It was my policy (if I may so express myself) to talk much
and say little. At the inn tables, the country, the state of the
roads, the business interest of those who sat down with me, and the
course of public events, afforded me a considerable field in which
I might discourse at large and still communicate no information
about myself. There was no one with less air of reticence; I
plunged into my company up to the neck; and I had a long cock-and-
bull story of an aunt of mine which must have convinced the most
suspicious of my innocence. 'What!' they would have said, 'that
young ass to be concealing anything! Why, he has deafened me with
an aunt of his until my head aches. He only wants you should give
him a line, and he would tell you his whole descent from Adam
downward, and his whole private fortune to the last shilling.' A
responsible solid fellow was even so much moved by pity for my
inexperience as to give me a word or two of good advice: that I
was but a young man after all--I had at this time a deceptive air
of youth that made me easily pass for one-and-twenty, and was, in
the circumstances, worth a fortune--that the company at inns was
very mingled, that I should do well to be more careful, and the
like; to all which I made answer that I meant no harm myself and
expected none from others, or the devil was in it.
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