midday
But with Penge I associate my first realisations of the wonder and beauty of twilight and night , the effect of dark walls reflecting lamplight , and the mystery of blue haze-veiled hillsides of houses , the glare of shops by night , the glowing steam and streaming sparks of railway trains and railway signals lit up in the darkness . My first rambles in the evening occurred at Penge -- I was becoming a big and independent-spirited boy -- and I began my experience of smoking during these twilight prowls with the threepenny packets of American cigarettes then just appearing in the world . My life centred upon the City Merchants School . Usually I caught the eight-eighteen for Victoria , I had a midday meal and tea ; four nights a week I stayed for preparation , and often I was not back home again until within an hour of my bedtime . I spent my half holidays at school in order to play cricket and football . This , and a pretty voracious appetite for miscellaneous reading which was fostered by the Penge Middleton Library , did not leave me much leisure for local topography . On Sundays also I sang in the choir at St. Martin 's Church , and my mother did not like me to walk out alone on the Sabbath afternoon , she herself slumbered , so that I wrote or read at home .