“NOW before I quit _Calais_,” a travel-writer would say, “it would not
be amiss to give some account of “it.”—Now I think it very much
amiss—that a man cannot go quietly through a town and let it alone,
when it does not meddle with him, but that he must be turning about and
drawing his pen at every kennel he crosses over, merely o’ my
conscience for the sake of drawing it; because, if we may judge from
what has been wrote of these things, by all who have _wrote and
gallop’d_—or who have _gallop’d and wrote_, which is a different way
still; or who, for more expedition than the rest, have _wrote
galloping_, which is the way I do at present——from the great _Addison_,
who did it with his satchel of school books hanging at his a—, and
galling his beast’s crupper at every stroke—there is not a gallopper of
us all who might not have gone on ambling quietly in his own ground (in
case he had any), and have wrote all he had to write, dry-shod, as well
as not.
For my own part, as heaven is my judge, and to which I shall ever make
my last appeal—I know no more of _Calais_ (except the little my barber
told me of it as he was whetting his razor) than I do this moment of
_Grand Cairo_; for it was dusky in the evening when I landed, and dark
as pitch in the morning when I set out, and yet by merely knowing what
is what, and by drawing this from that in one part of the town, and by
spelling and putting this and that together in another—I would lay any
travelling odds, that I this moment write a chapter upon _Calais_ as
long as my arm; and with so distinct and satisfactory a detail of every
item, which is worth a stranger’s curiosity in the town—that you would
take me for the town-clerk of _Calais_ itself—and where, sir, would be
the wonder? was not _Democritus_, who laughed ten times more than
I—town-clerk of _Abdera?_ and was not (I forget his name) who had more
discretion than us both, town-clerk of _Ephesus?_——it should be penn’d
moreover, sir, with so much knowledge and good sense, and truth, and
precision——
—Nay—if you don’t believe me, you may read the chapter for your pains.