me at once. The unhappy war which now desolates Europe
will oblige me to defer seeing France till a peace. But that
reason can have no influence on Italy, a country which every
scholar must long to see. Should you grant my request, and
not disapprove of my manner of employing your bounty, I
would leave England this autumn and pass the winter at
Lausanne with M. de Voltaire and my old friends. In the
spring I would cross the Alps, and after some stay in Italy,
as the war must then be terminated, return home through
France, to live happily with you and my dear mother. I am
now two-and-twenty; a tour must take up a considerable time;
and although I believe you have no thoughts of settling me
soon (and I am sure I have not), yet so many things may
intervene that the man who does not travel early runs a
great risk of not travelling at all. But this part of my
scheme, as well as the whole of it, I submit entirely to
you.

"Permit me, dear sir, to add that I do not know whether the
complete compliance with my wishes could increase my love
and gratitude, but that I am very sure no refusal could
diminish those sentiments with which I shall always remain,
dear sir, your most dutiful and obedient son and servant.

"E. GIBBON, JUN."

Instead of going to Italy in the autumn of 1760, as he fondly hoped
when he wrote this letter, Gibbon was marching about the south of
England at the head of his grenadiers. But the scheme sketched in the
above letter was only postponed, and ultimately realised in every
particular. The question of a seat in Parliament never came up again
during his father's life, and no doubt the money it would have cost
was, according to his wise suggestion, devoted to defray the expenses
of his foreign tour, which he is now about to begin.

CHAPTER IV.

THE ITALIAN JOURNEY.

Gibbon reached Paris on the 28th January, 1763; thirty-six days, as he
tells us, after the disbanding of the militia. He remained a little
over three months in the French capital, which on the whole pleased
him so well that he thinks that if he had been independent and rich,
he might have been tempted to make it his permanent residence.

On the other hand he seems to have been little if at all aware of the
extraordinary character of the society of which he became a spectator
and for a time a member. He does not seem to ha