So In Coming In Sight Of The Promontory Of Sunium, Where The Greek
Muse, In An Awful Vision, Came To
Me, and said in a patronising
way, "Why, my dear" (she always, the old spinster, adopts this high
and mighty
Tone) - "Why, my dear, are you not charmed to be in this
famous neighbourhood, in this land of poets and heroes, of whose
history your classical education ought to have made you a master?
if it did not, you have wofully neglected your opportunities, and
your dear parents have wasted their money in sending you to
school." I replied, "Madam, your company in youth was made so
laboriously disagreeable to me, that I can't at present reconcile
myself to you in age. I read your poets, but it was in fear and
trembling; and a cold sweat is but an ill accompaniment to poetry.
I blundered through your histories; but history is so dull (saving
your presence) of herself, that when the brutal dulness of a
schoolmaster is superadded to her own slow conversation, the union
becomes intolerable: hence I have not the slightest pleasure in
renewing my acquaintance with a lady who has been the source of so
much bodily and mental discomfort to me." To make a long story
short, I am anxious to apologise for a want of enthusiasm in the
classical line, and to excuse an ignorance which is of the most
undeniable sort.
This is an improper frame of mind for a person visiting the land of
AEschylus and Euripides; add to which, we have been abominably
overcharged at the inn:
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