But in some cases our author is really too good-naturedly credulous. Says he: ’The people of London, though proud and hasty, are good at heart, and humane, even in the lowest class. If any stoppage occurs in the streets, they are always ready to lend their assistance to remove the difficulty, instead of raising a quarrel, which might end in murder, as is often the case in Paris.’ This is really too innocent! And our French visitor must have been very fortunate indeed never to have got into a London crowd of roughs or of pickpockets, who create stoppages in the streets for the only purpose of pursuing their trade, and who seldom hesitate to commit violence if they cannot rob without it. Our author’s belief, indeed, in London honesty is boundless. ’In order that the pot-boys,’ he says, ’may have but little trouble in collecting them [the pewter pots in which publicans send out the beer], they are placed in the open passages, and sometimes on the doorsteps of the houses. I saw them thus exposed ... and felt quite assured against all the cunning of thieves.’ But more astounding is the statement that there are no poor in London! ’A consequence,’ says our visitor, ’of its rich and numerous charitable establishments and the immense sums raised by the poor-rates, which impost is one which the little householders pay most cheerfully, as they consider it a fund from which, in the event of their death, their wives and children will be supported.’ Fancy a little householder paying his poor-rate cheerfully! And what a mean opinion must our author have had of the spirit of the householder who calmly contemplated his family, after his death, going to the parish! The Frenchman returns once more to our usual melancholy, ’which,’ he says, ’is no doubt owing to the fogs’ and to our fat meat and strong beer. ’Beef is the Englishman’s ordinary diet, relished in proportion to the quantity of fat, and this, mixed in their stomachs with the beer they drink, must produce a chyle, whose viscous heaviness conveys only bilious and melancholic vapours to the brain.’ It certainly is satisfactory to have so scientific an explanation of the origin of our spleen.