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JOHNA.SEAVERNS

TUFTS UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

3 9090 014 546 275

fA^ebster Family Library of Veterinary Medicine

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SPORTS AND EECREATIONS

LN

TOWN AND COUNTEY.

BY

FREDERICK GALE

(THE OLD BUFFEE).

LONDON:

SWAX SONNENSCHEIN, LOWREY & CO.,

PATERNOSTER SQUARE.

1888.

I

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

THE GAME OF CRICKET.

^tf^ a '^oxtxaxi of t^e |luf^or.

Crown Zvo, Paper Boards^ 7.s.

SECOND EDITION.

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS.

'• Here is a book you can recommend to a friend ; a good book, on a
good subject, by a good fellow. Mr. Gale ... is the moralist, the
philosopher, the instructor, the story-teller of Cricket." . . . "His
Cricket HomiUes . . . should be in the hands of all, and especially
of the young." — Saturday Reviezv.

' ' Mr. Gale's book, to which we have already referred, is a very refresh-
ing book in hot weather, a cool wind blows through it from the past into
the present, out of the dead past, over the daisied graves of ancient
cricketers." — Daily News.

"An agreeable volume which every cricketer will read with pleasure."
— AthencEum.

" The tone of the book is thoroughly sportsmanlike, and, what is still
better, high minded." — WestiJiinster Review.

" A thoroughly good book . . . a manly healthy tone befitting a
veteran speaking to the young men of a new generation. For the rest, it
is practical and shrewd, with a vein of simple humour, too, and many
rules for cricketers of all ?iges."— Graphic.

" Perhaps no living man is so well versed as he in the cricket lore of
other days. His recent book on the game is a storehouse of memories
and maxims." — Times.

"The interest never flags in this chatty (and cheap) volume."—
Yorkshire Post.

" Of all the books touching the game of cricket, this one of Mr. Gale's
is the most interesting, and ought certainly to become the most popular
. . it ought to be in the hands of all cricket enthasiasts."— Cricketer's
Herald.

"Not a dull page in the entire book."— Sporting Life.

PEEFACE.

HOME twelve years ago the late Mr. Baily, the publisher
'^ and originator of Baily's Magazine of Sports and Pas-
times— which is familiarly known now as " The Old Green
Cover " — asked me if I could contribute an article on cricket
in the days of the grand old Kent and Sussex elevens, as
one of the greatest sportsmen in England, who took an
interest in the magazine (and who died in 1884), was
anxious that a record of past cricket heroes should be pre-
served in its pages. Happening to have known Fuller Pilch
for the last twenty-five years of his life, I put in wi'iting all
that I could remember which had fallen from his Kps — during
many a long evening spent with him — under the name of
*' Fuller Pilch's Back Parlour," which appeared in a book of
mine, published in the summer of 1887 by Messrs. Swan
Sonnenschein& Co., under the title of "The Game of Cricket."
After the publication of that article in 1875, the old sports-
man who was the instigator of its production, and who was
a leading member of the Pugilistic Club, when the Ping was
supported by noblemen and gentlemen, asked if I could do
something in the same style about the Prize Ping, and,
curiously enough, I had the materials at hand, as during

race.

Prefc

some years of my pupilage in London, after leaving school, I
lunched every day at the Castle Tavern in Holborn (now
the Napier Restaurant), which was kept by <' Tom Spring,"
the ex-champion of England, who was one of Nature's
gentlemen. It was a very respectable place, and answered
to what is now called a " Luncheon Bar." So I set my
memory to work, and reproduced all that I could remember
of numberless conversations with Tom Spring, under the
name of " Tom Spring's Back Parlour "—which appears in
these pages, and which has not been hitherto reproduced. Mr.
Baily, for whose memory I have a great respect, and myself,
so to say, " put our horses together," and he gave me a
carte Uanclie to write what I pleased connected with English
sports and sketches of country and town life, and I availed
myself largely of his offer, so much so that a considerable
portion of this volume consists of a selection from my articles
which appeared in Baily's magazine. In fact, the excep-
tions are four papers only, namely, '' Boxing and Athletics "
and " My First Salmon," which come from a now extinct
weekly paper styled AsUre or Afloat; "The Racing
Stable," from Vanity Fair; and "Betting and Gambling,"
from Sporting and Dramatic. I take this opportunity of
tendering my sincere thanks to Mr. Baily, who reigns in his
late father's stead, for allowing me to reproduce my former
writings. I thought it better to leave the sketches just as
they were written, as, for what they are worth, they are
mostly reminiscences of happy memories, and are all drawn
from the life. People who call those of my school laudatores
temporis acti, will find, when the time comes that they
cannot shut their eyes to the fact that the shades of early
evening are closing over them, that the greatest pleasure

Preface.

in life is to bring back recollections of scenes and faces
which have passed away.

I have always looked on my fellow travellers of all
classes, through life, as brother puppets, who have been, or
are, on the wires at the same time as myself, all dancing to
different tunes; and I have taken every opportunity of
mixing with as many of them as I could, and I have yet to
learn that any puppet — however gaudy his dress and
spangles may be— has a right to classify any body of his
brother puppets, whom the costumier has clothed in more
humble attire, as ''the lower orders," without being self-
convicted of " judging his neighbour." I adhere to my
no 111 de 2^lume, " The Old Buffer," as the American
Cricketers, when in England on a visit, told me that
whenever they see any letter or article with that signature
they look out for something about old-fashioned England
of the past.

THE OLD BUFEER.

PRINTED BY

CHAS. STKAKER AND SONS, ETSHOPSGATE AVENUE, LONDON, E.G. ;

AND REDHILL.

C O N T E N T S

Tom Spring's Back Parlour . .

Boxing and Athletics . .

My Two Days' Salmon Fishing

About Several Men who went a-Angling

The Pride of Our Village .

In a Racing Stable . .

Newmarket

About Betting and Gambling

Whyte-Melville's Sermon

Reason or Instinct

About Breeches and Boots .

The Country Parson . .

I Preach to the Parson

Pre-Railway Life in London

The Old Dover Road . .

Bankruptcy in Arcadia

When we Old Fogeys were Boys

** De Senectute "

1

26

32

45

52

66

72

83

96

107

119

133

147

159

171

184

196

218

TOM SPEING'S BACK
PAELOUi^.

I HOPE I shall not get a reputation for being a pothouse
snob because I invite my reader to come into Tom Spring's
private parlour. In the month of February, 1842, I was
launched into the little village of London. I fancy my
candour proved my death-warrant, for on paterfamilias
suggesting the propriety of my commencing a profession at
the age of eighteen off, my reply was, " Let me have six
months more, sir, at school, or I shall miss playing in the
Lord's eleven again this summer." Paterfamilias was wise,
and foresaw that my mind was on athletics more than on
work, and I am sure he was right. When started in a place
of business I was in doubt where to go for my luncheon, for
I was utterly green to London, when a name on a lamp close
to Gray's Inn gateway caught my eye. That name was
" Tom Spring."

I suppose that all the world knows that Spring's real
name was Winter. He appeared at the old Fives Court
sixty years ago, or thereabouts, and when his name was
asked for (according to history), one Paddington Jones
shouted out " Young Spring."

At school we always took in BelVs Life for the

2 Tom Sp7'ing's Back Parlour.

cricket in the summer and for general news and amusement,
especially the fights, in the winter ; and Bell indulged in
caricatures of " Heads of the People," with poetical desciip-
tions, some of which caricatures, as we afterwards learnt,
were drawn by the immortal John Leech, w^ien a young
student in London. I can remember my old friends now.
Caricatures of the Lord Mayor, Common Councilmen, the
City Marshal, &c., and one in particular, of an assault case
at a police-court in which a young lady-costermonger,
kissing the book, deposes :

" Ees, sir, I'll do as you desire,

And tell 'ee how it coomed about :
Muggins called Giles a thundering liar,
And so Bill Giles sarved Muggins out."

I very Hkely shall be discursive, and reproduce some of
the eccentricities of Bell when Vincent Dowling was consul.

Two or three things to my uneducated mind seemed
impossible : one was that any men could really have seen
the Derby and have lived, or have spoken to such men as
Tom Spring, or Peter Crawley, or Tom Cribb — more im-
possible still to realise, — and have walked about afterwards
as ordinary citizens. I pictured to myself a prize-fighter as
a ruffian who lived on nearly raw meat, knocked every one
down who contradicted him, and out of whose mouth curses
and ribaldry proceeded, and into whose mouth went nothing
but brandy. However, curiosity overcame my scruples,
and I walked up the passage into the Castle in Holborn,
and found myself in a very comfoitable bar, behind which
stood a tall, broad-shouldered man, who looked a very well-
to-do Baptist minister, minus the hypocritical smile which
some of those gentlemen assume — an oily, unctuous, cold,
untoasted-muffin expression. He must have been nearly
six feet high, if not quite, and boasted a pair of very broad
shoulders. His hair was getting slightly grizzled, as were

Tom Spings Back Parlour. 3

Ms whiskers, which were bushy ; but I never shall forget
his eyes. If I remember rightly, his eyes were rather far
apart ; and in speaking, a kind of frown, which was not an
angry frown, seemed to come over his face and wrinkled
his forehead a little. His nose was disarranged from the
aquiline somewhat, as most of the P.R. heroes experienced.
He had a nice voice and a frank and open manner, which
stamped him as one of nature's gentlemen. He was dressed
in an evening black suit, though it was early in the after-
noon— for he always dressed for dinner, — and wore a white
neckcloth, and a brooch with some hah* in it in his shii-t
frill, and his boots were polished in a manner such as I never
saw surpassed, except by the late Mr. Daniel O'Connell ;
and it was enough to raise the envy of Beau Brummel to
have seen old Dan's boots.

I stood looking at him in blank amazement, and I thought
to myself, " Can this man be Tom Spring, the great prize-
fighter ? " Spring looked at me, and said with a smile,
" Well, young gentleman, what are you staring at ? " My
answer was, '' Are you reaJbj Tom Spring ? " ^' Well, I was
Tom Sirring this morning," he said, "and I suppose I am now."

Having made known my wants, which were some bread-
and-cheese and a glass of stout, Spring summoned his niece
from the back parlour, which opened out of the bar, and
my luncheon was placed on the counter. Now for Tom
Spring's niece — I never knew her name, except that she
was called " Mrs. B." She was a widow, of very consider-
able dimensions, of about forty years of age, fresh coloured
with a pau^ of arms from which I should have been very
sorry to have received a " one, two." An active little curly-
headed waiter, named Hickman (a relative of the celebrated
gasman), and a potboy, Joe Phelps (brother to Brighton
Bill) completed the establishment, so far as the outer world
could see ; and a very quiet, orderly household it was.
B-2

4 Tom Simufjs Back Farlour.

I used to go daily for my luncheon, and after a little wliile
I 'vvas invited into the sanctum ; but I never smoked a
pipe in S^Dring's parlour, for if I remember rightly, smok-
ing was not allowed in the daytime in the front bar, and
never in the private parlour.

The Castle was a quiet, cosy place, well removed from
Holborn by a long passage, and there was a homely appear-
ance about it all. There was generally a well-to-do cat
snoozing in the sun, and a bird hanging up in his cage, which
drew his own water with a little bucket and chain, and a
thrush or blackbird singing, and frequently some flowers.
In fact, nothing could be less like a prize-fighter's home.
The Castle was a bond fide luncheon house.

Bullet-headed ruffians, resembling bull-dogs who had been
baptized with what Charles Dickens called " a large tract
of barren country behind the ear" (though, by-the-bye,
Dickens utterly failed in painting a life-picture in the
character of " the Chicken "), dressed in flash coats, with
cheese-plate buttons adorned with fighting cocks and fancy
devices, and wearing fur caps, had no place in that bar.
They might go into the taproom if they did not get drunk
or use bad language ; though if they did, the way down the
passage was speedily shown to them, and they would as soon
have thought of insulting Tom Spring as a little parish
clerk would of kicking the Archbishop of Canterbury.
The old school, consisting of such men as Spring, Peter
Crawley, Jem Ward, Jem Burn, Frank Redmond, and the
like, had a position ; and having been backed by noblemen
and gentlemen of the highest rank, they had acquired that
natural good-breeding which is engendered by associating
with people much above them in society. You see this in
gamekeepers, cricketers of good stamp, huntsmen, yachts-
men, and the like, who have made their services essential to
the enjo}Tnent of men of fortune, and who have been treated

Tom Sprlnr/s Back Parlour. 5

with confidence and respect by the supporters of a pleasure
in which master and servant have a common interest.

Spring christened me " young gentleman," and I christened
him " governor ; " and I can honestly say, at this distance of
time, I look back with gratitude to his kindness to m3.
London afc the time I am speaking of was at about its very
worst. There were few railways to gefc out by, no Saturday
half-holidays, no cricket ground but Lord's, no volunteers,
few boating clubs, and every kind of blackguardism was put
under one's very nose by day and by night. The Tom and
Jerry days were not extinct. Most of the flash supper-
rooms and the upper boxes of the theatres were a disgrace
to a civilised country, and peopled with as delicate an
assembly of the softer (?) sex as the stage is now too often,
to the delectation of audiences who are delighted with
posturing, semi-nudity, and low slang ; and " fast life "
meant going to the devil, and ruin of health and happiness.
Bachelor life in chambers and in lodgings consisted much
of card-playing and drinking hard ; and a large number of
youngsters, after a short stay in London, got quite tired of
ladies' society.

Now, I remember old Tom's first " paternal." I went for
my usual luncheon earlier than customary, and instead of
my pint of stout, wanted some cold brandy-and-water. He
took me into his sanctum, and said :

" Look here, young gentleman, you will go to the dogs
if you drink brandy-and-water at this time of day, and
under twenty years of age, too ; and I don't mean you to go
to the doars." And then he told me that he never drank
before dinner, and never had a glass of anything in the bar
unless his niece was there and took the money ; " for," he
said, " whether the money comes back into a man's pocket
again or not, the act of taking his money out and paying
for his drink makes him think twice ; and many a time I

6 Tom S])ring's Back Parlour.

say to myself, ' Spring, yon worked hard for that money ;
keep it in your j^ocket.' "

If Spring's lectures about card-playing, gambling, and
other evils could all be remembered, they would do young
England good in these days, when so many foolish boys who
get afloat in the world are ruining themselves with brandy-
and-soda, pool-plapng and betting ; and I feel certain that
I owe it to Tom Spring's advice that I hardly ever won or
lost a sovereign at cards or in betting in my life.

" Well, governor," I said to him sometimes, " Avhy do you
bet yourself?"

Spring used to shake his head and say, " You mind what
the parson said — ' You do as I say ; don't do what / do.^
The fact is that when I used to fight I carried hundreds and
thousands of other people's money ; and when I had it, I
used to put on some of my own ; and I suppose what is bred
in the bone must come out in the flesh. And then, I am
very fond of a horse, and I do like to back my fancy some-
times, and to back a man, too, when he is a good one."

'' Now tell me about fighting and training, and what your
experience w^as."

'• Well, young gentleman, now I will tell you all about
it. Training was very hard work, unless you had the luck
to have a very cheerful trainer. The first feeling of having
nothing to do and a good job in hand was very pleasant,
particularly when you got over the stage when a man did
not know what thirst was, and health and strength were
coming every day ; but the hard work was when you felt
fit to fight twenty men, and the day was two or three
weeks ofi"; and then sometimes I could see my trainer was
fidgety, and I fancied that my backers might be fidgety
too, and I would get suspicious, and would think they were
keeping my friends away from me, or that too many people
came to see me, and were \vi-iting about me in the papers ;

Tom Sprinr/s BacJc Parlour, 7

in fact, it was a terrible trial of temper and patience ; and
v,-hen the time really did come, and I threw my hat into
the ring, and saw my colours tied to the stakes, it seemed
like taking a ton weight ofi'my mind, and I would not have
changed places w^ith the King of England."

" AVell, can you remember the rounds now, as I can
remember hits and catches of cricket matches years ago ? "

^' Most of them ; for, you see, when a man fights he sees
nothing of the crowd round him, but his whole attention
is on his opponent's face : and thinking over fights, I can
see now when I missed finishing a man off, or when I was
open, and he never took advantage of it. jSTow about the
pain. A heavy body blow or a bad fall must always tell,
and hands will sufter ; but the head blows weren't much at
the time, when a man's in training and his blood's up, except,
of course, behind the ear or parts like that, any more than
a hard blow^ on the leg, which would make a man dance
for a week in cold blood, hurts a cricketer in the summer.
You may depend upon it that the greatest pain to a good
man is to find that he has lost, and that they have given in
for him. A man feels down and done for. All his trouble
is thrown aw^ay, and he fancies that he may have lost his
friends too ; but if he happens to win, no matter how much
he may have been punished, he feels fit to jump over the
moon."

" Well, now, what do you think of the King now ? Is it
better or worse ? "

" What I think of it now is this. London is larger and
more accessible than it used to be. There always were
black sheep in the Ring, and now there are more black sheep
than there were. Lots of men manage to get a fight or so,
and call themselves fighting men, and set up low ginshops
and make small matches, when " win, tie, or wrangle,"
seems to be the motto. Mr. Jackson was trusted by the

8 Tom Spring's Back Parlour,

highest in Ihe land to arrange what we called 'Prize
Battles ' when I first began, and any fight with a lot of
noblemen behind Mr. Jackson was pretty sure to be square,
and if a young man really could fight, and did not show the
white feather, he might make his way if he took care what
company he went into ; but if he was ever seen in company
with blacklegs, he was marked.

'' The worst of the Rmg was that, when a man had a
house and wanted to make money quickly, he would keep a
kind of raree-shop, and sell any poison to anyone who
would come and drink it, and then he generally went into
the trap himself, and drank himself out ; and lost his
licence, and ended worse than he began. The grand secret
is to keep a good name, and keep your friends. Why, all
kind of gentlemen come in here at Derby time or Cattle
Show week, and those times — sometimes a lord, or a
baronet, or old country gentlemen who saw me fight my
early battles perhaps, many of them twenty years older
than I am, — and they treat me like a man, and come for
old acquaintance sake ; but I don't care for your swaggei'ing
betting men, half gentlemen, half, or more than half,
rogues. Some of the sporting publicans will let any one of
these fellows pat them on the back, and call them ' Bill,'
or ' Jack,' or ' Tom,' and think that their sixpenny worth of
brandy -and-water is a great consideration. I wouldn't give
sixpence for the whole gang. This is my house, and I am
landlord, and I choose my own company."

I once saw Spring settle a snob, and I once saw him
settle a bully. The first occasion was when a short, stout,
brandy-and-water-faced, dirty-nailed, hot-handed cad, with
a sky-blue satin neckcloth, Avith a waterfall to ditto, illumi-
nated with a large pin, the device of which was a pair of
silver spurs, and wearing no collar, came in, and, holding
out his black hand, on the little finger of which glistened a

Tom Springs Back Parlour. 9

diamond ring, exclaimed, ''Tom, liow are you, old fellow?
How am I to go to Chatham races and the tight too on the
same day ? " The man winked, as much as to say, " Look,
my fine fellows, what a sportsman I am.''

Spring put his hands quietly behind his back, and
answered, " When did you ever know me well enough to
call me ' Tom ? ' "

It was a floorer. The man had never seen him before in
any private company. The look which Spring gave him
S3ttled him, and he walked quickly out, muttering, and got
into a flash dog -cart and vanished.

The other occasion was when a drunken soldier, one of
the foot guards, came in and w^anted something to drink.
Mrs. B., the big niece, told him, very good-humouredly,
that he had better go to his barracks, as he had had enough.
Whereupon the soldier came out with a dreadful oath, and
called her a horrible name.

Spring came out of his parlour with his hair almost on
end. I never saw him angry before. He let fly at the
soldier in words somewhat warmly, and the soldier said
that if Spring had been a younger man, he would have
knocked him down ; and he began to take his belt off, like
a coward. In a much shorter time than I can write three
words of this. Spring was round the bar, and there was
such a CLU-ious conglomeration of a red coat and a black
coat twisting round and round down the passage into
Holborn, that it had the eftect of Chinese fireworks, which
are produced by constant change of colour revolving ; and,
to my delight, I saw Spring's right foot r pplied as a finisher
as he kicked the man into the street. In a minute or two
his good-humour returned, and he got his wind again.
" There," he said, " I would serve a whole regiment such as
that blackguard so, one at a time, or two, if they wished it.
That fellow fight ! Why, my niece could beat him."

10 Tom Sping's Back Parlour.

" That I could, uncle," said Mrs. B. ; '' and should
like the job too."

Spring Avas a very industrious man, and was always busy
in the morning, sometunes in a white smock-frock when he
was arranging his cellar. He enjoyed life thoroughly, be-
cause he never w^as a cockney. He knew a good horse, or
dog, or game-cock, especially a good beast, and was a good
judge of farming. I met him at the Cattle Show once,
amongst the Herefordshire shorthorns (Herefordshire being
his county), and I was immensely pleased to see how his
countr}Tnen welcomed him. Top-booted, sturdy farmers and
graziers and theii' daughters crowded round him ; and his
opinion — particularly as he was originally apprenticed to a
butcher — was cordially asked for. He was also very fond of a
day's shooting, and I can record what I heard from a country
gentleman, Avho had some very fine preserves in Hampshire,
and who let his shooting one year, owing to the absence of
his sons, of a trait in Tom Spring's character. My host
told me that he was horrified to hear from his head keeper
that the gentleman who had hired his shooting had invited
Tom Spring and Frank Redmond, the prize-fighters, to
shoot ; and that he, of course, expected wholesale slaughter,
and every kind of poaching. He also told me of his
surprise when he received a letter from Tom Spring,
apologizing for having accidentally shot a hen-pheasant
(hens being held sacred in January), and saying that he had
fined himself half a guinea for his mistake, and had paid it
to the keeper.

