1832.] The Inconveniences of an Independence. 573 



The sporting 1 season was now approaching, and the streets of London 

 emptying- of the fashionable and fortunate inhabitants. I migrated, as 



in etiquette bound, and was announced in the departures from 's 



Hotel, " on a sporting tour," which meant, that having no "box" or estate 

 of my own, and being unshackled by any pressing invitation, I was going 

 to make the circuit of my country friends, with only my gun and portman- 

 teau, and trust to their hospitality for dogs and a dormitory. But before 

 Christmas had well arrived, I grew weary of and disgusted at being- a 

 continual guest, though I had been" received with a cordial welcome where- 

 ever I had visited, and once more came up to London, to vegejtate in its 

 smoky atmosphere and stony (or rather brick) boundaries. I had now 

 need to economize ; and accordingly took furnished lodgings, ad with a 

 year's income in advance, commenced "single gentleman." 



This was the beginning of my misery. I was surrounded by (millions I 

 was about to say) thousands of my fellow-creatures, and yet a sailor 

 on a desolate island was not more solitary than I. While every body at 

 this festive season of the year seemed to partake more or less of the 

 general hospitality, I felt an outcast, and would fain have joined my 

 landlady's family party, that assembled in the best parlour, lent them for 

 that purpose by a fellow-lodger. I became a regular, staid, and retired man 

 a melancholic bachelor. My mode of life was this : I rose about twelve 

 at noon, generally with a head-ache, always with a languor, after passing 

 a restless and almost sleepless night. I lounged over my solitary and taste- 

 less meal for an hour ; then, if it were fine, I walked out to see the same 

 shops, and the same " new" prints and songs, and read the title-pages of 

 the same books, always " just published," and returned home, wearied, but 

 not wanting rest, to my dinner ; took a glass of wine and a nap afterwards, 

 and with coffee and a novel closed my joyless day. 



It formed a part of my occupation as an idler, to visit every " sight " 

 and new wonder in the town. I knew every object, as per catalogue, in 

 every panorama, attended the auctions, and saw every exhibition that was 

 placarded on the walls of the metropolis, or puffed in the columns of the 

 newspaper. I felt quite tired at seeing daily the boards announcing the 

 opening of the " new exhibition," for months after I had seen it ; and 

 equally amazed at the perseverance of the proprietors, and the prolonged 

 curiosity of the public. I always made one of the crowd to witness the 

 opening of the new view in the Diorama, and of course regularly saw each 

 view twice) the proprietors of that scenic exhibition changing their views, 

 as my respected grand-parent did the glasses of her spectacles, by one at a 

 time. Still I made shift to enjoy, or, more properly speaking, endure, a 

 town life for more than a year. I had a few books, and could sketch, and 

 once attempted a course of study ; but my object being only to kill time, 

 I found it too hard work, so I had recourse to the circulating library, which 

 proved for a long time an unfailing fund of amusement. I plied its con- 

 tents, however, so assiduously during a long winter, that I at length 

 exhausted all its stores, with which I desired to be, or had not before 

 been acquainted ; and the scanty supply of new books that were readable 

 soon made me again a bankrupt in regard to amusement. I cannot forbear 

 stating a trifling distinction that I attained, it being the first of any sort 

 since those ordinary ones at college, and that was my name being almost 

 invariably the first on the librarian's book for the new novel. 



Spring returned, and summer came on, and the town grew thinner, and 



