Esoteric London

Arlington Way, London, EC1. Photo © Roger Dean 2010

In the Days of Bicycles and Bustles – R D Blumenfeld, 1930:

I only stayed a few days at my lodgings in Torrington Square. It was quite a nice place, but on the third morning the proprietor came and sat with me while I was having my morning coffee, and told me that his profession was that of  ‘official embalmer’ to most of the foreign embassies and legations. Whenever a well-to-do foreigner dies in London my landlord is called in to embalm him. That was too much for me. For some reason my coffee took on the composition of embalming fluid, and on the next night I had a dreadful nightmare, in which I was being scientifically embalmed. So on the following morning  I paid up and came to live in Duke Street, St. James’.