cauliflowers--no bad illustration of the republican union of comfort
with elegance which reigns through the whole establishment. The master
of the mansion, perhaps an old and valued schoolfellow:--his wife, a
well-bred, accomplished, and still beautiful woman--cordial, without
vulgarity--refined, without pretension--and informed, without a shade of
blue! Their children!... But my reader will complete the picture, and
imagine, better than I can describe, how one of my temperament must
suffer at quitting such a scene. At six o'clock on the dreaded morning,
the friendly old butler knocks at my room-door, to warn me that the mail
will pass in half an hour at the end of the green lane. On descending to
the parlour, I find that my old friend has, in spite of our over-night
agreement and a slight touch of gout, come down to see me off. His
amiable lady is pouring out for me a cup of tea--assuring me that she
would be quite unhappy at allowing me to depart without that
indispensable prelude to a journey. A gig waits at the door: my
affectionate host will not permit me to walk even half a mile. The
minutes pass unheeded; till, with a face of busy but cordial concern,
the old butler reminds me that the mail is at hand. I bid a hasty and
agitated farewell, and turn with loathing to the forced companionship of
a public vehicle.

My anti-leave-taking foible is certainly not so much affected when I
quit the residence of an hotel--that public home--that wearisome
resting-place--that epitome of the world--that compound of gregarious
incompatibilities--that bazaar of character--that proper resort of
semi-social egotism and unamalgable individualities--that troublous
haven, where the vessel may ride and tack, half-sheltered, but finds no
anchorage. Yet even the Lilliputian ligatures of such a sojourn
imperceptibly twine round my lethargic habits, and bind me, Gulliver-
like, a passive fixture. Once, in particular, I remember to have _stuck_
at the Hotel des Bons Enfants, in Paris--a place with nothing to
recommend it to one of ordinary locomotive energies. But there I stuck.
Business of importance called me to Bordeaux. I lingered for two months.
At length, by one of those nervous efforts peculiar to weak resolutions,
I made my arrangements, secured my emancipation, and found myself on the
way to the starting-place of the Diligence. I well remember the day:
'twas a rainy afternoon in spring. The aspect of the gayest city in the
world wa