132 My Lodgings: a Sketch from Life. [ Aue. 
deep in the calf of hisleft leg. With the exception of these trifles, the 
representatives of Mars and Apollo are both on good terms with each 
other; for the bard, being high in poetic favour with “La Belle Assemblée,” 
and sometimes even contributing to the “ Literary Gazette,” is looked 
on by the warrior as a Chatterton, and brought forward to corroborate 
his hypothesis, that genius is too often neglected. For my own part, I 
should think more highly of his genius were it less periodical in its 
display ; but, somehow or other, I am almost daily compelled to admire 
it, just ten minutes before dinner, when he “ drops in,” to use his own 
expression, merely to discuss a metaphysical point with me (in a coat 
out at the elbows) upon the merits of Donne, Cowley, and the poets of 
that school. This, you'll allow, is dreadful ! 
In the attic opposite the minstrel lives—I should say, lived—a most 
prepossessing Spanish lady, 4 widow, with her only daughter, Leonora— 
a pretty, simple little girl, aged sixteen, with tender pensive black eyes, 
shrouded by finely-pencilled dark lashes ; an exquisitely-formed mouth, 
sylph-like figure, and voice the “ most musical, most melancholy "ek 
ever yet heard. This last family came to us about four months since, 
just at the time when Cadiz surrendered to Prince Hilt. Their gentle- 
ness, their melancholy, their subdued unobtrusive bearing, and, above 
all, a certain innate sense of decorum that characterized every thing they 
did or said, endeared them to the whole house, and convinced all who 
saw them that they had once known better days. At first they lived on 
a small pittance, which my landlady (an admirable politician) discovered 
was paid them weekly; but about a month after their arrival even this 
ceased, and they were then compelled to earn a subsistence by needle- 
work. It was a pleasant thing, I remember, and one that I can never 
recal without a sigh, to see Leonora, with all the elastic cheerfulness of 
youth and innocence, trip up and down stairs in the morning to prepare 
her mother’s breakfast, and give me, as she passed my room-door towards 
the kitchen, the usual daily welcome. To all of us she had something 
pleasant to say (she could not, if she had. tried, look otherwise than 
good-natured); yet, notwithstanding the cheerfulness thus excited by 
her presence, an impression, I know not why it was, at times came 
over us that she was not long for earth. P 
To people in the same situation with myself, I need not say that in 
lodgings—when once you are fairly housed—there is a sort of free- 
masonry established: such as the interchange of various kind offices, the 
loan of divers little household necessaries, together with those expres- 
sive courtesies, which keep up, as it were, a perpetual good-humour among 
the lodgers. At the same time, the strictest regulations with respect to 
rank are practised and enforced by the landlady. The aristocracy, for 
instance, or patrician portion of the house, are those who live on the 
ground floor (the furniture and internal economy of which are of supe- 
rior character) ; the next in rank are the tenants of the first, then come 
those of the second story, and lastly, the natives of the attic, each of 
whom sports but one room, and is, consequently, in my landlady’s phrase, 
“no gentleman.” Leonora and her mother were both in this last pre- 
dicament. Not that it mattered much whether they were “ gentlemen” 
or no (indeed I am inclined to think they were not, from the circum- 
stance of their being of the wrong sex), but that they must, as a matter 
of course, suffer the neglect attached o those who, instead of dwelling 
