A great review of the People.  Since man came into being did the world ever exhibit a sadder spectacle?

Evening advances; the great ugly building will presently be lighted with innumerable lamps.  Away to the west yonder the heavens are afire with sunset, but at that we do not care to look; never in our lives did we regard it.  We know not what is meant by beauty or grandeur.  Here under the glass roof stand white forms of undraped men and women—­casts of antique statues—­but we care as little for the glory of art as for that of nature; we have a vague feeling that, for some reason or other, antiquity excuses the indecent, but further than that we do not get.

As the dusk descends there is a general setting of the throng towards the open air; all the pathways swarm with groups which have a tendency to disintegrate into couples; universal is the protecting arm.  Relief from the sweltering atmosphere of the hours of sunshine causes a revival of hilarity; those who have hitherto only bemused themselves with liquor now pass into the stage of jovial recklessness, and others, determined to prolong a flagging merriment, begin to depend upon their companions for guidance.  On the terraces dancing has commenced; the players of violins, concertinas, and penny-whistles do a brisk trade among the groups eager for a rough-and-tumble valse; so do the pickpockets.  Vigorous and varied is the jollity that occupies the external galleries, filling now in expectation of the fireworks; indescribable the mingled tumult that roars heavenwards.  Girls linked by the half-dozen arm-in-arm leap along with shrieks like grotesque maenads; a rougher horseplay finds favour among the youths, occasionally leading to fisticuffs.  Thick voices bellow in fragmentary chorus; from every side comes the yell, the eat-call, the ear-rending whistle; and as the bass, the never-ceasing accompaniment, sounds myriad-footed tramp, tramp along the wooden flooring.  A fight, a scene of bestial drunkenness, a tender whispering between two lovers, proceed concurrently in a space of five square yards.—­Above them glimmers the dawn of starlight.

For perhaps the first time in his life Bob Hewett has drunk more than he can well carry.  To Pennyloaf’s remonstrances he answers more and more impatiently:  ‘Why does she talk like a bloomin’ fool?—­ one doesn’t get married every day.’  He is on the look-out for Jack Bartley now; only let him meet Jack, and it shall be seen who is the better man.  Pennyloaf rejoices that the hostile party are nowhere discoverable.  She is persuaded to join in a dance, though every moment it seems to her that she must sink to the ground in uttermost exhaustion.  Naturally she does not dance with sufficient liveliness to please Bob; he seizes another girl, a stranger, and whirls round the six-foot circle with a laugh of triumph.  Pennyloaf’s misery is relieved by the beginning of the fireworks.  Up shoot the rockets, and all the reeking multitude utters a huge ‘Oh’ of idiot admiration.