As London's residents sleep, a deep layer of snow falls all over the city. It muffles every sound and disguises every shape, seemingly falling without end. Eventually, it stops, though it is seven inches thick on the ground. In the morning, Londoners wake up, shaken out of their sleep by the bright white snow. They find themselves in an unearthly landscape, gazing at the bright, quiet city. The snow completely muffles urban sounds like carts passing and footsteps, and it makes people's voices sound quiet and strange.
But the speaker does hear a group of boys on their way to school, shouting as they play in the snow. They dive into snowdrifts up to their knees, make snowballs, and taste the snow. They also look up and yell at one another to pay attention to the snow-covered tree branches overhead. The few carts that are on the road aren't carrying much, and they creak past on their way out of town. The dome of St. Paul's Cathedral shines under the winter sun, which ignites morning activity with its light.
People open their doors and begin to fight their way through the snow, trying their best to get to work, though they have to forge a path just to walk. Even so, their minds are carefree, liberated from day-to-day concerns by the beauty of the snow. Because of this, they seem to have broken a kind of spell or seen through an illusion—that of labor, industry, and urban life.
