Night-Prowls in the Streets 105 



is working, might be at nearly any height 

 you please ; the turn of the street that you 

 know is half a mile beyond looks as if it 

 might be a league away. Especially are 

 these things baffling when the air is thick, 

 either with mist or snow. A fog obscures 

 rather than darkens in a town, for one has 

 less a sense of blackness, even in a London 

 "pea-soup," than he has in the small hours 

 of a clear winter morning. For a fog 

 soaks up light and diffuses it again faintly. 

 Along the Bay of Fundy the sailors talk 

 of " fog-eaters," which are spots of bright- 

 ness in the haze where the sun is striking 



o 



in. This lumination seems really to be 

 absorbed as its warmth takes up the cloud 

 that rests on the sea. So every lamp and 

 gas-jet makes a halo for itself, and before 

 we turn a corner we know where the street- 

 light is : the mist is aglow for yards about 

 it, as if from a conflagration, and walks, 

 walls, and tree-stems, being wet, reflect it, 

 too. On the Brooklyn bridge, on a thick 

 night, the shine of the green-globed lamps 

 is uncanny, while the red lights make a 

 mist of blood. 



