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235
The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft
·
George Gissing
50
I
had
in
me
the
making
of
a
scholar.
With
leisure
and
tranquillity
of
mind,
I
should
have
amassed
learning.
Within
the
walls
of
a
college,
I
should
have
lived
so
happily,
so
harmlessly,
my
imagination
ever
busy
with
the
old
world.
In
the
introduction
to
his
History
of
France,
Michelet
says:
"J'ai
passe
a
cote
du
monde,
et
j'ai
pris
l'histoire
pour
la
vie."
That,
as
I
can
see
now,
was
my
true
ideal;
through
all
my
battlings
and
miseries
I
have
always
lived
more
in
the
past
than
in
the
present.
At
the
time
when
I
was
literally
starving
in
London,
when
it
seemed
impossible
that
I
should
ever
gain
a
living
by
my
pen,
how
many
days
have
I
spent
at
the
British
Museum,
reading
as
disinterestedly
as
if
I
had
been
without
a
care!
It
astounds
me
to
remember
that,
having
breakfasted
on
dry
bread,
and
carrying
in
my
pocket
another
piece
of
bread
to
serve
for
dinner,
I
settled
myself
at
a
desk
in
the
great
Reading-Room
with
books
before
me
which
by
no
possibility
could
be
a
source
of
immediate
profit.
At
such
a
time,
I
worked
through
German
tomes
on
Ancient
Philosophy.
At
such
a
time,
I
read
Appuleius
and
Lucian,
Petronius
and
the
Greek
Anthology,
Diogenes
Laertius
and--heaven
knows
what!
My
hunger
was
forgotten;
the
garret
to
which
I
must
return
to
pass
the
night
never
perturbed
my
thoughts.
On
the
whole,
it
seems
to
me
something
to
be
rather
proud
of;
I
smile
approvingly
at
that
thin,
white-faced
youth.
Me?
My
very
self?
No,
no!
He
has
been
dead
these
thirty
years.
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