London in the twentieth century is very unlike Paris in the eighteenth century, or Florence in the fourteenth, if only because it is very difficult for any considerable proportion of the citizens to be gathered under circumstances likely to produce the special 'Psychology of the Crowd.' I have watched two hundred thousand men assembled in Hyde Park for a Labour Demonstration.

The scattered platforms, the fresh air, the wide grassy space, seemed to be an unsuitable environment for the production of purely instinctive excitement, and the attitude of such an assembly in London is good-tempered and lethargic.

A crowd in a narrow street is more likely to get 'out of hand,' and one may see a few thousand men in a large hall reach a state approaching genuine pathological exaltation on an exciting occasion, and when they are in the hands of a practised speaker.

But as they go out of the hall they drop into the cool ocean of London, and their mood is dissipated in a moment.

The mob that took the Bastille would not seem or feel an overwhelming force in one of the business streets of Manchester.