GREAT BRITAIN: Big Black Fog

Tiptoeing cautiously ahead of her automobile a hawk-nosed British dowager in a mink coat prowled down the middle of the street. ''Come on, Oscar, come on, we seem to be in the Strand!" cried she.

It was the worst fog England has seen for years, blanketing not only London but an area of 8,000 square miles. (Total area of England 50,327 sq. mi.; Scotland 30,405; Wales 8,016.) Two steps off the curb pedestrians were completely lost. Conductors carrying great sizzling gasoline flares stalked like old-time linkboys ahead of their buses. Many a scarlet omnibus caught fire from the heat of repeatedly jammed brakes. A pair of wild ducks, lost and dizzy, dropped quacking disconsolately in the middle of the Strand. Rail traffic was paralyzed. A Wimbledon train sat on a siding for hours while fog-bound commuters, jamming every compartment, sang "Who's Afraid of the Big Black Fog?"