standing, and known
to fast men as Bertolini's, _alias_ the Newton Hotel. Where now we see
the Sabloniere Hotel, Hogarth once dwelt, and at a later time Sir Joshua
Reynolds lived on the opposite side of the square. In its neighbourhood
Sir Charles Bell made his discoveries respecting the nervous system, and
here the renowned John Hunter lived. In later times Wordsworth made it
the scene of his Moon-gazers; and if he could term it "Leicester's busy
square," still more is that epithet appropriate to it at the present
time. It is true that the Great Globe is not a success; that the
Panopticon failed; that the Western Literary Institution did not
flourish; that the place is not literary or scientific, nor even
business-like, for by daylight the shops look seedy, and the wares
exhibited are somewhat of the cheapest. But at night a change comes over
the spirit of its dream. Here, from cheap lodging-houses hard by, from
cold garrets or dark and dusty two-pair backs, crawl out to walk its
flagstones, or taint its air with the smoke of cheap cigars, men of all
nations and tongues--French, Germans, Italians, Spaniards, Poles--the
scoundrels and patriots of Europe. There is business here now; the air
is laden with the sickly odour of a thousand dinners. Hotels and _cafes_
and _restaurants_ are lit up and gay. Mr Smith opens the Alhambra on
Sundays and week-days for Music for the Million; and women, rouged and
dressed as much as possible li