Introduction
ulous misadventures into the greatest romance in the world, you know what Dickens did with Cockneydom and silly men and cold punch and a dirty, stinking prison in "Pickwick." All these three shewed that there is a wonder in everything, a vast and exquisite relish in everything; yes, even in the very meanest thing on earth. Strip the veils of illusions, and there is nothing common or unclean, for all things are rare, all things have the radiance of a certain secret star that dwells within them.
And so I according to my measure—God help!—endeavoured to shew that there are wonders, secrets, mysteries, rarities, delights even in an ounce of shag tobacco and a clay pipe, bought from the talkative man in the Goldhawk Road, by Shepherd's Bush Green.
May we be rewarded according to our good desires, and now condemned according to our evil works.
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