ted. But its perusal in that condition was
not entirely thrown away, since I was able to recommend it to a teacher
of composition, as containing, within a moderate compass--after the
manner, in fact, of a handbook--good practical specimens of every
description of depravity of style of which the English language is
susceptible.

In the present day, when few scholars have opportunities of enriching
the world with their prison hours, perhaps the best conditions for
testing how far any volume or portion of printed matter, however
hopeless-looking, may yet yield edifying or amusing matter to a
sufficient pressure, will occur when a bookish person finds himself
imprisoned in a country inn, say for twenty-four hours. Such things are
not impossible in this age of rapid movement. It is not long since a
train, freighted with musical artistes, sent express to perform at a
provincial concert and be back immediately in town for other
engagements, were caught by a great snow-storm which obliterated the
railway, and had to live for a week or two in a wayside alehouse, in one
of the dreariest districts of Scotland. The possessor and user of a
large library undergoing such a calamity in a modified shape will be
able to form a conception of the resources at his disposal, and to
calculate how long it will take him to exhaust the intellectual
treasures at his command, just as a millionaire, haunted as such people
sometimes are by the dread of coming on the parish, might test how long
a life his invested capital would support by spending a winter in a
Shetland cottage, and living on what he could procure. Having exhausted
all other sources of excitement and interest, the belated traveller is
supposed to call for the literature of the establishment. Perhaps the
Directory of the county town is the only available volume. Who shall say
what the belated traveller may make of this? He may do a turn in local
statistics, or, if his ambition rises higher, he may pursue some
valuable ethnological inquiries, trying whether Celtic or Saxon names
prevail, and testing the justice of Mr Thierry's theory by counting the
Norman patronymics, and observing whether any of them are owned by
persons following plebeian and sordid occupations. If in after-life the
sojourner should come in contact with people interested in the politics
or business of that county town, he will surprise them by exhibiting his
minute acquaintance with its affairs.

If, besides the D