Here Pea and I disembarked,
passed under the black stone archway, and climbed the steep stone
steps. Within a few feet of their summit, Pea presented me to
Waterloo (or an eminent toll-taker representing that structure),
muffled up to the eyes in a thick shawl, and amply great-coated and
fur-capped.
Waterloo received us with cordiality, and observed of the night
that it was 'a Searcher.' He had been originally called the Strand
Bridge, he informed us, but had received his present name at the
suggestion of the proprietors, when Parliament had resolved to vote
three hundred thousand pound for the erection of a monument in
honour of the victory. Parliament took the hint (said Waterloo,
with the least flavour of misanthropy) and saved the money. Of
course the late Duke of Wellington was the first passenger, and of
course he paid his penny, and of course a noble lord preserved it
evermore. The treadle and index at the toll-house (a most
ingenious contrivance for rendering fraud impossible), were
invented by Mr. Lethbridge, then property-man at Drury Lane
Theatre.
Was it suicide, we wanted to know about? said Waterloo. Ha! Well,
he had seen a good deal of that work, he did assure us.
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