CHAPTER II
ROADS INTO LONDON
Is it where the glow on the sky is no longer seen that "the country" ends and the influence of London begins? I can scarcely tell even where that is. I have heard that it can be seen from near Colchester; from near Maidstone I have seen it myself. But these "shays" of the larger towns can be caught from very far: I have distinguished that of such a town as Folkestone from nearly thirty miles away.
Speaking a little arbitrarily, we may say that there are three Londons. There is the psychological London, where the London spirit is the note of life, there is the Administrative County, and there is the London of natural causes, the assembly of houses in the basin of the lower Thames.
To where then do the spheres of influence of these three Londons reach out? Frankly, I do not know, and I have asked myself the question many times. The Administrative County includes so little of psychological London. Chislehurst, for instance, psycho-
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