was released from his engagement, and he immediately went
abroad, alone. He travelled through Normandy into Brittany, spending
two months at a little village called Chanteuil, not far from the
Point du Sillon. Here he wandered about mostly alone, dressed in
the roughest possible costume, and allowing his beard to grow. "At
Chanteuil I first learnt how to think, or rather how to converse with
myself as I had before done with other persons; I also found for the
first time that I did not dislike my own company."

In June he went south, sailing from Brest to Bordeaux, and then
descending by land into Spain, where he remained till August. Here he
spent a long time in exploring the table-land between the Asturian
Mountains and the sea, and then from Burgos visiting Madrid, Toledo,
Ciudad, and Seville, and so to Gibraltar. From Gibraltar he sailed
up the south-east coast, and settled himself for another month at a
little village called Benigarcia, about five miles east of Sorrion,
on the river Mijares. In November he sailed by Minorca, starting from
Barcelona, to Sicily, and spent the rest of the year in the north of
Italy, sailing from Sicily to Genoa, and settling at a village called
Riviglio, not very far from Verona. He was obliged to adopt this
plan of settling, as his exchequer was not large. From this place
he visited Venice on foot, and early in the year visited Rome and
Florence, sailing from Ancona in March for Spalatro, and worked up
through Hungary to a little place called Bochnia, on the Vistula,
down which river he went by boat to Konigsberg, staying in
Warsaw a few weeks. Once on the Baltic, he hired a fishing-boat, and
spent a month in cruising about, during which time he discovered, or
rather unearthed, an island, which formed the subject of the only
letter he wrote to me during his entire absence.

"Copenhagen, June, 1876.

"My dear Carr,

"I am writing this on board the fishing-smack _Paradys_, which is at
this moment lying in Copenhagen Roads, being myself owner by hire and
supercargo of the same. The first object of my note is to assure you
of my existence, as your letter which was forwarded after me to
Danzig seemed to imply uncertainty on that point, and moreover
expressed a strange solicitude as to my well-being which was by no
means unpleasing to me; then to request you to perform several small
commissions for me....

"Lastly, to tell you of a very curious adventure I met with. Some
weeks a