aised in me. I
wish we were all in Eden again--for the sake of these toiling
creatures."

In the middle of August (Monday, 16th) I had announcement that he was
coming up for special purposes: "I sit down to write to you without an
atom of news to communicate. Yes, I have,--something that will surprise
you, who are pent up in dark and dismal Lincoln's Inn Fields. It is the
brightest day you ever saw. The sun is sparkling on the water so that I
can hardly bear to look at it. The tide is in, and the fishing-boats
are dancing like mad. Upon the green-topped cliffs the corn is cut and
piled in shocks; and thousands of butterflies are fluttering about,
taking the bright little red flags at the mast-heads for flowers, and
panting with delight accordingly. [Here the Inimitable, unable to resist
the brilliancy out of doors, breaketh off, rusheth to the machines, and
plungeth into the sea. Returning, he proceedeth:] Jeffrey is just as he
was when he wrote the letter I sent you. No better, and no worse. I had
a letter from Napier on Saturday, urging the children's-labor subject
upon me. But, as I hear from Southwood Smith that the report cannot be
printed until the new Parliament has sat at the least six weeks, it will
be impossible to produce it before the January number. I shall be in
town on Saturday morning and go straight to you. A letter has come from
little Hall begging that when I _do_ come to town I will dine there, as
they wish to talk about the new story. I have written to say that I will
do so on Saturday, and we will go together; but I shall be by no means
good company. . . . I have more than half a mind to start a bookseller of
my own. I could; with good capital too, as you know; and ready to spend
it. _G. Varden beware!_"

Small causes of displeasure had been growing out of the _Clock_, and
were almost unavoidably incident to the position in which he found
himself respecting it. Its discontinuance had become necessary, the
strain upon himself being too great without the help from others which
experience had shown to be impracticable; but I thought he had not met
the difficulty wisely by undertaking, which already he had done, to
begin a new story so early as the following March. On his arrival,
therefore, we decided on another plan, with which we went armed that
Saturday afternoon to his publishers, and of which the result will be
best told by himself. He had returned to Broadstairs the following
morning, and next