Page:Pen And Pencil Sketches - Volume I.djvu/8

viii few short months that the loss is not so irreparable as was at first supposed. The gap is filled top by some one else, the world continues to revolve , and goes on much the same as before. So with the entreaties and suggestions of friends to publish per- haps a volume of verse. I have my doubts, and sometimes fancy they are having a joke at the would-be author's expense, or that their suggestions exist only in his imagination.

In place of writing disquisitions and views of art, except in a humble way, I have ventured to give a few of my impressions of London, its omnibuses, theatres, and music-halls, &c., its noises and other delights. Some words on the dog, the friend of man, whose praises have been sounded by hundreds of trumpets, may serve to show his admirers that there are still other points of view from which his claims to universal perfection may be regarded and enforced. In what I have said about personal friends, I have endeavoured, as far as possible, to give anec- dotes that have not appeared in print before, as in the case of Fred Walker and others. The anecdotes of Mr. Ruskin and selection from his letters will be found interesting, as showing in some degree another view of his many-sided nature. In writing of my