Travelling, whatever may be said of it, is one of the saddest pleasures of life.

When you find yourself comfortable in some foreign city it begins to feel, in some degree, like your own country; but to traverse unknown realms, to hear a language spoken which you hardly comprehend, to see human countenances which have no connection either with your past recollections or future prospects, is solitude and isolation, without dignity and without repose; for that eagerness, that haste to arrive where nobody expects us, that agitation, of which curiosity is the only cause, inspires us with very little esteem for ourselves, till the moment when new objects become a little old, and create around us some soft ties of sentiment and habit.
The grief of Oswald was, then, redoubled in traversing Germany in order to repair to Italy.

On account of the war it was necessary to avoid France and its environs; it was also necessary to keep aloof from the armies who rendered the roads impracticable.

This necessity of occupying his mind with particulars material to the journey, of adopting, every day, and almost every instant, some new resolution, was quite insupportable to Lord Nelville.

His health, far from becoming better, often obliged him to stop, when he felt the strongest desire to hasten to his journey's end or at least to make a start.