days of cold
philosophic latitudinarian doctrine, universal tolerism, and
half-concealed rebellion--rare times, no doubt, for papists and
dissenters, but which would assuredly have broken the heart of the loyal
soldier of George the Third, and the dignified High-Church clerk of
pretty D---.

We passed many months at this place: nothing, however, occurred requiring
any particular notice, relating to myself, beyond what I have already
stated, and I am not writing the history of others. At length my father
was recalled to his regiment, which at that time was stationed at a place
called Norman Cross, in Lincolnshire, or rather Huntingdonshire, at some
distance from the old town of Peterborough. For this place he departed,
leaving my mother and myself to follow in a few days. Our journey was a
singular one. On the second day we reached a marshy and fenny country,
which, owing to immense quantities of rain which had lately fallen, was
completely submerged. At a large town we got on board a kind of
passage-boat, crowded with people; it had neither sails nor oars, and
those were not the days of steam-vessels; it was a treck-schuyt, and was
drawn by horses. Young as I was, there was much connected with this
journey which highly surprised me, and which brought to my remembrance
particular scenes described in the book which I now generally carried in
my bosom. The country was, as I have already said, submerged--entirely
drowned--no land was visible; the trees were growing bolt upright in the
flood, whilst farmhouses and cottages were standing insulated; the horses
which drew us were up to the knees in water, and, on coming to blind
pools and 'greedy depths,' were not unfrequently swimming, in which case,
the boys or urchins who mounted them sometimes stood, sometimes knelt,
upon the saddle and pillions. No accident, however, occurred either to
the quadrupeds or bipeds, who appeared respectively to be quite _au fait_
in their business, and extricated themselves with the greatest ease from
places in which Pharaoh and all his host would have gone to the bottom.
Nightfall brought us to Peterborough, and from thence we were not slow in
reaching the place of our destination.

CHAPTER FOUR

NORMAN CROSS--WIDE EXPANSE--_VIVE L'EMPEREUR_--UNPRUNED WOODS--MAN WITH
THE BAG--FROTH AND CONCEIT--I BEG YOUR PARDON--GROWING TIMID--ABOUT THREE
O'CLOCK--TAKING ONE'S EASE--CHEEK ON THE GROUND--KING OF THE
VIPERS--FRENCHMEN & WATER