met nobody. I stood in the slobbered vestibule. From afar I
heard the sluck of the waters against the staples of the wharves, and
the wicked hoot of the tugs.

It was then that a sudden nameless fear seized me; it was that simple
terror that comes from nothing but ourselves. I am not usually afraid of
any man or thing. I am normally nervous, and there are three or four
things that have the power to terrify me. But I am not, I think, afraid.
At that moment, however, I was afraid of everything: of the room I had
left, of the house, of the people, of the inviting lights of the
warehouses and the threatening shoals of the alleys.

I stood a moment longer. Then I raced into Brick Lane, and out into the
brilliance of Commercial Street.

A SCANDINAVIAN NIGHT

SHADWELL

_AT SHADWELL_

_He was a bad, glad sailor-man,
Tan-ta-ta-ran-tan-tare-o!
You never could find a haler man,
Tan-ta-ta-ran-tan-tare!
All human wickedness he knew.
From Millwall Docks to Pi-chi-lu;
He loved all things that make us gay,
He'd spit his juice ten yards away,
And roundly he'd declare--oh!
"It isn't so much that I want the beer
As the bloody good company,
Whow!
Bloody good company!"_

_He loved all creatures--black, brown, white,
Tan-ta-ta-ran-tan-tare-o!
And never a word he'd speak in spite,
Tan-ta-ta-ran-tan-tare!
He knew that we were mortal men
Who sinned and laughed and sinned again;
And never a cruel thing he'd do
At Millwall Docks or Pi-chi-lu;
If you were down he'd make you gay:
He'd spit his juice ten yards away,
And roundly he'd declare--oh!
"It isn't so much that I want yer beer
As yer bloody good company,
Whow!
Bloody good company!"_

A SCANDINAVIAN NIGHT

SHADWELL

One night, when I was ten years old, I was taken by a boy who was old
enough to have known better into the ashy darkness of Shadwell and St.
George's. Along that perilous mile we slipped, with drumming hearts.
Then a warm window greeted us ... voices ... gruff feet ... bits of
strange song ... and then an open door and a sharp slab of mellow light.
With a sense of high adventure we peeped in. Some one beckoned. We
entered. The room was sawdusted as to the floor, littered with wooden
tables and benches. All was sloppy with rings and pools of spent cocoa.
The air was a c