I never shall forget an eccentric picture which I saw
once in the old back parlour. I had been away for a few
days, and read in the paper that Spring's eldest son had
died very suddenly. I at once started for Spring's, and
Mrs. B. told me that the governor was sitting alone, and
very bad indeed. I went in to see him, and I could not

Tom S])rin(js Back Parlour. 1 1

help laughing, and so did he afterwards ; for he was sobbing
audibly, with the tears running down his eyes, and trim-
ming a game-cock for Peter Craidey.

It was about the year 1845 or 1846,1 think, that a new
visitor was found at the Castle, as old Tom Cribb paid Spring
a very long visit. It was to me like talking to a man from
the dead, for if Spring was to me one of the heroes of the
past, what was Tom Cribb ? — antediluvian at least. Cribb
always occupied an easy-chair near the fire, and I had from
his own lips the accounts of his first fights and of his two
fights with Molyneaux, the black.

Cribb told me that where he first worked, when a young-
ster of about eighteen, he was bullied and " set upon" — I
think it was in a coal wharf. Anyhov,-, the oppression be-
came so terrible that he could stand it no longer, and he
picked out three of the worst bullies, and matched himself
to fight them one after another, and— " God forgive me,"
said Cribb, who was about sixty -eight when I first knew
him, "it was on a Sunday morning; but I did a good
Sunday morning's work, and polished them all oft' at five
shillings a man."

Cribb was Spring's second when he fought Langan, and
told me all about that fight, as, in the words of BeJVs Life
" Cribb had promised to 2^^c7c up Spring." Anyone can
read the account of Spring and Langan' s fights in JB ell's
Life for 1824, and tremendous fights they must have been ;
but to show how the old school stuck to one another. Spring,
a few days after the tAventieth anniversary of that fight,
gave me a liqueur glass of neat whisky from a keg which
Jack Langan — who became a prosperous man in the whisky
trade — had sent to him as a token of respect and affection,
and in memory of the fight.

Tom Cribb, who had taken his farewell benefit in 1822,
appeared once more in the ring in 1845 or 1846, I think,

12 Tom Sping's Back Parlour.

when in his sixty-eight year, at his own benefit at the West-
minster Baths, and put on the gloves with old Tom Oliver.
It Wtis a tremendous crush, and of coursa the old man could
not spar, but he just showed us the old guard with his right
hand within a few inches of his face about the level of his
eyes, and his left hand advanced a little before it, and a few
inches higher. It is impossible to exaggerate the wonderful
reception which he received from people of all classes.

A host of good men sparred on that evening, Spring
included, who looked like a gentleman, in his black trousers,
well-polished boots, and close-fitting white jersey. About that
time there were a great many good men who really could spar,
and did spar with a good deal of fire — Owen Swift, Hannan,
the two Broomes, Bendigo, Johnny Walker, Hayes, Keen,
Phelps, young Keed, Alec Reid, Ben Caunt, and others ;
Peter Crawley, Spring, Jem Burn, and Jem Ward often
appeared amongst the veterans ; and there were two of the
minor lights who were too delighted to show, anywhere and
at all times — '' Porky Clark" and " Jacko," who were
further removed from the Adonis type than any two
bipeds whom I ever saw ; but when they did put on the
gloves they hammered one another as if their lives de-
pended on it.

The master of the ceremonies at the grand benefits, Jem
Turner, the D"Orsay of the ring (as he was called in Bell)
was a host in himself, and if he had been educated, would
have made a splendid low-comedian, as he had a most
astonishing flow of a ready wit.

When Caunt and Bendigo were induced to meet some
time after their fight, in Avhich the ISTottingham Lambs
.smashed the ring, and which Caunt lost by a foul blow,
according to the referee's decision, there was bad blood be-
tween them. The two sparred in fighting costume — I think
at Tom Cribb's benafit — and party spirit ran high amongst

Tom S])rin(js Back Parlour, 13

the spectators. Jem Turner introduced them : " Ben
Gaunt, gentlemen ; Bendigo, gentlemen ; both champions
of England. No applause, gentlemen. Mum as oysters,
gentlemen. If you please — time ! " That was something
like a set-to, and Bendigo gave Gaunt a regular hammering?
and hit him just as he pleased.

I went to many benefits with Spring, or by his advice,
at the Westminster Baths and elsewhere, but I never but
once went to a fight, as it was very expensive work in the
first place, and very rough work, as a rule, in the second.
The fight I saw was between Keen and Grant, and I met
Spring on the ground by appointment, and I certainly
would go a hundred miles to-morrow to see it over again.
The fight took place in the autumn of 1849, on the borders
of Hants and Surrey. Spring told me that it was sure to
be a good fight, as he knew that the money was found by-
men in the Household Brigade, who could afford it, and
that strict orders had been given by both sides to take
either man away if fairly licked. I can recall every inci-
dent of that day as if it occurred yesterday. The arrange-
ments were perfect, and a special " way in " at the railway
station was reserved for the excursionists ; and the police
made no bones about it, but kept on calling out, " This
way for the fight, gentlemen ; this way for the fight — two
pounds and a pound." A poor old lady, a venerable third-
classer, made a mistake and thought she was going to Ports-
mouth, and it was only discovered just in time. I was in
a second-class carriage, full of old ring-goers, and was
amused to see the enthusiasm with which they recorded
past battles. One old gentleman in tops and corduroys,
and a large mackintosh and low-crowned hat (who need net
have informed us that he was a cowkeeper, as there was
an aroma about him which disclosed the fact), who had
seen one of the men every morning during his training.

14 Tom Sj)rin(/s Back Parlour,

and supplied him with new milk, was very enthusiastic
about his performances.

We had a funny scene at Woking, where the train
stopped, and a number of the constabulary were drawn up,
and announced that they had a warrant to arrest the men,
on which Old Bishop, the gun-maker of Bond Street, ex-
plained that it was a private train, and that he had come
down with a party, " to consecrate a church^ After much
parleying and delay the police were allowed to get into an
empty carriage at the end, and after they had been run
out a hundred yards, the train was backed and the bobbies'
carriage was uncoupled, and they were left lamenting.

We had good fun with an old farmer in a smock-frock,
in whose field the fight took place. I often pass the spot
now, near Fleet Pond. It was a meadow three fields
off from a lane just below a high embankment : each
meadov/ had a gate opening into the last, which was a cul-
de-sac. A long parley ensued about what was to be paid,
and Spring and Burn wanted to give three pounds.

"Noa," said the farmer ; "five pounds is my money."

" But," argued Jem Burn, '' you are an old fool, for we
shall do your meadows five pounds' worth of good, trampling
'em down in the middle of October."

u Very likely you will."

*' And you will see the fight for nothing."

u Yery likely I shall."

"Now, what is your price? "

Farmer, loq. " Five pounds in money, gentlemen ; five
pounds' worth of good done to my meadows by stamping
'em down, and a view of the fight for nothing."

" Give the d old fool his fiver. Burn," shouted a

noble Lord (since deceased) v/ho was in the Life Guards,
and who lived almost for sport.

" Ah ! just you do ] that's what I say about it."

Tom Springs Back Parlour. 15

Of course the five-pound note was paid, and as soon as it
was, the man said, " Now, who is a fool ? I've got all I
want, and now I shall let you have a truss or two of straw
to make yourselves comfortable in the inner ring, and shall
be happy to see you another time."

It was a splendid autumn day, and the scene of the
fight was in the heather country, in that part of Surrey
which so strongly resembles Scotland and Ireland. It was
a pretty sight to see the crowd dotted about. If I remem-
ber rightly, the commissariat was highly praised in the
sporting papers. All I can say is, that in the company of
many Peers, Guardsmen, Members of Parliament, and fre-
quenters of the best London clubs, who like myself were
half famished, I made one in consuming what appeared to
be half-raw horse, which probably had been killed the day
before, eaten with the crummiest new bread and no salt,
a,nd washed down with some brandy-and-water, which
ought to have killed us all on the spot.

Just before the fight commenced, a startling event
occurred. A gentleman on a magnificent hunter, took a
hedge and ditch which bovmded the field in grand style,
^nd, riding up to the ring-side, he informed a select few of
the company, Spring included, that he was a magistrate
for Surrey and Hants, and confessed his incapacity, single-
handed, to clear the ring, if called upon to act, but he
dropped a hint pubHcly that the county constabulary would
be up at least in two hours, whereupon the crowd gave him
three cheers. The magistrate, who was an ex-guardsman,
and formerly a patron of the P.R., lit his cigar, and, as I
saw him with my own eyes, gave Lord L. a sovereign for
the losing man after the fight. (For particulars of the
fight, vide BelVs Life October, 1819.) The fight lasted
an hour and five minutes, and, barring one or two nasty
incidents, which are not worth mentioning, I never enjoyed

16 Tom Siwings Back Parlour.

a sight much more, it being a wonderful display of science,
courage, and endurance, without any brutality. The
slighter man tried wrestling with Grant, and got the worst
of it ; and afterwards, about the sixth or seventh round,
by sheer science and timing the blow, knocked Grant clean
off his legs. Two things only distressed me : one was the
broken-hearted look of the man who lost, when he came to
himself ; though I saw him eating some bread and meat
within half an hour, and surrounded by a number of gentle-
men who cheered him up, and told him that he had done
his best, and that they would be his friends ; and the other
was the hideous blasphemy of some of the lower grade of
prize-fighters, who got a lift down for nothing for some
service which they rendered. As regarded the arrange-
ments, an inner ring ticket secured as comfortable a place
as one would find in a cricket ground ; but if for no other
reason than the outrageous language and blasphemy, which
were twenty thousand times worse than I ever heard in a
London crowd — even an execution crowd, — the abolition of
the Bing was a necessity. I saw one rufiian kneel down and
tear the grass with his hands like a wild beast, apparently
to assist him in his blasphemy. Coming back, there was a
scramble for places, and, to my horror, 1 found myself,
with the exception of two officers, in a carriage full of the
roughs of the King, and I suppose that amongst the whole
lot there was not one who could read or "svTite. One inci-
dent did amuse me, which was a question asked, not un-
civilly, by one of them, of a gentleman, who, speaking about
a well-known prize-fighter, remarked that he got into
trouble about a crim. con. " Beg your pardon, sir," asked one
of the prize-fighters, " Who did crlm. con. fight ? " Possibly
the question was excusable, as a certain Mr. Con Parker
was backed to fight Tass Parker at that very time.

I suppose, if the truth was really told, the Ping once had

Tom S])ri)if/s Back Parlour. 17

its palmy days. Battles were fought under the auspices of
the highest in the land, who backed a sport in which many
of them would not have minded taking the punishment
themselves, as, according to reUable accounts, many " sets
to " in Gentleman Jackson's rooms, between amateurs who
stood high in the fashionable world for what was called " a
bellyful," were next door to a fight. And I know that
many of the most mincing dandies, who u?ed to be seen
with their lavender kid gloves and curled whiskers and
moustaches, sitting in their cabs, w^ere ready and willing at
a moment's notice, at a race meeting or elsewhere, to jump
off their drags and to tackle a big bully twice their size. I
once heard an enthusiastic patron of the ring describing a
fight at which he lost his money, in these words as nearly as
possible : " I give you my honour, that for nearly twenty
minutes my man's left was hardly off the Black's face for a
moment, and I doubled my bets, I was so sure, when, to all
our surprise, the Black put in an upper cut, which knocked
my man out of time, and the sponge was thrown up at once.
It was such a splendid upper cut, that, although I lost my
money, I could not help admiring the man who gave the
blow, and I was so pleased that / should like to have had it

The low sporting (?) publicans appear to have brought
the Bmg to its lowest ebb, just as they have done with
many local metropolitan races. Matches for small stakes,
which the backers could not afford to lose, the cheap trips
by steamboats into the marsh districts on the Thames,
brought together a crowd of costermongers and roughs,
who ruled the roost, and some of the scenes enacted caused
much public scandal, and the whole thing became a nuisance.
Many years ago much sensation was caused by the accounts
of the fight between Gaunt and Bendigo, when the Notting-
ham Lambs attended en masse, and the spectators were
c

18 Tom Simncjs Back Parlour.

stripped of watches, money, and jewelry wholesale ; and I
heard, upon good authority, that an unfortunate foreignei",
who wanted to witness La boxe, injudiciously w^ent do\\ai in
a new pair of patent-leather boots, and who, after being
relieved of all his valuables, was set down on the ground,
and some roughs also took off his boots, and left him to
get home in his socks.

The low sporting publican who encouraged little fights, if
not a fighting man, was generally a pudding-faced rufiian
who could not stand one in the face from a boy, and was
much of the same class as those who engaged windows at
public executions, and who delighted in cruelty for cruelty's
sake.

How Thackeray delighted to portray the low sporting
*' gent," to wit, the slang young man at his club, who in-
formed you that he had run down to Epsom from Saturday
till Monday, to spend Sunday with Hocus, the leg ; or
Colonel Altamont, who went to the Derby in a four-in-hand
from Wheeler's of the Harlequin's Head, with a " slap-up
lunch in the boot ; " or Sir Francis Clavering, going down
in the steamer, and losing his money on Billy Bluck, the
cabman, who was killed ; or the sporting parson, the Eev.
Bute Crawley, w^ho, in enumerating his nephew RawTlcn
Crawley's vices, exclaimed, " Didn't he cross the fight
between Bill Soames and the Cheshire Trump, and thereby
lose me forty pounds ? "

Sayers and Heenan created as much sensation as the
Crimean War or the Prmce of Wales's marriage. The
Times, according to their own statement, sent a rejDorter to
the fight for the first time for thirty-six years, and their
report, as a piece of graphic description, will be quoted long
after most of us of this generation are under the tuif.
Their account of that fight opened people's eyes to iLe
reality of prize-fighting. It was not couched in the curious

Tom Sjjring's Back Parlour. 19

phraseolgy of ever-pleasant BeWs Life, which poor Thackeray
described in his dry way as " an admirable paper, with a good
deal of erudition in the ' Answeis to Correspondents,' but
they called a spade a spade, and described how ' Heenau
felled Sayers Hke a bullock.' "

I said I was going to be discursive, so, under " Tom
Spring's Back Parlour," I may as well call to mind a few
Ring peculiarities, including its literature.

The Times stuck to Tom Sayers, and commenced their
leader with, " Yesterday all England was determined to
break the peace." I have not looked to the file of the
Times to correct myself, nor have I looked to the files of
Bell either, except for two dates, nor shall I, in what I shall
quote about that good old sporting paper.

ISTo doubt the Ring had to be humorously treated. It was
considered by many, some of the judges and members of
the Legislature included, almost a necessary evil. '' The Art
of Self-defence v. The Knife " was a popular cry ; and if a
fatal accident occurred, the delincpients were dealt with
with leniency, and the defence always was that it was a fail*
fight.

I remember, on one occasion when a man was killed,
w^hose name, I think, was Simmonds, the daily press went
in for sensational w^riting on the brutal spectators who saw
the man killed, and "^stuck the knife " into BeWs Life
for advertising the sport. BeWs Life had a leader in
which they quoted the greater part of the article, and
candidly admitted in effect that the spectators were of the
lowest and most rufiianly order, almost outside the ]3ale of
civilisation ; but as they were left by the State in an un-
educated and semi-barbarous state, and as the only sermon
which could touch them was an exhibition of a fight under
the rules of fair-play, which they all understood, and which
the majority of them respected^ and as they belonged to a

C-2

20 Tom Sj)ring's Back Parlour.

class who habitually got drunk and quarrelled, it was much
better for them to be taught to settle their quarrels in a
mode which left them with a couple of black eyes and a
broken nose, than to be found in the street with a knife
stuck in them, and a widow and fatherless children left
unsupported. In the same article they stated that, as
i-egards the Ring, if no necessity for it existed, nothing-
would please them more than to withdraw all note of it
from their columns.

Whether it is owing to our frequent intercoiu^se with
foreign nations, or from what other cause, I know not, but
the knife is much more frequently used now than it ever
was.

I knew very intimately, from having passed a long vaca-
tion— within the last twenty years — in the parish where
he dwelt, a very eminent editor of a very eminent sporting
paper, who used not only to -attend the great fights, but
was often referee. He was one of the most amiable cf
men, and his three proclivities were gardening, being a vei y
active Yicar's churchwarden, and looking after the parish
schools, in which his wife was an indefatigable worker. I
remember at church disturbing the devotions of a very
excellent lady, who was getting her money ready for the
collection at a missionary sermon, by remai'kmg that Bell's
Life was stakeholder.

But what quaint language they used in Bell, especially
in the days of old Vincent Dowling, and, earlier still, in the
days of Pierce Egan.

I wish everything would stick to my memory like the
quaint sayings of such writers do. Here is a specimen, in
the description of a fight between young Dutch Sam and
Ned Neale, from Pierce Egan's " Book of Sports " : —

" The nobby appearance of Curtis and Holt attracted the
admiration of the spectators. They were dressed in new

Tom S^jrings Bach Parlour, 21

flannel jackets with side pockets to ditto, in fact they might
have been termed ' dress-jackets,' and, in order to make the
tnit enseinhh more complete, the tonsor had been put in
requisition to decorate their nobs."

Then, in the Answers to Correspondents : —

*' Owen Swift did not marry a nun, nor Avas his father a
friar." " Frosty-faced Togo was his godfather." And
(nihil ad rem to ring) — " Our correspondent can have his
question about the young lady answered at the stage-door
of Drury Lane Theatre, but we advise him to go ivitli his
nose ireJl soaped'''

''Phil Sampson himself again. — We are happy to announce
that the gallant Phil Sampson is not, as was reported,
knocked out of time : our correspondent had a loag of his
daddle last Sunday."

Then, again, a benefit advertisement : —

'•'• The gallant Jem Davis having lost his wife, begs to
announce his benefit for Tuesday next, and hopes his friends
will rally round him and dry up his tearsT

One more specimen, and I have done. In the account of
the fight between Caunt and Bendigo, the reporter
(evidently old Vincent Dowling) A\T:*ites : —

"And now let us record our gratitude to that good
Samaritan the Right Rev. Father the Lord Bishop of Bond
Street, who took us into his carriage and recruited us with
a twopenny buster and a slice of bees-wax, which, with a
flash from his pocket pistol, enabled us to survive and tell
our tale."

There ! I have not seen any of the above in print for, I
suppose, five-and-twenty years, nor have I looked at Bell
(except for dates), as Bell will testify ; but I fancy that
any one who refers to the originals will not find me far out.
With all its oddity, BelVs Life had a strong and lasting in-
fluence over the London roughs who attended fights, and an

22 Tom Swing's Back Parlour,

exposure in their columns of any blackguardism committed
by a man who aspired to be a pugilist soon brought him to
his senses.

The ring now is dead, sto7ie dead, but boxing and good
boxing, perhaps never was better. Young Reed, though he
must be well middle-aged, I will be bound to say makes
twice as much as three-fourths of the clergy of England do,
and is as much surrounded by Peers and men of position
as Gentleman Jackson ever was, though his rooms are only
designed for pure business, and are not a lounge ; and many
more ''professors" are doing well. I very much doubt if
people would stomach a regular prize-fight now. The halo
y\-hich surrounded it is gone. The quaint language and
oddities which marked it are things of the past.

It would never have done to have talked about fists,
noses, mouths, blood, teeth, and eyes in describing a fight,
or to have recorded, in cold blood, how one man knocked
out another's teeth and cut his knuckles to the bone. It
would read nasty, so it was necessary to say *' that the
Nobbier dashed in his left mawley and landed on the British
Oak's kissing-trap, drawing the claret freely, knocking out
two of his front rails ; though we doubt if the move was
advantageous in the long run, as the Nobbier was evidently
in pam with the force of the blow, which cut his knuckles
badly, and he was inclined to use his ' right duke ' the most
till the finish." Strange it was to see the delight which the
British rough showed in having this kind of thieves' Latin
read to him, and the gravity with which he accepted the
account ; and if he happened to know a friend who was on
duty at a fight, how his dignity rose ; and an engagement
to go down and to help to guard the commissariat — what Jem
Burn called " the belly-timber" — was looked on as some-
thing equal to a field-marshal's post.

I firmly believe that in its time the Bing did a great deal

Tom Sjmnfs Back Parlour. 23

of good, and that the old rough -and-tough school brought
to perfection a system of boxing which is not likely to die
out. To show how the Ring was backed fifty years ago, it is
recorded in the fight between Spring and Langan, on Wor-
cester racecourse, that the magistrates met and determined
to allow the fight ; and a short time since, a venerable old
gentleman told me that when a great fight took place at
the back of the " Queen Charlotte," on the London-road,
near Andover — a celebrated fighting country near Stock-
bridge, — a grand exhibition of boxing was held at the
Andover To^vn Hall, under the patronage of the Mayor and
CorjDoration, on the evening before the fight, and that the
Mayor, having been driven into granting a warrant for the
arrest of the men, lent the prompters of the fight a map of
the borough, so that they might fight outside the limits
of his jurisdiction, and went, with many of the Cor-
poration and the Town Clerk, in a w^aggon, with a luncheon,
and sat by and saw the fight out. Some few years since I
witnessed at St. James's Hall, on the occasion of a benefit
for the Soldiers' Female Orphan School, an exhibition {inter
alia) of boxing between soldiers of the Life Guards and the
Blues, which for science and pluck were unsurpassed. A
great many ladies were present, and at first they did not
know whether to be pleased or not ; but, after a round or
two, the waving of their handkerchiefs showed what they
thought of it.

Fighting was a bad trade on the whole, as a very large
number who did rise were wholly uneducated, and got
money, and drank themselves out. Poor Tom Sayers was
one of the last specimens of that school. It seems but
yesterday that I saw a well-known county member and
county magistrate collecting sovereigns in a hat for him in
the lobby of the House of Commons in 1860, after his fight
with Heenan, w^hen, as the story goes, Lord Palmerston

24 Tom Sj^r big's Back Far I our.

insisted, against the rules, on giving five instead of one
and on being remonstrated with for his over-KberaHty,
answered, '• Put down one for me, and four for Lord
Shaftesbury." I went to the Tottenham Court Road to
see Sayers' funeral start, Avhen the crowd was so great that
all traffic was stopped. One of the morning papers stated
that the only respectable person present was Tom Sayers'
dog.

Well, good-bye to Tom Spring. He died in 1851, at the
Castle, in Holborn, as he lived, respected. Sevei-al testi-
monials were given to him ; one, many years ago, after he
beat Langan, by the " lads of the cider country." It was a
very handsome silver cup and cover, with a cider cask for a
handle; the last, in the year 1846, a very massive silver
flagon, which was well lined with sovereigns. 1 remember
one very amusing incident about the Spring testimonial in
1846, which was an announcement that a special extra
meeting of the subscribers would be held at the Castle
Tavern, Holborn, with a remark in large type, " Mr. T.
Spring has kindly consented to take the chair."

Although I had a horror of ordinary " sporting houses "
and of ''sporting gents," I was in Spring's house for
luncheon many hundreds of times ; and I suppose that
ninety times out of every hundred my refreshment was
bread and cheese and a pint of stout. Though, on state
occasions, I have been in very good company in his sanctum,
when old members of the Pugilistic Club and men of rank,
too, gave him a call, and had a bottle of wine, and talked
over old times.

I never heard him say an unkind word, or saw him
sponge upon any one, or do a shabby trick of any kind ;
and I look back on his memory with something very near
affection, and I believe him to have been a kind true man.
The clergyman who attended his death-bed wrote a vei-y

Tom Sjjring's Back Parlour. 25

feeling letter in BelVs Life about liis last moments, and
told how he left life as he had lived — an honest Englishman,
As a proof of the great respect in which Tom Spring's
memory is held, when the trustees of Norwood Cemetery
gave notice, thirty years after Spring's death, that his
monument at Norwood Cemetery was becoming a dangerous
obstruction, for want of repair, it was handsomely restored
by public subscription, at a considerable cost — the first
subscribers being the present Duke of Beaufort, the late
Hon. Robert Grimston, and Sii' John Dugdale Ashley,
Bart.

Spring's first appearance at the Fives Court must have
been some time before the Battle of Waterloo, as the friends
of Shaw, the immortal Life Guardsman, had made over-
tures to back their hero, on his return from Belgium,
against Spring. Shaw had fought and beaten Painter in
the April preceding the Waterloo campaign ; and at that
time Spring — who afterwards, in 1818, beat Painter, and
was beaten by him (his only defeat) in the same year —
had only appeared once in the Prize Ring for a small stake.

BOXING AND ATHLETICS

It is now very many years ago since, as the Times drily
remarked, all England was determined that the peace
should be broken, and in April, 1860, Sayers stood np for
the honour of England against the Benicia boy, Heenan-
The records of that fight have been handed down to us by
a writer in the Times, and it would be '' gilding refined
gold and painting the lily " to try and add a word to the
graphic account which was written by the correspondent
who represented that paper. Both combatants are dead,
the former having laid down his arms after his gallant
contest, and the latter having succumbed to Tom Kmg, the
now world-known and much respected ex-chami3ion, whose
great proclivity now is to be Champion of England in
growing roses.

I am not going to weep over the fallen fortunes of the
Ring, and nothing should induce me to go to a fight in
the present day, even should such an occurrence take place ;
because the pugiHsts are under no control, and, conse-
quently, one would have a right to expect unmitigated
ruffianism and brutality.

In the olden days the Pugilistic Club consisted of noble-
men and gentlemen of high position ; and if a prize-fighter
behaved in a dishonest or cowardly manner, they withdrew
their support, and he was much in the same position as a
26

Boxing and Athletics. 27

jockey who is under a cloud, and cannot get employed by
the leading men of the turf.

All the evidence that I have ever collected tallies exactly
with what I have heard from the late Old Tom Cribb, Tom
Sprmg, Alec Keene, and Young Read (rather long in the
tooth, perhaps, now, for a young 'un, but alive and well,
and teaching the present generation the noble art) ; which
evidence is, that there was a real pleasure in fighting,
springing from a love of boxing and an honest struggle for
superiority. We all know that there was a black side to
it, and so much blackguardism crept in, that gentlemen of
position turned their backs on it, and practically it died
out.

And it is a matter of immense congratulation that there
has arisen from the ashes of the old Ring a love of boxing,
which has produced a large school of amateurs, who
perhaps are quite equal to a great number of the good men
of the past with the gloves. Whether they are hard
enough to do it without the gloves is another thing, and is
not of much consequence. On the other hand, it is a
matter of much regret that the police are encouraged to
pry into every contest under the Queensbery rules for a
cup. There should be a little discretion allowed. When
they know that two low beershop-keepers are puttmg up
two youngsters to box for an endurance match, to see
which will last it out, they might put in an appearance, as
a man may die of exhaustion quite as much as from an
unfortunate blow ; and for the sake of a small stake and a
few bets, a contest may be prolonged for the good of no-
body, and possibly the death of one of the boxers ; but
when a combat of three rounds only is to take j)lace, to be
decided by experts in points of excellence, they had much
better stop away. The evidence is always the same, and
the police say that from information they received it was

28. Boxing and Athletics.

really a prize fight. Great care should be taken that the
world is not getting too soft. In former times fighting
was as natural to a boy as quarrelling : boys fought at
school, boys fought in the street, and men too, for that
matter ; and say what they will, the knife and kicking are
not only coming in, but have come in.

I am not crying down the present in favour of the past ;
but we are getting more effeminate in many things. Pads
and gloves were invented rather more than forty years
ago, and capital things they are ; but pads now are like
mats, and double the size of the leg, and many of the
modern school, if the ground is not like a billiard-table,
make such a fuss about it, that you would think they were
going to storm the Redan. I quite agree with the present
cricketers, that it is madness to stand against a man who
throws as hard as he can on a rough ground, and calls it
bowling. The gjime is not worth the candle, and it is not
cricket, but I think sometimes they cry out before they are
hvirt, and many of them are much averse to taking the
rough with the smooth. It is a great pity now that School
Board education is carried to such an extent, that manly
sports and gymnastics do not form part of the curriculum.
Oar friend, the working man, cried out not long ago against
drilling, as tending to warfare and military pursuits. I
went to an admirable institution, the Polytechnic Young
Men's Christian Institute, not long ago ; in fact, we had a
talk on manly sports that night. It is, I believe, an Eton
mission, where young men and youths have the advantage
of classes, preliminary instruction in trades, fine arts, and
also a good deal of religious instruction — but one great
feature is the gymnasium, where every means and appliance
are to be found for manly exercise of all kinds, not forget-
ting the noble ai-t of self-defence.

And now I want to ask this — why are not swimming.

Boxing and Athletics, 29

single-stick, and boxing taught in the Board Schools —
especially the first? It is a shame to Englishmen that
year after year the accidents from drowning are so often
fatal. If poor Captain Webb, who lost his life so miserably
in Canada_, had been taken care of by the G-overnment, and
been appointed as swimming inspector to prepare pupil
teachers in that art, and if swimming was made part of all
English boys' education, it would save hundreds of lives
every year. At Eton no boy is allowed to go in a boat
until he has passed in swimming ; consequently most Eton
boys can swim. There should be a swimming bath in every
inland to^\Ta, and in London the parks should be utiHzed :
a few pontoons, with staunchions and screens, would do all
that is necessary, and the swimming-baths are ready made ;
and in county towns there should, as I said, be a swimming
bath for the boys, and they should be obhged to learn.
Why compel children to be vaccinated, and why not com-
pel them to learn to swim ?

The natural propensity for manly sports is shown by the
admirable use which young fellows make now of the Satur-
day Half-holiday, by giving their attention to boating,
cricket, football, volunteering, and the like — by w^hich
means the idle, debauched, effeminate shopmen of the past,
who had not an idea beyond doing the Sunday swell, a la the
Tittlebat Titmouse family, have disappeared, and seeing how
naturally athletics come to those w^ho are above the working
classes, surely every opportunity should be given to
children of the poor to become active and m.anly. The
energies of the ragged little boys who turn cart-wheels for
coppers might be turned in a better direction ; and, as I
said before, above all things, they should be taught swim-
ming and athletics.

One of the most touching stories ever told was how, when
the Goliath was burned in the Thames, the little boys obeyed

30 Boxing and Athletics,

discipline to the last in getting their fellows out of the ship^
and when the last order was, " Swim for your lives ! " over-
board they went, and all reached land safely. In days of
the past, the aspirants to the Ring at prizefighters' benefits
consisted often of young gentlemen who " had the keys of
the street ! " in other words, rough young fellows who slept
under the dark arches, or in the markets : many of the
costermonger class or their allies, the rough-and-ready school
who had to elbow theii' way through the vvorld from child-
hood. Coal wharves supplied a good many of them, and so
did the river stairs, where the boatmen kept their wherries*
I knew all the school pretty well, and I can conscientiously
say that rough as many of them were, they were always
ready to earn an honest penny, no matter how tough the
job might be — I don't mean in boxing, but in their ordinary
life, — and they had the keenest sense of justice and of kind-
ness, and the most utter contempt for a flash snob. More-
over, they were very funny in their remarks. '' Oh ! 'ere's
a friend of Prince ^albert's, gentlemen, just come from
Buckingham Palace to say the greens must not be biled too
long before supper," was the remark I once heard from one
of them to an over-dressed snob, who jDushed the s]3eaker
out of the way. " I sa}'', governor," another would ask, '' I
see you a speakin' to Mr. Spring ; could you ask hun to let
my mate go on at the beginning ; he wants a shower of browns
very bad, and has set to at Ben Oaunt's and Owen Swift's.''
" What's his name ? " *' Cranky Jack, of Billingsgate
Market, sir : it's wery clever he is"— introducing me to a
young gentleman with a lignum vitce face and very short
hair. And if room could be found for Cranky Jack befoie
the great stars appeared, the gratitude of his friends for my
putting their " pal" in the way of having his head punclied
was unbounded.

Well, T will admit it was a very rough school, and some

Boxing and Athletics, 31

of the exhibitions of the past hardly suit a city now number-
ing nearly four millions of inhabitants ; but the basis of that
school was real English courage, and we cannot have too
much of it ; and moreover they all had a keen appreciation
of the old English rule of "Fair Play."

MY TWO DAYS' SALMON
FISHING.

I KNOW all the South and West of Ireland, from frequent
visits, and I will call back to memory my first and only
two days' salmon fishing. I had been staying at a charming
village inn, in an out-of-the-way district on the borders of
Lough Corrib, and finding that my time was come to re-
turn, had packed up my fishing things sadly, and went for
a long evening stroll by the mountain side, for the purpose
of taking a farewell of scenes Avhich had grown upon me.
I saw a light in my room, and on going in, found a gentle-
man and lady playing at cards. Moreover, it was not a
dry game of '' spoil five," as I found the game to be that
they w^ere playing. " I blush to see you, sir ! " said the
male intruder ; " but my woife, to whom I introduce you,
was taken rather poorly on the c>/ar, and w^e stopped here
for the night, and having no other room, the landlady put
us in here, and she has ventured to bring in the groceries,
that my Avoife might have a glass o' punch before going to
bed." The speaker w^as very broad Irish, with a good-
humoured eye ; so I stopped further apologies, and swore
eternal friendship on the spot, ratified there and then by
Biddy the maid producing a tumbler and S230on ; and Saxon
32

Mfj Two Days Salmon Fishing. 33

and Milesian joined in the bowl. In primitive inns man-
ners were primitive too, and the custom was to leave the
guest with a large bottle of whisky and the kettle and
sugar, and to ask him next morning " how many glasses of
punch to charge for ; " and as the whisky often possibly
'•' never j;)?r? the Queen a sixpence," it was good for all
parties. My guests were well middle-aged, evidently of the
commercial grade, and it was not long before it was dropped
incidentally by the lady, " that her brother-in-law had been
to a ball at the Castle, and her uncle had been in the
miletia." She asked for trumps so plainly, that I was
obliged to admit, with some blushes, that I had been patted
on the head by the late Archbishop of Canterbury when a
boy — which was strictly true, by the way, as he confirmed
me along with the inhabitants of some five or six adjoining
parishes. The lady retii-ed for the night ; Bid.ly put some
fresh peat on the fire, and brought in a fresh kettle of
boiling water, my guest smoked a little of his cigar at
intervals — your well-seasoned Irishman who likes the
national beverage is generally too busy with the groceries
to smoke much, — and I sat me do\\Ti quietly to a well
coloured Irish short clay. We spoke in a subdued tone, as
the rooms were small and the walls thin, and we did not
wish to disturb the lady fair ; in fact, the walls were so thin
that (without lifting the veil which screened the privacy of
my lady's chamber), we could hear the whistling of a stout
staylace through the eyelet-holes, in the air, and eventually
the fall of a heavy paii' of stays ; and I am bound to
record that we kept a respectful silence while the re2)resen-
tative of the fair sex, with a fine brogue, said her prayers,
which were very audible — a practice much to be commended,
— and to our mutual joy a good wholesome family snore
eventually proclaimed that the night was our own.

We got friendly and confidential, and my guest remarked,

D

34 Mij Two Days Salmon Fishing.

" Did ye ever catch a salmon, now ? " I admitted my
innocence of that feat, remarking that the cost of salmon
fishing was so enormous, and the chances of good sport so
vague, that the game was not worth the candle, and it was
not worth while to pay a pound for a licence, and nearly
four pounds for a week's ticket. " Give me your hand, my
boy ; stop where I am going," naming the place, '' and I
will give ye two days' salmon fishing for nothing ; it shall
only cost ye a trifie for the fisherman, and a man w:th a
boat, and a relation of my woife's (our house is full), will
take ye in as cheap as any inn, and much more comfortable.
As to a licence, there is no fear, as I am officially connected
with the fishery, and shall hear first of any chance of a
prosecution ; and if I hear that anyone is moving, ofi" ye go
to England, my boy." You will observe that he was getting
friendly and familiar. As the bottle got lighter, and my
cruest pulled two strokes to my one, a tear came in his eye,
and he called me " Charles," or, as he pronounced it," Chorlus,"
and told me I resembled an only son who died young; and
very much in the small hours he joined the stout fah-y
whose snoring was like the noise of a well-regulated gong.

It was with no small pleasure that I listened to my new

acquaintance of the previous evening, when he told me

that we should reach our destination before six o'clock m

the dav, and that I should have a try for a salmon as soon

as we "^arrived. I was " struck of a heap" as the vulgar

saying is. One of the large public cars took us leisurely

along*" through charming scenery, and I was landed at

my journey's end at a comfortable house close to a large

weir, and saw at first sight that my new home held out

every promise of enjoyment— and the river said " salmon."

The usual inquidtive crowd of idlers, mostly bare-footed,

forming a picturesque group, stood round the car, and my

mentor singlmg out a bright-eyed, rough-headed httle

My Two Days Salmon Fishing. o5

urchin, said, '^ Go at oust, Larry, to Phil Morris, and bid
him come quick with his rod, and hook a sahnon for an
Enghsh gintleman ; and when you are back, and say he is
coming, I will give you a penny."

Pending the messenger's return, I was pondering in my
o'svn mind whether it was consistent with my dignity to
have a salmon hooked for me, but on second thoughts I
felt confident that I never could manage it myself, before a
crowd of strangers, with a large two-handed rod and heavy
tackle which was quite new to me. Before I was out of
my reverie the boy returned, followed shortly after by Phil
Morris, a well-known professional fisherman ; and his rod
and tackle somewhat astonished me. The rod, a weather-
beaten, rough-looking afiair, consisted of two pieces only,
utterly innocent of paint or varnish, about 17 feet in length
when spliced together with string. At the end of the butt
two holes were drilled, through which a rough winch was
bolted, and there were a few rings for the line to run
through.

"Do you think you will get a salmon to-night ? " I asked.

" Get a salmon, yer honour ? Why, there are as many
salmons in them pools as there are rogues at the Curragh
on a race day, and I wish the master and his good lady here
and all of us were as shure of going to glory and no questions
asked, as I am to stick a salmon now." And going to a
little distance, where there was plenty of elbow room, he let
out what seemed to me a very long line, and made a cast or
two, the heavy two-handed rod looking like a feather in his
hand, and the long heavy line paying out like a slippery
snake uncoiling itself, and the flies falling on the water like
gossamer. I could have watched the man for lioui-s, for he
was a thorough master of his art ; and whilst I watched I
heard a shout ; " I've got one, sir, look out," and a sheet of
silver shot up in the air and carqe down with a splash, and
D-_2

36 My Two Lays' Salmon Fislihuj.

then shot up again, and the line went whizzing through the
ring.-^. " Bide a while, sir, till I steady him for ye ; " and
Phil Morris, after letting the salmon run, wound in the
slack till he had him well in hand, and made him feel the
weight of the line, the fish ploughing up stream about a
quarter of a mile an hour, and then he gave me the rod and
said, " Catch hold, sir, now you've got your first salmon on,
and never mind if you lose him. I'll get you another."

And I said to myself, " Now I've got my first salmon on,
and if I lose him he'll get me another," and then 1 thought,
" Well, the tackle is heavier and the fish is bigger than
Avhat I am accustomed to, but it feels like playing a trout,
as far as I can see, and the water is heavy and no piles : by
Jove ! I think I shall land him." By degrees I found my
salmon tiring, after some minutes, and I had recovered a
good deal of line, and could see him, for he was nearly on
the top of the water, and he began to move quicker, and I
could guide him. The fear I had w^as of his jumping again,
and my holding too tight. I felt the perspiration standing
in beads on my face, and my hands were cramped. And
then for the first time Phil Morris spoke, almost in a
whisper, " Go on as you are, sir, aisy, and try and get him
alongside that wood-work, fifteen yards ahead, and I'll be
handy with the gaff; and for the Lord's sake, when he
smashes at the line Avith his tail, keep the top of your rod
well over him, and the line as tio^ht as you can convaniently
without jerking him." Every word fell on my ear, and I
tried to follow the advice, and played him with a steady
give-and-take, and suddenly I felt the excitement of a mad
fish rushing towards the side, plunging downwards and
smashing with his tail, and I thought all was over, when the
strain on the line slackened, and with a wild hurroo ! my
trusty fisherman laid him on the grass. I was so excited
with the fish that I did not see the man (who was Ipng on

My Two Dcujs Salmon Fishing. 37

his face below the high bank on which I was standing) gafi'
him. Aspen leaves " were fools to me," qua shaking, for I
felt almost drunk with excitement. " No more fishing to-
night, Phil Morris," I said, "or I shall go mad," as he
poured a little whisky into the salmon's mouth, more
Hibemico, before wetting him ourselves, which we all did.
It was autumn, and he was a red salmon, but he was a real
salmon, and weighed over nine pounds, and I was verij
happy. Acting on my request, Phil Morris got the crowd
to disperse, and we were left alone, and I explained to him
that I had two days' salmon fishing before me, and I would
take care of him if he would teach me to throw a line with
a two-handed rod ; and when we were alone I got him to
take the flies off, and I kept on till I felt pi-etty certain
that I was fairly safe against whipping out my own eye or
anyone else's : and we parted for the night with a mutual
promise to meet the next morning at six o'clock. It was
dark when I got to my lodgings, and I found my friend, to
whom I was indebted for so much pleasure, there before me.
I never saw a man more pleased, for, like all big-hearted
men, his pleasure was in pleasing others. " Bedad, sir," he
said, " I went away when I saw you with the rod, for I said
to myself, his heart will break if he loses the fish, and I
would not like to see it." There was no difficulty about it ;
it was all plain sailing ; the fish was well hooked, there
were no rocks or piles, and Phil Morris knew exactly when
to bring him in^ and how to gafi him. But how happy it
made us all, simply because we all loved real sport. Need
it be said that a good tea, and some eggs and bacon and
buttered toast galore were acceptable, and that a quiet
tumbler of punch, or perhaps two, were di'uiik, but no small
hours were indulged in, as I was due at six o'clock next
morning by the river, and I fell asleep to the music of the
water rushing over the weir. The catching of one fish is

38 Mij Two Days' Salmon Fishing,

much like the catchmg of another. Suffice it to say that
for the two days succeeding the taking of my first salmon
I worked hard for fourteen hours a day, from six till eight
o'clock each day, taking on Phil Morris and a man with a
boat, and Larry with the gafi'. Of course I missed lots of
fish, for I would not let anyone touch my rod, and it took
some time to get into the knack of striking accurately, and
not too soon ; but somehow or another, I managed unaided
to hook and land five salmon in the two days, and on the
last day — having w^aded without waterproofs for some hours —
when I got home I felt downright beaten, and could just keep
my eyes open to eat a mutton chop and drink a large glass
of hot punch ; and, getting under two or three extra blankets
at nine o'clock on Saturday night, I slept where I fell, with-
out mo\'ing, till half-past one on Sunday afternoon. I
believe my five salmon cost me about a sovereign apiece,
after Phil Morris, and the boat, and the boy with the gafi",
and my lodging, and the bill for refreshments, and flies were
all paid ; but one of the best of Irish fishermen (I need
hardly say that Phil Morris is not his real name) I ever
saw, tried his very hardest to teach me to throw a salmon
line, and if I had the chance again I think I could do it
w^ell enough for my own amusement ; but I do not profess
to know more of salmon fishing than I learnt in my two
days' experience, and I look back on that visit as one of the
brightest eras of my life.

My chance acquaintance overpaid me twenty times for
the loan of my private room, by giving me. the fishing, and
I made him accessory after the act to breaking the laws of
his country, he being a member of the Salmon Fisheries
Board. It occurred thus. On Sunday evening I told Phil
Morris I must have a dish of salmon-parr for dinner, and
he slipped down to a quiet spot and got me a couple of
dozen about the size of large smelts. The penalty, I be-

Mij Two Days Salmon Fisldng. 39

lieve, is forty shillings for every one found in your posses-
sion. I got over my kind landlady's scruples, and per-
suaded her to let me have them fried in batter, and in the
middle of dinner in walked my Irish friend. '•' Have
some Kentish smelts," I said to him ; " came this morning
by post ; sit down and join me."

He winked, and sat down. " Holy Moses ! " he ex-
claimed j " they are salmon -parr ; you are in for two pounds
apiece."

" And you are in for it too, my boy, for you have eaten
three already."

" Ah ! well, let us put them all out of sight, then. Give
me two or three more, for they are food for the Pope
himself."

The next day I left my salmon haunts, and went back
with much content to what trout fishing I came across. It
is childish to sa.y that a man who had once caught a salmon
-would never care for anything else. In my rambles I came
across an Irish fair in a picturesque village on the sea-
shore.

" I shall give a halfpenny to the best boy," I said to a
group of bare-footed, shock-headed, bright-eyed little Irish
urchins w^ho w^ere standing in a ring round '' the English
Gintleman," who was sitting on the stump of an old tree
outside '' Pat Murphy's Grocery and Entertainment," in
the little Irish village, where he was the only stranger in
the place. I was that stranger. " I am the best boy, sir,"
yelled the little crowd, in chorus, and each sang his own
virtues lustily. " But stop, my little men," I continued ;
" I am going to give a penny to the worst boy." The
chorus turned round and proclaimed the wickedness of
their neighbours. " That boy helped beat his uncle when
they got him down at the fail-," said one. " That boy was
sent to Mass with twopence for the priest's dues, and only

40 My Tivo Days' Salmon Fishing.

put a penny in the bag," said another, *' and kept the other
himself." " And that boy, sir," exclaimed an impudent
little rascal, winking at a good-natured police-constable
who was standing by, " put the j^ollice off the scent when
they were after the whisky stills, and the poor constables
had nothing to eat, and slept in the mountains and caught
nobody." And so they went on blackening one another,
in hopes that the capital might be safely landed by one of
the party, for the good of the commonwealth. So I referred
the question to the police-constable, who decided that they
were all such bad boys that they were all worst, and giving
them the benefit of the doubt, they received a penny apiece,
which gave general satisfaction.

Did you ever go to an Irish fair ? I mean a real country
fair, where you see all classes — county gentlemen, farmers,
small squireens, peasants, and some of the prettiest girls in
the world. You don't see the latter at their best, as they
make it a point to come to fairs in shoes and stockings, and
you miss the wonderfully graceful carriage which marks
them wdien they walk barefooted with a j)ail of milk or a
basket on their heads.

I was at a fair on the sea-shore early in the day, in time
to see the crowd assemble, and made the acquaintance of a
handsome old dame who was sitting before a table, on
which, mirahile dictu, was a clean cloth — for that article is
less common in Ireland than with us at home —and upon
it a lot of sheep's tongues and biscuits. " Glory be to God,
it's a fine day, yur honour," said the old lady, taking her
pipe out of her mouth, " have a ship's tongue and a cracker
to keep ye in good humour, and if ye wish it I'll get ye a
a drain o' punch from Dan Finnigan's booth, and take care
of your rod and your basket when ye go into the fair, and
(looking into the basket) them mountain trout will just do
for a poor ould woman's supper when she gets home, and

My Two Bays Salmon Fishing. 41

you're sure to catch some more when the sun is sinking,
and your fishing book bulges out your pocket — let me take
that, too, and make room for the fairings ye'll be buying."

I complied with the old lady's proposition, barring the
fishing book, " No, mother, not the fishing book, for
tackle is the only thing the Irish will steal."

*' True for ye, there ; the boys icill steal it or coax the
English gintlemen out of it — and, there now — give me a
bit for my son, for he is a clever boy with the trout." And
so I sat down and had two or three tongues and crackers,
and even a second sip of Dan Finnigan's whisky, for I had
walked a long way and had had nothing but a tumbler of
milk and whi.Nky very early in the morning ; which, by-the-
bye, in default of breakfast, will carry one on for three or
four hours.

It was a pretty sight seeing the people arrive on cars and
donkey carts, or strolling down the hill-side on foot, the
girls with their red or blue cloaks and hoods or shawls,
artfully put on, the older women in clean w^hite caps, and
the squii-eens with wonderful shirt collars, and frieze coats
with metal buttons. Some had a fowl or a duck under
each arm, others a basket of eggs or butter, or jars of
honey, and not a few drove a pig before them, or a cow or
horse of no great pretensions, or a donkey. I watched the
bartering, and observed that a good donkey was the greatest
subject for competition, and though I did not catch the
figures, the biddings went on for a long time over each
donkey sale. The cattle and sheep and horses were sold
some little way from the pleasure fair, arrd a substantial
class of farmers and county gentlemen, and more than one
London horse dealer whom I recognised, were assembled.
But that was dull business.

My old lady called me to her as I was strolling back from
the cattle sale. " Come here, sir ; here's the prettiest Irish gii-1

42 My Two Lays Salmon Fishing,

in Connauglit, the blacksmith's daughter." And by Jove she
did speak the truth. Aye, indeed ! and he's Y\'orth a dale of
money, a hunther they say, when her ould father goes ; and
he was bad last Christmas, and Father Regan made his
sowl."

" Yes," remarked a bystander, ''and the punch brought
him to life again."

" Get out, Mick, and don't be listening to my discourse ;
'tisn't you that's the boy she will be having — there's better
nor you in the barony — and (to the gii"l) come here, Mary,
and I'll tell you a sacret."

" And what's that, mother ? " as she called the ould
woman.

" I tould the English gintleman that you are the
prettiest girl in the Connaught, and I tell ye something
else ; there's Phelim, not a hundhred yards from ye noAv — "
And she spoke the truth, for Phelim, a fine young fellow,
came towards her, blushing very much, and catching sight
of me (for the story told itself) looked as if he would have
smashed me if he could, under an erroneous suspicion of
jealousy, thinking that I had spoken to her perhaps. It
vjas a case, and from the hajDpy expression on her face and
on her lover's, I was certain that the green-eyed monster
was quelled. I wish a few London 'Arries would go over
to an Irish fair and make some of their witty (?) remarks
to an Irish peasant girl or two ; they would get what they
deserve so much.

Turning from love to theatricals, I have seen something
pretty good at old Greenwich Fair in the past, with Wicked
Barons, injured innocence, and blue fire and ghosts ; but
commend me to the same thing at a rural Irish Fair. Upon
my word, I think they took the drama for reality, for when
the ghost of the bleeding nun appeared to the virtuous
character, and pointing, said, " Ye'll find my bloody corse

My Tii'o Days' Salmon Fishinrj. 43

Yonder," one gentleman remarked, *• I'll go bail it's in the
cupboard." *' Hould yer tongue, you fool,'"' said his friends
" it will be buried under the stairs." A horrible vision
crossed my mind — had the speaker ever had practical
experience with the body of an agent ? However, when
the AVicked Baron is led to the fatal corner, and the
\-irtuous character runs his sword through him, the dehght
of the audience was enormous, and there were loud cries of
" Kill him again ! Kill him again ! " But the Corpse and
Ghost and the Baron and the virtuous character contented
themselves with bowing to the audience.

Then followed something of a pantomime ; but a screw
was loose evidently, and there was a cry of '• AVhere's the
merriman ? Where's the Jack Pudding ? •' whereon the
manager, who evidently was well known to his audience,
came forward and said in a kind of stage whisper, " Ladies
and gintlemen, I never like to disappoint my friends, and
I'll tell ye the truth — he's been to his aunt's funeral, and is
a little overcome with excitement." Which apolog}- was
received with acclamation. Only fancy an Irish clown in
liquor !

The old woman prophesied rightly about the trout, for as
I strolled home in the evening, when the sun was sinking
the fish were mad with glory, and I brought home enough
for my supper and the peoj^le at my inn too. And over
my evening's pipe and a tumbler of punch my thoughts
went back to the blacksmith's daughter, and I drank to her
happiness.

I don't think I shall ever re-visit my old haunts. There
is hardly a spot in the faiiy land which I have so often
trod that has not been the scene of misery, and outrage,
and murder since I saw it last, and I prefer to keep in my
mind the pleasant visions of the past, and my recollection of
the people as they were when I was so happy amongst

44 My Two Days' Salmon Fishing,

them, and not run the risk of mixing with those whose
lives have been embittered, and affections estranged from
Enghsh sportsmen by wicked and designing men. As I meet
some of these agitating scoundrels, most of whom I know by
sight, day by day in London, I feel as if I was meeting the
father of mischief himself, and look down expecting to see
the cloven hoof. I like to remember the old-fashioned
greeting, " You're welcome, anyhow," and a rough answer
from an Irish peasant noio would grate terribly on my ear.
The drawback to Irish tackle is that their gut is not so fine
or pliable as ours, and I rejoiced Phil Morris's heart by
giving him two or three of Holroyd's finest-drawn gut
collars, and a few of the '' Strange's fancy " Wandle flies,
which I have found " death on trout " in mountain streams
in Ireland and Scotland.

Note.— My fishing was in Galv\'ay river, just below the weir at
Lough Corrib. My fisherman was young George Brown, but I did
not put his name at the time, as there were two George Browns,
senior and junior, and near relatives ; and there was much jealousy
between them, the friends of one declaring that the other was of no
use. My John Brown was the best fisherman I ever saw. The
salmon, crede the late Frank Buckland, swarm in Galway river.

ABOUT SEYEEAL MEN
WHO WENT A-ANGLING,

On Yalextixe's Day hundreds of housemaids will look up
the area palings, expecting a missive from Postman X,
and many a boarding-school miss will try to square the
servants so as to prevent the old lady abbess of the boarding
school from cutting off some amatory correspondence from
lovesick boys.

You, who have the run of trout streams in the Avarmest
parts of the West of England, a sou'-west wind, a keeper
waiting for you with all fishing paraphernalia, so as to enable
you to welcome your first trout as your valentine on
February the lith. This occurred at Broxburn some
twenty-eight years ago, and sure I was there.

Have to wait for thirteen days from the day you read
this until you feel the top of your rod bend down almost to
your knuckles with exactly the same delightful sensation as
a cricketer feels when he meets the first ball of the season,
and knowing that it is six inches ofi his wickets, he makes
" the cut," which he has dreamt of all through the winter,
and feels that the hit has come well off.

Fancy again. Lady fisheresses (I appeal to good old Tory
45 ' "

46 Alout Several Men ivlio went a- Angling.

young ladies who land big salmon every autumn in or aljout
the Gordon-Richmond estates in Scotland), how much jollier
it is to see the monarch of the stream on the grass than to
*' rink" at Prince's, or to be carried round Belgravian draw-
ing-rooms, half dead and quite knocked up, in the mazy
waltz. Kot that Prince's is a bad place by any means, nor
ballrooms either.

Now, is not this a romantic opening ? I am going to
talk about cockney fishing twenty years ago from this date.

Dramatis personce. Myself No. 1 : An overworked
official in those days ; and I only wish my friend *' the
working man" could be induced to do w^hat I did then at my
pay, and would put his soul into it as I did, at the risk of
heart and brams.

No. 2. A poor Clerkenwell w^atchmaker, accompanied by
a sickly-looking little boy on a crutch and a kitten in a
basket. The poor little fellow loved the fresh air much,
but he loved his kitten more.

No. 3. Three jolly young farmers vrho took it into
their heads to study the gentle art.

No. 4. A sour, bumptious fellow, who knew every art
of livebait fishing for jack, which only means " ledgei-ing,"
with a detective to w^atch the float and to haul it in when
the jack has gorged the bait, after ten minutes. These
coves are not within the pale of the " Fishing Church."

Twenty years ago w'ork was harder, and no Saturday
half-holiday existed, and those who worked with their
brains had to work a fair six days, from nine o'clock till
six or seven, and very often till two or three in the morning,
Saturdays included ; and many, like myself, who had been
born and bred in the country, and knew and loved most
sports, would be as pleased, for want of better spoi't, to cut
out a mouse on a hillside, or catch minnows or gudgeons,
than do nothing. Hence it occurred to me that it was

About Several Men tvho ivent a- Angling. 47

batter to ran down to a place t\yenty miles from London,
more or less, which Izaak Walton once trod, for the purpose
of quiet and enjoyment in meadows which were sacred to
those who paid for privacy and seclusion, than to do nothing.

According to the accounts direct from the fishery, the
fishing was A 1. The real truth was that, under very
special seasons, and at special times, a ten or even a fifteen
pound pike mi'jht be caught, but in ordinary times perch
and roach and jack of no great size ruled the market.

Well, I went a fishing ; and having the run of the back
waters, and by working all day, I had a little incidental
sport of no great moment, but every bit of which lifted a
ton weight off my mind ; and I spent more time chatting
with those who were fishing than I spent in my own sport ;
so exit No. 1 of the dramatis per sonce.

Enter No. 2. The poor Clerkenwell clockmaker and the
little boy with the crutch and the kitten.

No. 1 was taking stock of the frequenters of the water,
and "fell into discourse," as Mr. Pepys would have said,
with No. 2, and he learnt that No. 2 and his little boy and
the kitten had started on foot, on Saturday afternoon, from
Clerkenwell, and had made an easy ten miles ; my little
friend with a crutch being '■' a rare game one to j^eg along,"
according to his father's account, and had slept at a friend's
house some eight miles from the fishery, and had finished
the journey that morning early. Good heavens, little
Bethel ! could this honest clockmaker have been fishing on
a Sunday ?

The little fellow was shoutinaj with delisfht at butterflies
and dragon-flies, and wdien he saw a Idngfi slier for the first
time he went quite mad, and told the kitten all about.

Well, I sat and looked at the clockmaker for a long time,
and saw 7«i.§ fishing. He had a very long bamboo ro 1 which
could readily be pulled to pieces, for the 2:>urpose of

48 About Several lieu ivho ivent a'Angling.

landing his fish, and Avas watching an almost invisible
porcupine quill float which sailed about in a little fresh-
water sea, and I would defy any one but a clockmaker to
mark a bob of that float ; but as sure as the float sunk a
hundreth part of an inch he struck ; and when a little
roach, about five to a pound, came in, the little boy shouted
and told the kitten again.

I thought to myself, " If that poor fellow had the run of
a fine river, well preserved, with an old keeper's instruc-
tions and good tackle, wouldn't he * wipe the eye ' of many
a salmon-fisher," for I never saw a keener sportsman or a
man with a quicker hand and eye.

No. 2's refreshments were very scanty, and it was in my
power to give them a banquet at the cost of half-a-crown ;
but such a nature's gentleman was the poor clockmaker,
and so happy was he with his harmless enjoyment, that if
I had tendered pecuniary assistance he would have looked
on me as a snob.

Some tobacco and a pull at my flask was all 1 dared oflTer :
could I ofier more to a man who kneAv Izaak Walton by
heart ? In desultory cross-examination I found, to my
great jo}^ that the party were going home by train.

I would have given four times its value to have put a
crown into his hand, but I knew the man's mind : he was
as independent as I was, and felt it.

Enter No. 3. The party of three jolly young farmers,
ligged out with new tackle, new bait cans, gaiters, fishing
boots, and all sorts of things advertised by fishing shops.
There was no difliculty in making their acquaintance.
They made mine. They had cold chicken, tongue, ham,
bottled beer, gin, whisky, rum, and tobacco in all vaiieties,
and were in riotous spirits.

Their story came out in a moment. One of their party
professed to be a fisherman, and had enticed all the others

About Several Men lolio ivent a-AnfjUng. 49

to commence the noble art ; and, at considerable expens9,
they had bought the necessary tackle, and the result was
" nil."

I travelled on, and came to No. 4, the sulky ledger-fisher.
He was morose and taciturn, and said he had only caught
one fish — no sport to speak of.

" What weight ? "

*^ Oh ! only about fifteen pounds ! "

'Twas true he had got it, for I saw it.

He never asked me to have any lunch. On the contrary,
he evidently wished me at the place where little Bethel
would have sent him for fishing on a Sunday.

And now, why did I fish on a Sunday? — for I don't
think I ever did so before, and (bar one, under similar
circumstances) I don't think I shall ever do so again. It is
all very well for poor clockmakers who live in garrets ; but
I think a week-day better under ordinary circumstances.

I will tell you how it came about. I went to the
doctor's, half dead, on Saturday morning, and he said, " If
you don't go awa}' at once for forty-eight hours into the
green fields, and lie on your back, and do nothing, I won't
answer for you; for your brain is overworked. No church,
mind — no reading — be idle." So I went to a little fishing
inn, the only place I knew where I could be sure to be out
of a crowd, as the fishing meadows were sacred ; and hence
I met my companions.

Now to kill oft' the dramatis per soncp. No. 2, the clock-
maker's party, went home by train, and I had the oppor-
tunity of slipping in a jDot of real good ale into my bill,
and could tender my friend the stirrup-cup without any
appearance of pride, — and, by the way, he put his head into
the pot — it was clear he relished it.

No. 3, the jolly farmers' pai-ty, sent me an invitation to
join them in their private rooms. They were in very good

50 Ahoid Several Men ivlio icent a'Angling,

trim — in other words, were in great mii'th, — though not
intoxicated, by any means. Around them were many
bottles. On the table was a jack, or " jackikin," of about
seven or eight ounces in weight, and I was requested to act
as coroner whilst they held an inquest over the deceased ;
which office I readily accepted, and a verdict was returned
of " found drowned," which verdict was duly wetted by the
gentlemen of the jury.

The way they chafied one of their companions, who had
induced them to come a-fishing, was a caution ; but as we
fell into discourse (again quotmg Mr. Pepys), I told them
that if they really wanted to learn anything about fishing,
a Thames fisherman, for a sovereign, would give them
enough preliminary instruction to enable them to follow
out the art themselves ; and they concluded, as a Yankee
would say, to go somewhere where they could be well posted
up in the gentle art.

And here let me digress for a moment, and say a word
to young England, if he wants to learn fishing. The genial
spirit of Izaak Walton, who taught his '' scholar " all the
rudiments of fishing, has descended on his disciples ; and
there is not a fisherman in England worth his salt who is
not always ready and willing to communicate the mysteries
of the gentle art to a tjvo.

Now for No. 4 — the morose man who landed the 15-
pounder. With the aid of the landlord we soon found out
his value. He was a pot-hunter, belonging to one or two
fishing clubs, and fishing for prizes. His game was, to get
information about the water, and as to when and where a
good fish was on the feed, and to drop down with tackle
^^hich would tow a barge, and with two rods out, and any
amount of live bait, and to go " ledgering." We heard quite
enough about No. 4's sport, and he swaggered and blustered
about it when he came in, and wrote oflf to the S2')orting

Ahout Several Men lulio ivent a- Angling. 51

papers on the subject, and then gave himself up to painting
his nose with ^roof.

So No. 1 (that's myself) and No. 3 (that's the three
farmers) talked over No. 2 (the clockmaker and his little
party), and we voted them the best of the best, and we
voted No. 4 a snob. Then the No. 3 party whispered
together; and one of them almost died of convulsions,
and said to me (that's No. 1), "You ivill hear of a lark."
And so we separated for the night.

Izaak Walton talked of inns where the beds smelt of
lavender, and ballads hung on the wall. My bed was a very
lively bed indeed, and sleep came not. Whilst I was bless-
ing {?) the fleas, and in utter despair, T heard a hubbub
which might have awakened the dead. There was much
violent language, and, on opening my door, I saw a madman
rushing about the passage in a very short night-shirt ; and
from adjoining bedrooms, occupied by No. 3, 1 heard shrieks
of merriment. The madman was No. 4.

No. 4 rushed at me like a tiger.

" Did you do it, sir ? "

''Do ivhat ? " I asked.

"• Did you put the big jack in my bed, sir ? "

I thought I must have exploded right off: I told him, in
remarkably plain words — I may say, in vei'y remarkably
plain words — to go to bed, and not kick up such a row ; and
shut the door in his face.

Query? Could No. 3 have done such a wicked thing as
to put the jack into No. 4's bed ? Somebody did it.

E-2

THE PEIDE OF OUE
VILLAGE.

There is between the hills in a south-eastern English county
one of the prettiest villages in England. On one side for a
distance of several miles there is a line of well-wooded
heights, and on the other side some picturesque down-
country. Through the valley runs a river, and on the ris-
ing knoll stands a village church just above the bridge, over
the stream, and near the church are the great house and
deer park. It is a very little village, containing some three
hundred inhabitants, and was, and probably now is, a very
primitive place in its way. There was no public-house or
beershop in that village ; the whole jDlace, barring the
vicarage, belonged to the squire, who, when a railway first
made its appearance, bargained that no station should be
placed anpvhere nearer than two miles and a half, and who
obstinately refused to every builder who applied for a plot
of land the slightest concession to erect any house upon his
estate. There were no poor to speak of, and as every
labourer was employed, we had no poachers, and so kept
the even tenor of our way, content with one service
on the Sunday morning or afternoon alternately, for
our spirtual wants. We were orthodox withal, for on feasts
52

The Pride of Oar Village. 53

and festivals, when the Athanasian Creed was appointed to
b3 read, the old clerk would say to the Vicar, '^ If you please,
sir, we have '* Haunanias" creed to-day." The Ranters
once tried to preach on the green, and had there been any
stocks in the parish, no doubt they would have found them-
selves in them ; but as there were no stocks they were
simply ordered to move on, and they had the sense to do so,
the villagers being conservative, and the river handy.

Our village was for some twelve months one of the most
celebrated in England, for the big house and the park being
let by the squire to a nobleman who was sportingly inclined ,
we all woke up with a new excitement in the shape of
racing stables in oar parish. People shook their heads and
prophesied the ruin of us all ; but a reaction soon took
place. The trainer and a swarm of nice little boys with
close-cut hair and shining faces made quite a show in our
village church with their smart liveries, and looked as if
butter w^ould not melt in their mouths, and the new
community of grooms, rough-riders, and stable-boys settled
down quite pleasantly amongst us, and people found that a
good deal of money was circulated, and that we grew none
the wickeder. There was no Sunday training, no four-in-
liands came from the cavalry barracks on Sunday after-
noons (as the Mawworms all said there woidd be), and the
park and the racing stables were as quiet on a Sunday as any
other part of the village ; and our new Squire's purse was
never closed to any appeal from the Yicar, and we never
saw or heard anything of the evils of racing, if such there
be. In the autumn our enthusiasm reached its highest
pitch, for the next year's Derby favourite became one of
our parishioners. High and low, rich and poor, thought
and dreamt of nothing else but the coming race in the
spring.

" La ! miss," said our oldest inhabitant, a venerable old

54 The Pride of Our Village.

woman of nearly ninety, who inliabited the almshouse —
^Yhose first husband was hung for robbing the mail, and
also hung in chains afterwards, in the latter part of the
last century, when George III. was king — to the parson's
daughter, who went to read " Pilgrim's Progress" to her,
" I have had a message from the Lord." The lady, who
was not unaccustomed to hear very old women say strange
things, asked innocently, *^ What was the message ? "
"Why," answered the nonagenarian, " the butler from the
gi^eat house was here yesterday, and ' ' told me that the
Lord " (meaning the noble owner) " had told him that
Cleorge, the celebrated jockey, is going to ride the favourite
for the Derby, and T do hope he will win." So you see the
poor old woman had mixed up her theology with stable
talk ; and, old as she was, her mind was on the Derby, as well
as ours.

The fact was that the occupier of the big house — " the
Lord," as the poor people called him — was never known to
say or do anything except w^hat was kind and generous to
every one about him, especially to the jDOor, and conse-
sequently every one's heart was in the favourite's success, out
of regard to the owner ; and there is little doubt that, had
someone suddenly suggested that prayers should be offered
up for the favourite's success, the primitive people would
not have seen any profanity in it ; and most certainly, had
anyone shouted out in the middle of the sermon, " Ten to
one against the favourite ! " the parson — whom probably I
knew better than anyone else in this life, and who never
bet in his life before — would have answered, " Done, man !
done, in sovereigns ! " So great was the feeling in favour
of the owner, that a clergjTuan whom I met at dinner in
London the Sunday before the Derby, said to me, " I
believe a racecourse to be little better than a pandemonium,
and I hate the whole system ; but the owner is such a kind-

The Pride of Our Village, 55

hearted man, that I would go there myself if it could secure
his success."

It was a royal treat to be taken into the stable to see
the horse — -a treat which no Avell-bred gentlemen would
ever think of asking for, as it is a difficult thing to refuse
on the owner's part, and me jiidice, you may as well ask to
see a man's banking book.

The favourite w^as all sixteen hands; a splendid bay,
with a beautiful head and a large, full eye, as soft as a
gazelle's, and in temper as gentle as a lamb. He recaived
his visitors, especially ladies, on whose shoulders he would
lay his head (happy horse !), like a thoroughbred gentleman,
and came up — possibly with an eye to a little bit of sugar,
or apple, or bread, — and did the honours of his loose box
with great effect. Very few strangers ever saw him ; and
I fancy that I grew six inches, and swelled in proportion,
wdien I received a message one Sunday afternoon from the
owner, that he would be happy to show me the stables the
next morning, and that, if the weather only held on as bad
as it then was — it was blowing a December hurricane from
the south-west, — I might see him galloped on Monday at two
o'clock in the wind and rain.

The park was a splendid place for training, with three-
quarters of a mile finish — very like the Derby course. There
were only two paths through the park, and all adits and
exits were easily watched ; and should a stranger be found
out of the lawful beaten track, what was easier than for one
of the keepers (who were many in number) to punch that
stranger's head ? jSTo fear of a magistrate of sound religious
principles convicting anyone in that part of the country for
thrashing a tout who was after our favourite. He would
be much more likely to give a tout tln-ee months for
running his head against a keeper's stick in the exercise of
the keeper's duty.

C6 The Pride of Our Village.

Barring treachery from within, which was very unlikely,
that horse was safe from the touts — though once we thought
that we were clone. It happened thus. The old parson
Avas ill, and the clergy of the neighbouring cathedral town
being in " full blast," as the manufacturers say, owing to
some grand Church week, a stranger came from London
for two or three Sundays. He was a curious kind of man,
and not much like a parson in manners or carriage. People
were civil to him, of course, and he had the natural
curiosity which most of the parish had about our favourite.
Coming out of church one Sunday, the wife of the noble
owner was talking about some suspicious people having been
seen about the woods, and a sudden idea occurred to me

which nearly paralyzed her : " Lady ," 1 said, ^' I have

it ! that new parson is a Newmarket tout as sure as we are
born ! " The idea was almost too horrible to think of.

A young lady who was staying at the Vicarage, after
having been sworn to secrecy by every oath which would be
likely to stop a woman's tongue, was allowed to accompany
me to see the favourite gallop ; and although she w^as
particular, as a rule, about catching cold, and damp fee,
she cheerfully walked through the long wet grass to a hill
side in the park, in such a storm as I never saw excej^t in the
"Witches' scene in " Macbeth."

The favourite had his hood on — and he carried, as I
thought, but I did not inquire, of course, a much heavier
weight than the Derby regulation weight, and was led by a
powerful mare ridden by a feather-weight boy who looked
like a squirrel on an oak-tree ; but despite the weather,
which w^as tremendous, the horse came along with a mag-
nificent stride, at a pace which seemed to me quite equal to
Derby speed, and pulled up after his mile and a quartei-
perfectly fresh.

Everything seemed to prosper : the jockey who was to

The Pride of Our Village. 57

ride the horse came down and tried him and was dehghted
w-ith his going, and when early spring came on and our
favourite was removed to his final training quarters on the
Sussex Downs, and we missed the people at the big house
and our trainer and jockeys, our little parish grew quite
dull.

One day at luncheon the Vicar came in, looking as if he
had seen the Father of Evil himself.

" What is the matter, Tom ? " asked his wife, quite
alarmed.

"My dear, dear wife! I have just heard the moot
dreadful thing in the world," answered the parson.

" What is it, my dear ? "

<< Why, some villains have put some broken glass in the
favourite's gallop, in Sussex. I would have such fellows
hanged twice over, ay, and quartered, too." This he said,
forgetting that on the previous Sunday he had preached
forgiveness down to any extent, and even so far possibly as
forgiving a man who ran away with one's mother-in-law.

I wonder how many hundreds of persons on cricket-
gi^ounds and elsewhere asked me if I could give them any
" information," knowing that my people lived in the parish
where the favourite used to be. To one and all I gave the
same answer, which was, that if they believed in anything
such as honesty on the Turf, they now had the chance of
backing a horse whose owner possessed that quality, and if
not, they had better leave it alone ; and moreover, that if I
had any so-called " information," I was not going to betray
the confidence of a man who had made me free of his
stables on the faith of my being a gentleman and not a
tout.

The Derby Day approached, and we had the latest news
that the horse was safe in the neighbourhood of Epsom, and
that all was well ; and that to prevent mistakes some of the

58 The Pride of Our Village.

keepers — all ISTorth-countrymen, slow to speak and quick to
act — ^had gone down with him to form a body-guard, and
prevent the ^possibility of the horse being got at.

On looking out of my window on the morning of that
memorable Derby Day, the only thing visible was one
pei-petual stream of rain, which looked like endless small
bell-ropes which were pouring down from a dark-brown
ceiling, which w^as called by courtesy a sky. Talk about a
wet day — this was a concentration of all the cataracts in
the world, sent by atmospheric pressure through miles of
colossal cullenders. Ladies, as ladies always do, with their
usual unselfishness, Avere deploring the spoiling of a holiday,
which a guest of mine — a parson — and myself were going*
to enjoy at Epsom, and could not understand how I kept
up my spirits and whistled with keen delight, as I arrayed
myself in an old fishing dress, which consisted of waterproof
boots which came up to my knees over my trousers, a tar-
paulin coat which reached to my heels, and a very much-
worn waterproof wideawake, with sloping sides, like a
beefsteak pudding, two sizes too large for my head ; the
combined dress making me look about as big a blackguard
as any who started for the Downs that day.

I was perfectly indifferent to everything during the
journey down, utterly unmindful of people who offered me
correct cards, or Fundi or the latest sporting paj)er, or
tracts warning me of certain perdition if I w^ent to the
Derby. Weather, and eating and drinking, were things of
nought. One thing only was on my mind, which was the
sight which I saw in December, of our favourite going like
lightning through mud and slush, and against weather as-
bad as we could have that day, and I made up my mind he
would do it again.

Once having gained Barnard's Stand, and having estab-
lished myself in a good place next to a post, high up,.

The Pride of Our Village. 59

iQimediately behind the judge's box, and opposite the
winning post, time was no object. I did not miss the
Punch-and-Judy men, or stilts, or knockemdowns, or
gipsies, all of which unfortunate people never stirred out
on that miserable day : it seemed nothing extraordinary
that the only things visible were thousands of square yards
of umbrellas, and nothing else. Nor was anything else an
object. A fight took place close to me, in which I took no
interest : I saw one man pick another's pocket, and did
not care to interfere ; and my feeling was one of gratitude
to the hundreds of thousands who had paid our village the
compliment to come down in such weather to see our race
— for it was our Derby and nobody else's. Here were my
parson friend and myself, two representatives of our parish,
and ready to fight the whole crowd — one down, t'other come
on, — who said a word against our horse, or his owner. Father
JSToah might have come by again in his ark, as of yore — as he
might well have done, — and I am quite sure that we two,
the parson and myself, would have stopped outside to see
race.

I suppose there n'cis some racing before the Derby, as I re-
member bells ringing, crowds clearing, shouting, and
numbers going up, and occasionally beds of tulijDS flying by,
which no doubt were really jockeys and horses racing :
nothins^ roused me till I heard the real bell soundincr for
clearing the course for our Derby. Quite right of the Com-
missioners of Police to send all those constables to clear the
way for our favourite. Ah, I perceive that other jockeys on
horses take advantage of the open space, and are galloping
too. Well, I have no objection ; we are not selfish. At
last I saw a crowd coming down near our stand. No, there
was no mistake ! there was our favourite, with George on
his back, and the owner and trainer walking by him, and
one or two helpers and some of the keepers, and I see the

60 The Pride of Our Village.

jockey lean down for a moment and speak to the owner.
George gives him a shake of the rein, no whip or spur, and
our favourite passes us towards Tattenham Corner, going
possibly a little stiff. There is no mistake about it, the
match is our villa o^e aojainst the world.

'' Call that a horse," shouted a man close to me, who was
eating some fat greasy meat out of a piece of Daily
Telegraph newspaper, w^ith a very doubtful knife, and hold-
ing in the palm of his left hand a dirty piece of bread, which
he gnawed like a dog, and whose mouth seemed filled with
equal proportions of teeth like broken rails (which had
never been washed by anything but beer since he was
weaned), the Litany utterly perverted, and the lowest tap-
room slang, j)lus his cold meat and bread ; "I call him (I
omit the adjectives and substantives of the speaker) a cow.
I'll lay a level ' quid ' (thieves' Latin for a sovereign) he
ain't first, second, or third."

" Done ! " I shouted in his ear, with such a roar that the
man almost jumped off the stand ; and in my excitement I
called him by an epithet similar to one which Mr. Chucks
the boatswain in " Peter Simple," delighted in, which if
true — as no doubt it was — would have qualified him to
quarter the " bar sinister" on his escutcheon.

" Halves ! " shouted the parson who was with me ; so I
and the Church were partners in a sovereign bet, which was
the only one w^e had.

Again the favourite passes us on his return gallop to the
paddock, with a magnificent stride this time, utterly re-
gardless of mud or w^eather. I could have shaken hands
if I had had time, with every one near me, for I felt sure
that our favourite was the favourite of nine out of ten.

A kind of sulky presence of mind came over me again,
and I watched with comparative indifference the horses file
out through the paddock to the post.

The Pride of Our TiUafje. 61

A gentleman behind me, knowing — by instinct I suppose
— how utterly absorbed I was in the race, and whom I after-
wards found out to be a gi^eat AYest of England horse-
breeder, very kindly offered to keep me ' posted up' as to
the success of the favourite, as he said, though not a bet-
ting man, he knew^ every horse, and the names and colours
of the riders and all about them. At a quarter-past three
o'clock the lot were at the jDOst, and after a horse called Sky-
blue had bolted three or four times, for one whole hour the
last horse in the rank, one called Tambourine, every time a
start w^as attempted, stuck his feet hard against the gi-ound,
and stood on his head with his heels in the air and would
not move, although friendly hands with stout sticks gave
him one or two which would have seriously injured a hippo-
potamus. All this time my informant, who was an admii'-
able judge, told me that the favourite was as quiet as possi-
})le, and not the least flurried, and the false starts were more
likely to prejudice the other horses the most. At last the
starter left Tambourine at the post, and after thirty-three
false starts they were oif in a hurricane of wind and rain.

My friend behind me was very hopeful and encouraging.
" ISTow," he said, " he is in a good place by the bushes ; they
are makmg for the Corner ; now he is well round, w^ell
through his horses, a little wide, perhaps, but out of the
ruck ; now he is shaking them all off. Look at him passing
the stand ! He must win ! He must win. Ko, by Jove,
he's broken down ! " (I saw the horse go from under his
jockey almost.) " jSTo, he's all right again ! " Then, for the
first time, I opened my mouth just as the horse was within
a hundred yards or so of home, and I know not why, except
from utter madness, I kept on shrieking out like a maniac
the jockey's name, in a voice which could be heard half-way
across the course, and in a moment I saw two horses locked
together dash past the judge's chair.

62 The Pride of Our Village.

Then came the babel of voices. " Favourite won ! " " No
Italian ! " '' No, clead-heat ! " The fact was, as I learnt
afterwards, that neither jockey knew which horse had won.
I waited quietly for the verdict, when — oh ! horror — a
stoutish elderly man in a red coat (the old clerk of the
course), mounted on a very powerful chestnut horse with four
white stockings, trotted into the space in front of the rub-
bing-house, and led out Italian first, followed by our
favourite, who was beaten on the post by a very short half
head. And then — I am not the least ashamed to say so — I
sat down and cried like a child.

The judge, of course, incurred much odium, because he
made a mistake about the number of the third horse, which
had afterwards to be reversed, but I have no doubt that
he was right, as Mr. F. Verrall, whose obituary was
published a short time since, and whom I knew very
well, and who backed the favourite, was standing outside
the judge's box and could see the race as well as the judge;
and he told me that he fancied that the favourite's shoulder
and the jockey were first, but the favourite's head was down,
and Italian threw up his head in his last stride, and Mr.
Yerrall agreed with the judge about the half head, and
said that had he been judge he would have given the same
decision.

As to what followed after, is it not written in the annals
of racing how our favourite was nearly beaten by a second-
rate French horse on the Friday following the Derby, and
got into bad odour, and was peppered tremendously by the
Ring for months? How the greatest bookmaker laid
£11,000 to £1,000 against him in one bet with the owner,
and paid the bet the night of the Leger ? How the horse
went to Doncaster, and with a start of a hundred yards
behind the other horses at the post he won the Lege?
easily ? How our villagers and those of the neighbouring

The Pride of Our Village. 63

villages waited from two o'clock in the afternoon till ten
o'clock at night at the railway station, near the big house
for the owner's return, a few clays after the Leger ? How
they took the horses out of the owner's carriage and
dragged him home, and illuminated the park, and burnt
tar-barrels ? And this was all done by those who probably
amongst them all had not five pounds on the race, or any
other race in the world, and it was done simply because the
owner was a kind neighbour and honest sportsman.

I do not believe there is any better evidence of a '' mens
Sana in coiyore sano " than for people to take an almost
mad interest in any honest sport or amusement. If one
only com^^ai-es those who do so with the Mawworms who
are always holding meetings about their neighbours' doings,
he will see which are of the happiest frame of mind. 2^o
doubt many of them are honest, but I have no doubt also
that to many of those who attend the Exeter Hall meet-
ings, and Moody and Sankey meetings, and the like, the
excitement is the real object, bar one — as their wickeder (?)
brethren would say, — and that bar one is love of vulgar
notoriety and self-glory, and seeing their names in the so-
called reHgious papers. I suppose the fact is that I hate
your amateur religionist who whistles through his nose like
a sandpiper, and bothers me about his ideas of my state of
mind, and foretells my perdition because I like to see two
noble animals have a fair struggle for victory for the
struggler's sake, as much as I hate the man who would be
vitterly indifferent whether the competitors are horses, dogs,
pigs, cows, or two drops of rain running down a glass, so
long as he can rob someone. The Mawworms are like the
Puritans of old, who, according to Lord Macaulay, went
regularly wild about bear-baiting, not because it hurt the
bear, but because it pleased the people.

There is an anecdote about our favourite which I know

G4 The Pride of Our Village.

to be true, for I had it from the noble owner. At Don-
caster he was restless and off his feed, and great fears were
entertained that he had been got at, when one of the stable-
boys said to the trainer, '' He's a-looking for his kitten."

On the chance, a telegram w^as sent to the training
stables, two hundred and fifty miles off, for someone to
come at once by first express train with the kitten : and
the boy turned out to be right. Dh^ectly the kitten was
out of his basket and saw the horse, he jumped on his
back, ran over his head, and was on the manger in a
moment, and began patting his nose, and the horse was
quiet at once, and fed as well as ever.

Of course every real racing man will see that this sketch
— which is true in every detail — is so ear-marked that
there can be no doubt as to the name of the owner and of
the favourite ; but I purposely have not put the real names,
because, first, I never put people's names (except on public
matters) in print without their leave ; and, secondly, be-
cause I want to baulk our friend the sporting (?) penny-a-
liner, who would talk about " that prince of sportsmen and
good fellow Lord Blank ; " just as he icill, in some hunting
account of some run which he describes from the hearsay
evidence of some "beery" underwhip — having himself pro-
bably seen nothing more of hounds and huntsmen than a
glimpse of them passing a tap-room window at which he
and the pot-bo}" were sitting-— take in vain the names of
numbers of gentlemen to whom he never spoke in his life.
But there is a moral to this. See how happily the world
goes when the parson and squii^e pull together, and when,
as in this case, the owner of the favourite went out of his
way almost to avoid offending the honest prejudices of the
parson.

Note. — There is a pleasant reminiscence about this article. Lord
St. Vincent, one of the kindest men who ever lived, was owner of

The Pride of Our Village. 65

Lord Clifden, which was the Derby favourite, and was trained for the
Derby, first at Godmersham, in Kent, of which parish my late
father was vicar. Some twelve or fifteen years after my father's
death, and long after Lord St. Vincent had left Godmersham, I received
a letter from him, asking me to come and bring one of my daughters
to his youngest daughter's wedding, in London, as he wished to
have a reminiscence cf "dear old Godmersham," as he called it.
We had lost sight of one another for year?, and I " countered" him
by writing a sketch of his former home, and of his favourite race-
horse, and got the printers of Baily to get me an advance copy a
day or two before publication, and sent it to him as a wedding
present. He told me that the story of the kitten was perfectly
accurate, and the moral of the story about squire and parson at the
end was quite true. The late George Fordham rode Lord Clifder,
which was beaten by Macaroni by a short half-head. Tambonr
Major made thirty-three (!) false starts. The judge put up the
number of the third horse wrong, and had to alter it.

IN A EACING STABLE.

The worst use you can put a man to, say tlie anti-capital
punishment party, is to hang him. The worst use you can
put a magnificent horse to, say I, is to make him a mere
vehicle for gambling, and to cause him to be so handled in
the stable or on the race-coin^se that his whole strength and
energy are intentionally cramped for the purposes of the
betting-ring or possibly of his owner.

The late Lord Derby was very strong on the question of
the abuse of horse-racing, and stated in print — I think in
the Times — that expressions such as " it is not his journey,"
"he was never meant," (fee, (fee, are direct proofs that as
regards the class called "the sporting world," as contra-
distinguished from the real British sportsman, the horse is
an animal about which they care nothing, except as a means
of gambling.

In the present autumn I had a private introduction to a
well-known and much respected trainer and owner of race-
horses, who had gone through the whole career of racing
from boyhood, from the lowest rung of the ladder, and
who, owing to his own industry and integrity, lives in a
comfortable house surrounded by a small home farm of his
own, all freehold, and all bought and paid for by his own
industry.
66

In a Bacing Stable. 67

We are now looking out of the trainer's drawing-room
window on to a magnificent sweep of down country, which
commands a grand view of over more than one county. The
hour is eleven, and it is Sunday morning.

A long string of horses in single file are coming back to
the stables, past the drawing-room window, each horse rid-
den by the boy who attends to him except two, on one of
which sits the trainer and on another his father, who has
gone beyond the Psalmist's allowance of life by some years,
but who — like the retired tallow-chandler who bargained
to attend the place of business " on dipping days " — always
rides a horse at exercise every morning.

Old fogies who read the Orlando and Running Rein
trial, over thirty years ago, will remember that much
laughter was caused by a witness explaining to the judge
that they never " sweated horses " on a Sunday, but only
walked them. I went on Sunday morning because the
horses are all walked early, and come in at eleven, and the
stables shut at noon or soon after, so that I could see them
all being cleaned.

Whether there were fifty or seventy horses or more I
could not tell, as I walked from stable to stable, each of which
was so much like the other that there was no means of
CQunting the number ; and, moreover, I did not wish to
count, reasoning that when a man invites one behind the
scenes to see that which is not shown to the general public,
the golden rule is, "Ask no questions."

My friend very kindly showed me everything which would
interest a novice, and gave me the names of many horses,
with an account of their performances and engagements,
and when he did not give me the names I never asked him.

The most striking feature about a racing stable to my
mind is the discipline and oixler. There was a place for
everything, and everything was expected to be in its place.
F— 2

68 In a Bacing Stable.

We went into one loose-box after another, most of wliich
formed a separate stable, consisting of a square room, with
small sky-lights in the roof, a ventilator, but no side
windows. And the same sight met the eye in each of one
boy and a horse in solitary confinement iiro tern., the boy
cleaning his horse after exercise. Every horse seemed to
know the trainer directly he spoke, and many of them put
their heads on his shoulder and fondled him, though a few
of the " softer sex " welcomed him by putting back their
ears and pretending to lash out with their hind feet. This
was only ladies' chaff. I could quite understand the secret
of success which my guide imparted to me, which is ex-
cessive gentleness and kindness from the time a colt is first
taken up for breaking ; and he told me that if a horse is
ever bad-tempered or vicious, it is, as a rule, the fault of
the boy.

Reverting to the question of order. Everything is done
under the master's eye, and if a headstall is on the wrong
nail, or a comb out of place, it is sure to be observed in a
moment, and the boy using it will be reminded — if an old
offender with a sharp reproof. But one of the most striking
features in training is the wonderful memory which the
manager must have. It is clear that he has the whole of
the stable on his mind, and remembers every ailment, or
threatened ailment, of every horse, and remembers also the
treatment -which he ordered the day before, and, without
written nobss or memoranda, inquires the result of yester-
day's treatment, and gives new directions.

No wonder that training is anxious work, as at any
moment a horse may tread on some rough substance, no
matter how carefully the course is kept, or put his feet in
a hole, or suddenly sprain himself, and the success of
months of training may be jeopardised by an accident, the
result of which cannot be known for a day or two perhaps.

In a Bacing Stable, 69

It may be a slight injury reducible by hot water and
bandages in four-and-twenty hours; it may turn out in
eight-and-forty hours to be fatal to the fulfilment of a
horse's engagements for the rest of the season. What is
a trainer to do ? If the owner is an excitable man a false
alarm may drive him half crazy ; if he is an unreasonable
man he will never forgive his trainer — should the accident
prove bad — for not telegraphing to him on the first sus-
picion of mischief. Added to these troubles is the danger
of mischief from without. There must be black sheep in
this world, as any Head Master in England will tell you
there are in all ranks of life — and in spite of the eyes of
Argus the temptations ofiered by the scum of the earth
outside the stables must often break a trainer's rest. A
globule, the size of a homoeopathic dose, may contain enough
mischief to stop a horse temporarily, without permanent
injury, and without fear of detection. Given a weak-
minded or wicked boy, a villain with the medical appliances,
and ten golden sovereigns, and where is the trainer's labour ?

People little think when the horse, the engagements of
which may be worth many thousands of pounds, is stripped
for their admiration, how black care has sat behind the
trainer for weeks and weeks past as well as behind the
horseman.

Turning into the home farm and the paddocks, where
brood mares of the first pedigree are walking about heavy in
foal, it was pleasing to see how many of the mares " sought
the master's hand," and to witness how they came up to
him as if they were ladies seeing a visitor ; and a young
colt, of six months old, of very good pedigree, who had his first
headstall, did the honours of his paddock, quite like a
gentleman ; but on the first crack of the whip like the
celebrated —

" Liber et exultaas latis equus ardet in agris."

70 In a Racing Stable,

the baby racer threw up his heels, and of his own accord
ran an imaginary Derby round his paddock for ten minutes
at least, leaping over small furze or bramble fences at
intervals.

That home farm must be a good thing for a trainer who
has a large establishment to keep up of his own household
and his stable-boys and servants. And so it struck me that
to be a successful trainer the following qualities are
necessary : —

1. Honesty, industry, and great physical endurance from
boyhood.

2. A knowledge of men and horses, and jockey-boys,
household management, economy, as well as management
of corn and farm produce, and pigs.

3. A genial and hospitable manner, tempered with a
maximum of caution as regards forming ofF-hand acquaint-
anceships.

4. A good education, with facility at accounts and corres-
pondence.

5. Health and prosperity, and a good helpmate above all.

MoRA-L. — In my visit to the racing establishment I did
not hear a single rough word, and I did not see a single
thing done which did not say '' industry, and diligence, and
care." When those qualities have been exercised on the
noblest of God's brute creatures, anyone who directly or
indirectly does anything to rob a horse of his health, or
prevent his developing to the fullest the wonderful powers
of endurance and speed with which jSTature has invested him,
is, to my mind, one of the lowest of God's creatures in
human form.

Note. — When you have seen a racing stable don't say
" No " when the trainer takes you home and introduces
you to his family, and puts before you some silvery cold

Li a Racing Stable. 71

boiled beef, pickles, home-made butter, and home-made
bread, flanked by some very fine bitter beer. Then is the
time to eat, drink, and be merry ; and those viands (for I
count the beer as a viand), after a turn on the downs with
an agreeable and intelligent expert in racing, are worth
a king's ransom.

NEWMAEKET.

BY A NON-RAGING MUFF WHO KNOWS
NOTHING ABOUT IT.

I SUPPOSE that I am within the mark if I say that ninety
per cent, of my e very-day acquaintance have been to Epsom,
and that not five per cent, of them have ever been to New-
market. All the workl has an idea that a Newmarket
meeting is sheer business, and they are not far wrong. The
cause of it is simple enough, and it is because the Heath is
the private property of the Jockey Club, and is under the
supervision and management of the first racing men in the
world, who are the law-makers of one of the most popular
of English sports, and the strictest order and regularity are
maintained. Just the same as at Lord's, the committee are
the authority to the whole world in cricket, and the sport
is conducted by those who have been bred and brought up in
the game, and who know the value of order and good
management. I was to have gone down with the editor of
a sporting paper to see the Middle Park Plate run for ; but
I missed my train all " along of " the Church Congress. The
fact was that a dear old country parson was staying with
72

Xewmarket. 73

me, who never came home from the Croydon Congress till
after eleven o'clock at night ; and having the appetite of a
good honest man with an easy conscience, he wanted his
supper, and after his supper he liked a long churchwarden
by the kitchen fire before going to bed. Could I say " no "
to a worthy Churchman who wanted his pipe after a long
day's work ? The result was that when my hot water was
brought at seven o'clock on the " Middle Park" day, I told
the water-carrier to carry the water to a place where it
could have been kept hot, and said, " Bother Newmarket,"
and turned me round for just five minutes more, and you
know what that means.

Consequently I went to Newmarket alone the next day,
by 9.30 special, with about twenty passengers, all told ; and
i was alone for the first half of the racing, until I tumbled
across an old Sussex professional cricketer — with whom I
have played many and many a match at Eastbourne — who
makes a book, and under his auspices I saw all the
celebrities of the turf who were present.

It is a good thing to see a new place alone, as you see
everything for yourself.

On getting out at the station I jumped into a trap, and
made the fifth passenger, and completed the number, my
four companions being "outside " bookmakers, and the trap
being the most rickety, and the horse the longest, boniest,
and most bow-backed quadruped, up-hill, I ever saw. The
remarks of my companions on the breed and performances
of the noble animal which was drawing us were more
humorous than polite. I don't believe that there was a
portion of his body which is known to anatomical science
which was not discussed and spoken of disparagingly.

The first mouthful of air on the Heath was worth going
all the way to inhale, for the day was autumnal and brac-
ing, and within half an hour I had what 1 have not had

74 Keivmarket.

for a long time, and that was a raging appetite. More
power to the elbow of the people who cut sandwiches at
Jarvis's booth ; they are real bread and good meat, none of
the ci'ummy abomination, smeared with bad butter and
lined with tough ham, which one too often gets at a rail-
way station, but the sandwiches were a fair " fist-full of good
victuals," and the beer was good too.

I am very fond of a grand sweep of country, with God's
pure air blowing across it. Possibly I appreciate it the
more through having been born and having lived on the
Wiltshire Downs during my childhood, and my lungs are
made for it. Though living now within eight or nine miles
of the Grand Stand on Epsom Downs, I have only been to
the races four times in thirteen years, and then I have
made my pilgrimage for the benefit of some country
cousins. But many times in the year, when seedy, I walk
up to Epsom Downs and back for the sake of the magnifi-
cent jDure air, and walk the Derby course whilst they are
getting me something to eat at the Rubbing House, and
when I come back don't I fall on to the grub ? Many a
time in the winter, as far as I could see, I was the only
person on the Downs. Ay ! and don't I bring back many
ghosts of the past, in the days of the old gambling-booths
and the immortal Jerry, the king of the beggars, and of
Lord Chesterfield, Prince Louis Napoleon, afterwards
Emperor, Count D'Orsay, Crockford, Gully, and hundreds
of others who were pointed out to me when I saw Atilla
win the first Derby I ever saw, in 1842.

But I must cut Epsom and get back to Newmarket, as I
am going to jot down a few notes for the benefit of those
who have never been, and with a view to induce them to
enjoy as much pleasure as I did. To show how unnecessary
it is to have a thorough knowledge of racing to appreciate
Newmarket, I may remark at this minute that I can call to

Neicmarket. 1 5

mind the names of only four horses in England, viz., Silvio,
Lady Golightly, Hampton, and Shillelagh, and if yoii werj
to give me a ten-pound note, I couldn't remember another
for the life of me.

I think there is something contagious in the precision of
racing men. Order and neatness are of course the keystone
to success in a racing stable, and I often observe in travel-
ling up and down the Epsom line how neat the trainers and
jockeys are in their appointments ; and so it is at New-
market. I thought I never saw a cleaner town than
Newmarket, except Epsom, which is one of the neatest
places in Surrey, and when no racing is going on, one of
the very quietest; and such, I presume is the case at
Newmarket.

Going back to the air of the Heath, and the charm of the
scenery and quiet. There are no niggers, no three-card
men, no Whitechapel gipsies, no throwing at the sticks, no
parade of the scum of St. Jolin's Wood and Pimlico, painted
and noisy and drunk ; no witty (?) London cads squirting
some filth out of a leaden squirt, or pea-shooting, or making
ribald and senseless remarks ; no sporting cads in tandem
carts with a horn ; but order and quiet prevail, the only
noise heard being the roar of the betting ring.

And now I want to ask one question, and it is this : Why
should the outside bookmakers (some few of whom I recog-
nized as the worst offenders at London suburban meetings)
refrain from their blackguard and filthy language at New-
market ? and why should they poison the air with their
horrible oaths in the neighbourhood of London, and allow
themselves to be surrounded by ticket-stealers, whom some
of the bookmakers (if they don't encourage them) see steal-
ing tickets with impunity 1 The reason is simple enough.
It is because they would be put off the course at once by
the authorities whose property the Heath is, and it would

76 Newmarket.

be very good policy for owners of private suburban race-
courses to keep as good order as is kept at Newmarket.
Mind I don't say that many of the outside bookmakers
are not honest men, as I know to the contrary. I have one
in my mind's eye now, who supports a very aged mother in
comfort, and who is as civil as a man can be, and as honest
as the day, and is trusted by his neighbours with many and
many a sovereign to do his best with in backing something
at the post. Moreover, some of them are not only re-
markably well-behaved, but very witty and amusing to
boot.

Now about this Newmarket Heath. I am talking to
those who have never been there. In imagination, take a
very large tea-tray, and bend the top a good way diagonally
upwards, so as to make a hill with a sky-line as viewed
from the centre. The sky-line is a great feature in the
prospect, as from a distance horsemen and carriages look
like moving toys against the sky. Looking from the bottom
of the tray towards the sky-line, put down a Noah's ark in
the upper left-hand quarter, and dot about the course here
and there smaller Noah's arks as fixed stands for certain
points of finishing. Put the bowl of a tobacco-pipe here
and there about the tray to represent judges' chairs, and
stick up some pieces of tobacco-pipe near the bowls, here
and there, for posts, and then imagine the bottom of the
tray to be an immense sweep of beautifully-kept smooth
grass, divested of stones, broken bottles, or rubbish of any
kind, and imagine that you have a grand view of the fen
country, with the circular horizon just as you have at sea —
in fact, the fen land which you see in the horizon was sea
once, — throw in a fine autumn day, and there is Newmarket
Heath.

And how many incongruous memories Newmarket brings
back. The Rye House Plot, and Charles II., James II.,

NeivmarJcet. 77

and William III.,* and George lY. and his racing scrapes,
with the Jockey Club and the ChifFneys ; and Osbaldeston's
great two hundred miles match, accomplished in something
more than eight hours and a half — the wager being that
with the pick of fifty horses he did not ride two hundred
miles in ten hours ; and Admiral Eous, the prince of fair
play ; and old rinj scenes connected with Six Mile Bottom
and Milden Hall, and prize-fighters training on the heath.
Why, a man who trained on that heath ought to be able to
fio^ht a threshinoj machine and lick it. Hundreds of men
and things of the past are seen through the curtain of
time.

Oh, the joy of the elbow-room — which enables one to walk
about and look at everybody and everything — not forgetting
the trainers' wives and daughters in their broughams and
family phaetons, and ladies on splendid horses, w'ho ride
about without fear of having their ears shocked by oaths

* [a. D. 1698.] "The ambassador [Tallard, the French ambas-
sador] was graciously received at Kensington, and was invited to
accompany William to Newmarket, where the largest and most
splendid spring meeting ever known was about to a'^semble. The
attraction must be supposed to have been great, for the risks of the
journey were not trifling. The peace had, all over Europe, and
nowhere more than in England, turned many old soldiers into

marauders.

******

Nowhere does the peril seem to have been so great as on the New-
market Road. There indeed robbery was organised on a f-cale un-
paralleled since the days of Robin Hood and Little John. A fraternity
of plunderers, thirty in number, squatted near Waltham Cross, under
the shades of Epping Forest, and built themselves hu*s, from which
they salliei forth with sword and pistol to bid passengers stand.
The King and Tallard were doubtless too well attended to be in
jeopardy. But soon after they passed the dangerous spot there was
a fight on the highway attended with loss of life." — Loed Macau-
lay's History.

78 JS'eivmarket.

and blasphemy and blackguardism. Then, too, there are
the little stable-boys on the yearlings, at exercise, looking
like children on mad spiders. It was a treat to hear them
talk to their horses when restive, and to see the horses turn
round and laugh at them. I suppose it must have been a
" horse laugh." I have heard it hundreds of times stated as
a fact that the hardest thing in the world is to square the
little stable-boy who lives with his horse. An occasional
rascally trainer or jockey may be " got at," as Turf history
proves, but the horse and the boy are inseparable friends,
and I believe the story that the horse is the last friend in
the world whom the boy would sell.

Their little fresh-coloured faces looked just like cherubims'
heads on a cathedral stall, though 1 fancy if they were to
sing with the seraphims the latter would be a little
astonished at some of their expressions, which, pai-rot-like,
they pick up in the stables. One young gentleman, who
mio-ht have weis'hed three stone or so, and who was
about forty-eight inches high, related to his companions an
anecdote about what he called the " off hind leg of a tough
goose " which they had on Michaelmas Day, and his
remarks on the deceased bird were more eccentric than
complimentary. If I was Fielding, and we were in the
days of George II., instead of Queen Victoria, I would
relate the story, but am afraid I must not put it in print.
But upon the whole they seemed a happy lot of little
fellows, who had the appearance of being kindly treated and
well looked after. They are doubtless as good as any other
lot of English boys, and their ringing laughter made very
pretty music in the clear autumn air. There was one
grand old gentleman on horseback who wore one of the old-
fashioned long coats, which was neither a great-coat nor a
surtout, but like a huntsman's coat of the last century, and
mahogany^tops and a loose white neckcloth, who was accom-

JS'ewmarJcet. 79

panied by a little curly-haired boy of about nine years old
on a priceless little horse of about thirteen to fourteen
hands high. The little fellow's breeches were about the size
of a pair of wicket-keeping gloves, and his leggings no
bigger than a lady's six-button gauntlet. He was sitting
carelessly on his horse, with his reins and small hunting-
whip in his right hand, and leaning on the pummel with
his left hand, and remarking to his delighted grandfather,
"But, Grandpapa, Uncle G-eorge said at breakfast the
Monarch could give Sailor Boy (to coin two names) seven
pounds and a beating any day." Yerily, verily, these boys
are born and bred in racins^.

Don't let anyone listen to the nonsense which people say,
that it is useless going to Newmarket unless you are
mounted. Trainers, and racing men who bet heavily, and
who wish to attend the ring and see all the race, must of
course be mounted, but those who are content to see the
finish, or see the race some way from the post, have no
difficulty whatever. Half the fun is watching the troops
of horsemen, and the trainers' ponies, some of ti:em wonder-
ful specimens, savouring strongly of Welsh ponies, Xew
Foresters, and Exmoors. There was one rough iron-grey,
wall-eyed, little dray-horse of a pony, apparently able to
carry a billiard table on his back, whose legs were almost as
thick as mine, who was so intelligent that 1 am sure he had
a soul, and possibly a heavy book with some other pony on
the race. Talk about excitement dying out with advanced
middle age — why I saw" a w^ell-known trainer, who must be
very long in the tooth, galloping on one of these ponies, and
shrieking at the top of his voice, '• A hundred pounds the
young 'un wins," He was as mad as a Harrow or an Eton
boy at Lord's, pending a crisis in the match. Even one of
the mounted police was on an old racer thirteen years old,
who, according to the rider's account, had run thii"d or

80 WewinarJcet.

fourth in the Derby one year. Why, every horse one met
seemed to know all about it. If you are a stranger, any
gentleman will tell one where to go for each race, and half
the pleasure is walking about on the beautiful turf on a fine
day. Oh, but what a terrible place it must be in rain or
snow ! Barring two or three scrubby bushes, there is not
shelter for your corns even in the open.

Shouldn't I like to enclose a circle of 450 yards in
diameter with a 10-feet bank, well turfed round, with a
terrace on the top for spectators, and lay out a cricket
ground on that heath, and not let a living soul be on the
ground except the eleven, the two batsmen, and the umpires,
as is the case at the dripping-pan at Lewes. What a
splendid ground it would make.

1 have a nasty knack of talking to myself when alone,
and sometimes of quarrelling with myself out loud ; so, after
two hours of my own company, I was not sorry to meet my
Sussex cricketer, who knew everything and everybody. I
may allude to an admirable arrangement, which is having
the birdcage, which answers to the paddock at Epsom, ad-
joining the Grand Stand, and open to the public as regards
seeing everything, as it was a great pleasure to see the
horses saddled and walked about, and the owners, jockeys,
and trainers, and to see the people in the Jockey Club, and
all the real English sportsmen. Lst me not omit also to
draw attention to another admirable arrangement, which is,
having a clock-tower on the Stand, which is a great con-
venience. I do delight to see a sport carried out by noble-
men and gentlemen who really understand it, although I
may know little of it myself, as much as I hate shams of all
kinds ; and although I was at Newmarket on a quiet day,
I never was more pleased in my life. The enthusiasm of
the female equestrians, some of whom wore Napoleon boots,
and knickerbockers, I suppose — we cannot suppose that they

Newmarket, 81

wear the unwhisperables — but it would be impertinent to
inquii^e, — and short habits (perfectly neat and lady-like),
rode splendidly, and were as excited as I sometimes am at
a cricket match, when I have a colt in a county eleven, and
I fancy it is the same with them about horses. No doubt
they know several of the horses from the time they were
foals, and have seen them galloped many and many a time,
and look on them as almost members of their own family.
I was reading in some book — " Post and Paddock," I
think — how the landlady of an inn, who was aroused in the
middle of the night by the news that some celebrated mare
had foaled, jumped out of bed and ran across the stable-
yard with nothing on but her night-shift, to see the new
arrival. Ay, and I can imagine how racing becomes a
passion, like anything else ; and how the better half of
creation take an immense interest in a noble horse for the
horse's sake.

How the gentlemen of the press manage to report as
accurately and well as they do is a wonder to me. Their
only chance is being driven from one course to another and
writing in a brougham. It is hard work enough for them
to sit in a room on a cricket ground, and to note every over
and hit, and to furnish the admirable reports which they
publish each day in the summer, and which reports are the
next best thing to seeing the matches ; but rushing about
from the betting ring to the post and back again all over the
course, and writing their report in a carriage, must be very
hard and exhausting work. These are the men w^ho are the
bona fide sporting press.

There now, I have jotted down my ideas of a most enjoy-
able place and a most enjoyable scene, for the benefit of
those who have never been, and I can promise them that, if
they don't want to go into the Stand, and are content with
an occasional good sandwich when hungry, and some good

82 Newmarket,

beer, not forgetting the home-brewed, which can be got in
the town in many places, they can go first-class by special
expresss to Newmarket and back, and have their eating and
drinking, for about five-and -twenty or thirty shillings, all
told, and get health and enjoyment, and be in rare good
company for little money.

ABOUT BETTING AND
GAMBLING.

Perhaps there is no finer amusement on a dull, wet day
than a little quiet betting or gambling occasionally, pro-
vided always that the stakes are such as cannot injure
any person, and that it is an ofi"-hand pastime begun, con-
tinued, and ended on the spur of the moment. Unfortu-
nately, at this present time betting and gambling are the
greatest national curses we have, as they have become the
business of life to people who can't afTord it, and they simply
produce an unwholesome greed for getting money — not
always honestly — about sports of which they know nothing
and never see. In the old days of racing, when the gam-
bling booths were allowed on the Tattenham Corner side of
the course, a large number of people w^ho were out for a holi-
day bought a little experience at rouge et noir, roulette,
or the homely teetotum games of goose, anchor, club,
spade, diamond, and heart, and also put into a lottery or
two ; in fact, they went out with two or three sovereigns
to play with, and whether they w^on or lost did not much
matter. It was really only once in a way, as racecourses
were not inundated by cheap excursionists as now. Even
schoolboys had a shilling Derby lottery in my days.
a— 2 83

84 About Betting and Gambling.

When I was a boy, card-playing in private houses was
very common, and regular card-parties were common also,
especially in Cathedral towns — I know not why, — and the
seniors played whist, and the general company betook them-
selves to a round game ; '' Commerce," which Queen Char-
lotte played every evening in the days of our great grand-
mothers, was very fashionable, and Pope Joan, rather a
complicated game, which required a board with eight
divisions in it. The game is mentioned in " Pickwick," in
the Dingley Dell scene. '' Vingt-et-un," or " Yan Jon," as
it was commonly called, came in rather as an innovation
some half -century back, and there was a steady family game
called " Casino " much played, for love, in parsons' families.
In fact, in the Vicarage there was generally Backgammon,
and a game of cards for children every winter evening, but
all for love. At Christmas, sometimes, a sixpence or two
would be put in the pool, but it did more harm than good,
as I have seen little men and women with their eyes half
out of their heads with excitement as they got near to
winning a pool, and go away crying to bed. Card- parties
were a custom, and round games were in fashion, and at
round games in which ladies took part, the heaviest winners
or losers could count their gains or loses at a sovereign or so ;
but still money passed, and tempers were lost, and if the
truth was told, all did not play quite fair. There were
always one or two — even of the gentle sex — who were
suspected of having roving eyes over the hands of those
who did not hold their cards up. This card era was not
a good musical era. Songs were mild, and pianos milder.
^^ I'd be a Butterfly " was a twittering sentiment at best,
and an invitation of '' Will you come to the bower ? " was
not attractive, and not much enthusiasm could be got out
of " Off, said the stranger ; off, off, and away — and away
flew the light bar-r-r-ark o'er the silvery spray." The fact

Ahout Betting and GamhUiig. 85

is, the world was not educated, and little societies were
isolated, and people were old-fashioned, and there was a
good deal of boarding-school Miss-ism amongst young ladies,
and cards were requisite to prevent people sitting round
the room and staring at each other, with little or nothing
to say. All this state of things died out with railways and
travelling ; and music has made rapid strides, not only with
ladies, but men have now the sense to find out that playing
the piano is no longer considered effeminate, and there are
few country houses now where you do not find young men
who accompany themselves or others well on the piano, and
who can sing part-music at sight, or even a buffo or patter
song very fairly, after the model of Corney Grain or the
late Charles Matthews. Lawn tennis out of doors — a
charming pastime when that terrible bore, a soi disant
champion player, is conspicious by his absence,— dancing,
and music have banished cards from ordinary society ; and
in what would be called unfashionable life, young clerks
and shopmen and id genus oinne most sensibly and credit-
ably have gone in for volunteering, cricket, rowing,
bicycling, football, and all other pastimes on their Saturday
half- holidays, and have places of meeting in the winter
where music, dramatic recitals, reading — all taken " with
tobacco " in these smoking days, — and the general tone of
educated people has been much improved. The broad-
brimmed hat and " covert coat " schools, who represent the
" gent " of Albert Smith's days, who frequent restaurant
bars and music-halls and low billiard rooms, and have no
two decent ideas, may be dismissed as useless and mis-
chievous excrescences of a city which contains four millions
of people ; but there is a class of *' weak-kneed " brothers
of all ranks who are going to ruin through betting and
gambling under our very noses every hour. I say again
that betting and gambling are the curse of the day. It

86 About Betting and Gambling.

is not the occasional turn at roulette or rouge et noir
which one saw once a year, perhaps, but it is the
daily, nay hourly, betting and gambling. I ask the
whole of your readers whether I am saying the
truth or not, when I state that you cannot get into
a railway carriage among a lot of young fellows without the
conversation running on the odds about this or about that,
and more than often " nap " is going on. Why do railway
directors not put a notice on season tickets that they are
issued on condition that the holder does not play at cards
or any other game for money on the journey ? What more
demoralising sight is there than seeing young fellows, who
are coming some twenty miles or so to London, playing
cards at nine o'clock in the morning ? It is becoming a
public scandal. I knew one card-playing gang by sight on
a railway over which I often travelled — about two of them
went together in the same carriage ; they all had known
homes and employments, and possibly '' quasi " respecta-
bility ; hut I dont think they lost much money, and I don't
think the amount of their salaries would have justified
them travelling first class, and I fancy they paid their
railway fare, and a good bit more, before the year was out.
The first time I travelled by that railway I got in at the
last moment and found myself the no?i -playing member in a
carriageful ; and they kindly asked me to join. The pro-
poser of my joining, who took the pack out of what, I
believe, is now known as a " card side pocket," was very
civil, and so was I, and I made a little joke, the point of
which none of them saw. " No, thank you," I said — " by
the bye, do you remember Punches joke about sudden
acquaintances over games : ' Beware of the man who carries a
bit of chalk in his pocket and calls the marker Jack ? ' '' — and
these fellows never thought it funny. I took stock of them
directly I saw there were two card-players and three pigeons.

About Betting and Gamhling. 87

Horse-racing has no more to do with the betting mania
than the man in the moon, jyer se ; it is the free press which
has done it, and the telegraphs. Every penny, and every
halfpenny paper now has the latest odds in respect of all
horses, and even foreign racing — in fact, a paper which did
not publish the betting lists would have no sale, — and the
lists are read by a lot of boobies who don't know a racehorse
from a cow, which boobies think it the thing to bet ; and
the aggregate sum subscribed by boobies who bet, and who
" put the pot on," is sometimes so considerable as to be
worth more than the stakes themselves, and so Mr. Mephis-
topheles, the owner or the man who " manages the stable,"
goes to some public place of resort and puts the pot on him-
self in one big sensation bet, which is taken by a con-
federate, who is laying on the quiet every shilling he can
get against the horse. Nothing is easier than to get up a
rumour that the horse pulled up lame, or some story of
that kind, and when Mr. Mephistopheles runs his pen
through the horse's name, all the knowing ones (?) declare
they must have won if the horse had run. And they go on
again and again, till the venerable grey-healed butler
cannot make out the plate list correctly ; and some wretched
young clerk — " respectably connected and gentlemanly-
looking young man," as the police reports say — has put five
or six hundred pounds on the wrong side of the ledger ; or
young de Plunger has left the cavalry and joined an
infantry regiment in India, and so on, and so on, ad
infinitum.

The real connection with horse -racing and betting proper
is this : Betting is a chance for an owner who has a good
horse to recoup himself for very heavy expenses. He buys
a yearling or two, perhaps, or breeds colts ; in fact, he goes
in for racing as a business. He enters his horses for various
races, and if he has any sense he keeps his thoughts to

88 About Betting and Gambling.

himself, and when he is pretty sure that he has a promising
two-year-old, he determines to try him in some small race,
and if he answers his expectations, he will feel his way
towards backing him for the Derby (if he is entered for it),
in the following year, at very long odds, and if he gets
what he wants, he knows exactly where he stands, and he
has simply put so much more capital into his racing ex-
penses. And then, should his horse turn out a real good
one, and prominent amongst the leading favourites, and
comes to short odds, he is perfectly justified in betting by
commission against his own horse enough to cover him,
provided he runs his horse fair to win. Or, again, a man
of large fortune likes to own and run race horses, and he
likes to back his own horses for a win or a place. Why
should he not do it just the same as commercial men are
buying or selling for rise or fall of markets every day ?

As to the bookmakers, the solvent and respectable men
are nothing more or less than bankers to the sporting
world. They are very clever men and good calculators;
and by judiciously laying against everything they make a
certain book, as only one horse can win. It is the work of
a lifetime, and very harassing work, too ; and one thing is
always against them, which is that a bookmaker must pay
although some of his creditors do not come to time. His
good name is the foundation of his undertaking, and the
word of a large proportion of them is as good as Eothschild's
in Lombard-street. I have often travelled with and knew
many of them, but I never had dealings with them, as
betting is not my " vanity," though more than once they
have good-naturedly given me a good tip about backing
some dark horse for a place, which I have passed on to
friends who bet, and they have found it useful.

A gam, I have known many men who have studied the
history of racing as I have done the history of cricket,

Ahout Betting and GamhUng. 8D

and who know the stud book by heart and pedigrees of"
horses. They talk, and talk well and authoritatively,
too, about the Sweetmeat and Whalabone and Stockwell
strain (I think that is the word), and know all the handicaps
and weights. Now these men go ocsxsionally to a race
and see the horses gallop, and like to take theii' fancy
and back a horse for five, or ten, or twenty, or even fifty
or a hundred pounds, according to their means. They
have the keenest enjoyment in the sport itself, because they
know it and understand it, and see the horse stripped and
saddled and galloped ; and if they win great is their joy,
and if they lose they have had a run for their money any-
how, and no harm is done. The saints and parliament have
nothing to do with men of this kind. The " saints" play a
game of speculation for livings, and deaneries, and place ;
and the lover of racing plays a game of speculation for
honest amusement, and wins one day and loses another with
even temper. The betting lists have demoralised England,
and army, navy, bar, trades and professions, and all their
adherents and hangers-on must bet about horses of which
they know positively nothing. It is a greed for making
money without working for it, and ignoring the good old
principle of earning one's bread by the sweat of brow or
brain. What on earth has the working man— that grumbling,
querulous humbug —to do with betting on horse racing ?
But he does bet no end very often, whilst we pay for his
children's education, and he is crying out for want of work.
Horse-racing in its purity is one of the noblest sports in
the world. Although I know nothing about the arcana of
the science, I can read " Post and Paddock," and " Scott
and Sebright," and Nimrod's ''Turf, Chase, and Road"
ao-ain and again. They are so fresh and pleasant, and
written by men who loved sport for sport's sake. Racing
is so fascinating, and the real followers of it are often so

90 About Betting and Gambling,

credulous and inexperienced that rogues and scoundrels
have grown up round it for a century past, though, thank
Heaven, there are plenty of honest owners, and trainers,
and jockeys left still. It is seventy years since Dawson was
hung at Cambridge for poisoning racers, and the careful
reader of " Doctor Syntax " will remember Rowlandson's
picture of the Doctor's horror at seeing the favourite, which
he backed, " roped " at York races. The scratching of the
horse has become so common that nothing is thought of it
now; it is sometimes, doubtless, an open swindle, but it
cannot be proved or punished.

And now, my dear youngsters, to whom life is somewhat
easy, let me say a word to you who have good expectations
and a liberal allowance, and who, according to conventional
expression, were born to life and a curricle. Let me take
one of you, and imagine that you are the last joined officer,
looking out- of the mess-room window of the cavalry bar-
racks. You have left school only a year, and here you are
"with your red scarlet coat, as proud as a goat with your
feathers so fine " (though, by-the-bye, the chances are the
coat would be blue), as Mickey Free sung. You are in
rather a fast regiment with an allowance of five hundred a
year and heir to a good property (if the people's William
does not abolish the possibility of such a glorious inherit-
ance) ; your uniform, board, horses, regimental expenses,
and other claims, will pull hard against that five hundred
and your pay. With plenty of leisure and a love of sport
you will probably get a little hunting, shooting, fishing, and
of course some garrison racing, and any amount of good
society, and your daily life and surroundings as regards
comfort do not cost you a third of what people pay at a
club. Do rest and be thankful, and turn your back on real
gambling and betting, and, above all, avoid a book on the
Derby. What on earth can you know about it, except

About Betting and Gambling. 9 J

what you read in the papers ? Read " Digby Grand," that
splendid life-picture of Whyte-Melville's, and inwardly
digest it ; it is as true as Gospel. Be content to put your
sovereign into the lottery on the race-course or back your
favourite for a sovereign in the Garrison Steeplechase.

If you bet and gamble you become the property of
scoundrels. I know garrison towns pretty well, and there
are always a certain class who have decent houses and keep
up outward respectability somewhat, and pass for gentle-
men, which they almost are. You never meet these men
in society in the county, but they are always hand-in-glove
with the officers, and they are always ready for loo,
lasquinet, poker, nap, or any other game, and generally
have a horse for sale, and not unfrequently are stewards at
third-rate race meetings. Xot unfrequently, too, they have
a pretty daughter or two who are ready for lunch in the
garrison drag. Many of this class are jackals for money-
lenders.

You can convict them of notlnm/, but they never lose.
Oh ! if you knew, my boys, how many of your class, some
of them old schoolfellows, who have come and told me their
sad tale— simply a tale of wholesale credulity on their part,
and wholesale robbery by those whom they thought were
their friends. " It is impossible," they tell me, " that Major
Blank, of the yellows, could have ' rooked ' me ; why, he is
a glorious fellow, and I lost ninety pounds to him at poker
at a very good fellow's house, Mr. Jollyboy, where we
dined." It is no use telling the poor youngster that I know
all about Major Blank and Mr. Jollyboy, and the Major is
never about with men of his own age and rank, but always
with youngsters. Alas ! alas ! it is like the moth in the
candle. And nihil ad rem to this subject, why on earth
luere moths born to go into candles ? Now, if you must
gamble, I will give you a recipe. Sit down a party of six

92 About Betting and Gamhling.

or eiglit (somehow seven is the best number) who know one-
anobher. Shuffle two packs of cards of the same make and
colour together, by which means you will have eight aces
and thirty-two tens. Buy counters, value sixpence a dozen,,
and start with five dozen each. Play at vingt-et-un, limit
stake to three counters, with leave to anyone who has an ace
dealt to him first card, which very often happens, to turn it
up and put a sixpence on it, in which case the dealer must
double all round ; ties to pay the dealer, and each to deal
three times running in turn ; as you are broke buy counters-
of each other. You may play all night at this, and if you
play fair and quick you won't win or lose a sovereign nine
times out of ten, and you will have all the honest fun and
excitement of gambling to the very hilt. If I was colonel ^
of a regiment I should like to see this kind of fun going on
every night in the winter in the ante-rooms. Brother
ofiicers playing Avith one another come to no harm, and the
black sheep in a regiment is seldom a sociable cove — he i:*
playing some game outside or in his own quarters, with some
youngster from another regiment perhaps. There is one
golden rule, which is, name your stakes at starting, and
stick to them. The man who wants to play higher is the
man who thinks he can win — he is not playing for the game
but the money, and he would rob his own brother. Per
contra, I never in my life saw high play when someone did
not lose his temper, and someone did not go away without
a suspicion of sharp practice.

And if you want the fun of betting, do as I have done
many a timie amongst my own friends, and sit down in a
cricket tent and announce that you open a sixpenny book
and give or take the odds on anything as it goes on, over by
over, and if you don't get some fun out of it it is your own
fault, and very little money will you win or lose if you know
the game ; and if you did the same in half-crowns on the

About Betting and Gambling, 93

•drag at the races, you would have plenty of fun for your
money, and do yourself no harm. Betting money which
you cannot command is certain ruin in the end ; and the
same remark applies to playing cards at high stakes. If
men who really gamble played only with notes and gold, and
barred I.O.U.'s and cheques, there would be less loss. I
have a great respect for Frith's '^ Derby Day," but I wholly
quarrel with his " Eoad to Ruin." Its moral is absurd, as
his hero would go to the dogs anyhow. In the first place
he is a spoilt boy at college with a great deal too much
money ; in his after career he is an overdressed effeminate
■cad, who would have cried and called in the police if any
•one " put in one " between his eyes ; and in the last scenes
he is going to blow out — what he never had — his brains.
Hogarth's hero, " Jack Idle," is a much more interesting
character. I pity him somewhat, as the sweep with the one
eye began his rain by hussle-penny on a tombstone in
<.-hurch time, and eventually split on him. No, I don't care
for greedy, spoilt boys, who had no generous traits at school
or at college, and who are mean at heart ; but I do shed a
tear over fine, manly, generous young fellows, who enter
life full of hopes, and from a sensitive abhorrence of being
singular or stingy, they touch pitch and are seethed in the
cauldron.

If great merchants and bankers were to make a hard and
fast bargain with theii* emjyloyes, that in the event of their
^oing into a billiard-room within three miles of their place
■of business, or playing cards or betting in any public place,
their engagements would terminate at once, they would do
^i great kindness to many young men, and real good for
themselves, as young men who wanted promotion elsewhere
would take a character with them from the fact of their
having been in such a firm.

It is useless reminding heads of schools that potdiunting

94 Ahout Betting and Gambling.

and handicapping at athletics is the root of this betting
evil amongst many youngsters ; they will go on just the
same, and the mastei's' wives will give the prizes and have
a large party of ladies ; but if I was to publish all the
letters which I have received from the first men in England,
who have been in their school, university, county, and gen-
tlemen of England's eleven, and in their college and uni-
versity boats, on this subject, I think the schoolmasters of
England, who profess always to have more knowledge of the
world than men who have lived in it, would rather open
their eyes. Their boys leave them at eighteen years of age,
when we make their acquaintance and see their proclivities,
and, I am sorry to make the imputation, but I believe it is
true, that these pot-hunting athletics are advertisements for
many schools. I must wind up wath a little incident in
gambling, which is one of the greenest spots in my memory.
It was at an hotel abroad. The rain came down as rain will
come in a mountainous country, and meant lasting as it did
for twenty-four hours. We had breakfasted, and were
lounging about in a glass-covered galley, smoking and
grumbling, when a Yankee said, "Well, I am miserable,
and feel ' very mean ' — bring me a large bottle of cham-
pagne and a soda water glass, I guess I can do it in twice ;
and if I'm not more cheerful afterwards, I will have
another." Pop went the cork, and landed a few yards off
on the cocoa-nut matting. A young Oxford fellow, a
stranger to me, who was with a reading (?) party, pitched a
sous at it. I pitched another. " Have a game of pitch and
toss ? " he asked. " Done," said I. " Take me in," said a
high church curate, who had been climbing mountains, and
was in knickerbockers, and a pepper-and-salt shooting
jacket and waistcoat, and a white tie — I like a parson who
is not ashamed of the cloth ; — " and me," says the Yankee,
" as I found the cork." For the benefit of the uninitiated,

About Betting and Gamhling. 95

real pitch and toss means playing quoits with pennies, and
the one who is nearest to the cork tosses all the coppers up
and pockets all the heads ; the next nearest goes on with the
remaining coppers, and so each in turn until all the half-
pence originally cast turn up heads. In short, we set to
work amidst much fun and laughter, and a Frenchman,
with his hair cut like a clothes-brush, to whom the game
was new, joined us, and a millionake ironmaster, who had
come about a railway contract. Our merriment attracted
some of the ladies who looked on half in diffidence, and
eventually got easy-chairs and sate by. At luncheon the
Frenchman was very enthusiastic for " Encore de peetch and
toss Anglais;' and to it we went again, and some of the
ladies joined. All the waiters looked on, the cook came
from the kitchen, and the laundresses too. It was gi^eat
fun, and we had a long argument about a fair or unfan-
pitch of the ironmaster. I was out of the game pro tern.,
and it was referred to me, and I gave it against him. The
next morning all the party were scattered to the four winds
of Heaven, never to meet again— bar two- and the French-
man took a touching fareweU of me. In the winter of '66
I was in Lombard-street, and met someone I thought I
knew, and I puUed up, and so did he, and we shook hands :
it was the ironmaster, and we had a hearty laugh. '' And
how did you get through the panic? " I asked— for there
had been a tremendous panic. " Oh, all right," he said ;
.'but the ship nearly grounded." And as we parted and
shook hands again he called me back and said, " You were
^^-rong about that penny when you gave it against me— it
was a fair tail as it fell." So, in spite of intervening
trouble and care, that game of pitch and toss left a sunny
spot on the ironmaster's memory, as it has on mine.

WHYTE MELVILLE'S
SEEMON.

When some terrible calamity has occurred — such as the
sinking of the Eurydice, the running down of the Princess
Alice, an explosion in a mine, the death of the late lamented
Princess— we hear that '' several ministers of all denomina-
tions improved the occasion, and addressed their congrega-
tions on the recent deplorable event." In other words, in
most cases vain-glorious men, who delight in their own
voices, indulged in rhapsodical utterances, and deduced
-absurd theories from events which had already made a
solemn impression on thinking men ; and they simply
disturbed sad pictures which were for the time indelibly
painted on the minds of their audience.

Public bodies, as a duty, are bound to record certain
events, and from published accounts they have for the most
part — especially in both Houses of Parliament — done what
was right, simply and solemnly, and have communicated
their votes of sympathy kindly and delicately to the Queen.
When the Princess died every man said to his neighbour,
^' The poor Princess is dead. What a trial for the Queen ;
and at this time too ! " So, when a terrible calamity
occurred in the hunting field a short time since, and the
96

Whyte-MeUille s Sermon. 97

Ava^ AvSpu)v was killed, men and women of all classes
said, with much feeling, '' Poor Whyte-Melville ! " and
probably ninety-nine out of every hundred who said so had
never seen him, and simply knew him by his writings —
which were pure, classical, and graphic — as they knew
Dickens or Thackeray.

I am going " to improve the occasion," taking for my
text one work of Ms only, and that is " Digby Grand ; "
and I am going to say nothing about the author, and very
little about the book, beyond pointing what appears to me
to be the moral therein contained to the rising generation.
Anyone taking up that book and reading it carefully
through can see every rung of the ladder of the facilis
descensus most accurately delineated, from the moment
that Digby Grand, the young hero, of good family
and prospects, leaves Eton until he becomes a beggar. He
has a fair start enough in a Line regiment, commanded
by a sporting colonel, and falls into the hands of a
bad companion, Captain Levanter (who is his bad genius
through life, and turns out a thorough scoundrel) ; goes to
Canada and enjoys the wild sports harmlessly enough, and
eventually joins the Guards in London. He is, perhaps, a
little bit of a fop, but manly and simple withal ; honourable,
well-bred, and straightforward, and mixes with men of good
rank and position. There is nothing slang about him, and
things go on pretty fairly until he attains his majority and
goes to his ancestral home, where great rejoicings are held
in honour of the presumptive heir; on which occasion he
enjoys " the run of the season " (the description of which
makes the blood run quicker in the veins of the most non-
hunting man even in England), and winds up his home
visit with an interview with his father. Sir Peregrine Grand
whom he finds to be involved in great diJfficulties, and who
is furious at his son's wish to marry a charming girl, unfor-

H

98 Whyte-Melvilles Sermon.

f unately without a portion. He lias a desperate quarrel
with him, and returns to London. Then comes a most
graphic account of fast life in London, gambling, bill dis-
counting, and racing, which lead to his falling into a lower
grade of society ; his being compelled to leave the Guards
and to exchange into another regiment ; his arrest for debt
on the eve of his leaving England for a staff appointment ;
and ultimately his lot is ruin and beggary. Having
abandoned his title on the death of his father, he meets
with an old friend whose rustication at Oxford he had caused
most unintentionally ; joins him in partnership as a wine
merchant ; solicits and obtains the custom of some of his
aristocratic friends ; makes an honest living, and marries
his first love, whom he meets again at his partner's
wedding.

