冬夜

　　I seem to recall best a journey we made by tram one winter night.

　　We were going to visit my Granny at Westoe, and I was very excited, because an evening excursion was something quite unheard of for me. It had been raining; the gas lamps lit the gleaming pavements and cobbles with a doubled radiance. The shaking tram wires were sending down showers of white raindrops. Everything in the ram seemed fresh and glittering. The breezy windows sparkled with long zigzags of rain and the passing street lamp flared gorgeously through the panels of blue and yellow and ruby glass. Outside, it was cold and windy, and we could feel the gale buffeting against the side of the tram, making it sway and lurch ore than usual, and throwing the passengers of song, and the fresh, clean, cold sea-wind was blowing right through the upper deck. Above, a high half-moon seemed to be skidding along on its back through piles of black, white-lined rags. It was a wild night, with a sense of magic in the offing. The people in the tram did not like ordinary mortals; a kind of exhilaratinggaietyhadseizedthem,anditseseememed to lighten their bodies and illuminate their faces. At times I was sure we were really flying.