These introductory remarks cannot be better wound-up than by a quotation from a preface to “HOOD’S Own,” in which is laid down the system of “Practical Cheerful Philosophy,” which is reflected in his writings, and which influenced his life. The reader will more thoroughly appreciate the comic writings of THOMAS HOOD after its perusal: In the absence of a certain thin “blue and yellow” visage, and attenuated figure,--whose effigies may one day be affixed to the present work,--you will not be prepared to learn that some of the merriest effusions in the forthcoming numbers have been the relaxations of a gentleman literally enjoying bad health--the carnival, so to speak, of a personified Jour Maigre. The very fingers so aristocratically slender, that now hold the pen, hint plainly of the “_ills_ that _flesh_ is heir to:”--my coats have become great coats, my pantaloons are turned into trowsers, and, by a worse bargain than Peter Schemihl’s, I seem to have retained my shadow and sold my substance. In short, as happens to prematurely old port wine, I am of a bad colour with very little body. But what then? That emaciated hand still lends a hand to embody in words and sketches the creations or recreations of a Merry Fancy: those gaunt sides yet shake heartily as ever at the Grotesques and Arabesques and droll Picturesques that my good Genius (a Pantagruelian Familiar) charitably conjures up to divert me from more sombre realities. It was the whim of a late pleasant Comedian, to suppose a set of spiteful imps sitting up aloft, to aggravate all his petty mundane annoyances; whereas I prefer to believe in the ministry of kindlier Elves that “nod to me and do me courtesies.” Instead of scaring away these motes in the sunbeam, I earnestly invoke them, and bid them welcome; for the tricksy spirits make friends with the animal spirits, and do not I, like a father romping with his own urchins,--do not I forget half my cares whilst partaking in their airy gambols? Such sports are as wholesome for the mind as the other frolics for the body. For on our own treatment of that excellent Friend or terrible Enemy the Imagination, it depends whether we are to be scared and haunted by a Scratching Fanny, or tended by an affectionate Invisible Girl--like an unknown Love, blessing us with “favours secret, sweet, and precious,” and fondly stealing us from this worky-day world to a sunny sphere of her own.