BULLER.
And are all those stories lies?
NORTH.
All. I have sometimes swam a loch or a river in my clothes—but never except when they lay in my way, or when I was on an angling excursion—and what danger could there possibly be in doing that?
BULLER.
You might have taken the Cramp, Sir.
NORTH.
And the Cramp might have taken me—but neither of us ever did—and a man, with a short neck or a long one, might as well shun the streets in perpetual fear of apoplexy, as a good swimmer evade water in dread of being drowned. As for swimming in my clothes—had I left them on the hither, how should I have looked on the thither side?
BULLER.
No man, in such circumstances, could, with any satisfaction to himself, have pursued his journey, even through the most lonesome places.