Miss Becky Glibbans gave a satirical keckle at this, and showed her
superior learning, by explaining to Mrs. Craig the unbroken nature of the
kingly office. Mr. Snodgrass then read as follows:-
LETTER XXV
Andrew Pringle, Esq., to the Rev. Charles Snodgrass MY DEAR FRIEND--You are not aware of the task you impose, when you
request me to send you some account of the general way of living in
London. Unless you come here, and actually experience yourself what I
would call the London ache, it is impossible to supply you with any
adequate idea of the necessity that exists in this wilderness of mankind,
to seek refuge in society, without being over fastidious with respect to
the intellectual qualifications of your occasional associates. In a
remote desart, the solitary traveller is subject to apprehensions of
danger; but still he is the most important thing "within the circle of
that lonely waste"; and the sense of his own dignity enables him to
sustain the shock of considerable hazard with spirit and fortitude. But,
in London, the feeling of self-importance is totally lost and suppressed
in the bosom of a stranger. A painful conviction of insignificance--of
nothingness, I may say--is sunk upon his heart, and murmured in his ear
by the million, who divide with him that consequence which he
unconsciously before supposed he possessed in a general estimate of the
world. While elbowing my way through the unknown multitude that flows
between Charing Cross and the Royal Exchange, this mortifying sense of my
own insignificance has often come upon me with the energy of a pang; and
I have thought, that, after all we can say of any man, the effect of the
greatest influence of an individual on society at large, is but as that
of a pebble thrown into the sea. Mathematically speaking, the
undulations which the pebble causes, continue until the whole mass of the
ocean has been disturbed to the bottom of its most secret depths and
farthest shores; and, perhaps, with equal truth it may be affirmed, that
the sentiments of the man of genius are also infinitely propagated; but
how soon is the physical impression of the one lost to every sensible
perception, and the moral impulse of the other swallowed up from all
practical effect.
But though London, in the general, may be justly compared to the vast and
restless ocean, or to any other thing that is either sublime,
incomprehensible, or affecting, it loses all its influence over the
solemn associations of the mind when it is examined in its details. For
example, living on the town, as it is slangishly called, the most
friendless and isolated condition possible, is yet fraught with an
amazing diversity of enjoyment. Thousands of gentlemen, who have
survived the relish of active fashionable pursuits, pass their life in
that state without tasting the delight of one new sensation. They rise
in the morning merely because Nature will not allow them to remain longer
in bed. They begin the day without motive or purpose, and close it after
having performed the same unvaried round as the most thoroughbred
domestic animal that ever dwelt in manse or manor-house. If you ask them
at three o'clock where they are to dine, they cannot tell you; but about
the wonted dinner-hour, batches of these forlorn bachelors find
themselves diurnally congregated, as if by instinct, around a cozy table
in some snug coffee-house, where, after inspecting the contents of the
bill of fare, they discuss the news of the day, reserving the scandal, by
way of dessert, for their wine. Day after day their respective political
opinions give rise to keen encounters, but without producing the
slightest shade of change in any of their old ingrained and particular
sentiments.