Esoteric London

Bethnal Green Road, London, E1. Photo © Roger Dean 2010

Gaslight and Daylight: With Some London Scenes They Shine Upon – George Augustus Sala, 1859:

Golopin is a worthy little creature, but is very irascible. He boasts of unnumbered persons he has killed in single combat abroad, and specially of a maitre d’armes whom he vanquished with the broadsword. He has great faith in his flute, and generally carries it about with him. At Casserole’s restaurant in the Haymarket, one evening, having a violent dispute with Klitzer, the cornet-apistonist, who had bantered him into a frenzy, he positively struck that big instrumentalist in the face, though he had to jump at least a foot in the air to do so. He dismissed him with these magniloquent words, ‘Miserable! You have neither the courage of a bug nor the integrity of a lobster. Had I my instrument with me I would chastise you.’ People have been rather chary of bantering Golopin since then.