Sounds familiar ,,,

... "We Revel in a Crowd of Any Kind": Dickens the Jou... - The Barnes & Noble Review. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)


"We have," proclaimed the young journalist, "a most extraordinary partiality for lounging about the streets. Whenever we have an hour or two to spare, there is nothing we enjoy more than a little amateur vagrancy -- walking up one street and down another, and staring into shop windows, and gazing about as if, instead of being on intimate terms with every shop and house in Holborn, the Strand, Fleet Street and Cheapside, the whole were an unknown region to our wandering mind. We revel in a crowd of any kind -- a street 'row' is our delight -- even a woman in a fit is by no means to be despised, especially in a fourth-rate street...."