Lackington at length quitted Chiswell Street, and took the enormous building at the corner of Finsbury Square, which was styled "The Temple of the Muses," and to which the public were invited as the cheapest bookshop in the world. He declared in his catalogue that he had half a million of books constantly on sale, "and these were arranged in galleries and rooms rising in tiers--the more expensive books at the bottom, and the prices diminishing with every floor, but all numbered according to a catalogue which Lackington compiled by himself."[6] His profits on the first year's trade at "The Temple of the Muses" amounted to £5000. He retired from business in 1798, having made a large fortune. [6] "History of Booksellers," see above, p. 74. His capacity for business was remarkable. Until he was nearly thirty years of age he had no opportunity of exercising it. But once having given up the gentle craft, in which he was no great proficient, he proved himself one of the smartest and cleverest business men in London. We can readily pardon the simple vanity of the self-made and self-taught merchant prince who writes about his recently acquired _chariot_ in the following strain: "And I assure you, sir, that reflecting on the means by which the carriage was procured adds not a little to the pleasure of riding in it. I believe I may, without being deemed censorious, assert that there are some who ride in their carriages who cannot reflect on the means by which they were acquired with an equal degree of satisfaction." For several years, both before and after he retired from business, he made a journey through different parts of England and Scotland, calling at the chief towns, such as York, Leeds, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Carlisle, Lancaster, Manchester, Bristol, and inspecting the bookshops. His observations are of the most quaint and out-of-the-way character. At Newcastle he found nothing more remarkable to record than "the celebrated _crow's nest_ affixed above the weather-cock on the upper extremity of the steeple in the market-place," and the famous _brank_, an iron instrument, shown in the town-hall, and used in olden time to punish notorious scolds. At Glasgow the most notable spectacle, and one that calls forth a considerable amount of remark, is that of the washerwomen, whose practice of getting into their tubs, placed by the river-side, and dollying the linen with their bare feet, awoke his profound astonishment. Of his visits to Bristol and the west of England, the scene of his early life, he gives the following curious and interesting account: "In Bristol, Exbridge, Bridgewater, Taunton, Wellington, and other places, I amused myself in calling on some of my masters, with whom I had, about twenty years before, worked as a journeyman shoemaker. I addressed each with, '_Pray, sir, have you got any occasion?_' which is the term made use of by journeymen in that useful occupation when seeking employment. Most of those honest men had