IN LONDON NOW.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 60, Issue 31, 16 November 1939, Page 4

IN LONDON NOW.

STROLLING ACROSS PICCADILLY! SILENCE SAID TO BE UNCANNY. WOMEN ESCHEW COLOURED DRESSES. London in war time, with its blackouts, its lightless vehicles, its sandbags and its uncanny silence, is described interestingly in a letter which an Ashburton resident has received from a friend in the great city. Women have given up wearing coloured dresses, the writer states, preferring black and navy blue. Colours are not popular. “You would not recognise London now,” the writer says. “I was there on Friday, a lovely, still, golden day. Regent Street was empty except for about 15 people (including A.R.P. Wardens), one bus and a cart containing radishes, carrots and cabbages. Overhead, against the clear blue sky were the motionless silver barrage balloons like great gleaming zeppelins, and sandbags were piled against every shop. “The silence is most restful, but very uncanny, and more so was the {act that I actually strobed straight across Piccadilly without looking for traffic or stopping even for a ouyclc. Horses and carts will be coming back soon as all cars except those used foi State work have bad to be given up, and those others are allowed only live gallons of petrol a month ! Everyone carries <a gas mask, which must bo worn over the shoulder, so the shops are doing ivell in selling waterproof eases, though colours aren’t popular. We all tend to stick to black or navy blue. Blackness of the Black-out. “There is no lighting up now, and the nightly black-out is the blackest thing I have every struck. My white coat comes in useful in avoiding collisions, and the men carry lighted cigarettes, but no torches can bei used. •Car and cycle'lamps are completely covered, except for the merest slit. All the tubes are without lights except for a dim blue glimmer- here and there, and it is perfectly horrible feeling your way along those passages and up the stairs. “We have all been hectically hunting out evqry curtain we possess, as even one tiny glimmer of light from a window means a £5, fine.” The Refugee Children. The writer goes on to refer to the evacuation of children from London and says that the town she lives in, in Berkshire, is crowded, with refugees. “We have two small boys billeted here, Charles, 11 years, and John 9 years. They are dears and come from sort of orphanage. I have never seen anything so enchanting as their faces when they had fried eggs for the first time.” It is also stated that the country people cannot refuse .to take the evacuated people. “We have already had one air raid warning down here while London has had three, but the planes didn’t cross the coast,” the letter continues. “Considering that most of the planes travel 300 miles an hour it would take them only a couple of minutes before they were over London from the south coast, if they ever crossed l the Channel, so that people have to be nippy in getting down the cellars or A.R.P. shelters. There are notices all over London directing, to the nearest shelter and every other shop in Regent ■Street or Oxford Street has a place for 30 to 50 people to shelter in. “But we all keep cheerful, though a bit subdued, I think. The people are awfully serious. I am terribly glad New Zealand and Australia werei the first of anybody to rally to us.”