thawing at any period of the long watch. The
deputy came up once (about nine o'clock at
night), evidently expecting to find me sunk
in a dangerous sleep, as people are supposed
to sink when exposed to cold for any long
period in elevated positions; but, finding me
brisk and lively, and being told by me to go
and brew half-a-gallon of egg-hot, he
descended the long winding staircase very
cheerfully.

My object in exposing myself all those
hours in such an elevated cage on a
winter's night was not to gratify any lunatic
whim (although I pride myself upon having
that slight tinge of insanity which gives a
spice and flavour to a man), nor was it for
the purpose of scientific experiment; but
simply to see the aspects of the night from
hour to hour, and, under new circumstances,
faraway from convivial atmospheres (of which
I have had enough) and my family circle (of
which I have not had enough) to witness in a
peculiar solitude—in the world but not of the
world—the death of that old, rotten, bankrupt
swindling year that has just past; the year
upon which we all turn our backs with little
sorrow and regret, and to witness the birth
of that other new, untried year that we have
just reached, and which, I fear, we turn our
faces to with little hope.

I am a conscientious man; and, although I
know that in a great degree I have my public
in my hands, (for few men are likely to test
my experiences by a similar experiment, and
if they were so disposed, no two nights are
the same throughout the year) still I will not
abuse the trust confided in me; but will, to
the best of my ability, record what I saw and
felt on the borders of cloud-land without
exaggeration.

The Monument is not the highest building
in London—as every Londoner knows—but
it has the advantage of being very central;
its outer gallery, or cage, extending over the
column all round, gives you the feeling—not
an unpleasant one—of being entirely
unsupported from below, as if in the car of a
balloon; and, while it is high enough to impress
you with a firm belief in your immeasurable
superiority to your diminutive fellow-worms
beneath, it is not so lofty that it quite
removes you from all sympathy with the doings
and movements of those very contemptible,
but very interesting creatures to whom you
belong.

Ascending on this winter's afternoon at
four o'clock, I find the City—from north to
west, and from west to south—half encircled
by a high, black, dense wall, just above
which shines the golden cross which
surmounts Saint Paul's Cathedral. Fog and
cloud this wall may be; but what a noble
barrier it is! rising high into those purple
heavens, in which the imagination may see
more forms of golden palaces, and thrones,
and floating forms than ever Martin dreamed
of in his sleep, and which, when his feeble
pencil endeavoured to put them upon canvas,
with all their beauty, height, and breadth,
and depth, degenerated into an earthly
Vauxhall Gardens sticking in the air. Keep
all the masterpieces of Turner—or any of the
great colourists—down between the close
walls of the City, but do not bring them
up here to be shamed into insignificance by
the glow of Nature. Then, the veil of fog and
mist which covers half the City like a sea,
and under which you hear the murmur and
feel the throbbing of the teeming life—see it
float away like the flowing skirts of an
archangel's robe, revealing churches, bridges,
mansions, docks, shipping, river, streets, and
men, and tell me, lover of the picturesque,
and dweller in the valley of coughs and
respirators, wouldst thou give up this fog with
all its ever-changing, glowing, Rembrandt-like
effects, for all the brilliant, clear blue
monotony of the vaunted Italian sky, and
all the sharply defined outline and cleanly
insipidity of Italian palaces? For the
love of art and nature, say " Never! " like
a man,

The puppet men now hurry to and fro,
lighting up the puppet shops; which cast a
warm, rich glow upon the pavement. A cross
of dotted lamps springs into light, the four
arms of which are the four great thoroughfares
from the City. Red lines of fire come
out behind black, solid, sullen masses of
building, and spires of churches stand out in
strong dark relief at the side of busy streets.
Up in the house-tops, under green-shaded
lamps, you may see the puppet clerks turning
quickly over the clean, white fluttering pages
of puppet day-books and ledgers; and, from
east to west, you see the long silent river,
glistening here and there with patches of
reddish light, even through the looped steeple
of the church of Saint Magnus the Martyr.
Then, in a wide circle of light round the
city, dart out little nebulous clusters of
homes, some of them high up in the air,
mingling in appearance with the stars of
heaven; some with one lamp, some with
two or more; some yellow and some red;
and some looking like bunches of fiery
grapes in the congress of twinkling suburbs.
Then the bridges throw up their arched
lines of lamps, like the illuminated garden-
walks at Cremorne—like the yellow buttons
on the page's jacket, or the round brass-
headed nails in a coffin.

Meantime the roar of the great city goes
steadily on—the noise of voices—the rumble
of carts—the bells on the land and river—the
crash and clinking of chains falling from
heavy cranes into paved yards—the
distant  shriek and whistle of the engines
on the railway, and the barking of dogs.
Then another sense is regaled with the
smell of warm grains from breweries, the
roasting of coffee, and the frying of numerous
herrings.

The different clocks have, by this time,