Page:Letters from England.djvu/30

 Traffic

UT as long as I live I shall never become reconciled to what is known here as “traffic,” that is, the volume of vehicles in the streets. I recall with horror the day on which they first brought me to London. At the outset they conveyed me by train, then they rushed through some huge glass halls and thrust me into a barred cage which looks like scales for weighing cattle; this is a lift, and down it went through an ugly steel-plated well, whereupon they drew me out and led me through serpentine subterranean passages; it was like a nightmare. Then there was a sort of tunnel or channel with railway lines, and a snorting train flew in; they hurled me into it, and the train flew on; the atmosphere was oppressive with a mildewy closeness,