Those who witnessed the fires of London in 1940 were occupied with other thoughts and acts than the contemplation of the past. Today remoter skies are aglow, and the quiet and cavernous places of London where busy offices once stood are already planned and regimented for reconstruction. No doubt, as often enough in the past, London will gain functionally if not artistically in the process; the new buildings will be higher and deeper than their predecessors, with air-conditioned basements carried far down into the native clay.