falls, I
do not think of a retreat; but at all events I am provided with two
strong horses and a hundred louis in gold." Fate was hard on the
kindly epicurean, who after his long toil had made his bed in the sun,
on which he was preparing to lie down in genial content till the end
came. But he feels he must not think of rest; and that, heavy as he
is, and irksome to him as it is to move, he must before long be a
rover again. Still he is never peevish upon his fortune; he puts the
best face on things as long as they will bear it.

He was not so philosophical under the bereavements that he now
suffered. His aunt, Mrs. Porten, had died in 1786. He deplored her as
he was bound to do, and feelingly regrets and blames himself for not
having written to her as often as he might have done since their last
parting. Then came the irreparable loss of Deyverdun. Shortly, an old
Lausanne friend, M. de Severy, to whom he was much attached, died
after a long illness. Lastly and suddenly, came the death of Lady
Sheffield, the wife of his friend Holroyd, with whom he had long lived
on such intimate terms that he was in the habit of calling her his
sister. The Sheffields, father and mother and two daughters, had spent
the summer of 1791 with him at Lausanne. The visit was evidently an
occasion of real happiness and _epanchement de coeur_ to the two old
friends, and supplied Gibbon for nearly two years with tender regrets
and recollections. Then, without any warning, he heard of Lady
Sheffield's death. In a moment his mind was made up: he would go at
once to console his friend. All the fatigue and irksomeness of the
journey to one so ailing and feeble, all the dangers of the road lined
and perhaps barred by hostile armies, vanished on the spot. Within
twelve days he had made his preparations and started on his journey.
He was forced to travel through Germany, and in his ignorance of the
language he required an interpreter; young de Severy, the son of his
deceased friend, joyfully, and out of mere affection for him,
undertook the office of courier. "His attachment to me," wrote Gibbon,
"is the sole motive which prompts him to undertake this troublesome
journey." It is clear that he had the art of making himself loved. He
travelled through Frankfort, Cologne, Brussels, Ostend, and was by his
friend's side in little more than a month after he had received the
fatal tidings. Well might Lord Sheffield say, "I must ever regard it
as the most en