I am fond of travelling: yet I never undertake a journey without
experiencing a vague feeling of melancholy. There is to me something
strangely oppressive in the preliminaries of departure. The packing of a
small valise; the settlement of accounts--justly pronounced by Rabelais
a _blue-devilish_ process; the regulation of books and papers;--in
short, the whole routine of valedictory arrangements, are to me as a
nightmare on the waking spirit. They induce a mood of last wills and
testaments--a sense of dislocation, which, next to a vacuum, Nature
abhors--and create a species of moral decomposition, not unlike that
effected on matter by chemical agency. It is not that I have to lament
the disruption of social connexions or domestic ties. This, I am aware,
is a trial sometimes borne with exemplary fortitude; and I was lately
edified by the magnanimous unconcern with which a married friend of mine
sang the last verse of "Home! sweet home!" as the chaise which was to
convey him from the _burthen_ of his song drove up to the door. It does
not become a bachelor to speculate on the mysteries of matrimonial
philosophy; but the feeling of pain with which _I_ enter on the task of
migration has no affinity with individual sympathies, or even with
domiciliary attachments. My landlady is, without exception, the ugliest
woman in London; and the locality of Elbow-lane cannot be supposed
absolutely to spellbind the affection of one occupying, as I do,
solitary chambers on the third floor.
The case, it may be supposed, is much worse when it is my lot to take
leave, after passing a few weeks at the house of a friend in the
country;--a house, for instance, such as is to be met with only in
England:--with about twenty acres of lawn, but no park; with a
shrubbery, but no made-grounds; with well-furnished rooms, but no
conservatory; and with a garden, in which dandy tulips and high-bred
anemones do not disdain the fellowship of honest artichokes and laughing
cauliflowers--no bad illustration of the republican union of comfort
with elegance which reigns through the whole establishment. The master
of the mansion, perhaps an old and valued schoolfellow:--his wife, a
well-bred, accomplished, and still beautiful woman--cordial, without
vulgarity--refined, without pretension--and informed, without a shade of
blue! Their children!... But my reader will complete the picture, and
imagine, better than I can describe, how one of my temperament must
suffer at quitting such a scene. At six o'clock on the dreaded morning,
the friendly old butler knocks at my room-door, to warn me that the mail
will pass in half an hour at the end of the green lane. On descending to
the parlour, I find that my old friend has, in spite of our over-night
agreement and a slight touch of gout, come down to see me off. His
amiable lady is pouring out for me a cup of tea--assuring me that she
would be quite unhappy at allowing me to depart without that
indispensable prelude to a journey. A gig waits at the door: my
affectionate host will not permit me to walk even half a mile. The
minutes pass unheeded; till, with a face of busy but cordial concern,
the old butler reminds me that the mail is at hand. I bid a hasty and
agitated farewell, and turn with loathing to the forced companionship of
a public vehicle.
My anti-leave-taking foible is certainly not so much affected when I
quit the residence of an hotel--that public home--that wearisome
resting-place--that epitome of the world--that compound of gregarious
incompatibilities--that bazaar of character--that proper resort of
semi-social egotism and unamalgable individualities--that troublous
haven, where the vessel may ride and tack, half-sheltered, but finds no
anchorage. Yet even the Lilliputian ligatures of such a sojourn
imperceptibly twine round my lethargic habits, and bind me, Gulliver-
like, a passive fixture. Once, in particular, I remember to have _stuck_
at the Hôtel des Bons Enfants, in Paris--a place with nothing to
recommend it to one of ordinary locomotive energies. But there I stuck.
Business of importance called me to Bordeaux. I lingered for two months.
