Aiken ventures to congratulate her upon her "success" in London society, she loftily repudiates the word. Success implies endeavour, and she (Harriet Martineau) has "nothing to strive for in any such direction." When she sails for the United States, it is with the avowed purpose of "self-discipline." She has become "too much accustomed to luxury," and seeks for wholesome hardships. It sounds a trifle far-fetched. Byron—an incomparable traveller—admits that folks who go "a-pleasuring" in the world must not ask for comfort; but even Byron did not visit the East in order to be uncomfortable. He was not hunting a corrective for St. James Street and Piccadilly.
There is no finer example in the world of the happiness of writing an autobiography than that afforded us by Miss Martineau. Her book is a real book, not an ephemeral piece of self-flattery. Her enjoyment of it is so
