and Mrs. Hook. The domestic disagreements of this hot-tempered couple always took place coram populo, at the street entrance to the Alley, instead of in the decent seclusion of their own hovel; not through any exhibitionism, I suppose, but simply because, for fighting on the scale practised by them, their hovel was not big enough. We had learned, from nurse-maid’s or servant’s gossip, enough of Mr. and Mrs. Hook’s affairs to be able to reconstruct the course of their quarrels, which much resembled that of a Punch and Judy show. Mr. Hook would return, lurching and staggering, from his festivities, and Mrs. Hook, hearing his approach or being warned of it, would rush out to greet him with blows and blasphemy; and in a confused flurry of attack and counter-attack they would disappear together into the alley’s dark maw. There followed an interval during which it might be supposed Mr. Hook slept, while his wife providently abstracted what remained of his week’s pay from his pockets. Then Mr. Hook would wake up, remember an important appointment at the George, and discover that he was penniless. His enormous bellow of rage was the signal for Mrs. Hook to run helter-skelter down the alley to take up station in their traditional battleground at its entrance. There among the chattering anticipatory neighbours she would await, with arms akimbo, the terrible coming of her outraged lord. Again it was just like Punch and Judy. Whang!—Mrs. Hook clouted him on the side of the head. Bonk!—Mr. Hook countered with a left to the jaw. And so it went on, until some spoil-sport fetched a policeman. (Punch and Judy again, you see; these disputants invariably observed the formality and the tradition.) But to the two peaky-faced children who watched with their noses glued to the window it was better than any Punch and Judy show: it was the first taste of real life.

There were others, more colourful if less violent than the Hooks, who took part in this daily pageant which might almost have been staged for our special benefit. (At least we had seats in the front row of the stalls.) There was, for instance, Black Sal. She was mad, she was frequently drunk, and she never washed. When the frenzy was upon her, or when she was full of gin, she would range about the town chanting meaningless obscenities; at other times she practised a kind of coarse and friendly banter, a running commentary upon life and affairs, addressed to all and sundry, but particularly to the mayor, as she waddled down the middle of the street. These comments were generally expressed in rough and ready rhymes, or in the assonances which modern poets use, which gave them added point. “Wot’s the Town Council but a lot of scoundrels?” she would ask; and there were few found willing to answer her. “The Mayor has banquets, we ain’t got no blankets,” she would declare. All the time she threw quips and jeers over her shoulder as the respectable top-floor windows were opened and the respectable householders peered out.