His
publisher he had changed, for what reason is not known, and the firm
of Becket & De Hondt had taken the place of Dodsley. Sterne hoped by
the end of the year to be free to depart from England, and already he
had made all arrangements with his ecclesiastical superiors for the
necessary leave of absence. He seems to have been treated with all
consideration in the matter. His Archbishop, on being applied to, at
once excused him from parochial work for a year, and promised, if
it should be necessary, to double that term. Fortified with this
permission, Sterne bade farewell to his wife and daughter, and betook
himself to London, with his now completed volumes, at the setting in
of the winter. On the 21st of December they made their appearance, and
in about three weeks from that date their author left England,
with the intention of wintering in the South of France. There were
difficulties, however, of more kinds than one which had first to be
faced--a pecuniary difficulty, which Garrick met by a loan of 20L.,
and a political difficulty, for the removal of which Sterne had to
employ the good offices of new acquaintance later on.
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