The weather in London was mild and clear.  The third evening after I had got settled in one of those delightfully English hotels in the heart of the city, yet removed from the traffic, with letter-boxes that still bear the initials of Victoria, I went to visit some American naval officers in their sitting-room on the ground floor.  The cloth had not been removed from the dinner-table, around which we were chatting, when a certain strange sound reached our ears—­a sound not to be identified with the distant roar of the motor-busses in Pall Mall, nor with the sharp bark of the taxi-horns, although not unlike them.  We sat listening intently, and heard the sound again.

“The Germans have come,” one of the officers remarked, as he finished his coffee.  The other looked at his watch.  It was nine o’clock.  “They must have left their lines about seven,” he said.

In spite of the fact that our newspapers at home had made me familiar with these aeroplane raids, as I sat there, amidst those comfortable surroundings, the thing seemed absolutely incredible.  To fly one hundred and fifty miles across the Channel and southern England, bomb London, and fly back again by midnight!  We were going to be bombed!  The anti-aircraft guns were already searching the sky for the invaders.  It is sinister, and yet you are seized by an overwhelming curiosity that draws you, first to pull aside the heavy curtains of the window, and then to rush out into the dark street both proceedings in the worst possible form!  The little street was deserted, but in Pall Mall the dark forms of busses could be made out scurrying for shelter, one wondered where?  Above the roar of London, the pop pop pop! of the defending guns could be heard now almost continuously, followed by the shrieks and moans of the shrapnel shells as they passed close overhead.  They sounded like giant rockets, and even as rockets some of them broke into a cascade of sparks.  Star shells they are called, bursting, it seemed, among the immutable stars themselves that burned serenely on.  And there were other stars like November meteors hurrying across space—­the lights of the British planes scouring the heavens for their relentless enemies.  Everywhere the restless white rays of the searchlights pierced the darkness, seeking, but seeking in vain.  Not a sign of the intruders was to be seen.  I was induced to return to the sitting-room.

“But what are they shooting at?” I asked.

“Listen,” said one of the officers.  There came a lull in the firing and then a faint, droning noise like the humming of insects on a still summer day.  “It’s all they have to shoot at, that noise.”

“But their own planes?” I objected.

“The Gotha has two engines, it has a slightly different noise, when you get used to it.  You’d better step out of that window.  It’s against the law to show light, and if a bomb falls in the street you’d be filled with glass.”  I overcame my fascination and obeyed.  “It isn’t only the bombs,” my friend went on, “it’s the falling shrapnel, too.”