November and find the room still dark, and are told it is time to get up
when it looks like the middle of the night, then you know the fog has
come; and he visits rich and poor alike. There is no keeping him in the
East End.

With all her money and her cleverness London has never found out
anything good enough to tempt Mr. Fog-fiend to go right away. No, he
comes often, and stays, perhaps, for weeks together, and the eyes of
children smart and their throats feel thick, and they find it so dull to
do lessons by artificial light; and when the time comes for the daily
walk they cannot go out, because they might get run over, not being able
to see. And everything is very quiet, for the omnibuses and taxi-cabs
have to go at a walking pace for fear they might run into something.
And it is no wonder sometimes that children get cross and tired when
they cannot see the sun, which may be shining brightly in the country
all day long. Mr. Fog-fiend has many dresses; sometimes he puts on a
white one instead of a black one, and that is not so bad, because it is
quite light, but just as if soft white shawls were hung in front of your
eyes so that you couldn't see. But it is even more dangerous to try to
cross the road in a white fog than in a black one. It is like living
inside a big white cloud. Then there is a yellow dress, which is the
ugliest of all. It is like yellow smoke, and it gets into people's
throats and makes them cough, and it steals into all the rooms so that
even the lamp across the room looks quite dim; and the air is full of
it, and you taste it in all your food. But it is lucky that there are
not always fogs in London, or no one could live; they only come in the
last months of the year or the very early ones, and in the summer London
children do not see fogs any more than country children do, though
perhaps the sun does not shine always quite so brightly in London as it
does in the country.

Close to the river are the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey,
both very wonderful. I have not told you about Westminster yet, because
I was afraid of confusing you with too many things at once, but you
ought to know now. You can tell for yourselves which side of London it
is on from the name--that is, if you are not very stupid. Yes,
Westminster is on the west side of the City, but what is rather odd is
that once Westminster and London were two separate places with long
green fields and hedges lying between them, but