I go out for an hour's walk every day, but it does me little good. My usual stroll is to a shot factory, and back by a patent bolt and rivet establishment; but this avoids the theatre, for I own to you Nabucco, as they call him for shortness, shouts in a manner that makes me quite irritable.
James never leaves his room; he's studying hard at last; and although his health would be the better for a little exercise, I 'll just leave him to himself. It's right he should pay some penalty for his late conduct. As for the girls, Mary Anne is indignant with me, and only comes to say good-morning and good-night; and Cary, though she tries to look cheerful and happy, is evidently fretting in secret. Betty Cobb takes less trouble to repress her feelings, and goes howling about the hotel like a dog run over by the mail, and is always getting accompanied by strange and inquisitive travellers, who insist upon hearing her sorrows, and occasionally push their inquiries even as far as my room!
Paddy Byrne alone appears to have taken a philosophical view of his position, for he has been drunk ever since we arrived. He usually sleeps in the hall, on the stairs, or the lobbies; and although this saves the cost of a bedroom, the economy is counterbalanced by occasional little reprisals he takes, as stray gentlemen stumble over him with their bedroom candles. At such moments he smashes lamps and china ornaments, for which his wages will require a long sequestration to clear off. And now a word about home. Our English tenant, you tell me, is getting tired of Dodsborough; we guessed how it would be already. "He thinks the people lazy"! Ask him, did he ever try to cut turf, with two meals of wet potatoes per diem? "They are bigoted and superstitious too." How much better would they be if they knew all about Lord Rosse's telescope? "They won't give up their old barbarous ways." Is n't that the very boast of the Conservative party? Is n't that what Disraeli is preaching every day and every hour?--"Fall back upon this,--fall back upon that,--think of the spirit of your ancestors." Now they say, our ancestors yoked their horses by the tails to save a harness. It's rather hard that all the "progress," as they call it, must begin with the poor. It's a dead puzzle to me, Tom, to explain one thing. All the moralists, from the earliest ages, keep crying up humility, and telling you that true nobility of soul consists in self-denial and moderation, simple tastes, and so on; and yet, what is the great reproach they bring against Paddy? Is n't it that he is satisfied with the potato? There's the head and front of his offence. That he does n't want beef, like the Englishman,--nor soup and three courses, like "Mounseer"--nor sauerkraut and roast veal, like a German; "cups and cold water" being the food of a fellow that could thrash the whole three of them all round, and think it mighty good fun besides.