He has no objection to ride a fine horse when he has the opportunity: he has his day-dream of making a fortune of two hundred thousand pounds by becoming a merchant and doing business after the Armenian fashion; and there can be no doubt that he would have been glad to wear fine clothes, provided he had had sufficient funds to authorise him in wearing them.

For the sake of wandering the country and plying the hammer and tongs he would not have refused a commission in the service of that illustrious monarch George the Fourth, provided he had thought that he could live on his pay, and not be forced to run in debt to tradesmen, without any hope of paying them, for clothes and luxuries, as many highly genteel officers in that honourable service were in the habit of doing.

For the sake of tinkering he would certainly not have refused a secretaryship of an embassy to Persia, in which he might have turned his acquaintance with Persian, Arabic, and the Lord only knows what other languages, to account.

He took to tinkering and smithery, because no better employments were at his command.

No war is waged in the book against rank, wealth, fine clothes, or dignified employments; it is shown, however, that a person may be a gentleman and a scholar without them.