At length, by one of those nervous efforts peculiar to weak resolutions,
I made my arrangements, secured my emancipation, and found myself on the
way to the starting-place of the Diligence. I well remember the day:
'twas a rainy afternoon in spring. The aspect of the gayest city in the
world was dreary and comfortless. The rain dripped perpendicularly from
the eves of the houses, exemplifying the axiom, that lines are composed
of a succession of points. At the corners of the streets it shot a
curved torrent from the projecting spouts, flooding the channels, and
drenching, with a sudden drum-like sound, the passing umbrellas, whose
varied tints of pink, blue, and orange, like the draggled finery of
feathers and flounces beneath them, only made the scene more glaringly
desolate. Then came the rush and splatter of cabriolets, scattering
terror and defilement. The well-mounted English dandy shows his sense by
hoisting his parapluie; the French dragoon curls his mustachio at such
effeminacy, and braves the liquid bullets in the genuine spirit of
Marengo; the old French count picks his elastic steps with the placid
and dignified philosophy of the _ancien régime_; while the Parisian
dames, of all ranks, ages, and degrees, trip along, with one leg
undraped, exactly in proportion to the shapeliness of its configuration.
The huge clock of the Messagéries Royales told three as I entered the
gateway. The wide court had an air of humid dreariness. On one side
stood a dozen of those moving caravansaras, the national vehicles, with
their leathern caps--like those of Danish sailors in a north-wester--
hanging half off, soaked with wet. Opposite was the range of offices,
busy with all the peculiar importance of French _bureaucracie._ Their
clerks, decorated with ribbons and crosses, wield their pens with all
the conscious dignity of secretaries of state; and "_book_" a bale or a
parcel as though they were signing a treaty, or granting an amnesty. The
meanest _employé_ seems to think himself invested with certain occult
powers. His civility savours of government patronage; and his frown is
inquisitorial. To his fellows, his address is abrupt and diplomatic. He
seems to speak in cipher, and to gesticulate by some rule of
freemasonry. But to the _uninitiated_ he is explanatory to a scruple, as
though mischief might ensue from his being misapprehended. He makes sure
of your understanding by an emphasis, which reminds one of the loudness
of tone used towards a person supposed to be hard of hearing--a
proceeding not very flattering where there happens to be neither dulness
nor deafness in the case. In a word, the measured pedantry of his whole
deportment betrays the happy conviction in which he rejoices of being
conversant with matters little dreamt of in your philosophy. Among the
bystanders, too, there are some who might, probably with more reason,
boast their proficiency in mysterious lore--fellows of smooth aspect and
polite demeanour, whom at first you imagine to have become casual
spectators from mere lack of better pastime, but whose furtive glances
and vagrant attention betray the familiars of the police--that complex
and mighty engine of modern structure, which, far more surely than the
"ear of Dionysius," conveys to the tympanum of power each echoed sigh
and reverberated whisper. It is a chilling thing to feel one's budding
confidence in a new acquaintance nipped by such frosty suspicions;
yet--Heaven forgive me!--the bare idea has, before now, caused me to
drop, unscented, the pinch of _carote_ which has been courteously
tendered by some coffee-house companion. In the group before me, I
fancied that I could distinguish some of this ungentle brotherhood; and
my averted eye rested with comparative complacency even on a couple of
_gens d'armes_, who were marching up and down before the door, and whose
long swords and voluminous cocked hats never appeared to me less
offensive.
In the mean time, knots of travellers were congregating round the
different vehicles about to depart. In the centre of each little band
stood the main point of attraction--Monsieur le Conducteur--that
important personage, whose prototype we look for in vain among the
dignitaries of Lad-lane, or the Bull-and-Mouth, and whose very name can
only be translated by borrowing one of Mr. M'Adam's titles--"the
Colossus of _Roads_." With fur cap, official garb, and the excursive eye
of a martinet, he inspects every detail of preparation--sees each
passenger stowed _seriatim_ in his special place--then takes his
position in front--gives the word to his jack-booted vice, whose
responsive whip cracks assent--and away rolls the ponderous machine,
with all the rumbling majesty of a three-decker from off the
stocks.--_Monthly Magazine_.
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