WATERS OF BABYLON 



Perhaps it was some vagrant geniality of spring 

 in the veins, perhaps it was merely the moral feeble- 

 ness remaining after influenza. The tradition that it 

 is a kindness to see people off on journeys rose up in 

 youth and freshness, a slight thrill answered to the 

 thought of watching for the first time an ocean 

 steamer move forth in huge composure to the East; 

 ultimately a hansom clapped its doors upon me, and 

 the flap in the roof fell on the name of Liverpool 

 Street. 



Victoria Street, grey as lead even in the most 

 golden day of summer, was a tank full of thick air; 

 Westminster loomed with blurred outlines; then the 

 Embankment, and some semblance of clearness and 

 distance; Cleopatra's Needle, pale and slender, spoke 

 as in a dream of Egyptian deserts and horizons thick 

 with heat, but the river at its foot was pitted with 

 rain, and the roar of Big Ben to it was sombre as 

 the voice of John Knox preaching before the Queen 

 of Scots. Ludgate Hill; Threadneedle Street : a 

 dirty ant-heap, where the two-legged black ants sped 

 to and fro in their appalling uniformity; the buses 

 jammed and strove, uniform, too, in purpose, in 

 freight, in the hideous ease of the conductor's repartee. 

 Monotony and strife and gloom; a delirium of simi- 

 larities in black cloth and preposterous headgear; 

 those may be envied who leave it for countries where 

 life, however acute, must fall into step with the 

 Eastern cadence, must go in colours and doze in 

 the heat. 



66 



