I ACQUIRE A KINGDOM.


"_Gloucester_. The trick of that voice I do well remember:
Is't not the king?"
"_Lear_. Ay, every inch a king."
_King Lear_.

From our lodgings, which were in Bond Street, we sallied forth next
morning to view the town; my father leading us first by way of St.
James's and across the Park to the Abbey, and on the way holding
discourse to which I recalled myself with difficulty from London's
shows and wonders--his Majesty's tall guards at the palace gates, the
gorgeous promenaders in the Mall, the swans and wild fowl on the
lake.

"I wish you to remark, my dear child," said he, "that between a
capital and solitude there is no third choice; nor, I would add, can
a mind extract the best of solitude unless it bring urbanity to the
wilderness. Your rustic is no philosopher, and your provincial
townsman is the devil: if you would meditate in Arden, your company
must be the Duke, Jaques, Touchstone--courtiers all--or, again,
Rosalind, the Duke's daughter, if you would catch the very mood of
the forest. I tell you this, child, that you may not be misled by my
example (which has a reason of its own and, I trust, an excuse) into
shunning your destiny though it lead and keep you in cities and among
crowds; for we have it on the word of no less busy a man than the
Emperor Marcus Aurelius that to seek out private retiring-rooms for