Note 178 — Chapter XXVI
Reading edition
It is thus that an old schoolfellow, Dalrymple, describes the episode in a fragment of manuscript in the possession of Mrs. James Stuart of Carrow Abbey, from which I have already quoted:
'In 1850/2/3 Borrow lived at Yarmouth; he here made rather a ludicrous exhibition of himself on the occasion of a wreck, when he ran into the sea through a full tide up to his knees, with the utmost apparent heroism, and retreated again as soon as he thought it might be dangerous. He incurred so much ridicule that he abruptly quitted the town, and I have not heard since of him.'