accompli. He was in comfortable lodgings, and had established an
intimacy with a gentleman of superior literary acquirements,
personally acquainted with many London celebrities of our day. I
remember the delight with which he came to my hotel and said: "You
must dine with me to-day; I want to introduce you to a person you
will much like. His greatest fault is one you possess yourself, a
turn for satire, which sometimes makes him enemies." On the same
morning he had announced to his friend with beaming eyes, "My
father is here;" and when the next day that same friend wished to
engage him to an evening party, he replied: "You forget that I have
a wild young father to take care of." Alluding again to this, in a
letter to his mother, on the 17th of May, he says: "You must excuse
a brief epistle this time. The Doctor has been in town for a few
days lately, and of course seduced me into all sorts of wild
habits. He is looking well, in good condition, but not so fat as he
was two years ago." At that time I had been living very frequently
on little more than one hard egg per day. Milk and coffee in the
morning, and half a pound of meat twice a week. In another letter
to his mother, shortly after the above date, he says: "I have not
heard from my father for the last fortnight. I am in very good
lodgings, at a boarding-house, not working hard, and have time to
cultivate some agreeable society. The landlady is all that can be
desired and more than could be expected--the company far above the
average. There is Mr. B., a barrister and Cambridge man, first
rate; and a nice old lady, Mrs. F., very intelligent and
good-natured. We three are great friends. Taking it altogether, the
house is so comfortable, that I did not go to the theatre once last
month." The mutual good opinion may be estimated by the following
introduction from the gentleman alluded to above, to the Colonial
Secretary at Perth, in the event of his explorations leading my son