ks out on it from his offices in the
Hotel Cecil, Londoners have to look to him to see if he or Pierpont
Morgan will not open it to them again. What a pleasant alternative
from the asphyxiating Underground or the tortoise-moving omnibus would
not a fast, comfortably fitted line of river steamers be! It seems
inconceivable that, with such a waterway and such primitive and
inadequate alternative means of travel, the people should stand its
being closed. What a great, stimulating, suggestive pathway it is
through the Dingy City! Coming from a dance early the other morning I
walked along the Embankment, to see a carpet of blue and silver being
laid along the river as if by the angels of the dawn; and at evening
in ever-varying schemes of sometimes gorgeous colour a richer carpet
is laid sunsetwards, while the smoke and dust exhalation of the City
is glorified to an incense offering by the stained rose window to the
west. At such times the Dingy City looks great, robed in vague
organ-tones of colour. But you must no longer walk on that carpet,
even though the angels have laid it for you; you must no longer see
your city from that pathway; you must burrow homewards from your work
in a sewer-pipe of stink, and deeper rabbit-warrens of burrowing are
being prepared for you, and you have no Declaration of Independence
that secures to you the undeniable right to breathe fresh air.
Long-suffering, patient Londoner! To whom does the City belong, and
the river? If you reward with honours the men who make beer or whisky
for you, or supply you with cheap tea, or signalise themselves by
successfully struggling against disease, there ought to be the
inducement of honours and reward waiting for the man or men that would
help the millions in their daily struggle with this plague of long
distances. Is there no knight to champion the cause of the toilers of
London and in earnest tackle this dragon problem of distances? That
is left to enterprising Americans who come over from pure philanthropy
(?) to help you. Three years of his life are spent by the
average-lived Londoner in the Underground, who has to take a daily
half-hour's journey in it to get to his business. A man with an office
in the neighbourhood of the Stock Exchange and a dwelling-house in
South Kensington will spend about four or five years of his life going
to and fro. To an extent it is a necessary evil. We cannot transport
ourselves by telegraph, but there are things that the