Page:Letters from England.djvu/188

 Escape

O end up, I shall betray terrible things; for instance, the English Sunday is awful. People say that the use of Sunday is to enable them to go into the country; this is not true; people go into the country to protect themselves in a wild panic from the English Sunday. On Saturday every Briton is assailed by the blind instinct to escape somewhere, just as an animal flees in a blind instinct from an approaching earthquake. Those unable to flee away, at least seek refuge in church, there to tide over the day of horror in prayers and song. This is the day when nobody cooks, nobody travels, nobody gazes, and nobody thinks. I do not know for what unutterable guilt the Lord has condemned England to the weekly punishment of Sunday.