But these different habits and characters were still of farther use to our hero, for by their means he had a better opportunity of seeing the world, and knowing mankind, than most of our youths
who make the grand tour; for, as he had none of those petty amusements and raree-shows, which so much divert our young gentlemen abroad, to engage his attention, it was wholly applied to the study of mankind, their various passions and inclinations; and he made the greater improvement in his study, as in many of his characters they acted before him without reserve or disguise. He saw in little and plain houses hospitality, charity and compassion, the children of frugality; and found under gilded and spacious roofs, littleness, uncharitableness and inhumanity, the offspring of luxury and riot; he saw servants waste their master’s substance, and that there were no greater nor more crafty thieves than domestic ones; and met with masters who roared out for liberty abroad, acting the arbitrary tyrants in their own houses:—he saw ignorance and passion exercise the rod of justice; oppression, the handmaid of power; self-interest outweighing friendship and honesty in the opposite scale; pride and envy spurning and trampling on what was more worthy than themselves;—he saw the pure white robes of truth sullied with the black hue of hypocrisy and dissimulation; he sometimes, too, met much riches unattended by pomp and pride, but diffusing themselves in numberless unexhausted streams, conducted by the hands of two lovely servants, Goodness and Beneficence;—and he saw honesty, integrity and goodness of mind, inhabitants of the humble cot of poverty.
All these observations afforded him no little pleasure, but he felt a much greater in the indulgence of the emotions of filial piety, paying his parents frequent visits, unknown to them, in different
disguises; at which time, the tenderness he saw them express in their inquiries after him (it being their constant custom so to do of all travellers) always melted him into real tears.
It has been remarked, that curiosity, or the desire of knowledge, is that which most distinguishes man from the brute, and the greater the mind is, the more insatiable is that passion: we may, without flattery, say no man had a more boundless one than our hero; for, not satisfied with the observations he had made in England and Wales, (which we are well assured were many more than are usually made by gentlemen before they travel into foreign parts,) he now resolved to see other countries and manners. He was the more inclined to this, as he imagined it would enable him to be of greater service to the community of which he was a member, by rendering him capable of executing some of his stratagems with much greater success.
He communicated this design to his school-fellow, Escott, one of those who joined the gipseys with him, (for neither of the four wholly quitted the community). Escott very readily agreed to accompany him in his travels, and there being a vessel ready to sail for Newfoundland, tying at Dartmouth, where they then were, they agreed to embark on board her. Nothing remarkable happened in their passage which relates to our hero; we shall therefore pass it by, and land him safe in Newfoundland. Having remained there during the fishing season, he acquired all the information he possibly could, and which he thought might be useful to him, and returned in the same vessel to Dartmouth, from whence he had at first sailed,
bringing with him a surprising fierce and large dog, which he had enticed to follow him, and made as gentle as a lamb, by an art peculiar to himself. Our hero was received with great joy by his fellow gipseys, and they were loud in his praises, when they understood he had undertaken this voyage to enable him to deceive his enemies with the greater success. He accordingly, in a few days, went out on a cruise in the character of a shipwrecked sailor, lost in a vessel homeward bound from Newfoundland, sometimes belonging to Pool, sometimes to Dartmouth, at other times to other ports, and under such or such commander, according as the newspapers gave account of such melancholy accidents.
If the booty he got before under this character was considerable, it was much more so now, for being able to give an exact account of Newfoundland, the settlements, harbours, fishery, and the inhabitants thereof, he applied with great confidence to masters of vessels, and gentlemen well acquainted with those parts; so that those to whom before his prudence would not let him apply, now became his greatest benefactors, as the perfect account he gave of the country engaged them to give credit to all he asserted, and made them very liberal in his favour.
It was about this time our hero became sensible of the power of love; we mean of that sort which has more of the mind than the body, and is tender, delicate and constant; the object of which remains constantly fixed in the mind, and will not admit of any partner with it. It was in the town of Newcastle, so famous for its coal-works, which
our hero visited out of curiosity, appearing there undisguised and making a very genteel appearance, that he became enamoured with the daughter of Mr. Gray, an eminent surgeon there. This young lady had charms perhaps equal to any of her sex; and we might in that style, which one, who calls himself an author of the first rate, calls the sublime, say, “Here was whiteness, which no lilies, ivory, nor alabaster could match. The finest cambric might be supposed from envy to cover that bosom, which was much whiter than itself;” but we must confess we always feel a cold horror shoot through our limbs at the reading of this puerile sublime, and we make no doubt but many other readers do the same, as it greatly tends to make our hearts ache by putting us in mind of what our posteriors have suffered for us at school. We shall therefore content ourselves by saying, this lady had charms sufficient to captivate the heart of any man not unsusceptible of love; and they made so deep an impression upon our hero, that they wholly effaced every object which before had created any desire in him, and never permitted any other to raise them afterwards; and, wonderful to tell, we have after about thirty years enjoyment, seen him lament her occasional absence almost with tears, and talk of her with all the fondness of one who had been in love but three days. Our hero tried all love’s soft persuasions with his fair one in an honourable way; and, as his person was very engaging, and his appearance genteel, he did not find her greatly averse to the proposals. As he was aware that his being of the community of the gipseys might prejudice her against him without