partly, I suppose, from my
expectations being too high. But what I have seen has been in such a
hurry as to make it a fatigue: besides, I have strolled about amongst
them neither in very good humour nor very good health.

"I have delayed writing till I could lay before you the plan of my
future operations for a few weeks. I propose to post it to Naples about
the middle of next week, along with a Colonel of our Country, who seems
to be a very good-natured man. After remaining a week or ten days there,
I shall return hither, and, after having visited Tivoli and Frascati,
set out for Leghorn, if possible, in some vessel from Civita Vecchia;
for I hate the lodgings upon the road in this country. I don't expect to
be happy till I see Leghorn; and if I find my Friend in such health as I
wish him, or even hope for him, I shall not be disappointed in the chief
pleasure I proposed to myself in my visit to Italy. As you talked of a
ramble somewhere towards the South of France, I shall be extremely happy
to attend you.

"I wrote to my brother from Genoa, and desired him to direct his answer
to your care at Pisa. If it comes, please direct it, with your own
letter, for which I shall long violently look, care of Mr. Francis
Barazzi at Rome. I am, with my best compliments to Mrs. Smollett and the
rest of the ladies, &c.,

"JOHN ARMSTRONG."

* * * * *

There is no reason to suppose that Armstrong found anything in the
condition of his friend to fulfil the anxious wishes of his letter. In
the following year, Smollett died, leaving to his widow little beyond
the empty consolations of his great fame. From her very narrow purse she
supplied the means of erecting the stone that marks the spot where he
lies; and the pen of his companion, whose letter we have just given,
furnished an appropriate inscription. The niggardly hands of government
remained as firmly closed against the relief of Mrs. Smollett as they
had been in answer to her husband's own application for himself; an
application which must have cost a severe struggle to his proud spirit,
and of which his most intimate literary friends were probably never
aware. He sought favors for others, says Dr. Moore; but "for himself
he never made an application to any great man in his life!" He was not
intemperate, nor yet was he extravagant, but by nature hospitable and of
a cheerful temperament; his housekeeping was never niggardly, so long as
he could e