gentleman does seem, taking his gaiters and his
clean linen, and his sherry-wine and his regular
habits and altogether, to be the nearest to
perfection of any lodger that a landlady need desire
to see.

For oh! what creatures there are that come
down to the sea-side, and that I call scampish
lodgers. There are always some of them at
every watering-place, and so I must expect
sometimes to come in for a share like the rest.

My scampish lodgers are like the easy lodgers
in being almost invariably of the muddling sort;
but there the likeness stops, they not being in
the least easy to deal with or easy to satisfy.
Never were such exacting people, never were
people, according to their own account,
accustomed to so many luxuries of every kind. They
have a large circle of acquaintance, that they
are always talking about when I come into
the room; but somehow or other they never
know anybody down here, and, indeed, to hear
them talk, you would think everybody here
was altogether beneath their notice. They get
up late; they quarrel in their bedrooms awful;
they wear great big moustarchios—at least the
gentlemen-scamps do—and large-patterned
seaside suits, and white sand-shoes.

It is not unfrequent for my scampish lodgers
to have passed a good deal of their time
abroad, and especially, I have observed from
what they say, at Brussels. It is not unfrequent
for them to allow the tradesmen's bills to
run on till they amount to a sum which they
consider "worth while drawing a cheque for,"
and it is not at all unfrequently the case that the
bills in question never attain to such a sum,
and, consequently, do not get paid.

It does my heart good to have the house full
of sociable lodgers. To have a lot of young
people just growing up, boys and girls all full
of life and spirits, and half frantic with delight
at finding themselves down at the sea-side. The
real sociable lodgers, though they are a large
party in themselves, don't come down to Bastings
alone. There's always another family who
come down at the same time, and take another
house farther up the Parade, and so these two
sets of young creatures are always together—
always walking, and riding, and rowing, and
flirting, and falling in love with one another.
They talk to each other through the open
windows, and make so many plans that they
have hardly time to take their meals. But they
do take them nevertheless, and, goodness me,
how they do eat!

I come next, and last, to my secluded
lodgers. These are either single individuals,
or, more generally, two together—an old
married couple, a lady and daughter, or perhaps a
mother with her sick son. Poor things! Being
a sociable person myself, and numbering among
my acquaintance some of the leading commercial
families in Bastings, it really sometimes makes
me feel quite miserable to see what a lonely
time of it my secluded lodgers have. I
suppose, however, they don't all of them feel it as
strongly as I should. The old married couple
—the secluded lodgers never take my best
apartments, for they are always poor, or else
they would have more friends—the old married
couple, I feel almost sure, don't mind being so
much by themselves. Lord! How they do
seem to cling to each other, to be sure! I
wonder what their history has been. I wonder
if they have ever had any children. They seem
so much to each other that I should almost
think not, or, perhaps, their children have died,
or are all out in the world, and so these two
have come back to be as they were when they
were first married. Well, to be sure, the old
gentleman takes care of the old lady, and she
takes care of him. They go out marketing
together, and sometimes they make a bit of an
excursion, the lady in a donkey-chair, and the old
gentleman walking by her side. Then, when
they come in, he reads the news to her, while
she knits or sews, and in the evening, as I
suppose their eyes arn't over good, they have their
backgammon, or a game at cribbage.

I don't pity such secluded lodgers as these
much, but some others there are that do seem
to have a melancholy time of it. The lady
with her sick son, who has something the
matter with his eyes, and wears a shade over
them, what a weary time they must have of it!
The poor youth can't see to do anything to
amuse himself, and they have nobody to come in
and cheer them up with a bit of gossip. Sitting
about upon the beach all day, as they do, or
taking a short walk in the neighbourhood, must
be wearisome work; and this is all, besides the
boy's bathing, which they have to attend to.
Then, on wet days, what a time they have of it!
To be sure, the lady can read aloud to the poor
young fellow, but what's that?

I sometimes let my parlours to a young lady
and her mamma. The young lady looks sickly,
and has, perhaps, been sent here for a change:
which is what the doctors always order when
they don't know what else to say. Whenever
people get nervous and uncomfortable in
their minds, they are ordered to have a change.
Well, I don't know, but it seems to me that
they can't change their own minds; they
carry them about with them go where they
will. However, these are things that I know
nothing about, any more than I do what it is
that makes the young lady seem so quiet and
down-hearted, but what I do know is, that the
best cure for the heart-ache is to have plenty of
occupation, plenty of exercise, and plenty of
friends to talk to, and keep you from thinking
always about yourself. This poor young lady is
always at her books which she has brought
down with her, and I do sometimes think, from
what I have overheard, that she's come down here
to finish preparing herself, and to get strong if
possible at the same time, that she may go out
teaching. Both she and her mother are in deep
mourning. Perhaps they have had some heavy
loss, and are poorer than they used to be.
Perhaps this young lady has had a happier
prospect once than she has now. I saw her only
yesterday evening standing by the sea in front