most pleasing
impressions of it on my mind, and the idea of a pedestrian excursion,
particularly among the mountains, has from this time seemed delightful.

It was only in my happiest days that I travelled on foot, and ever with
the most unbounded satisfaction; afterwards, occupied with business and
encumbered with baggage, I was forced to act the gentleman and employ a
carriage, where care, embarrassment, and restraint, were sure to be my
companions, and instead of being delighted with the journey, I only
wished to arrive at the place of destination.

I was a long time at Paris, wishing to meet with two companions of
similar dispositions, who would each agree to appropriate fifty guineas
of his property and a year of his time to making the tour of Italy on
foot, with no other attendance than a young fellow to carry our
necessaries; I have met with many who seemed enchanted with the project,
but considered it only as a visionary scheme, which served well enough to
talk of, without any design of putting it in execution. One day,
speaking with enthusiasm of this project to Diderot and Grimm, they gave
into the proposal with such warmth that I thought the matter concluded
on; but it only turned out a journey on paper, in which Grimm thought
nothing so pleasing as making Diderot commit a number of impieties, and
shutting me up in the Inquisition for them, instead of him.

My regret at arriving so soon at Turin was compensated by the pleasure of
viewing a large city, and the hope of figuring there in a conspicuous
character, for my brain already began to be intoxicated with the fumes of
ambition; my present situation appeared infinitely above that of an
apprentice, and I was far from foreseeing how soon I should be much below
it.

Before I proceed, I ought to offer an excuse, or justification to the
reader for the great number of unentertaining particulars I am
necessitated to repeat. In pursuance of the resolution I have formed to
enter on this public exhibition of myself, it is necessary that nothing
should bear the appearance of obscurity or concealment. I should be
continually under the eye of the reader, he should be enabled to follow
me In all the wanderings of my heart, through every intricacy of my
adventures; he must find no void or chasm in my relation, nor lose sight
of me an instant, lest he should find occasion to say, what was he doing
at this time; and suspect me of not having dared to reveal the whole.