That power was not, indeed, very extensive; however, in common with the
rats, I sate rent free; and as Dr. Johnson has recorded that he never but
once in his life had as much wall-fruit as he could eat, so let me be
grateful that on that single occasion I had as large a choice of
apartments in a London mansion as I could possibly desire. Except the
Bluebeard room, which the poor child believed to be haunted, all others,
from the attics to the cellars, were at our service; "the world was all
before us," and we pitched our tent for the night in any spot we chose.
This house I have already described as a large one; it stands in a
conspicuous situation and in a well-known part of London. Many of my
readers will have passed it, I doubt not, within a few hours of reading
this. For myself, I never fail to visit it when business draws me to
London; about ten o'clock this very night, August 15, 1821--being my
birthday--I turned aside from my evening walk down Oxford Street,
purposely to take a glance at it; it is now occupied by a respectable
family, and by the lights in the front drawing-room I observed a domestic
party assembled, perhaps at tea, and apparently cheerful and gay.
Marvellous contrast, in my eyes, to the darkness, cold, silence, and
desolation of that same house eighteen years ago, when its nightly
occupants were one famishing scholar and a neglected child.
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