MELLOW ENGLAND. 167 



plunged into it on the other. Waterloo Bridge gave 

 one or two leaps and disappeared, and the Nelson 

 Column in Trafalgar Square was obliterated for half 

 its length. Travel was impeded, boats stopped on the 

 river, trains stood still on the track and for an hour 

 and a half London lay buried beneath this sickening 

 eruption. I say eruption, because a London fog is 

 only a London smoke, tempered by a moist atmos- 

 phere. It is called "fog" by courtesy, but lampblack 

 is its chief ingredient. It is not wet like our fogs, but 

 quite dry, and makes the eyes smart and the nose 

 tingle. Whenever the sun can be seen through it, 

 his face is red and dirty; seen through a bond fide 

 fog his face is clean and white. English coal, or 

 " coals " as they say here, in burning gives out an 

 enormous quantity of thick, yellowish smoke, which 

 is at no time absorbed or dissipated as it would be in 

 our hard, dry atmosphere, and which at certain times 

 is not absorbed at all, but falls down swollen and 

 augmented by the prevailing moisture. The atmos- 

 phere of the whole island is more or less impregnated 

 with smoke, even on the fairest days, and it becomes 

 more and more dense as you approach the great 

 towns. Yet this compound of smut, fog, and common 

 air is an elixir of youth ; and this is one of the sur- 

 prises of London, to see amid so much soot and dingi- 

 Oess such fresh, blooming complexions and in general 

 euch a fine physical tone and full-bloodedness among 

 the people such as one has come to associate only 

 *rith the best air and the purest, wholesomest country 



