d got out and said to the cabman:

"You did that very well, considering the general state of things. I
don't know whether you'll live to enjoy it or not, but there's a
five-pound note for you, and if you'll take my advice you will get your
wife and family, if you have one, into that cab, and drive right out
into the country. It strikes me London's going to be a very good place
to stop away from for the next two or three days."

"Thank 'ee, sir," said the cabman, as he gathered up the five-pound note
and tucked it down inside his collar. "I don't know who you are, but
it's very kind of you; and as you seem to know something, I'll do as
you say. What with these devil-ships a-flyin' about the skies, and
dropping thunderbolts on us from the clouds, and furreners a-comin' up
the Thames as I've heard, London ain't 'ealthy enough for me, nor the
missus and the kids, and thanks for your kindness, sir, we're movin'
to-night, keb an' all.

"Oh, my Gawd, there's another! 'Otel Cecil and Savoy this time, if I've
got my bearin's right. Well, there's one thing, t'ain't on'y the pore
what's sufferin' this time; there'll be a lot of rich people dead afore
mornin'. A pal of mine told me just now that Park Lane was burnin' from
end t' end. Good-evenin', sir, and thenk you."

As the cab drove away Lennard stood for a few moments on the pavement,
watching two columns of flame soaring up from the side of the Strand.
Perhaps the most dreadful effects produced by the aerial torpedoes were
those which resulted from the breaking of the gas mains and the
destruction of the electric conduits. Save for the bale-fires of ruin
and destruction, half London was in darkness. Miles of streets under
which the gas mains were laid blew up with almost volcanic force. The
electric mains were severed, and all the contents dislocated, and if
ever London deserved the name which James Thompson gave it when he
called it "The City of Dreadful Night," it deserved it on that evening
of the 17th of November 1909.

Lennard was received in the Prime Minister's room by Mr Chamberlain,
Lord Whittinghame, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, Lord Milner and General
Lord Kitchener.

It was perhaps the strangest meeting that had ever taken place in that
room, not even saving the historic meeting of 1886. There was very
little talking. Even in the House of Commons the flood of talk had ebbed
away in such a fashion that it made it possible for the nation's
business to be got