Two Little Pilgrims' Progress by Frances Hodgson Burnett

The crowd in the dépôt surged into the streets, and melted into and became an addition to the world of people there. The pavements were moving masses of human beings, the centres of the streets were pandemoniums of wagons and vans, street cars, hotel omnibuses, and carriages. The brilliant morning sunlight dazzled the children's eyes; the roar of wheels and the clamor of car bells, of clattering horses' feet, of cries and shouts and passing voices, mingled in a volume of sound that deafened them. The great tidal wave of human life and work and pleasure almost took them off their feet.

They knew too little of cities to have had beforehand any idea of what the overwhelming rush and roar would be, and what slight straws they would feel themselves upon the current. If they had been quite ordinary children, they might well have been frightened. But they were not ordinary children, little as they were aware of that important factor in their young lives. They were awed for this first moment, but, somehow, they were fascinated as much as they were awed, while they stood for a brief breathing-space looking on. They did not know-no child of their ages can possibly know such things of him or herself-that Nature had made them of the metal out of which she moulds strong things and great ones.