Night Walks
Some years ago, a temporary inability to sleep, referable to a distressing impression, caused me to walk about the streets all night, for a series of several nights.
The walk
The month was March, and the weather damp, cloudy, and cold. Dickens went out at about half past twelve and came home tired at sunrise. Those nights, he writes, finished his education in “a fair amateur experience of houselessness.”
His route takes in the river, the two great theatres, Newgate, Bethlehem Hospital and Westminster Bridge. At Waterloo Bridge he paid the halfpenny toll for the excuse to say good night to the toll-keeper and catch a glimpse of his fire.
The line
“would walk and walk and walk, seeing nothing but the interminable tangle of streets”
Right angles only: blocks, corners, and once a street taken back the way it came.