Esoteric London

Old Cavendish Street, London, W1. Photo ©RogerDean 2013

Living London, Its Work And Its Play, Its Humour And Its Pathos, Its Sights And Its Scenes – George R. Sims (Editor), 1900:

LIGHTING LONDON – DESMOND YOUNG

If one could only hover in a balloon over Central London as night falls! To see, as the man with the long stick makes his round and switches are turned on and levers pulled behind the scenes, the transformation scene gradually unfold and the myriad lights spurt out of the grey gloom beneath: the sinuous Thames become outlined by moonlike arc lamps; the bridges start up as if set pieces of fireworks; Leicester Square assert itself as the hub of Pleasure London in a blaze of bluish-white refulgence, more than ever eclipsing its sedate neighbour, Trafalgar Square; long lines of stars shoot out from the busy, pulsing heart below, radiating in all directions, beginning with steady white orbs and fading away in glimmering specks of yellowish luminosity – what a picture it would be!