I was, however, glad to find that tea was not condemned as entirely useless, and I thoroughly enjoyed this third and last meal of the day, after which I was taken out to explore posthumous Dublin, now called Andersonia. Once, when paying a flying visit to St. Petersburg, I was much struck by the large scale upon which all the principal streets and buildings were planned, and when I arrived in London, not very long after this, I felt positively relieved at the sight of the comparatively narrow and dingy London streets and buildings, and the sense of glare and unreality which made itself palpable in St. Petersburg promptly vanished in the atmosphere of London smoke.
Yellow-ochred palaces, lime-washed theatres, golden domes, and gaudy blue and white and gilt churches appealed less to my fancy than did the solid stone beauties of London architecture, grimy though they might be.
In looking upon Andersonia I was forcibly reminded of both the cities just mentioned. There were the same large, open squares, revealing broad, avenue-lined streets planned with mathematical exactitude, and the same huge buildings that I had noticed in St. Petersburg. But there was also the same solidity, freedom from glare, and honesty of composition, which roused my admiration when looking upon some of London’s magnificent stone buildings. Here, however, were examples of architecture such as I had never before seen the like of for magnificence, and it was no detriment to their beauty that they were unsullied by smoke or dirt.
This seemed a very large city, and must have contained a numerous population, yet not one smoking chimney did I see. The weather was delightfully mild, but of course heat was necessary for cooking. In my ideas, a fire was just as necessarily associated with smoke, and I expressed my surprise at its evident absence. Considerably to my astonishment, I had some difficulty in making myself understood, but, in the end, mutual enlightenment was the result of our confabulations.
Electricity was made so thoroughly subservient to human will that it supplied light, heat, and powers of volition, besides being made to perform nearly every conceivable domestic use. So well were the elements analysed and understood here that thunderstorms were unknown, and the force which yearly used to slay numbers of people was now attracted, cooped, and subjugated to human necessities.