“I arrived here this evening, without having suffer’d any inconvenience or fatigue in my whole progress. We were met on Thursday in Leeming Lane[267] by a Messenger from Capt. Twycross to tell us the waters were out at Burroughbridge, and that we could not pass them, so I apply’d to my guide, Mr. Carter, and a wise man is certainly never out of his element. He told me I might go to Kirby Hill and there get a warm lodging, though not an elegant one; which he thought would be as well as turning back. For my part I assured him I had rather have my bed stuffed with flocks than my pillow with care and disappointment, and agreed to go on to the place he mentioned, and then send a messenger to see if the waters were fallen. The Dove returned with an olive branch, and we went on to the Waterside[268] there to prevent fear (for danger there was none), we got into a boat and navigated through Mr. Williamson’s gardens, his melancholy yews just shew’d their formal heads above the water. Himself a melancholy shade too, was almost in as bad a way, for the water was quite to his door, so he could get no amusement from the rest of the world, but what he saw from the windows. We were safely landed at the door of the Inn. The coach came through the water without getting any wet inside of it, and we all rejoiced that we had been more afraid than hurt. Mr. Carter, in his care, often bid me be of good courage; as there was not occasion for any, I could not be disgraced for want of it: from our first setting out I have not been less entertain’d than guarded by him, he has really acted the part of Sir Roger de Coverley all the way; his benevolent heart breaks into such honest and affectionate expressions, you would think he was talking to his family wherever he is; at the ‘Oak-tree’ he was, I saw, shaking hands with every creature. I stopp’d to speak to a servant of Mrs. Yorke’s who met us with her compliments, and could hear Mr. Carter praising the strong beer, thanking the Landlord, wishing many good things to a boy who was stuffing a luncheon of bread and butter, thanking Heaven for good weather, and commending the road, all in a breath. At Lord Castlecomer’s Inn he would stop for the horses to eat, he said a sort of grace to it, praying it might strengthen them to the end of their journey, then he extolled the Inn, the Landlord and his wife, not forgetting a ‘lile lass’ that stood at the gate: all the way we went in the boat he commended the boatmen more than an envious person would have done Christopher Columbus, for exploring leas and lands unknown; at Borough Bridge he made the funeral Elogy of Mr. Mann, but not to wrong the living for the sake of the dead, he said the handsomest things to mine Hostess, the civilest things to her daughters, the most honourable things of her son, and the most affable things to the chambermaid, that ever I heard in my life.