Just as I was prepared to bid them farewell, he gave a deep sigh; and said 'he thought he should soon come to London. He wished he knew where I might be found, and, if he should leave the country, it would be a great favour done him if he might but be allowed to come and ask me how I did. If I would allow him that honour, it would make his heart very light. He had been many years in his present employ; and perhaps his master would be sorry, if he were to leave him; but he had given him fair notice. At one time, he did not believe he ever should have left him; but he thought now he should be much happier in London.'
His tone was serious, there was a dejectedness in his manner, and with it, as was evident, much smothered emotion in his heart. I was affected; and taking his hand, earnestly assured him that, if ever fortune should smile on me, I would not forget what had happened at Bath. His parting reply was, 'God be with you, wherever you go! Perhaps you may see me again sooner than you think for.'
This was the temper in which we took leave, previous to my sending the maid with the ten-pound note: and, as I passed within sight of his door, I felt the regret of quitting a human being whose attachment to me was manifestly so strong and affectionate. But I had no alternative; and I pursued my road.
Winter was advancing: the weather was rainy: the roads were heavy. The cloudy sky sympathised with the gloom of the prospect before me. I had wasted my patrimony, quarrelled with my protectors, renounced the university, had no profession, no immediate resource, and had myself and my mother to provide for: by what means I knew not.
The experience of Wilmot seemed to prove how precarious a subsistence the labours of literature afford; and Wilmot was indisputably a man of genius.
I had not quite concluded against the morality of the practice of the law: but I remembered, in part, the objections of Turl; and they were staggering. Had it been otherwise, where would have been the advantage? I had entered of the Temple: but I had neither the means of keeping my terms nor the patience to look forward, for precarious wealth and fame, to so distant a period.
All this might have been endured: but Olivia?—Where was she?—Perhaps, at that moment, the wife of Andrews!—Or if not, grant she were never to be his, she never could be mine. Yet mine she must be! Mine she should be! I would brave the despotism of her odious enslavers! I would move heaven and earth! I would defy hell itself to separate us!
Such were the continual conflicts to which I was subject: and, while the fogs of despondency rose thick and murky around me, with them continually rose the ignis fatuus of hope; dancing before my eyes, and encouraging me step after step to follow on.
Considering how wild and extravagant the desires of youth are, it is happy for them that they calculate so ill; and are so short-sighted. Their despair would else be frequently fatal.
I did not forget, as a supposed immediate means of relief, that my pamphlet against the Earl and the Bishop was printed; and I thought the revenge more than justifiable: it was a necessary vindication of my own honour and claims. I was indeed forty pounds in debt: twenty to Belmont; and twenty more to I knew not whom: though I suspected, and partly hoped partly feared, it was Olivia. I hoped it, because it might be affection. I feared it, lest it should be nothing more than pity; for one whom she had known in her childhood, but whom, now he was a man, she might compassionate; but must contemn. To have been obliged even to Olivia, on these terms, was worse than starving. Such were my meditations through the day; which was a little advanced when I left Bath.