No sooner had he found himself in the metropolis, alone and free, with a pocketful of money, than a delirium possessed him.

Every resolution notwithstanding, he yielded to London's grossest lures.

All he could remember, was a succession of extravagances, beneath a sunless sky, with chance companions whose faces he had forgotten five minutes after parting with them.

Sovereign after sovereign melted out of his hand; the end of the second week found his capital diminished by some five-and-twenty pounds.

In an hour of physical and moral nausea, he packed his travelling-bag, journeyed to Newhaven, and as a sort of penance, crossed the Channel by third-class passage.