Nobody Lives

A diary extract by Samuel Pepys for July, 2007

July 2007 (not, it seemeth, January 1684). So, up at 5 0’clock, proposing to breakfast, hence to river and thence to Temple Stairs and the frost fair. The month, being mightily bitter, I dress accordingly and venture forth but am sorely troubled perceiving nothing I recognise and finding the ayre unseasonably hot as though the entire globe were suddenly minded to warm.

About my ears the clamour of horseless carriages rushing past post-haste and the deafening din of unseemly musique, nowise like Purcell, resounding from hostelries. I observe no known places or faces, no ice on the river whose banks appear crowded with strangers in foolish apparel and monstrous buildings, one like a great eye gazing down, another resembling an upright cucumber, one even domed like a giant mushroom! Greatly afeared I hasten homeward desirous of meeting ought familiar, even my wife!