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They passed the once prosperous houses, the corner saloons pandering to two vices, decked with the flamboyant signs of the breweries. The trees were dying along the asphalt and in the yards, the iron fences broken here and there, the copings stained with rust and soot. Hodder's thoughts might have been likened to the heated air that simmered above the bricks. They were in Dalton Street!
Hardly less melancholy is the change which has overtaken the favourite seaside resorts of my childhood. Tynemouth was the earliest watering-place of which I knew anything. In those days the pleasant village, not yet defiled by the soot of Shields, consisted of three streets, called respectively Front Street, Middle Street, and Back Street.
One boy in Salle V had a flower pot from the window-sill above fixed on his head! Beyond being slightly dazed, and of course covered with mould, he was none the worse; and those who were well enough enjoyed his discomfiture immensely. The concussion had shaken this to such an extent that accumulations of soot had come down and covered him from head to foot, and he was as black as a nigger!
Black designs, such as appear in the ornamentation of lime holders and the like, are secured by rubbing oil and soot into incised lines, and then holding the object in the smoke of burning rice-straw. Net Making. Nets are used in fishing, in catching wild chickens and grasshoppers, and in hunting deer and pigs. The first three types are made of twine, but the fourth is of strong rope.
Soot had killed the pear trees, the apricots behind the lattice fence had withered away; asphalt and soot were slowly sapping the vitality of the maples on the sidewalk; and sometimes Uncle Tom's roses looked as though they might advantageously be given a coat of paint, like those in Alice in Wonderland. Honora should have lived in the Dwyers' mansion-people who are capable of judging said so.
The three pigments mentioned above black, red, and white, made respectively from soot, iron oxide, and lime are, so far as we know, the only native varieties; but at the present day these are sometimes supplemented with indigo and yellow pigments obtained from the bazaars. The pigment is generally laid on free-hand with the finger-tip, a few guiding points only being put in.
The vis-a-vis of these dancers were not less vile. The man of very tall stature, disguised as Robert Macaire, had daubed his bony face with soot in such a manner that he was not recognizable; besides a large band covered his left eye, and the dead white of the right one, standing out in relief with the black face, made it still more hideous.
"I hain't shined them shoes every week with soot off the bottom of the pot without knowin' that one pair of 'em was wore by Ma an' one of 'em by Da. But let's see how far they come. Why, I orter looked round the teepee before tramplin' round."
And if it be set on fire, as when we make that acid Liquor, that Chymists call Oleum Sulphuris per campanam, it affords very little Soot, and indeed the flame yeelds so little, that it will scarce in any degree Black a sheet of White Paper, held a pretty while over the flame and smoak of it, which is observed rather to Whiten than Infect linnen, and which does plainly make Red Roses grow very Pale, but not at all Black, as far as the Smoak is permitted to reach the leaves.
Thinking of the chimney fire he remembered also that his father had said at the time that a plank laid over the top of a burning chimney, or a screen fastened over the fireplace would stop the burning of the soot by stopping the air, and so smothering the fire. This suggested a new plan of operations for present use.
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