He stays at the "Dog" at Oundle for some days, still ill, and visits Northampton, where he is struck with the curious church, town-hall, prison, and courts of justice, and slept at the "George." From there he rides to the "Angel" at Wellingboro', and so home to London by Dunstable, where he stays at the "Saracen's Head," Watford, Rickmansworth, and Uxbridge, where he puts up at the "Swan." Being now well again, he recommences the old round of the "Horns," the "Red Cow," the "Mermaid," the "Crown," and so on, usually winding up with a roaring carouse at Phillips', and occasionally relieved by trips to Islington-wells to walk in the fields with friend Stourton, who lives near there, and who later on becomes his inseparable companion. To illustrate the methodical character of this roistering blade, it is curious to note that, as he could not well carry his cumbrous diary with him on his journey to Oundle, he has made his daily entries on a small loose leaf and has afterwards carefully transcribed them in the book, the loose leaf, however, being also bound up with the rest. On the reverse side, in English, Richard has copied the following couplet of Lord Thomond's, which seems to have struck him:-- "Whatever Traveller doth wicked ways intend, The Devill entertains him at his journey's end," and to this he adds several little remedies which some travelling companion seems to have told him on the road. He scrupulously records the fact that the day is his birthday on each succeeding 28th of August, and the occasion appears to be an excuse {356} for a burst of deeper drinking than ever, but on this first birthday mentioned in the diary, 1693, he is evidently getting hard up. He lodges with a man named Nelson, who ceaselessly duns him for his rent, and we soon learn that the faithful Benson has pawned his two rings for eighteen shillings. On the 27th of September his friend Dr. Stockton tells him "that Mr. Addison told him that I lost my place because I was against the Government, and was foolish enough to talk about it, which," says indignant Richard, "is a lie." It sounds curious nowadays to read that he and his friends, Westmacott and others, sometimes walk out in the fields to shoot with bows and arrows, and usually return thence to the "Hole-in-the-Wall" to pass the evening.