impression of conditions there.

The weather in London was mild and clear. The third evening after I had
got settled in one of those delightfully English hotels in the heart of
the city, yet removed from the traffic, with letter-boxes that still bear
the initials of Victoria, I went to visit some American naval officers in
their sitting-room on the ground floor. The cloth had not been removed
from the dinner-table, around which we were chatting, when a certain
strange sound reached our ears--a sound not to be identified with the
distant roar of the motor-busses in Pall Mall, nor with the sharp bark of
the taxi-horns, although not unlike them. We sat listening intently, and
heard the sound again.

"The Germans have come," one of the officers remarked, as he finished his
coffee. The other looked at his watch. It was nine o'clock. "They must
have left their lines about seven," he said.

In spite of the fact that our newspapers at home had made me familiar
with these aeroplane raids, as I sat there, amidst those comfortable
surroundings, the thing seemed absolutely incredible. To fly one hundred
and fifty miles across the Channel and southern England, bomb London,
and fly back again by midnight! We were going to be bombed! The
anti-aircraft guns were already searching the sky for the invaders. It is
sinister, and yet you are seized by an overwhelming curiosity that draws
you, first to pull aside the heavy curtains of the window, and then to
rush out into the dark street both proceedings in the worst possible
form! The little street was deserted, but in Pall Mall the dark forms of
busses could be made out scurrying for shelter, one wondered where?
Above the roar of London, the pop pop pop! of the defending guns could
be heard now almost continuously, followed by the shrieks and moans of