I remained in London only a few days, and then proceeded to Amsterdam, where I stayed a week, and then went to Paris. After completely exhausting my stock of money I was compelled to walk back to Calais, which I did with little inconvenience, as I found that money was unnecessary; the only difficulty I met with being how to escape from the overflowing hospitality I everywhere experienced from rich and poor. My health was much improved when I arrived in town, and I immediately proceeded on foot to Birmingham, where I engaged with Dr. Palmer, a celebrated physician, to supply the Greek and Latin synonyms and correct the press for a dictionary of the terms used by the French in medicine, which he was preparing. The pay I received was so very small that I was again reduced to the poorest and most meagre diet, and an attack of pleurisy produced such a state of debility that I was compelled to leave Birmingham and return to my mother's house in Kenilworth.
I had now firmly resolved to free myself from my fatal habit; and the very day I reached home I began to diminish the quantity I was then taking by one grain per day. I received the most careful attention, and every thing was done that could add to my comfort and alleviate the sufferings I must inevitably undergo. Until I had arrived at seventeen and a half grains a day I experienced but little uneasiness, and my digestive organs acquired or regained strength very rapidly. All constipation had vanished. My skin became moist and more healthy, and my spirits instead of being depressed became equable and cheerful. No visions haunted my sleep. I could not sleep, however, more than two or three hours at a time, and from about 3 A.M. until 8--when I took my opium--I was restless and troubled with a gnawing, twitching sensation in the stomach. From seventeen grains downward my torment (for by that word alone can I characterize the pangs I endured) commenced. I could not rest, either lying, sitting, or standing. I was compelled to change my position every moment, and the only thing that relieved me was walking about the country. My sight became weak and dim; the gnawing at my stomach was perpetual, resembling the sensation caused by ravenous hunger; but food, though I ate voraciously, would not relieve me. I also felt a sinking in the stomach, and such a pain in the back that I could not straighten myself up. A dull, constant, aching pain took possession of the calves of my legs, and there was a continual jerking motion of the nerves from head to foot. My head ached, my intellect was terribly weakened and confused, and I could not think, talk, read, nor write. To sleep was impossible, until by walking from morning till night I had so thoroughly tired myself that pain could not keep me awake, although I was so weak that walking was misery to me. And yet under all these _dèsagrèmens_ I did not feel dejected in spirit; although I became unable to walk, and used to lie on the floor and roll about in agony for hours together. I should certainly have taken opium again if the chemist had not, by my mother's instructions, refused to sell it. I became worse every day, and it was not till I had entirely left off the drug--two months nearly--that any alleviation of my suffering was perceptible. I gradually but very slowly recovered my strength both of mind and body, though it was long before I could read or write, or even converse. My appetite was too good; for though while an opium-eater I could not endure to taste the smallest morsel of fat, I now could eat at dinner a pound of bacon which had not a hair's-breadth of lean in it. Previously to my arrival in Kenilworth an intimate friend of mine had been ruined--reduced at once from affluence to utter penury by the villainy of his partner, to whom he had entrusted the whole of his business, and who had committed two forgeries for which he was sentenced to transportation for life. In consequence of this event, my friend, who was a little older than myself and had been about twelve months married, determined to leave his young wife and child and seek to rebuild his broken fortunes in Canada. When he informed me that such was his plan I resolved to accompany him, and immediately commenced preparations for my voyage. I was not however ready, not having been able so soon to collect the sum necessary, when he was obliged to leave, and as I could not have him for my companion, I altered my course and took my passage for New York, in the vain expectation of obtaining a better income here, where the ground was comparatively unoccupied, than in London, where there were hundreds of men as well qualified as myself, dependent on literature for their support. I need not add how lamentably I was disappointed.