le your hero neck and heels
into the midst of a drunken fox-hunting party, and then carry him
off from his paternal estate, without even noticing his ancestors,
relatives, friends, connexions, or prospects--without any description
of romantic scenery on the estate--without so much as an allusion to the
female who first kindled in his breast the tender passion, or a detail
of those incidents with which it is usually connected!--a strange, very
strange way indeed this of commencing."

"My dear Sir, I agree with you as to the deviation from customary rules:
but allow me to ask,--is not one common object--amusement, all we have
in view? Suppose then, by way of illustration, you were desirous of
arriving at a given place or object, to which there were several roads,
and having traversed one of these till the monotony of the scene had
rendered every object upon it dull and wearisome, would you quarrel with
the traveller who pointed out another road, merely because it was a new
one? Considering the impatience of our young friends, the one to return
to scenes in which alone he can ~6~~live, and the other to realize
ideal dreams of happiness, painted in all the glowing tints that a
warm imagination and youthful fancy can pourtray, it will be impossible
longer to continue the argument. Let me, therefore, entreat you to cut
it short--accompany us in our rapid pursuit after Life in London; nor
risk for the sake of a little peevish criticism, the cruel reflection,
that by a refusal, you would, probably, be in _at the death_ of the
Author--by Starvation."

CHAPTER II

"The panting steed the hero's empire feel,
Who sits triumphant o'er the flying wheel,
And as he guides it through th' admiring throng,
With what an air he holds the reins, and smacks the silken thong!"

ORDINARY minds, in viewing distant objects, first see the obstacles that
intervene, magnify the difficulty of surmounting them, and sit down in
despair. The man of genius with his mind's-eye pointed steadfastly, like
the needle towards the pole, on the object of his ambition, meets and
conquers every difficulty in detail, and the mass dissolves before
him as the mountain snow yields, drop by drop, to the progressive but
invincible operation of the solar beam. Our honourable friend was well
aware that a perfect knowledge of the art of driving, and the character
of a "_first-rate whip_," were objects worthy his ambition; and that,
to hold fou