In Seymour Street I could not distinguish the houses on the far side of the road; at the Marble Arch I was unable to see from the one side of the pavement to the other; and I made my cautious way to the tube station chiefly by sense of touch. A London fog can be the completest insulator in the world. Paralysing sight and muffling sound, it separates the individual from his fellows in the densest part of a crowded street. As I walked up Great Cumberland Place, there was no sound but my own faint footsteps; the whole city belonged to me. “‘_Dear God, the very houses seem asleep_’;” I murmured involuntarily: “‘_And all that mighty heart is lying still._’” Then, I am not ashamed to confess, I felt suddenly frightened, for I knew that the mighty heart was beating, the houses which seemed asleep were full of people peering into the darkness of the street as I peered through the darkness at their windows. The street was full; at any moment I might trample on the unseen; and the unseen that watched and listened for my faint footsteps might spring out on me. I walked on tiptoe . . . and could have sworn that some one or something laughed at my futile caution. At an unattainable distance, a haze of dirty-lemon light smeared the darkness. I hurried forward six paces and bruised my knees against a lamp-post. Pausing to pick up my hat, I saw a knot of motionless bodies tangled on the doorstep at my feet. There was no word, no more laughter; perhaps I had imagined that earlier laugh. The fog insulated me again as though I had been thrust under an airless bell-glass with a pile of dead. I dared not move for fear of treading on one of them. The lemon light grew dim, as a thicker wave of fog floated silently from the unplumbed reservoir in the park. I felt my fingers tightening round my stick. Then one of the crumpled bodies moved in its sleep and broke the spell. I walked on—slowly, because I was out of breath—and steadied my nerves by speaking to the policeman on duty at the corner. He too, I found, was insulated by the fog. Some one should have relieved him hours ago; but every man in the force was required to regulate the traffic and to shepherd the hunger-marchers. What had happened to them he could not tell me. Whenever the fog lifted, he saw groups of them drifting aimlessly about or camping wearily in the first resting-place that they could find. As armies, they had either ceased to exist or had transferred themselves to another part of London. I asked whether he had heard of any trouble. “Haven’t heard nothing, sir,” he answered. “Wish I had. No, there won’t be no trouble. These chaps are too tired; and they’re all of them strange to London.” 2