obliging; the air is good; the inclosure is
handsomely variegated with flowers; and the
supply of water is pure, abundant, and cheap.
Yet Homo cannot endure it. Ask him to
particularise the faults of his house or the
sins of the Square, and he becomes very
voluble indeed. The window on the first
landing-place opens outside instead of inside;
the sun never shines upon the back attic
window, owing to an intervening stack of
chimneys; there is a board of the second-floor
front room perceptibly loose. And then look
at the pump in the Square, Sir, why it can
only be worked by the left hand. These
things are not to be borne by a sensible man;
therefore Homo is looking out for a cottage
in the suburbs—a cottage with bow-windows.
Why bow-windows? Because his present
abode has the ordinary square windows.
The cottage in the suburbs must have two
drawing-rooms communicating by folding-
doors. Why "must?" Because in his mansion
in the Square the drawing-rooms are
permanently separated.

Homo finds a cottage with these peculiarities.
Forthwith he engages a man who
advertises on several spring-vans, that Goods are
carefully moved in town and country. His
household gods are about to be translated
from his old Purgatory in the Square to his
new Elysium in the suburbs. His tables look
gouty swathed in bands of hay; his last night
in the Square is passed in a room destitute of
carpet. In the morning the towel-horse, he
finds, has already taken to the road, having
started with the first van, and his brushes are
in the lower recesses of a box at the bottom
of the loaded van still at the door. But
when Homo compares these temporary
inconveniences with the dungeon from which he is
now emancipating himself, he bears them with
a light heart.

The miseries of moving, however, are not
insignificant trials. In the first place, several
days before you perceive any necessity,
your wife orders the curtains to be
removed from your study, and your Turkey
carpet to be carried away on the back of a
sturdy fellow who promises to beat it. A little
square of drugget is provided, just sufficient
in extent to protect your feet from the floor,
provided always that you concentrate your
attention upon the position of your toes
throughout the morning. For one day you
feel no other annoyances—as yet, you have
only caught an ordinary cold; but, if you
expect to get through the business with this
slight inconvenience, you are unreasonable.
On a succeeding day you descend quietly,
as usual, to the breakfast-table. A tool
basket lies in your arm-chair, and a chisel is
placed conveniently (for the plumber) upon a
bunch of wax-fruit; the glass of which has
been carefully packed up long ago. The
presence of the carpenter is painfully
suggested by a strong perfume of saw-dust.
But you have made up your mind to leave
the abominable house, and you still determine
to make the best of matters. You endeavour
to say a cheerful word or two to the workmen
(who appear to be making a hasty breakfast
of tin-tacks), and sit down to consume the
roll and rasher. You look about for the
Times; yonder carpenter has perched it upon
the top of his ladder, as a convenient tray for
his nails. Probably you try to go out for the
day after this experience. Where is your hat?
The hat-stand has been carefully moved by
spring van, and there is nothing in the hall
but two fish-kettles and a boot-jack. Your
favourite umbrella (of course, being "moving"
day, it rains) is nowhere to be found; and,
were it not that your wife has preserved from
the wreck a cast-off hat by stuffing it full of
children's boots and bundles of tradesmen's
receipts, and that the cook accommodates you
with her gingham parachute, you would be
obliged to remain at home, and to stand all
day, like Byron, with your Household Gods
shivered about you.

In the evening you return home early in
the hope of having a quiet hour or two
before bed-time. Of course you knock three
times before you are heard, and then a
strange head from an upper window obliges
you by an inquiry, "Is that you, Joe?"—Joe
being one of the bright company engaged to
effect your removal to the villa paradise from
the detestable town-house. Not being Joe,
you make no reply; but, on effecting an
entrance with an air of sufficient dignity, you
narrowly escape a fall over the hall lamp
which has just been taken down, and you
carelessly deposit your hat upon an oil-can.
These are trifling matters, especially when
weighed against the happy emancipation you
are about to effect. You enter your study,
thinking of the cozy hours you have spent
there; of the thoughts—the bright thoughts
that have been with you there; of the fairy
world with which you have been on intimate
terms there for years; of that head of Pallas
over your book-case which has been long an
eye-rest; of your favourite corner which you
have always kept in confusion, and which you
have always meant to set in order; and of
twenty other familiar nooks and corners dear
to you in your thoughtful, your quiet, your
best and brightest hours. Wretched man! a
pot of glue stands upon your favourite copy of
Tennyson; your oft-pored-over chart of the
Arctic Circle (in search of Franklin) is
crunched round a silver candlestick; that
carved and cherished paper-knife which you
brought from Lucerne sticks dangerously
up out of your waste-basket full of crockery,
with a super-stratum of old slippers. Your
silver inkstand, "presented as a mark,
&c., &c.," has totally disappeared; and—
distraction!—your pet corner of confusion has
been put in order. You think you will, in
spite of all these disturbances, write—with a
crushed pen plunged at every dip feather-deep
into a quart ink-jar—a few letters; but the