*

Beauty is a strange bird. Hither and thither she flies, and settles
where she will; and men will say that she is found here and
there--sometimes in Perugia, sometimes in Mayfair, sometimes in the
Himalaya. I have known men who found her in the dark melancholy of
Little Russia, and I can understand them. For beauty appears, too, in
various guise; and some men adore her in silks and some in rags. There
are girls in this quarter who will smite the heart out of you, whose
beauty will cry itself into your very blood. White's Row and the
fastnesses of Stepney do not produce many choice blooms; there are no
lilies in these gardens of weeds. The girls are not romantic to regard
or to talk with. They are not even clean. The secrets of their toilet
are not known to me, but I doubt if soap and water ever appear in large
quantities. And yet.... They walk or lounge, languorous and
heavy-lidded, yet with a curious suggestion of smouldering fire in their
drowsy gaze. Rich, olive-skinned faces they have, and hair either gloomy
or brassy, and caressing voices with the lisp of Bethnal Green. You may
see them about the streets which they have made their own, carrying
loads of as enchanting curls as Murger's Mimi.

But don't run away with the idea that they are wistful, or luscious, or
romantic; they are not. Go and mix with them if you nurse that illusion.
Wistfulness and romance are in the atmosphere, but the people are
practical ... more practical and much less romantic than Mr. John
Jenkinson of Golder's Green.

You may meet them in the restaurants of Little Montagu Street, Osborn
Street, and the byways off Brick Lane. The girls are mostly
cigarette-makers, employed at one of the innumerable tobacco factories
in the district. Cigarette-maker recalls "Carmen" and Marion Crawford's
story; but here are only the squalid and the beastly. Brick Lane and the
immediate neighbourhood hold many factories, each with a fine
odour--bed-flock, fur, human hair, and the slaughter-house. Mingle these
with sheep-skins warm from the carcass, and the decaying refuse in every
gutter, and you will understand why I always smoke cigars in
Spitalfields. In these cafes I have met on occasion those seriocomics,
Louise Michel, Emma Goldmann, and Chicago May. Beilis, the hero of the
blood-ritual trial, was here some months ago; and Enrico Malatesta has
visited, too. Among the men--fuzzy-bearded, shifty-eyed fellows--there
are those who have been to Siberia