Chapter One

Now begins a gentleman's exile, and, with it, my tale.

You may wonder, dear Reader, dear, unfathomable Reader, why I have undertaken this voyage, why a man of parts, of fine parts, I may say, and education, better than most, would hazard a crossing and that, in April, the most treacherous of months-showers sweet turn to tempests bitter-and, worse, on a galleon with no berth for a gentleman but a bunk not fit for a dog, not even my mastiff, Gulliver-and I, though six foot tall, his Lilliputian-who, despite my best efforts, splays himself, fleas and all, atop my moth-ridden blanket, with me huddled under it, as if I were a city and he a great army, equipped with cauldrons of drool, besieging me. While you wonder why I wander, know this: run I must.

Aye, I would have stayed home if I could. If I could. Instead, each day the winds blow me farther from the dales and vales of Jamesons past, clan of clans, men among men, though, truth be told-and here, dear Reader, it will be told, and without ornament-our tartan is sold by the yard at Covent Garden to every shaver, ever striver, every waster with two pence in his pocket and a plan to marry a merry widow with ten thousand a year and an estate in Derbyshire, with horses, comely, and tenants, timely in their rents. Had I ever come across such a lady-let us call her the Widow Bountiful-I would have wooed her with sighs enough to heat a stone-cold bed-chamber in the dead of winter.