1827.] [ 241 ] 



TRAVELLING SKETCHES ! 

 No. I. 



Travelling in General: Bordeaux Diligence in particular. 



I AM fond of travelling : yet I never undertake a journey without 

 experiencing a vague feeling of melancholy. There is to me something 

 strangely oppressive in the preliminaries of departure. The packing 

 of a small valise ; the settlement of accounts justly pronounced by 

 Rabelais a blue-devilish process ; the regulation of books arid papers ; 

 in short, the whole routine of valedictory arrangements, are to me as 

 a nightmare on the waking spirit. They induce a mood of last wills 

 and testaments a sense of dislocation, which, next to a vacuum, Nature 

 abhors and create a species of moral decomposition, riot unlike that 

 effected on matter by chemical agency. It is not that I have to lament 

 the disruption of social connexions or domestic ties. This, I am aware, is a 

 trial sometimes borne with exemplary fortitude ; and I was lately edified 

 by the magnanimous unconcern with which a married friend of mine sang 

 the last verse of " Home ! sweet home !" as the chaise which was to con- 

 vey him from the burthen, of his song drove up to the door. It does not 

 become a bachelor to speculate on the mysteries of matrimonial philosophy ; 

 but the feeling of pain with which / enter on the task of migration has no 

 affinity with individual sympathies, or even with domiciliary attachments. 

 My landlady is, without exception, the ugliest woman in London ; and 

 the locality of Elbow-lane cannot be supposed absolutely to spell-bind the 

 affection of one occupying, as 1 do, solitary chambers on the third floor. 



The case, it may be supposed, is much worse when it is my lot to take 

 leave, after passing a few weeks at the house of a friend in the country ; 

 a house, for instance, such as is to be met with only in England : with 

 about twenty acres of lawn, but no park ; with a shrubbery, but no made- 

 grounds; with well-furnished rooms, but no conservatory; and with a 

 garden, in which dandy tulips and high-bred anemones do not disdain the 

 fellowship of honest artichokes and laughing cauliflowers no bad illustra- 

 tion of the republican union of comfort with elegance which reigns through 

 the whole establishment. The master of the mansion, perhaps an old and 

 valued schoolfellow : his wife, a well-bred, accomplished, and still beauti- 

 ful woman cordial, without vulgarity refined, without pretension and 

 informed, without a shade of blue ! Their children !. . . .But my reader 

 will complete the picture, and imagine, better than I can describe, how 

 one of my temperament must suffer at quitting such a scene. . At six 

 o'clock on the dreaded morning, the friendly old butler knocks at my room 

 door, to warn me that the mail will pass in half an hour at the end of the 

 green lane. On descending to the parlour, I find that my old friend has, 

 in spite of our over-night agreement and a slight touch of gout, come down 

 to see me off. His amiable lady is pouring out for me a cup of tea 

 assuring me that she would be quite unhappy at allowing me to depart 

 without that indispensable prelude to a journey. A gig waits at the door: 

 my affectionate host will not permit me to walk even half a mile. The 

 minutes pass unheeded ; till, with a face of busy but cordial concern, 

 the old butler reminds me that the mail is at hand. I bid a hasty and 

 agitated farewell, and turn with loathing to the forced companionship of a 

 public vehicle. 



M.M. New Scries, VOL. IV. No, 21. 21 



