Our last day in London was not half bad.  Suzie was mostly over her flu, but we decided to take it pretty easy to make sure she didn’t get overtired and make herself sick again.  Our two predetermined destinations were the British Library (to see the collection of rare books on display) and the court area of London (for obvious reasons).

Everything went pretty much as planned, a bit boring perhaps but after yesterday I was ready for boring.  We found our way to the British Library without incident, and the old and rare books and documents on display were amazing.  They ranged from a third-century papyrus containing one of “letters” of the gospels, to the Magna Carta, to sketches by Leonardo di Vinci, to the only known medieval manuscript of Beowulf, to the notebook of a teen-aged Jane Austin, to one of the first Gutenberg Bibles, to the handwritten notes of the Beatles creating several famous lyrics.  Remarkable and amazing, especially after the boys gave up on it and found their way to the cafe.  No pictures are permitted in the display room (light damages the paper), but below are a couple of pictures of the British Library (which I liked as a building, even though it was modern).

We decided just to have lunch at the cafe in the library; I figured that even if it was a little dear, we had just seen an amazing display of artifacts for free, so we could consider it our contribution to the ongoing funding of the library. The food was surprisingly good, and we sat in a bright, light eating area among people who looked like people who would be at the British Library. Quite civilized.

From there, another underground trip to St. Paul’s Cathedral station, and a walk down to the London criminal court, aka the Old Bailey. We happened by the door for the public galleries by accident, and Suzie and Will were able to take in about 30 minutes of a rape trial, which both of them found fascinating. Suzie has agreed to guest blog about it later in this post. But first, a picture of a cute London girl:

This is Suzie blogging for the first time:

Steve finally let me invade his blog space. Today was a thrilling day for me. After years of watching Rumpole of the Old Bailey and loving his antics in court, I actually got to go to the Old Bailey – the Central Criminal Court in London and watch a trial. Will and I stood in a short line, got frisked, and walked up three flights of strangely tiled stairs to arrive at the criminal courts. The public observation was in a balcony high above the court action. And we were well warned not to move around while the judge was “summing up” and not to “lean over the rail.” The view from the balcony was just as I had expected but the court room was surprisingly small. The room was divided up into cubicles by beautifully carved wood partitions. The judge and other various people at the front of the room, the defendant (making his presentation of evidence), barristers, jury and others all in their appointed spaces. Above the judge’s table was an elaborate carving of what I assume to be the crest of the Old Bailey, with this same motif recreated in gold leaf on the leather back rests of all the chairs and booths in the court room. The judge and barristers were in gowns and wigs.

We had happened upon a choice moment at the Old Bailey, as a defendant (who was oddly defending himself in court) began to present his evidence – evidence of what occurred the evening that he did not rape Wendy, his girlfriend of three years. Amazingly, the defendant was well prepared, articulate, concise and seemed to have a grasp of exactly what he needed to tell the jury – namely that he had no motive to rape Wendy (as he could have sex with her any time he wanted, and that she never evidenced any desire not to have sex). We got a complete blow by blow (and I use that term intentionally) of everything that happened that night, including Wendy pulling a knife on the defendant, his hitting her with a bat, her pleading with him not to leave her, and the obligatory make up sex with just enough detail to make it really interesting.

The judge, a caricature of himself, peering over glasses perched on the tip of his nose, kept saying, “Yes, continue” as the defendant presented his evidence. It was a bit more explicit than I remember the evidence that Rumpole presented, but also more interesting. We could have stayed to watch the whole trial, but we left when the defendant began to ramble about how his solicitor had screwed up in not getting the evidence from his computer that proved he was innocent. He was starting to sound like a real pro se at that point.

You can imagine that Will was riveted by the whole experience and would have stayed much longer to hear this guy more.

A couple of things really struck me while watching the trial. First, despite the fact that a court reporter was taking everything down, the judge and the jurors were taking word for word notes of everything the defendant said – even at times asking him to stop and repeat things. I’ve never seen a judge and jury so engaged in a trial, especially a criminal trial. Second, if you had changed the defendant into costume from the 1800s and removed the telephone and computer from the court room, this scene could have played out 200 years ago in exactly the same way. For some reason, this gave me a big thrill. For some reason it seems good to me that somewhere in the world people cling to traditions that have served their society well. I’m enjoying the sense of tradition in so many things British. Something we unfortunately lack in the U.S.

[Suzie signs off here. Thank you, Suzie….]

A picture of the Old Bailey itself:

and a building across from it:

Finally, I realized I’d not posted a picture of our apartment, so here are three of us on route “home,” the front of our place, and our pleasant backyard.

Off to Belfast tomorrow!

• Every Trip has at Least One: A Real Stinker of a Day
• London Odds and Ends No. 1 — Stockwell Station Shooting Memorial

Categories: Travel -- London