disinclination of every nimble spirit to bruise itself against walls,
and did not like to place himself where no step can be taken. But he
was honest and true, and cognizant of the subtile links that bind ages
together, and saw how every event affects all the future. 'Christ died
on the tree: that built Dunscore kirk yonder: that brought you and me
together. Time has only a relative existence.'

"He was already turning his eyes towards London with a scholar's
appreciation. London is the heart of the world, he said, wonderful
only from the mass of human beings. He liked the huge machine. Each
keeps its own round. The baker's boy brings muffins to the window at a
fixed hour every day, and that is all the Londoner knows, or wishes
to know, on the subject. But it turned out good men. He named certain
individuals, especially one man of letters, his friend, the best mind
he knew, whom London had well served."[A]

[Footnote A: "English Traits," by R.W. Emerson. First Visit to
England.]

"Carlyle," says Emerson, "was already turning his eyes towards
London," and a few months after the interview just described he did
finally fix his residence there, in a quiet street in Chelsea, leading
down to the river-side. Here, in an old-fashioned house, built in the
reign of Queen Anne, he and his wife settled down in the early summer
of 1834; here they continued to live together until she died; and here
Carlyle afterwards lived on alone till the end of his life.

With another man, of whom he now became the neighbour--Leigh Hunt--he
had already formed a slight acquaintance, which soon ripened into
a warm friendship and affection on both sides, in spite of their