10 MY LIFE [Chap. 



"A Riddle. 



" Doctor, Doctor, tell me can you cure 

 Or say what 'tis I ail? I'm feverish sure ! 

 Sometimes I'm very hot, and sometimes warm, 

 Sometimes again I'm cool, yet feel no harm. 

 Part bird, part beast, and vegetable part, 

 Cut, slash'd, and wounded yet I feel no smart. 

 I have a skin, which though but thin and slender, 

 Yet proves to me a powerful defender. 

 When stript of that, so desperate is my case, 

 I'm oft devoured in half an hour's space." 



One more enigma in my father's writing is interesting 

 because founded on a custom common in my youth, but 

 which has now wholly passed away. 



" Kitty, a fair but frozen maid, 



Kindled a flame I still deplore, 

 The hood-wink'd Boy was called in aid 



So fatal to my suit before. 

 Tell me, ye fair, this urchin's name 



Who still mankind annoys ; 

 Cupid and he are not the same, 

 Though each can raise or quench a flame, 



And both are hood-wink'd boys." 



My sister told me (and from what followed it was pretty 

 certainly the case) that while he remained a bachelor my 

 father lived up to his income or very nearly so ; and from 

 what we know of his after life this did not imply any extrava- 

 gance or luxurious habits, but simply that he enjoyed himself 

 in London and the country, living at the best inns or board- 

 ing-houses, and taking part in the amusements of the period, 

 as a fairly well-to-do, middle-class gentleman. 



After his marriage in 1807 he lived in Marylebone, and 

 his ordinary household expenses, of course, increased ; and as 

 by 1 8 10 he had two children and the prospect of a large 

 family, he appears to have felt the necessity of increasing his 

 income. Having neglected the law so long, and probably 

 having a distaste for it, he apparently thought it quite hope- 

 less to begin to practise as a solicitor, and being entirely 

 devoid of business habits, allowed himself to be persuaded into 



