The Expedition of Humphry ClinkerSmollett, T. (Tobias)
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The Expedition of Humphry Clinker
Smollett, T. (Tobias)
Epistolary fiction; Great Britain -- Fiction; Travelers -- Fiction
If I can glean any thing for your amusement, either from his observation
or my own, you shall have it freely, though I am afraid it will poorly
compensate the trouble of reading these tedious insipid letters of,
Dear Phillips, Yours always, J. MELFORD
To Dr LEWIS. BATH, April 23. DEAR DOCTOR,
If I did not know that the exercise of your profession has habituated
you to the hearing of complaints, I should make a conscience of
troubling you with my correspondence, which may be truly called the
lamentations of Matthew Bramble. Yet I cannot help thinking I have
some right to discharge the overflowings of my spleen upon you, whose
province it is to remove those disorders that occasioned it; and let
me tell you, it is no small alleviation of my grievances, that I have a
sensible friend, to whom I can communicate my crusty humours, which, by
retention, would grow intolerably acrimonious.
You must know, I find nothing but disappointment at Bath; which is
so altered, that I can scarce believe it is the same place that I
frequented about thirty years ago. Methinks I hear you say, ‘Altered it
is, without all doubt: but then it is altered for the better; a truth
which, perhaps, you would own without hesitation, if you yourself was
not altered for the worse.’ The reflection may, for aught I know, be
just. The inconveniences which I overlooked in the high-day of health,
will naturally strike with exaggerated impression on the irritable
nerves of an invalid, surprised by premature old age, and shattered with
long-suffering--But, I believe, you will not deny, that this place,
which Nature and Providence seem to have intended as a resource
from distemper and disquiet, is become the very centre of racket and
dissipation. Instead of that peace, tranquillity, and ease, so necessary
to those who labour under bad health, weak nerves, and irregular
spirits; here we have nothing but noise, tumult, and hurry; with the
fatigue and slavery of maintaining a ceremonial, more stiff, formal, and
oppressive, than the etiquette of a German elector. A national hospital
it may be, but one would imagine that none but lunatics are admitted;
and truly, I will give you leave to call me so, if I stay much longer at
Bath.--But I shall take another opportunity to explain my sentiments
at greater length on this subject--I was impatient to see the boasted
improvements in architecture, for which the upper parts of the town have
been so much celebrated and t’other day I made a circuit of all the new
buildings. The Square, though irregular, is, on the whole, pretty well
laid out, spacious, open, and airy; and, in my opinion, by far the most
wholesome and agreeable situation in Bath, especially the upper side of
it; but the avenues to it are mean, dirty, dangerous, and indirect. Its
communication with the Baths, is through the yard of an inn, where the
poor trembling valetudinarian is carried in a chair, betwixt the heels
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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