[Gibbon by James Cotter Morison]@TWC D-Link book
Gibbon

CHAPTER VIII
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His staid and solid nature was not given to transports of joy or grief.

But his constant references to "poor Deyverdun," and the vacancy caused by his loss, show the depth of the wound.

"I want to change the scene," he writes, "and, beautiful as the garden and prospect must appear to every eye, I feel that the state of my mind casts a gloom over them: every spot, every walk, every bench recalls the memory of those hours, those conversations, which will return no more....

I almost hesitate whether I shall run over to England to consult with you on the spot, and to fly from poor Deyverdun's shade, which meets me at every turn." Not that he lacked attached friends, and of mere society and acquaintance he had more than abundance.

He occupied at Lausanne a position of almost patriarchal dignity, "and may be said," writes Lord Sheffield, "to have almost given the law to a set of as willing subjects as any man ever presided over." Soon the troubles in France sent wave after wave of emigrants over the frontiers, and Lausanne had its full share of the exiles.


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