continued dissipation in which I lived, and, above all, the unpropitious
state of my belle passion, my health gave way; my appetite forsook me--my
sleep failed me--a wrinkle settled itself under my left eye, and my
mother declared, that I should have no chance with an heiress: all these
circumstances together, were not without their weight. So I set out one
morning to Hampton Court, (with a volume of Bishop Berkely, and a bottle
of wrinkle water,) for the benefit of the country air.

It is by no means an unpleasant thing to turn one's back upon the great
city, in the height of its festivities. Misanthropy is a charming feeling
for a short time, and one inhales the country, and animadverts on the
town, with the most melancholy satisfaction in the world. I sat myself
down at a pretty little cottage, a mile out of the town. From the window
of my drawing-room I revelled in the luxurious contemplation of three
pigs, one cow, and a straw-yard; and I could get to the Thames in a walk
of five minutes, by a short cut through a lime-kiln. Such pleasing
opportunities of enjoying the beauties of nature, are not often to be met
with: you may be sure, therefore, that I made the most of them. I rose
early, walked before breakfast, pour ma sante, and came back with a most
satisfactory head-ache, pour mes peines. I read for just three hours,
walked for two more, thought over Abernethy, dyspepsia, and blue pills,
till dinner; and absolutely forgot Lord Dawton, ambition, Guloseton,
epicurism--aye, all but--of course, reader, you know whom I am about to
except--the ladye of my love.

One bright, laughing day, I threw down my book an hour sooner than usual,
and sallied out with a lightness of foot and exhilaration of spirit, to
which I had long been a stranger. I had just sprung over a stile that led
into one of those green shady lanes, which make us feel the old poets who
loved, and lived for, Nature, were right in calling our island "the merry