Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography; De Quincey, Thomas, 1785-1859
With respect to Pink's yearning for England, that had been partially
gratified in some part of his long exile: twice, as we learned long
afterwards, he had landed in England; but such was his haughty adherence
to his purpose, and such his consequent terror of being discovered
and reclaimed by his guardians, that he never attempted to communicate
with any of his brothers or sisters. There he was wrong; me they should
have cut to pieces before I would have betrayed him. I, like him, had
been an obstinate recusant to what I viewed as unjust pretensions of
authority; and, having been the first to raise the standard of revolt,
had been taxed by my guardians with having seduced Pink by my example.
But that was untrue; Pink acted for himself. However, he could know
little of all this; and he traversed England twice, without making an
overture towards any communication with his friends. Two circumstances
of these journeys he used to mention; both were from the port of London
(for he never contemplated London but as a port) to Liverpool; or,
thus far I may be wrong, that one of the two might be (in the return
order) from Liverpool to London. On the first of these journeys, his
route lay through Coventry; on the other, through Oxford and Birmingham.
In neither case had he started with much money; and he was going to
have retired from the coach at the place of supping on the first night,
(the journey then occupying two entire days and two entire nights,)
when the passengers insisted on paying for him: that was a tribute to
his beauty--not yet extinct. He mentioned this part of his adventures
somewhat shyly, whilst going over them with a sailor's literal accuracy;
though, as a record belonging to what he viewed as childish years, he
had ceased to care about it. On the other journey his experience was
different, but equally testified to the spirit of kindness that is
every where abroad. He had no money, on this occasion, that could
purchase even a momentary lift by a stage coach: as a pedestrian, he
had travelled down to Oxford, occupying two days in the fifty-four or
fifty-six miles which then measured the road from London, and sleeping
in a farmer's barn, without leave asked. Wearied and depressed in
spirits, he had reached Oxford, hopeless of any aid, and with a deadly
shame at the thought of asking it. But, somewhere in the High
Street,--and, according to his very accurate sailor's description of
that noble street, it must have been about the entrance of All Souls'
College,--he met a gentleman, a gownsman, who (at the very moment of
turning into the college gate) looked at Pink earnestly, and then gave
him a guinea, saying at the time, "I know what it is to be in your
situation. You are a schoolboy, and you have run away from your school.
Well, I was once in your situation, and I pity you." The kind gownsman,
who wore a velvet cap with a silk gown, and must, therefore, have been
what in Oxford is called a gentleman commoner, gave him an address at
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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