Here the change that new conditions and requirements had wrought was more immediately noticeable than anywhere else in the West End.

Most of the shops on the western side had been cleared away, and in their place had been installed an "open-air" cafe, converting the long alley into a sort of promenade tea-garden, flanked on one side by a line of haberdashers', perfumers', and jewellers' show windows.

The patrons of the cafe could sit at the little round tables, drinking their coffee and syrups and aperitifs, and gazing, if they were so minded, at the pyjamas and cravats and Brazilian diamonds spread out for inspection before them.

A string orchestra, hidden away somewhere in a gallery, was alternating grand opera with the Gondola Girl and the latest gems of Transatlantic melody.

From around the tightly-packed tables arose a babble of tongues, made up chiefly of German, a South American rendering of Spanish, and a North American rendering of English, with here and there the sharp shaken-out staccato of Japanese.