CHAPTER FIVE
THE AGREEABLE FELLOW-PASSENGERS--RISKS FROM FRIENDS PICKED UP BY THE
WAYSIDE--SKETCHES OF HOLLAND AND THE DUTCH--SHIFTS WHILE A POOR STUDENT AT
LEYDEN--THE TULIP SPECULATION--THE PROVIDENT FLUTE--SOJOURN AT
PARIS--SKETCH OF VOLTAIRE--TRAVELING SHIFTS OF A PHILOSOPHIC VAGABOND
His usual indiscretion attended Goldsmith at the very outset of his foreign
enterprise. He had intended to take shipping at Leith for Holland, but on
arriving at that port he found a ship about to sail for Bordeaux, with six
agreeable passengers, whose acquaintance he had probably made at the inn.
He was not a man to resist a sudden impulse; so, instead of embarking for
Holland, he found himself plowing the seas on his way to the other side of
the Continent. Scarcely had the ship been two days at sea when she was
driven by stress of weather to Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Here "of course"
Goldsmith and his agreeable fellow-passengers found it expedient to go on
shore and "refresh themselves after the fatigues of the voyage." "Of
course" they frolicked and made merry until a late hour in the evening,
when, in the midst of their hilarity, the door was burst open, and a
sergeant and twelve grenadiers entered with fixed bayonets, and took the
whole convivial party prisoners.
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