Excerpt from Golden Hill by Francis Spufford, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"I would have thought you were well out of reach of Jacobite troubles."

"Would you? Were you in London last year?"

"Yes."

"Doing...?"

"This and that."

"Of course. And what was it like?"

"When the Pretender came marching down on us? A lazy sureness of being secure, till almost the last minute, and then panic so late it was virtually over as soon it was begun. The prince is coming, the prince is coming, the prince is retreating."

"Ah. Well, here it was long and slow, for the lag of the news kept us in suspense for weeks. Weeks of furious doubt if the next sail into the harbour wouldn't be a frigate bearing tyranny on its quarterdeck, and orders for us all to turn Papist on the instant—those are words I heard spoken in this room—and nothing to do about it, Europe's afterthought that we are, politically speaking, but to abide the issue of the quarrel, while snarling (or worse) at any soul within hand's reach who might be suspected of serving King Louis, from the French cut of their coat. So you see how the appetite would arise for a wholesome parade of savages, lightly blood-dabbled. Besides, we have no theatre."

"Do you not?"

"No," said Septimus. "Not since before my time, at any rate." His foot had begun to tap again, steadily.

"But— Wait a minute," said Smith, rummaging under the coffee-pot for the news-sheets. "Oh yes—what about the celebrated Mrs. Tomlinson, and her rendition of the classics?"

"That will be an upstairs room over a tavern, and Terpie dressed up as Britannia. Terpie keeps the lamp of culture lit, but her helmet will be gilded cardboard, and every time she misremembers a line, she'll give a flash of thigh."

"You don't approve? Peg Woffington does that every time she takes a breeches role."

"Mrs. Woffington gives us the thighs as well as the tragedy. I'm afraid with Terpie it's the thighs instead of. It doesn

Excerpted from Golden Hill by Francis Spufford. Copyright © 2017 by Francis Spufford. Excerpted by permission of Scribner. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.