Private courts, / Gloomy as coffins, and unsightly lanes / Thrilled by some female vendor’s scream, belike / The very shrillest of all London cries, / May then entangle our impatient steps; / Conducted through those labyrinths, unawares, / To privileged regions and inviolate, / Where from their airy lodges studious lawyers / Look out on waters, walks, and gardens green.

William Wordsworth (1779-1850), The Prelude