Evening star., 1940-10-21
Sleeping Becomes
An ART in London
During Attack
Third Floor of Hotel
Offers Best Refuge,
Briton Concludes
BY w. L. WHITE.


Radio Now I lay me down to sleep;
only first I shall have q pot OF
coffee with friends in the salon
because if enough is going on coffee
relaxes you instead Of keeping yor
awake.
1t is almost midnight and already
a few people who intend to sleep ir
this salon are getting fixed for the
night. Some are lying with their
knees drawn up on divans. Others
are leaning back in one chair and
have another pulled up for their
feet.
These may be hotel guests who
have no bedding Of their own, for
the hotel prohibits taking its blan-
kets and mattresses out OF Its
rooms. You may bring only a
pillow. Or they may be people from
outside, for no building in London
refuses shelter these days.
"a very fne hotel, this" said a
blond Engli2 .lan.
ut is new and comfortable" I
agreed.
Praises Construction.
"Oh. no, not that" he said. II
mean its construction. I had an
architect friend of mine stroll
through 1t last week. He says there
is nothing better in London. 1t Is
all steel and wonderful thick con-
crete, particularly the outside walls,
which are yards thick. Where are
you sleeping tonight?"
Il thought I would take my stuff
down into the main shelter just be-
low this" I said. ut is well under
ground"
The Englishman shook his head.
II shouldn't. My architect chap
looked at it. The sides are all right,
but what about above you? You see,
it is right below us, but we have only
glass roof here. 1t is just under
the central we'll of the building. so
you would have only that glass sky
light plus one thickness of concrete
floor to stop direct hit He shook
his head. Very bad
What about the side shelter-the
one under the central lobby?' l
asked
Stay Out of Big Rooms.
Not bad, but still big room.
Always stay out of big rooms. You
want lots of experimentation, par
titions and stuff to stop things fly
ing around, or SO this chap said
Think he's right, too. But Ill teI
you what is be.s Of eli. only mind
don't spread it around Here he
leaned toward me. Just take your
mattress out into the corridor, only
if everybody Gid it they would be
jammed with people snoring like
bloody hell"
But there are not many people
up where I am on the seventh
floor"
oh, good God! I don't mean
that, old fellow The seventh is a
death trap. All YOU got over you is
the eighth and it takes three OF
even these floors to stop a really big
one from above. Take the second
floor corridor or, better still, the
third" '-s-..----.-.-.--- ...-... ..-------.
But why?"
This friend of mine, the archi-
tect chap, explained it. A direct
hit from above could never blast its
way clear down to the third floor.
One landing in the street outside,
say even a really big land mine,
might smash through the outside
rooms Of the first floor into the cor
ridor and maybe even as high as the
second. but never up to the third.
You would be left overhanging a
crater-like bird on a branch. The
same way with one that lit in the
inner court.
Safe on Third Floor.
sleeping in the third floor corri-
cor you would be safer than back
in the United States. Or so this
chap said. Of course. you do get the
noise of the guns, which you don't
get in that side shelter, yet it is still
trifle safer. But don't spread it
about, do you mind?"
I said I would not, but when I
had finished my coffee I took my
bedding down to the side shelter be-
cause 1 was very tired of the raging
of tho orti O # o11nc
The shelters floor was sodden
with people sleeping and their
breathing was continuous sad, un-
even sigh. They lay there in bril-
liant-hued pajamas and dressing
gowns, but this had ceased to strike
me as funny several days ago. Some
families had built for themselves
little imaginary rooms of rows of
chairs and slept within them.
At about 6 O'Clock, when the all
clear sounded, wardens would
waken them and they would go
back to their rooms for few final
hours of sleep.
Sad, Uneven Signs.
In the dim half-light of this great
room, on what was a dance floor
and near the orchestra platform,
1 lay my mattress down and unroll
my sleeping bag and listen to the
continuous sad, uneven sigh of their
breathing. A few are snoring. Now
and then some one mumbles rest
lessly in his sleep.
A man is moaning in regular
cadence, softly mouthing indistinct
words, but each time they grow
palmer and palmer. go away,
commands the man in nightmare,
in the fiat, fear-frozen voice of a
dream. Go away, go away, go
away" A warden walks softly to-
ward him, a gliding figure in the
half gloom, but he does not shake
him. For why waken man out of
one nightmare into another? And
l. II - eli