If you have ever done the same sort of thing yourself you will
understand and feel for me. If you have not, you will very likely say,
"Disgusting old man! why does he tell us this?" The reason why is now to
come.
Having, then, taken my drop (bless you! you have got your favourite
vice, too; only your vice isn't mine, and mine isn't yours), I next
applied the one infallible remedy--that remedy being, as you know,
ROBINSON CRUSOE. Where I opened that unrivalled book, I can't say. Where
the lines of print at last left off running into each other, I know,
however, perfectly well. It was at page three hundred and eighteen--a
domestic bit concerning Robinson Crusoe's marriage, as follows:
"With those Thoughts, I considered my new Engagement, that I had a Wife
"--(Observe! so had Mr. Franklin!)--"one Child born"--(Observe again!
that might yet be Mr. Franklin's case, too!)--"and my Wife then"--What
Robinson Crusoe's wife did, or did not do, "then," I felt no desire to
discover. I scored the bit about the Child with my pencil, and put a
morsel of paper for a mark to keep the place; "Lie you there," I said,
"till the marriage of Mr. Franklin and Miss Rachel is some months
older--and then we'll see!"
The months passed (more than I had bargained for), and no occasion
presented itself for disturbing that mark in the book.
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