read
in your history books--the grim Tower where so many people who were not
wicked at all were imprisoned, and where some of them were beheaded
because, in the time when they lived, there were no laws such as there
are now safeguarding people's lives. The Tower will have a chapter to
itself later on.

This is all I am going to tell you at present about the City and the
East End, because it is quite impossible to tell everything. In the West
End, too, there are many interesting things, and the most interesting of
them must have chapters to themselves; for instance, the palaces
belonging to the King, and the hospitals which are entirely for
children. But there are other things which belong to the whole of
London, and must be mentioned here. There is, for instance, the
Embankment--rather a long word, but not a difficult one. It means the
wall which was built for miles along beside the river to make a road and
to prevent the river flooding right up to the houses. In old days, when
people had their houses on the water's edge, when there came a high tide
or a strong wind, the water washed up over them, and did a great deal of
damage; so it was decided to build a strong wall beside the river, which
the water, even in the highest tide, could not leap over. It was a
wonderful piece of work. It is difficult to think of the number of
cartloads of solid earth and stone that had to be put down into the
water to make a firm foundation, and when that was done the wall had to
be built on the top. But though the river had been banked up it could
still make itself disagreeable. In 1928, driven by strong winds and high
tides, after much rain, it flowed up over the Embankment in some places
and broke through in others. It flooded many houses, and some people
were drowned. The river also helps to cause fog; it seems as though it
had gone to the smoke demon to find out what they could do to be
spiteful, and they had agreed they could not do anything each by
himself, but that together they could be very nasty. So every now and
then the damp air which rises from the river, and the heavy smoke which
comes out of the hundreds of chimneys, join together and make a thick
black veil, and hang over London and come down into the streets so that
people can't see where they are going, and when they breathe their noses
and mouths are filled with nasty, dirty smuts. You who are London
children know Mr. Fog-fiend very well. When you wake on a morning in