rcy for both
of us that Harry Warrington did not follow the King of the Borussians,
as he was minded to do, for then I should have had to describe battles
which Carlyle is going to paint; and I don't wish you should make odious
comparisons between me and that master.

Harry Warrington not only did not join the King of the Borussians, but
he pined and chafed at not going. He led a sulky useless life, that is
the fact. He dangled about the military coffee-houses. He did not care
for reading anything save a newspaper. His turn was not literary. He
even thought novels were stupid; and, as for the ladies crying their
eyes out over Mr. Richardson, he could not imagine how they could be
moved by any such nonsense. He used to laugh in a very hearty jolly
way, but a little late, and some time after the joke was over. Pray, why
should all gentlemen have a literary turn? And do we like some of our
friends the worse because they never turned a couplet in their lives?
Ruined, perforce idle, dependent on his brother for supplies, if he read
a book falling asleep over it, with no fitting work for his great strong
hands to do--how lucky it is that he did not get into more trouble! Why,
in the case of Achilles himself, when he was sent by his mamma to the
court of King What-d'ye-call-'em in order to be put out of harm's reach,
what happened to him amongst a parcel of women with whom he was made to
idle his life away? And how did Pyrrhus come into the world? A powerful
mettlesome young Achilles ought not to be leading-stringed by women too
much; is out of his place dawdling by distaffs or handing coffee-cups;
and when he is not fighting, depend on it, is likely to fall into much
worse mischief.

Those soft-hearted women, the two elder ladies of the Lambert family,
with whom he mainly consorted, had an untiring pity and kindness for
Harry, such as women only--and only a few of those--can give. If a man
is in grief, who cheers him; in trouble, who consoles him; in wrath,
who soothes him; in joy, who makes him doubly happy; in prosperity, who
rejoices; in disgrace, who backs him against the world, and dresses
with gentle unguents and warm poultices the rankling wounds made by the
slings and arrows of outrageous Fortune? Who but woman, if you please?
You who are ill and sore from the buffets of Fate, have you one or two
of these sweet physicians? Return thanks to the gods that they have
left you so much of consolation. What gentleman is not