green spectacles, though of course it was not their
Wakefield. I thought, too, of Mr. Squeers, and
John Browdie, and Yorkshire pies and puddings,
and hams, and all the good and bad things with
which the name of the county is associated. And
so I worked myself up into a state of hot enthusiasm
about Yorkshire, and pursued my journey
with as much eager expectancy as was ever
manifested by a Mahomedan going to Mecca.

If anybody with ordinary powers of observation
and description will go anywhere and
relate what he sees and hears faithfully, he
can scarcely fail to interest those who listen to
him. It is when people write all out of their
own heads that they are dull and incomprehensible.
Human nature is always interesting
to human nature. I feel confident, therefore, that
I shall not bore the intelligent reader by relating
faithfully what I saw, heard, and observed, in my
scamper through the county of York. If you
put yourself in my place, which, being an
imaginative reader, you will have no difficulty
in doing, you will feel it quite a new sensation
to be walking into a strange town with a little
carpet-bag in your hand, but with no purpose
in your mind, seeking adventures, and trusting
to the chapter of accidents.

So this is Leeds! " Great seat of the woollen
trade," my geography-book used to tell me,
though I had vague notions about that word
"seat," and was apt to wonder how the woollen
trade sat down upon it. I cannot tell how I came
to entertain the notion that Leeds was rather an
elegant sort of a town, for a seat of commerce,
but I approached Leeds with that impression.
Perhaps it was owing to something
that I had read in a geography-book at school,
aided by a general idea that a seat of the
woollen trade would naturally be soft. But the
first glimpse I had of a forest of tall chimneys
lifting their heads above a canopy of black
smoke, was so strangely out of harmony with
my ideal, that I began to think I had got into the
wrong carriage, and been carried to Manchester.
But no, it was Leeds. They didn't expect me,
evidently; for there was no fly waiting to
convey me in triumph through the town.
Three flys were in attendance truly, but they
were engaged beforehand; but there were none
for chance travellers. I felt it to be entirely
my own fault. I ought to have given the good
people notice. I cannot remember ever before
this occasion emerging from a railway station
with a carpet-bag in my hand without being
surrounded by a mob of boys competing for the
honour and profit of carrying my luggage. But
here not a boy appeared. Not a single soul was
on the look-out for any chance whatever. Good
sign I thought. All employed in the wool trade.
Plenty of work, good wages, no idle people.
So I trudged along with my carpet-bag until it
began to rain water, soot, powdered bricks, and
grit, when I turned into the first hotel I came
to. I went straight to the smoking-room, to
calm my feelings with a cigar. The room
full of smokers. They were mostly enormously
big men with large long heads and high cheekbones,
and they all wore brown leggings and
had whips. They were smoking Iong pipes—
of a length to match themselves—in silence
when I went in; but presently they began to
talk. What is the matter with me? Have I
relapsed? Has my comprehension left me? I
do not understand a single word they say. Ah,
I see now; it is the dialect. Having had long
experience of it on the stage, I couldn't have
believed that real Yorkshiremen would speak it
so ill. I listened very attentively, but I could
make nothing of the conversation. If they had
only mentioned the word "yell," or said "dom
it," I might have felt that I was in Yorkshire;
but they never said anything so intelligible, and
I didn't feel that I was in Yorkshire. I spoke
to my next neighbour in real Yorkshire, which
I learned from a celebrated comedian, and the
ignorant yokel did not understand a word I
said. I observed too, with disappointment, that
their hair was not flaxen, and didn't curl; and
that not a man in the room slapped his waistcoat.
One man had so far outraged his county and
the well-known habits of its people as to come
out without a waistcoat. And without a flaxen
wig that curls all over his head, and a waistcoat
to slap when he says "dom it," how can a
man be a Yorkshireman?

I went in search of new adventures, and
wandering about for some time among high
gaunt red-brick woollen warehouses—unrelieved
by a single bright shop or cheerful dwelling—I
met with an adventure. I was getting very
depressed, and thinking of going back to London
by the very next train, when I heard somebody
cry "Hoy!" I turned round and saw a stout
sturdy ruddy-faced gentleman standing at a
green gate about twenty yards off. He cried
"Hoy!" again, and seeing that the signal was
intended for me, I went towards him. He
seized me by the hand, shook it heartily, and
said he was glad to see me.

"How was I?"

I said I was quite well. How was he?

"First rate."

"And how were all friends in London?"

I ventured to say that all friends in London
were in a satisfactory condition.

"And now come in," he said; "dinner will
be ready in a few minutes."

Now, the reader can believe me or not, just as
he likes; but I can honestly assure him that I
had never seen this gentleman before in my life;
but in looking at him, and listening to his voice
during the above brief colloquy, I came to have
a notion that I had known him for a long time,
that he had been expecting me, and that I should
find everything prepared for my reception.
Nothing occurred to dispel that notion, but
everything to confirm it. My host introduced me to
his wife. She shook hands with me, and said
she was glad to see me. Would I take a glass
of wine after my long journey? If I wished to
change my clothes, I would find my room—
right-hand door on the first landing. The cloth
was already laid, and it was laid for three.

"We expected you at two," the lady said;