The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1880-06-03
A LONDON FOG.

nave been acquired ut Newport or Nam
tucket, where, marvelously rs a troop
of ghosts at MONDAY, freakish clouds OF
mists whirl into the brilliant sunshine,
blotting it out with every outline of the
house across the marrow street, and as
| swiftly whirl away, or in New York,
where real danger turks on her shroud-
ell waterways and in her busiest streets,
that Is marvellous reading that sets forth
how cloud of vapor can paralyze the
| activities of n city like mighty world
in itself, send up the death rate swift
and high, and fill the accident wards
in the hospitals and the casualty COL
umns in the newspapers with victims.
But a dense London fog is a terrify-
ing thing, whether one be indoors or
out; depressing to sense and spirit,
and, if it be accompanied with air of
bitter chillncss, it is extremely Distress
ing TO endure by any one not in
high health. The winter Just past,
closed, in character, England's dark
year. Murkiness of varying intensity
reigned, day in, day out, for weeks to-
gether. a London letter said, in Feb
ruary, 1--WE live by gas or candle-light.
It's twilight from the time we get up
until three O'Clock, then it is dark; and
on foggy days twilight is omitted
And IN the same month the obituary
lists of the Times were filed with the
deaths of aged people. Protracted alb
sence of sunshine is of itself calamity.
As the gray dead days follow each other
the yearning for light and heat be-
Comes positive pain. No dweller un-
der brighter skies ever spends No
| vember in London without amazement
that any artist makes London his home.
When in winter can he work? What
light does he find to work by? And
what does he do with the days when he
| wakes to n coffec-colorcd obscurity in
his rooms, and all the world outside his
window panes is drowned from sight in
n lurid haze?
| In 1873, for q week or more, London
was buried in one of the most aggra-
waited fogs old Londoners could remem-
bcr. AT times all movement ceased,
and neither love nor money could COM
mand a carriage. When the dense yell
low vapor lighteneda little the fog horn
blew ceaselessly on railways, rivers. ca
nails 4; and drivers of carts, omnibuses
and cabs signaled each other and way
farers with bells and shrill whistles, and
crept along at snairs pace. But with
all care collisions were plenty; there
were accidents terrible, mingled with
some only laughable people lost them
selves and people and animals wander
ed haplessly off piers, bridges and en-
bankments. The writer was then stay
ing just out of London, in the lovely
hilly country toward Sydenham. Usu-
ally London lay beneath our gaze like a
map unrolleG-the Thames, with its
grand bridges, the Houses of Parlia-
ment, the clock-tower and Westminster
Abbey in the foreground. and the great
dome of st. Pauls lowering high in the
dim distance. Now London was hidden
in sea of sullen, smut-laden fog, and
we seemed to bc living alone in an en-
chantcd world for white mist, un-
tinged by any trail of smoke, lay like a
light veil over everything, shut off
houses and human beings, narrowed
our vision to garden spaces. arches un-
der old park trees, and hedgcrows on
either side the country lanes in which
we walked, and all out-of-doors was
was heavily powdered with hoar-frost
that, because of its slow deposition
hour after hour of successive still. chill
days, was the airiest, featherlest accre-
ton of ice crystals possible to fancy.
no glitter, no iridescence; but
all was fantastic beauty, austere
purity. and glorification of the COM
monest objects. Zach little capsule OF
the MOSES that vened the walls had
turned itself into fairy umbrella. The
fruit of the arbutus t,ees glowed car
mine under a filmy icing, and a white
halo hung ray-wisc, light as breath,
round the fringed disk4 of some late
lingering chrvsanthemums in sheltered
nook of the garden. The sharp curled
edges and bristling points of hollies
were muffled in down; down outlined
all the overlapping points of the black,
green, rich-mottled leaves of the ivy
screens; and the pines, the frs, the
weeping birches and the gothic arcades
of the park wore a solemn splendor fiji
for dream of the heavenly country.
But. stirless rs the air was, its icy
dampness pierced to the marrow. 1.-The
owl for all his feathers" would have
shuddered as did we in furs when, OIL
one of the days that the obscurity wa:
lessened enough for cautious getting
about, we set off by rail intent upor
using our tickets FOR the last matinee
| which DIR. Won Bulow would give tha
season in England. Besides the music
some accumulated shopping and luncl
ut n French restaurant were on th,
DAYS list; but as we neared the city the
fog grew yellower and yellower, breath
ing became heavy work, we were to'
miserably cold for speech. and whel
finally we essaved to walk the trlflins
distance from the station where we lef
the train to the strand, our lungs
throats and eyes smarted so unbearabl,
from the acrid, smoke-saturated mis-
that we were thankful to take refuge il
n close carriage and daily away ut tn
cafe the hours before we were due a
st. James's Hall.
To any save Londoners the great con
ccrt-room was that day queer place
Haze and coughs filed it, the light
twinkled such feeble sparks that only
few exceptionally-placei people coul,
: hope to decipher their programmes
, the audience was n crowd of Mother
! Bunch phantoms, our heads and eye
7 ached duly, our chests labored lik
I stiff bellows in the poisoned atmosphere
/ we should have felt benumhed who'll
I in spirit and bodily members but for tn
5 desperate grasp which the instinct O