POPPERIE—­NOISE—­QUIET—­
DESCENT—­CERBERUS—­PICTURE—­CATACOMBS SENSATIONAL—­STALACTITE—­SURMISES—
­DREADS—­POPPY—­WEIRD—­DESERTION—­LOST—­TERRORS—­CANDLE—­OUT!

Arrived!  These are the works that POPPERIE & Co. built.  On a height, commanding fine panoramic view.  Approach to the house and stores is through a fresh-looking garden, everything neat and trim.  Quite a surprise to find oneself suddenly among hundreds of casks and cases.  Distant sound of carts and horses, of pulleys and cranks, of bringing in and sending out; but this sound is only a gentle hum—­a murmuring accompaniment as it were; for, considering the amount of work that involves a lot of noise throughout the day, except, perhaps, during the feeding hours, the note of this place is its air of quiet activity.  There is, I remark, a curious flavour in the atmosphere, that causes me to smack my lips, quite involuntarily, as if tasting wine.  Remember somebody telling me, that the mere wine-laden atmosphere of the London Docks is quite enough to make anyone feel the worse for liquor, even though you do not touch a single drop in the vaults.  We have not yet reached the vaults, but somehow there’s something peculiarly exhilarating in the knowledge that we are in the outer court of one of King Champagne’s many palaces. Mem. Grand idea for a scene in a Drury Lane Pantomime.  Visit to Palace of POPPIN THE FIRST, king of the Champagne country.  Register copyright and suggest it to Sir DRURY O’LANUS.

[Illustration]

DAUBINET has his hat in his hand and his overcoat over his arm.  With his handkerchief he is mopping his fevered brow. “Piff!” he exclaims, “qu’il fait chaud! No?  You don’t find it?  I do. Caramba!  O Champagnski! da Karascho!  O Maman! Come on!  Here is our leader, le bon VESQUIER! Allons!  Marchons! Long to reign over us!”—­then as we move forward, DAUBINET again bursts into song, as usual more or less out of tune.  This time he favours us with snatches of “God save the Queen!” and finally, as we enter a huge tunnel, and, as I judge from the steep incline, are commencing our descent into the cave, I hear his voice behind me singing “We’re leaving thee in sorrow, ANNIE!”

Darker and darker as we descend through this tunnel.  Orpheus going to find Eurydice.  No Cerberus about, thank goodness.  Wonder if any rats or blackbeetles?  By the way, Cerberus would have been a nasty one for rats.  Cerberus, with three to one on him ("Heads I win—­tails you rats lose"), doing a match against time in killing rats, is a fine subject for a weird classical picture yet to be painted.  What R.A. could grapple with so tremendous a composition?  On returning to “carp the upper air,” must mention the subject to Sir FREDERICK the Great.  Cerberus would be a nasty one for rats to tackle.  My ideas of anything alive underground are generally associated with suchlike warmint.  At last—­out of the tunnel! and now, I presume, in the caves.