Publisher's Synopsis
Humorous narrative of Collins's and Dickens's walking tour of Cumberland during September 1857. Written in collaboration, it was originally published in Household Words, 3-31 October 1857; and Harper's Weekly, 31 October--28 November 1857. Collected in book form in 1890. Collins assumed the identity of Thomas Idle (a born-and-bred idler) and Dickens that of Francis Goodchild (laboriously idle). Collins wrote three main parts. In the first, he describes his sprained ankle after a reluctant ascent of Carrock Fell in the mist. The second, the story of Dr Lorn, was later republished as 'The Dead Hand'. The remaining section, in which Thomas Idle, stretched out injured on a sofa in Allonby, reflects that all the great disasters of his life have been caused by being deluded into activity, consists of reminiscences, and is loosely based on Collins's own life. At school, after foolishly winning a prize, he was rejected by the other idle boys as a traitor and by the industrious boys as a a dangerous interloper. The only time he played cricket he caught a fever from the unaccustomed perspiration. Mistakenly studying for the Bar, where he was expected to know nothing whatever about the law, he became the target of a persistent legal bore.
