a family of children, black and white, sufficient to make
a set of chessmen among then. There's no saying what might have happened
to me. It would seem like boasting, if I said that the Emperor of
Austria had some notions of getting rid of Metternich to give me the
'Foreign Affairs,' and that I narrowly escaped once commanding the
Russian fleet in the Baltic. But of these at another time. I only wish
to keep the principle at present in view, that Fortune will always do
better for us than we could do for ourselves; but to this end there must
be no tampering or meddling on our part. The goddess is not a West-End
physician, who, provided you are ever prepared with your fee, blandly
permits you all the little excesses you are bent on. No: she is of the
Abernethy school, somewhat rough occasionally, but always honest; never
suffering any interference from the patient, but exacting implicit faith
and perfect obedience. As for me, I follow the regimen prescribed for
me, without a thought of opposition; and wherever I find myself in this
world, be it China or the Caucasus, Ghuznee, Genoa, or Glasnevin, I feel
for the time that's my fitting place, and endeavour to make the best of
it.

The pedestrian alone, of all travellers, is thus taken by the hand by
Fortune. Your extra post, with a courier on the box, interferes sadly
with the current of all those little incidents of the road which are
ever happening to him who takes to the 'byways' of the world. The odds
are about one hundred to one against you that, when seated in your
carriage, the postillion in his saddle and the fat courier outside,
the words _en route_ being given, you arrive at your destination that
evening, without any accident or adventure whatever of more consequence
than a lost shoe from the near leader, a snapped spring, or a heartburn
from the glass of bad brandy you took at the third stage. A blue
post with white stripes on it tells you that you are in Prussia; or a
yellow-and-brown pole, that the Grand-Duke of Nassau is giving you the
hospitality of his territory--save which you have no other evidence of
change. The village inn, and its little circle of celebrities, opens not
to _you_ those peeps at humble life so indicative of national character:
_you_ stop not at the wayside chapel in the sultry heat of noon to
charm away your peaceful hour of reflection, now turning from the lovely
Madonna above the altar to the peasant girl who kneels in supplication
ben