XIX Containing the Achievements of the Knights of the Griffin and
Crescent
XX In which our Hero descends into the Mansions of the Damned
XXI Containing further Anecdotes relating to the Children of
Wretchedness
XXII In which Captain Crowe is sublimed into the Regions of
Astrology
XXIII In which the Clouds that cover the Catastrophe begin to
disperse
XXIV The Knot that puzzles human Wisdom, the Hand of Fortune
sometimes will untie familiar as her Garter
XXV Which, it is to be hoped, will be, on more accounts than one,
agreeable to the Reader

INTRODUCTION

It was on the great northern road from York to London, about the
beginning of the month of October, and the hour of eight in the evening,
that four travellers were, by a violent shower of rain, driven for
shelter into a little public-house on the side of the highway,
distinguished by a sign which was said to exhibit the figure of a black
lion. The kitchen, in which they assembled, was the only room for
entertainment in the house, paved with red bricks, remarkably clean,
furnished with three or four Windsor chairs, adorned with shining plates
of pewter, and copper saucepans, nicely scoured, that even dazzled the
eyes of the beholder; while a cheerful fire of sea-coal blazed in the
chimney.

It would be hard to find a better beginning for a wholesome novel of
English life, than these first two sentences in The Adventures of Sir
Launcelot Greaves. They are full of comfort and promise. They promise
that we shall get rapidly into the story; and so we do. They give us the
hope, in which we are not to be disappointed, that we shall see a good
deal of those English inns which to this day are delightful in reality,
and which to generations of readers, have been delightful in fancy.
Truly, English fiction, without its inns, were as much poorer as the
English country, without these same hostelries, were less comfortable.
For few things in the world has the so-called "Anglo-Saxon" race more
reason to be grateful than for good old English inns. Finally there is a
third promise in these opening sentences of Sir Launcelot Greaves. "The
great northern road!" It was that over which the youthful Smollett made
his way to London in 1739; it was that over which, less than nine years
later, he sent us travelling in company with Random and Strap and the
queer people whom the