The Oper

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: us ? Need I say that we shall be proud of your company ? Really, Captain Frederic Fordyce, returned I, I am excessively obliged to you For you, a dashing young gentleman, to take notice of an old semi-addle-headed philosopher, such as I am, or such an original, begging his pardon, as my right- hand man,...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: us ? Need I say that we shall be proud of your company ? Really, Captain Frederic Fordyce, returned I, I am excessively obliged to you For you, a dashing young gentleman, to take notice of an old semi-addle-headed philosopher, such as I am, or such an original, begging his pardon, as my right- hand man, poor Gilpin, who for lack of perhaps anything better to do counts the crows which he sees flying over his street, and is elated or depressed as he distinguishes two or one, argues that you wish to show us such compliment as we ?purblind anchorites?must be puzzled how to bow in acknowledgment of But I will go with you with all the pleasure in the world; and so shall Samuel. Agreed then, said Captain Frederic. You and your excellent friend, Gilpin? ' Of credit and renown, ' shall come and dine with me and Osterley. The honour is ours, sir, so don't refuse us, pray. But I'm off. Don't forget five o'clock and Bond Street. You mustn't stir. Surely I know my way downstairs by this time. Without waiting a word more, the captaingrasped rny hand and disappeared, pulling the door sharply after him, as if to forbid my following even to the head of the stairs. I heard his boots down the staircase, and then my street door clap-to. A fine young fellow, said I to myself, smiling, for he had put me in a good humour, with his heart in the right place, and of nature's own material?polished but not painted. A note which I had dispatched to Gilpin found him, as I learned, packing up writing-paper and cravats for his brother in India. But precisely at five o'clock we all met at the captain1s lodgings, and after dinner we took our way to the Opera House. The bustle outside here is very different to that surrounding one of our national theatres. It is rem...