The Complete Writings of Charles Dudley Warner Volume 2




CONTENTS:

SAUNTERINGS




MISAPPREHENSIONS CORRECTED

I should not like to ask an indulgent and idle public to saunter
about with me under a misapprehension. It would be more agreeable to
invite it to go nowhere than somewhere; for almost every one has been
somewhere, and has written about it. The only compromise I can
suggest is, that we shall go somewhere, and not learn anything about
it. The instinct of the public against any thing like information in
a volume of this kind is perfectly justifiable; and the reader will
perhaps discover that this is illy adapted for a text-book in
schools, or for the use of competitive candidates in the
civil-service examinations.

Years ago, people used to saunter over the Atlantic, and spend weeks
in filling journals with their monotonous emotions. That is all
changed now, and there is a misapprehension that the Atlantic has
been practically subdued; but no one ever gets beyond the rolling
forties" without having this impression corrected.