I-T.IMMKS \M) NAVIGABLE IIIVF.IIS. 



been iniicli improved. Smollett gives a rather dismal 

 account of his progress from London to Boulogne in 

 17<>:5, \vliidi presents a curious contrast to the facilities 

 of travelling 1 >y the modern Boulogne steam route. After 

 tc<liousl\ grumbling his way through Rochester and 

 Canterbury, fleeced by every innkeeper on the road, he 

 at last reached Dover in very bad temper. He pro- 

 nounced the place to be a den of thieves, where the people 

 live by piracy in time of war, and by smuggling and 

 fleecing strangers in time of peace. He did them the 

 justice, however, to admit, that " they make no distinc- 

 tion between foreigners and natives. Without all doubt 

 a man cannot be much worse lodged and worse treated in 

 any part of Europe ; nor will he in any other place meet 

 with more flagrant instances of fraud, imposition, and 

 1 ruta 1 ity. One would imagine they had formed a general 

 conspiracy against all those who go to or return from the 

 ( 1 ont incut." But Smollett's troubles had scarcely yet 

 I H -gun, as he found to his cost before he reached Boulogne. 

 He sent for the master of the packet-boat a comfortless 

 tub, called a Folkestone cutter and hired it to carry him 

 across the Strait for six guineas, the master demanding 

 eight. "We embarked," he says, "between six and 

 seven in the evening, and found ourselves in a most 

 wretched hovel. The cabin was so small that a dog 

 could hardly turn in it, and the beds put me in mind of 

 the holes described in some catacombs, in which the 

 bodies of the dead were deposited, being thrust in witli 

 tin- feet foremost: there was no getting into them but 

 endways, and indeed they seemed so dirty, that nothing 

 but extreme necessity could have obliged me to use them. 

 We sat up all night in a most uncomfortable situation, 

 tossed about by the sea, cold and cramped, and weary 

 and languishing for want of sleep. At three in the 

 morning the master came down and told us we were just 

 off the harbour of Boulogne ; but the wind blowing off 

 shore he could not possibly enter, and therefore advised 



