BRITAIN: Lynne O'Donnell joined the crowds in London watching David Blaine
David Blaine has become a lightning rod for British behaviour. Encased for the past fortnight in a perspex box suspended above dusty, sun-scorched parkland in the lee of London's Tower Bridge, he is attempting to notch up 44 days in deprived isolation.
Yesterday, Blaine (30), a magician, began to display the first signs of depression since his public exercise in endurance and self-promotion began on September 5th.
Having gone without food and with only water to drink, Mr Blaine can soon be expected to start hallucinating as he continues to lose body mass and his internal organs react to the extended lack of nutrition.
"It is the interaction between the physiological and the psychological that is causing mood swings and depression," said Dr John Potter, of the centre for leadership at the University of Exeter.
"That will be compensated with extreme highs, he will swing up and down. And then hallucinations will begin at the 21-day mark, or maybe even before."
An expert on the psychology of hostages, Dr Potter said that Mr Blaine's depression had set in later than expected, probably due to the attention he was drawing from the crowds that have gathered beneath his box around the clock since his performance began.
Indeed, Mr Blaine has created a sensation in London, attracting people from across Britain and adding an attraction for tourists who have been enjoying unseasonably glorious weather.
Traffic begins to build on Tower Bridge and its approaches around midday, and crowds swell towards evening as people gather on the southern bank of the Thames to look at Mr Blaine.
Yesterday, the former Beatle, Sir Paul McCartney, joined the thinner morning pack, only to create a fracas of his own when he objected to having his photograph taken.
It all adds to an atmosphere charged as much with confusion as curiosity.
Few people seem to know exactly why Mr Blaine has chosen to live in a plastic see-through box in their midst for so long. Some mistakenly think he is raising money for charity. Some suspect that, because he calls himself an illusionist, that there is some trick involved. "Perhaps it's not him, he's not even there," said Mary from Putney.
While there is little to see and even less to watch, Mr Blaine does make compelling viewing. He passes his time watching the crowd and occasionally waving to well-wishers holding up banners of support. He writes in a diary, drinks water from a large plastic bottle, performs his bodily functions as discreetly as possible beneath a blanket, and sleeps. Upon waking, he is often greeted with a roar of approval from the crowd.
Reactions to Mr Blaine's presence have ranged from the idolatry afforded the modern celebrity, to admiration for his powers of endurance, to hostility that echoes the medieval tomato-throwers who targeted criminals in stocks. Tossing eggs at Mr Blaine's encasement became so popular early in his stunt that one enterprising Londoner set up a stall selling eggs. Mr Blaine has inspired young women to bare their breasts, young men to bare their bottoms, and groups of schoolgirls to chant his name in unison.
One man used a remote-controlled miniature helicopter to drop a cheeseburger on top of the box, and another climbed a supporting scaffold with the intention of cutting the cable that suspends it.
A Sunday newspaper sponsored an open-air barbecue to taunt Mr Blaine with the aroma of frying onions. A barman at a nearby pub said turnover was up £2,000 a week thanks to Mr Blaine.
The Heaths, a retired couple who caught the train from their home in the north of England, were fascinated by the endurance element of the performance, Mr John Heath in particular as he recalled a similar feat in the 1920s by an English illusionist who was so sickened by the ordeal "that all the money he raised from the half-crown people paid to watch him had to be spent on his care in hospital after".
Sitting on a wooden bench a few metres from Mr Blaine's box, Mrs Joan Heath peered through her binoculars and said: "He's quite a good looking fellow. I wish I was young again."
Tony and Lee caught the bus in from Crystal Palace and swapped cynical jibes as they shared a bottle of Scotch.
"We're taking him down the Chinese later," Tony said. "Was at the Indian last night. Six pints of beer, couple of gin-and-tonics. I thought he could drink more than that. That's why he's asleep - he's drunk."
Mr Blaine's previous public feats of endurance have been in New York and include standing on a pedestal for a few days, burying himself in a glass coffin and encasing himself in ice.