only one poet for me--the divine--" and then he mentioned a name which I
had only once heard, and afterwards quite forgotten; the same mentioned
by the snorer in the field. "Ah! there is no one like him!" murmured
some more of the company; "the poet of nature--of nature without its
vulgarity." I wished very much to ask these people whether they were
ever bad sleepers, and whether they had read the poet, so called, from a
desire of being set to sleep. Within a few days, however, I learnt that
it had of late become very fashionable and genteel to appear half asleep,
and that one could exhibit no better mark of superfine breeding than by
occasionally in company setting one's rhomal organ in action. I then
ceased to wonder at the popularity, which I found nearly universal, of ---
's poetry; for, certainly in order to make one's self appear sleepy in
company, or occasionally to induce sleep, nothing could be more
efficacious than a slight prelection of his poems. So poor Byron, with
his fire and emotion--to say nothing of his mouthings and coxcombry--was
dethroned, as I prophesied he would be more than twenty years before, on
the day of his funeral, though I had little idea that his humiliation
would have been brought about by one, whose sole strength consists in
setting people to sleep. Well, all things are doomed to terminate in
sleep. Before that termination, however, I will venture to prophesy that
people will become a little more awake--snoring and yawning be a little
less in fashion--and poor Byron be once more reinstated on his throne,
though his rival will always stand a good chance of being worshipped by
those whose ruined nerves are insensible to the narcotic powers of opium
and morphine.

CHAPTER XXIII

Drivers and Front Outside Passengers--Fatigue of Body and Mind--Unexpected
Greeting--My Inn--The Governor--Engagement.

I continued my journey, passing through one or two villages. The day was
exceedingly hot, and the roads dusty. In order to cause my horse as
little fatigue as possible, and not to chafe his back, I led him by the
bridle, my doing which brought upon me a shower of remarks, jests, and
would-be witticisms from the drivers and front outside passengers of
sundry stage-coaches which passed me in one direction or the other. In
this way I proceeded till considerably past noon, when I felt myself very
fatigued, and my horse appeared no less so; and it is probable that the
lazy and listl