18 COMMON INCIDENTS. 



" Comment done?" said I, thrown off my guard by the cool man- 

 ner in which this stranger drew the double inference, that I under- 

 stood French, and was, moreover, a student in medicine. 



What added to my astonishment, was the purity of his French accent, 

 after having previously addressed me in English, as free from foreign 

 idiom or accent, as I could have spoken myself. After some expla- 

 nation, it appeared that my new acquaintance was really a French- 

 man, and had a brother who was a fellow-passenger with me from 

 France, and with whom I had some conversation on board. He was 



a student at the Ecole de , where he had frequently seen me, as 



I certainly had passed a few ' Trimestres' at that college, hot with 

 any professional view, but merely in admiration of the institution. 



My supper now appeared ; and, of necessity, the animal part of my 

 being took the lead in excitement ; further conversation ceased. As 

 the brother of my new acquaintance was for London, it was agreed 

 that we should start by the same coach in the morning. I now 

 availed myself of the professional labours of BOOTS, soliciting one 

 slight deviation from his usual habits, viz. that he should have my 

 boots cleaned and brought to me immediately. I am an. early riser ; 

 and having had occasion to sleep at more inns than one during my 

 life, I have necessarily gone through that agonizing ordeal of rising 

 two hours before you can obtain a hearing of any living soul in the 

 inn, and three hours before the dusky peripatetic has suffered ' DAY'S 

 orient streak' to shine upon your over-night consignment of leather. 

 Something may, and ought to be said of early rising in general, with 

 a view to establish its just position in the scale of society, either as a 

 nuisance or an advantage. 



It is a faculty possessed by comparatively few, when genuinely re- 

 sulting from the pure love of getting up, unallured by expectant 

 excitement, as applies to the huntsman or sportsman uncompelled, 

 as applicable to our various avocations in life. Your real, or, one 

 may say, professional early riser, is a being ' sui generis.' Winter or 

 summer, it is next to impossible for him to lie in bed after his usual 

 hour of rising. He is fidgetty, restless, heated, and excited at the 

 restraint. Illness-alone can detain him in bed; and even illness is 

 much more supportable to him, up and dressed, than imprisoned in a 

 bed ; the object of remaining in which, ceases to exist the moment 

 the propensity to sleep is satisfied. It matters little at what hour 

 such a man goes to bed ; early or late, he will awake at his usual 

 rising hour, even if he have not enjoyed one-fourth of his wonted 

 repose. Now this disposition of feelings requires that the individual 

 should possess a 'sanguine temperament;' a nervous ' appareil/ 

 highly sensitive and imaginative. This the reader may take for 

 granted. Whence else the intense interest, the devoted anxiety, 

 which enchains his attention to that first pale shadow, grey as a gos- 

 samer veil, which hangs for an instant betwixt darkness and day- 

 break : which constrains his eye to dwell still upon the gathering 

 phenomena in the east, as the distant horizon, indented by darkling 

 tree-tops, steals coldly upon his view ; and, as he watches tint after 

 tint, mellow, deeper, and at length blaze into the full effulgence of 

 sun-rise ; think you, he would exchange his feelings and position for 



