I was desolated, however, that first day of the faggot-laying, even in the midst of my sense of omnipotence, by one thing, which made me give some kicks to the motor:  for it was only crawling, so that a good part of the way I was stalking by its side; and when I came to that hill near the Old Dover Road, the whole thing stopped, and refused to move, the weight of the train being too great for my horse-power traction.  I did not know what to do, and stood there in angry impotence a full half-hour, for the notion of setting up an electric station, with or without automatic stoking-gear, presented so hideous a picture of labour to me, that I would not entertain it.  After a time, however, I thought that I remembered that there was a comparatively new power station in St. Paneras driven by turbines:  and at once, I uncoupled the motor, covered the drays with the tarpaulins, and went driving at singing speed, choosing the emptier by-streets, and not caring whom I crushed.  After some trouble I found, in fact, the station in an obscure by-street made of two long walls, and went in by a window, a rage upon me to have my will quickly accomplished.  I ran up some stairs, across two rooms, into a gallery containing a switch-board, and in the room below saw the works, all very neat-looking, but, as I soon found, very dusty.  I went down, and fixed upon a generating set—­there were three—­that would give a decent load, and then saw that the switch-gear belonging to this particular generator was in order.  I then got some cloths and thoroughly cleaned the dust off the commutators; ran next—­for I was in a strange fierce haste—­and turned the water into the turbines, and away went the engine; I hurried to set the lubricators running on the bearings, and in a couple of minutes had adjusted the speed, and the brushes of the generators, and switched the current on to the line.  By this time, however, I saw that it was getting dark, and feared that little could be done that day; still, I hurried out, the station still running, got into the car, and was off to look for a good electric one, of which there are hosts in the streets, in order at least to clean up and adjust the motor that night.  I drove down three by-streets, till I turned into Euston Road:  but I had no sooner reached it than I pulled up—­with sudden jerk—­with a shout of astonishment.

That cursed street was all lighted up and gay! and three shimmering electric globes, not far apart, illuminated every feature of a ghastly battle-field of dead.

And there was a thing there, the grinning impression of which I shall carry to my grave:  a thing which spelled and spelled at me, and ceased, and began again, and ceased, and spelled at me.  For, above a shop which faced me was a flag, a red flag with white letters, fluttering on the gale the words:  ‘Metcalfe’s Stores’; and beneath the flag, stretched right across the house, was the thing which spelled, letter by letter, in letters of light:  and it spelled two words, deliberately, coming to the end, and going back to recommence: