Riding in a carriage through London was only a little better than being systematically beaten by men with cudgels – Daniel felt the need for a stretch, and so he climbed out, too, turned round – and found himself looking straight down a lane toward the front of St. James's Palace, a few hundred yards distant. Spinning round a hundred and eighty degrees, he discovered Comstock House, a stupefying Gothick pile heaving itself up out of some gardens and pavements. Pepys's carriage had turned in off of Piccadilly and stopped in the great house's forecourt. Daniel admired its situation: John Comstock could, if he so chose, plant himself in the center of his front doorway and fire a musket across his garden, out his front gate, across Piccadilly, straight down the center of a tree-lined faux -country lane, across Pall Mall, and straight into the grand entrance of St. James's, where it would be likely to kill someone very well-dressed. Stone walls, hedges, and wrought-iron fences had been cunningly arranged so as to crop away the view of Piccadilly and neighboring houses, and enhance the impression that Comstock House and St. James's Palace were all part of the same family compound.