as he then himself expressed
it, as one of his recognised occupations; that is, by becoming a Reader
professionally.. It is with his career in his professional capacity as
a Reader that we have here to do. Until he had formally and avowedly
assumed that position, his labours in this way were, as a matter of
course, in no respect whatever systematised. They were uncertain, and in
one sense, as the sequel shewed, purely tentative or preliminary. They
yielded a world of delight, however, and did a world of good at the
same time; while they were, unconsciously to himself, preparing the way
effectually--that is, by ripening his powers and perfecting his skill
through practice--for the opening up to himself, quite legitimately,
of a new phase in his career as a man of letters. Previously, again
and again, with the pen in his hand, he had proved himself to be the
master-humorist of his time. He was now vividly to attest that fact
by word of mouth, by the glance of his eye, by the application to the
reading of his own books, of his exceptional mimetic and histrionic
gifts as an elocutionist. Added to all this, by merely observing how
readily he could pour through the proceeds of these purely benevolent
Readings, princely largess into the coffers of charities or of
institutions in which he happened to be interested, he was to realise,
what must otherwise have remained for him wholly unsuspected, that he
had, so to speak, but to stretch forth his hand to grasp a fortune.

During the lapse of five years all this was at first very gradually, but
at last quite irresistibly, brought home to his conviction. A few of the
Readings thus given by him, out of motives of kindliness or generosity,
may here, in passing, be particularised.

A considerable time after the three Readings just mentioned, and which
were distinctly inaugurative of the whole of our author's reading
career, there was one, which came off in Peterborough, that has not
only been erroneously described as antecedent to those three Readings at
Birmingham, but has been depicted, at the same time, with details in
the account of it of the most preposterous character. The Reader, for
example, has been portrayed,--in this purely apocryphal description of
what throughout it is always referred to as though it were the first
Reading of all, which it certainly was not,--as in a highly nervous
state from the commencement of it to its conclusion! This bemg said of
one who, when aske