Hors-d'oeuvre. -- A Word to the Reader and another to the
Critic. -- A Man who has a right to be proud. -- Why?
Here I pause, dear Reader.
An idea has just come to my head, and for fear it might be lonely there,
I will impart it to you without delay.
Now, to come at once to the sense of the matter, will you allow me for
once--for once only--to pay myself a compliment that I think I well
deserve? It is the word "Ireland," which I have just written in the
preceding chapter, that makes me think of addressing sincere
congratulations to myself. Forgive me for this little digression, it
will relieve me.
I have written two books on England, a third on the relations between
England and France, and I shall soon have finished a volume of
recollections of Scotland.
How many times I have had to write the words "England" and "Ireland," I
could not say; but I affirm that I have not once--no, not once--spoken
of "Perfidious Albion" or the "Emerald Isle."
"Indeed!" and "What of that?" you will perhaps exclaim.
Well, whatever you may say, I assure you that if ever a man had a right
to feel proud of himself, I have.
More than once have I been tempted, once or twice I have had to make an
erasure, but I am the first who has triumphed over the difficulty.
Come, dear Critic, if thou wilt be amiable, here is an occasion. Admit
that a Frenchman, who can write fourteen or fifteen hundred pages on the
subject of England, without once calling her "Perfidious Albion," is a
man who is entitled to thy respect and thy indulgence for the thousand
and one shortcomings of which he knows himself to be guilty.
There, I feel better now. Let us now go and see Donald's big _touns_.