The next morning, after breakfast, Hogarth went down old Thring Street, and spent a penny for a notebook. But this was no day for interest in stationery; for under the projecting first-floor of the paper-shop were newspaper placards bearing such words as: THE EARTH IN DANGER -- SHALL WE PERISH TONIGHT? ." . . colossal . . ." - H.G. Wells ." . . a flaming genius . . ." - Hugh Walpole ." . . amazing ideas, wild originality, genius . . ." - J.B. Priestley