I wonder how many will say, " What is the use of
recapitulating the story of an old novel which was written
years ago ? " My answer is, " Because it was written for
our learning, and I believe the lesson is just as necessary
to-day as it was when the book first came out." In that
book the author upholds all manly sports and amusements,
decries vulgarity and slang men and slang manners, and
points out the horrors of gambling. He makes his hero
travel, just as many a gambler does now, from rung to rung,
to ruin, until he reaches the bottom of the ladder — the
exception in Digby Grand's case being that he never loses
his innate sense of honour, although he is ruined.

And as it was in the beginning, so is it now going on
daily, and for that very reason I have brought, as it were,
from Major "Whyte-Melville's grave his most admirable
sermon. In it he hints at Digby Grand eventually buying
back the family property, and dismisses the Hon. Jack
Lavish — an impecunious cavalry officer, an intimate friend
of Digby Grand, who marries an alderman's daughter to

Whyte-Melville's Sennon. 99

retrieve his fortunes— in a very humorous manner,
thus : —

" I dined with Jack Lavish the night before kst at his,
or rather his wife's, house, in Tyburnia proper. He has
shaved off his moustache, and has grown stout. Miss Gold-
thread that was is a sensible and charming person, and I
think I can trace in her manner a slight and not unnatural
distrust of her husband's old friends. . . . Jack says
he likes being kept tight in hand, it saves so much trouble,
and until he had some lady to own him he never knew to
which of his fair friends he belonged. . . . He is still
as jovial as ever, but beneath his merriment runs a vein of
sound common sense, and in his frank and somewhat
dandified exterior exists a warm and benevolent heart."

The real sermon contained in " Digby Grand " is that
gambling and bill discounting are simple ruin. And
gambling and bill discounting are going on at this present
moment to an extent which was never surpassed ; for,
whereas in days gone by men ruined themselves at Crock-
ford's and the gambling clubs pretty openly, now that
gambling is put down by Act of Parliament they are doing
it to a far greater extent privately, in all classes, high and
low, and on that account the sermon is produced.

Digby Grand and Jack Lavish are as much alive and
walking about now as ever they were, and if some of us
who are behind the scenes were to disclose our secrets the
world would be rather astonished at what is going on.
And the worst of the case is that those who in the end
come for succour to men of honour are the real good fellows
— weak and impulsive perhaps — who have been dragged
to their fate by rogues, and they generally come too late.
The old story still goes on, and that story is often this :
namely, the bill discounters' credit has been exhausted, and
an angry father has been tired out. Sometimes it is the
H— 2

100 Wliyte-Melville s Sermon,

mother who comes in the strictest confidence ; oftener the
sister, who begs and entreats one to get poor Tom, or Jack,
or Harry, out of his difficulties. "He is so honest and
affectionate," they say ; " so kind and obliging ; such a
noble fellow, but bad companions have ruined him ; and all
the regiment are so fond of him." This class are very bad
witnesses as to facts ; the mother is thinking of the curly-
headed boy who said his prayers at her knee long ago ; the
sister, many years younger, is thinking of the eldest brother
who almost turned her brain when she first saw him in a
hussar uniform, and remembers how— when he got his first
leave— that, as regards herself, he never changed; how he
went gathering cowslips, or nutting with her in the woods,
just as if he was not a soldier at all ; and she will tell you
that it is impossible that her darling brother had been
gimbling and racing and is over head and ears in debt, and
harassed°by infamous Jews. We who are behind the cur-
tain know how debt and difficulties blunt a man's nature.
These are scenes of daily occurrence, speaking generally.
Whose fault is it ? A young fellow, utterly ignorant of the
world, is suddenly associated with men whose main objects
in life are pleasure, and excitement, and gambling, and is
dragged into a fiery cauldron, and must get out as he can.
What think you of a case, for the facts of which I will
vouch, and I will sum it up in a very few words ; it was
this, and it is one of many : A young officer of a few years'
standing, who had been greatly distinguished, left his regi-
ment (a very fast one), in which he could not afford to live
any longer, and an opening offering in another line of life,
a sister at once advanced the capital— 0/ course without
security. Being a very honourable young fellow he un-
bosomed himself to his lawyer, and wished to do everything
by his will, and otherwise to secure his sister's money in the
event of his death, which, strange to say, occurred within

Whyte-Melville s Sermon. 101

twelve months. The sister was wisely advised not to
administer to the estate until she knew where she was, as
there were Jews enough about his chambers in London to
make a row of hat pegs, had their noses been used for that
purpose, waiting to see what was going to happen. It so
happened, that after collecting all debts, there was enough
for everyone eventually, including the sister, and the matter
was wound up. But how were many of those debts in-
curred ? I hioio the facts to be true. The unfortunate
young fellow, being thoroughly good natured and unable to
say "No," ^^juinjKcl up hehincV — as he expressed it — or, in
other words, put his name to bills in India for several
hundreds for " one of my best friends in the world, my dear
fellow " (Jack or Tom Somebody), '' who had such a heavy
hook on the Derby that he got leave home for the purpose of
betting at the post.'' Of course the Jack or Tom Somebody
got the money, came home, sold out (being a soldier under
the old o-egime), and went to the Colonies; and when the
unfortunate victim applied to the family, and proved that
he had never received a farthing for himself^ the answer
was that they had paid too much already. His sister was
guilty of a pious theft ; and although warned that if she
took anything out of his chambers she would be liable as
executrix, she confessed that when she saw his medals for
the Indian mutiny she could not resist putting them in her
pocket, and I saw this close under my very nose, and
winked at it. I don't believe the hardest-hearted Jew in
Europe would have pressed that case, even in his own
interest.

And now about these money-lenders. " Digby Grand "
simply applies to the army, so to the army we must stick in
quoting Whyte-Melville's sermon. Just imagine the
present state of things. The moment a young fellow is
gazetted he receives circulars from all the harpies in London,

102 Whyte-Mehilles Sermon.

offering accommodation on personal security : it is the same
in the navy also. Has not the State some power to rescue
young fellows out of the hands of these men, by abolishing
all rights to sue officers on full pay for accommodation bills ?
The system is admirably organised, somewhat in this way :
First comes the tempting offer of ninety pounds for a
hundred at two months ; then, at the end of two months,
comes another advance of a hundred, with ten pounds for
renewing and ten more for interest on the next hundred,
and ten pounds interest on the original hundred ; and so it
runs on until an unfortunate youngster is bound hand and
foot by his creditors. A victim once came to me to rescue
him, and the transaction was as follows : Ninety pounds
paid down for one hundred, and interest (deducted) for
two months. Second hundred advanced for two months,
with ten pounds for renewal of first bill, and twenty pounds
interest on the two hundred (deducted) for another two
months. There were four subsequent renewals at forty
pounds each ; so that the poor fellow was called on, for
interest and renewals, to pay in all cent, per cent.

In private society the well-bred Jews are the most charm-
ing people imaginable, hospitable, accomplished, and refined ;
but the lower division of the nation, who infest garrison
towns, are many of them the veriest scoundrels unhung.
They frequent young officers' haunts, and do everything in
their power to get hold of them and tempt them to extra-
vagance.

The money-lending school consist of very many classes :
first come the great operators, who hunt and yacht and
keep their carriages and give parties, and fly at the high
game, such as young men of fortune who have come into
their property, and who form a racing stable and plunge on
the turf ; and transactions of this kind are done by mort-
gages and bills combined, the process often ending in the

Whyte-Melmlles Sermon. 103

lender getting the mastery and receiverships of estates.
Next come the money-lenders who have private houses, and
receive their clients there in a kind, confidential manner ;
when theii' patience is exhausted, the open unblushing bill
discounter comes in to " do a bit of stiif," and there is no
ceremony about this ; the borrower chafis him about his
nationality, his jewellery, his nose, and his roguery ; all of
w^iich the discounter receives with the greatest bojihomie
and good temper, and both parties fight for terms in the
most open manner. When this crisis arrives it is generally
a case of " smash up," or being pulled out of the scrape ; and
this is the stage at which a youngster goes to the family
solicitor, and if he goes soon enough he may be saved.
The settling with the low Jew class is very amusing,
as I happen to know, from having pulled many a
young fellow out of difficulties. The discounter is always
very civil and often jocular, and sherry and a cigar, from
habit, are generally tendered ; and something of this kind
occurs : " Well, sii^, there is no man in the world whom I

would so soon serve as Captain A , but he ivas so

foolish — so foolish, you know — he was so sw^eet on the
favourite that he would back him, and I settled his book^
and lost a deal of money myself too by taking his advice ; but
I couldn't see a friend in trouble," &c., &c., &c. And so it
goes on until real business is commenced, and then, if the
last thing left is a settlement by the " old governor," with a
large deduction or a " sell up," it is wonderful how figures
diminish, and how glad the school are to get their money
back, and five or six per cent, on the loan. Let all the
world take this as a fact from me, that the low bill-dis-
counters are too much afraid of exposure to refuse such
terms.

Setting aside the bill discounters, see how many vultures
live on the army. There is the half gentleman, half any-

104 Whyte-Melville's Sermon,

thing — no one knows what — who never mixes much with
his neighbours in the county, but who has a decent house,
a horse or two — which he is constantly changing, as he sells
horses to the garrison ; with the command of some shooting
or fishing, besides being a promoter of local races ; a man
w^ho knows every regiment which comes, and gets in with
the young officers, and meets them by the covert-side, on
cricket-grounds and elsewhere, and sometimes dines at the
mess ; gives them a day's rabbit-shooting, " and a bit of
lunch and a game of cards afterwards," as he says. These
are the men who live entirely on their wits, and encourage
youngsters in every extravagance, and are jackals for the
money-lenders.

One of this class died suddenly not very long since, and in
his private drawer were found loaded dice, beautifully
finished ; two or three dozen packs of new cards, the covers
of which had all been loosened so as to abstract the pack
and put it back again — ergo, marked cards ; coins in gold or
silver with two heads or two tails, as the case might be, and
a few oi\iQ,v facetice.

I never knew a garrison town in or near which some one
or more of this doubtful class did not exist, I don't mean to
say that all men are convicted of having such a useful
collection as my deceased friend (?), but I allude to doubtful
m.en who never lose.

Upon my word, it seems as if all the scoundrels in Europe
were determined, if possible to ruin young army officers.
If any good regiment would combine and invite all the
advertising money-lenders down on the same day, and at the
same hour, and get the soldiers out with the barrack engine
and pump over them, and trust to British juries and the
British public to see them out of the mischief, what a
glorious thing it would be. If heads of military depart-
ments would bestir themselves, and induce commanding

Whijte-Melmlles Sermon. 103

officers of regiments to set their faces against gambling and
money-lenders, at the same time encouraging all harmless
in-door amusements, such as cards and billiards for low
stakes, all openly played in barracks before all the officers,
how much good it would do. If it was thought '' good form "
to play in barracks, and " bad form " to play outside, what a
boon it would be too. We should no more see a boy,
almost, who knows no more of betting or races than I do,
with his betting-book, in the ring, ready for plucking ; and
we should not lose, as we do now, some of our most promismg
and dashing young officers who cannot go the pace. There
was one glorious instance during the Crimean war, of a
gallant young fellow who had gone through the London
ordeal to ruin, and who turned up in mufti at the battle of
the Alma ; saved the life of a former brother officer, when
badly wounded himself, and who was reinstated in the

army.

And all these remarks apply to a great extent to ci\4hans.
How is it that in every railway train a lot of young fellows
are playing shilling '' Nap," and losing a sovereign, or per-
haps two or three, in a half -hour's run ? How is it that, in
large public billiard-rooms, young fellows are playing pool
in business hours ? How is that in clubs the whist-room is
comparatively deserted in favour of " Nap," or " Poker," or
some other game ? How is it that in most club billiard-
rooms the haUtues never will consent to play pool for smaU
stakes ? The answer is, " Because the spirit of gambling and
fast living has seized all classes ; and the spirit of real sport,
for sport's sake, is comparatively dead." I know, I am
happy to say, many good houses where pool and pyramids
are played for mere" nominal stakes, with counters, and
where cards are played also for very trifling sums. Those
who are in favour of high stakes play for the money, and
nothing else.

106 Whyte-Melville's Sermon.

This is a sermon from Whyte-Melville's best sketch of
real life ; and, if the moral which he points induces one
youngster only who has broken out, or is about to break
out, to stay his hand, the gallant author's ghost has not
been invoked in vain.

Thackeray believed hugely in "week-day preachers; " in
other words, authors who tell the simple story of life : and
so, I should think, do most of us.

EEASON OE INSTINCT

This is a big question as regards the animal world, and one
which never wears out, but, on the contrary, acquires more
interest the deeper we go into it. The minds of animals of
the higher class are unfathomable, and I feel convinced
that, just as all must have experienced in the business
world, some good-natured action has often been the means
of bringing about some lucrative advantage in after life
most unexpectedly; so constant familiar intercourse with
the brute creation gives one a pleasure in life which grows
with increasing years, and if I was dying, I think I should
feel more comfortable if I said good-bye to my dogs.
Charles Dickens was very fond of his dogs; and, to my
mind, there is more pathos in Hugh, the rough gipsy out-
cast, on his way to the scaffold remembering his dog, than
in the death of little Nell, which, with many apologies to
the ghost of Mr. Dickens, I think a murder : " There is
nothing more; unless," said Hugh, "any person has a fancy
for a dog — and not then unless he will use him well. . . .
He'll whine at first, but he'll soon get over that. You
wonder that I think about a dog just now," he added, with
a kind of laugh ; " if any man deserved it of me half as
well, I'd think of him:' Whyte-Melville said in words all
that could be said about a horse in his beautiful song, " The
107

108 Beason or Listinct.

place where the old horse died ; " and some artist — name
(of course) forgotten— painted a picture which was in the
first left-hand room of the Royal Academy in 1850, I
think, called " Near Home." I wonder if any reader hap-
pens to have that picture ; and if it was engraved. In the
bxokground was an old ivy-clad church, and churchyard,
with grand old trees, and on a bench sat a venerable old
huntsman, pulling the ears of a worn-out old hunter, and
by him sat a very old foxhound looking up in his face.
Those pictures are sermons for life.

Now reverting to animals. The best friend they ever
had was an Irish M.P. who ruined himself, as it was said
inter alia by fighting the County of Gal way against Lord
Gort. His name was Martin of Cromartin, owner of
Ballynahinch, County Galway. He was the originator of
the " Martin Act " for prevention of cruelty to animals,
which, passed in 1822, has been carefully fostered and
carried on from time to time by the Royal Society for Pre-
venting Cruelty to Animals, than which no more Christian
institution exists, for it carries out the first principles of the
creation of dumb creatures, the condition precedent to
which was that man should exercise his dominion over them
Avith kindness and humanity. Aye, and men and women
have learnt, too, that kindness and persuasion are far above
the law in protecting dumb animals, as people like Lady
Burdett-Coutts, Lord Shaftesbury, and the writers and
artists in su3h works as the " British Workman," " Rab
and his Friends," and other do2r books, not fororettins: Miss

' 0 7 0 0

Edgeworth's stories of " Little Dog Trusty " and " Lazy
Lawrence," in which Jem's horse Lightfoot holds a pro-
minent place, have taught men and boys the benefit of
kindness. The Donkey Show alone, which was first held
in 1834 at the Agricultural Hall, placed Lady Burdett-
Coutts and Lord Shaftesbury on the throne of the coster-

Beason or Instinct, 109

monger world, and the British "moke" thenceforward
became the most popular animal in London and all great
towns. The song, *' If I had a donkey wot wouldn't go " —
which was in fashion when T was a little curly-headed boy,
working night and day to learn the multiplication table by
heart — the prize being a pair of shoe stirrups for my
donkey's pad — contained good sentiments too.

Let any one compare the status of horses, and donkeys
and mules, to what it was nearly forty years ago. Many
of us remember the wretched hackney-coach horses ; the
half-starved beasts in the small coal and coke-sellers' carts;
the persecuted donkeys, thrashed and bullied by gentlemen
of the Bill Sykes class ; the carts drawn by dogs, panting,
with their tongues out and eyes half out of their heads ;
the overdriven bullocks which made Smithfield hideous by
night, and which — according to poor Tom Hood's or Cruik-
shank's lively fancy, I forget which — caused two gentlemen
who were represented on the drop at Newgate, with ropes
round their necks, as congratulating one another as a mad
bull was charging the crowd, " How lucky it is, Bill^ that
you and I are up here." Al] these things, thank Heaven,
are things of the past, including the gentlemen outside
Newgate — on the drop.

Look at the present state of things. I hope the reader
enjoys a speaking acquaintance with horses; if not, let
them try it, and they will find a great deal of cheap amuse-
ment, and please the drivers who are kind to them. When
you see the great wagon horses two abreast, and possibly a
third " unicorn " in front, go quietly behind the head of one
of the wheelers and say, in a soft voice, ''And how are you,
old man 1 " Round comes his honest face, and up goes his
ears, and his companion gets jealous, which is very charm-
ing when he is a comic horse, as many are, and puts back^
his ears and pretends to bite his friend ; and then the

110 Heason or Instinct.

leader turns round and wants to join in, just as a fidgety
country parson at a watering place, who is out for a holiday
is itching to preach instead of listening to the sermon. And
again, with the cab horses, when a hansom driver has driven
you smartly up to the station, and you have paid him [JST.B. —
As a makeweight to all your sins, live so as to be ready to face
all the cabmen at the end of the world, for most of them
are good fellows], it costs you nothing to pat the horse, and
it pleases him ; and ten to one the cabman instantly tells you
what a good little horse he is, and how he or she once ran third
or fourth in some celebrated race, which is often the case.
Good nurses are invaluable if they are clever at " baby
talk," and horse talk is a great comfort to a horse. There
is a man whom I used to notice at the South-Western
stables — alas ! he is gone, and I never gave him a shilling
or '^ stood him a pint ; " he was great at horse talk. One
morning a horse which he was grooming slipped his halter
and ran up the yard. " Ah ! very well, Mr. Billy, you are
a gentleman to-day, are you ? You'll want your dinner
presently, and I shall go for my holiday." The horse fairly
laughed at the man, who fetched another horse out and
began cleaning him, and, when he had finished, the truant
came back, and fairly tried to put his head into his halter
again. So Billy promised, in fact, to behave better, and was
cleaned, and I hope had his dinner. This is reason, far beyond
instinct. Circus horses I don't much believe in, any more than
in performing lions and tigers, who very often end by biting
someone's head off, or walking about with a keeper's arm ;
but I make a special reservation in favour of the clown's
donkey, who nods his head at the mention of the names of
great public men, and on Quaker Bright being named kicks
the clown in the wind ; but this I saw done in a strong Tory
town in the good old diys of England when the existence of
a Deity was a necessary article of faith amongst English

Reason or Instinct. Ill

statesmen, and doubtless, had the circus been at Manchester,
Mr. Moke's heels would have gone up at the mention of
Lord Beaconsfield, and he would have nodded at Mr.
Bright's name.

And now about other horses : observe the intelligence of
the contractors' horses, which are as colossal as the navvies
are. The navvies call them names which would look bad in
the " Sunday Reader ; " but there is great sympathy
between the Herculean bipeds and the great strong horses ;
they go mostly by word of command, and you seldom see a
navvy hard with a horse, which moves apparently at the
roughly expressed word, and drags the enormous load of
earth to the top of the embankment, and turns it on the
second, and clears the truck, and runs round just in time to
avoid his hind legs being smashed when they are " tipping.''
Or look at the race-horse in a training stable under the
command of an imp of a boy, whom he could annihilate, and
probably he would " savage " you or me if we went near
him. It is curious to hear these little fellows, when a horse
threatens to kick, rate him with his childish voice, and give
him a sharp smack on his hind quarters, and to watch the
quiet way in which the horse will let him take up its hind
leg and wash it, and when he has done will put its head
round and expect the little fellow to make it all up again.
I always try to fancy what one of these lad's feelings must
be when he sees his favourite coming along stride by stride
to the front in a Derby or Leger, and wonder that he does
not go mad.

Perhaps the finest draught horses in London are those
which occupy the medium between the carriage horse and
the cart horse, in the large covered tradesmen's carts, rail-
way carts, (fee, which take loads along at a steady trot ; and
especially the dray horses in Liverpool, which draw goods
up and down hill to the docks. These are bred to a great

112 Beason or Instinct.

extent in Lincolnshire and the Midland counties, and very-
long prices they fetch. The horses look prosperous, and
from outward appearances I should say that the whip
ti-ade, except for show, must have declined considerably.
There is a very good custom at Liverpool, and I believe at
some other large towns in the North, which is to have
a procession of horses on May-day for prizes. And this
mention of the whip brings us back to the ante-Martin
days. In the second stage of " Cruelty " Hogarth paints
his prize villain, Tom Nero, — the last of whom we see on the
dissecting-table after execution, — as a hackney-coachman^
butt-ending an unfortunate horse which had fallen down
whilst bringing four counsellors, who have clubbed their
threepence apiece to ride from Thavies Inn to Westminster ;
in which same picture a bull is tossing a boy, a drunken
brewer is running over a child, and a drover beating a sheep
to death. Who knows but that Hogarth was the pioneer
towards a system of kindness which exists now ? Police-
man X of to-day would run in " all those culprits ; " and
things go further, for not only must animals not be
beaten, but if carried too closely packed, or sent away with-
out proper food and water, the Eoyal Protection Society
will be down on them.

Now about dogs. For reason the sheep-dog must come
No. 1, and I think one fact proves it, which is this : In the
wolds of Yorkshire and other similar places where immense
numbers of sheep are pastured, and outlying sheep get
mixed, and there is a dispute about ownership, it is left to a
jury of dogs, and the different dogs are collected and pick
out their own sheep and separate them, and the verdict is
final. The sheep-dog has a purely business mind ; in fact,
I never saw one at play. I am sorry the old woolly sheep-
dog is going out in favour of the colley ; but shepherds
know best, I suppose. I am afraid of col leys, and my

Beason or Instinct, 113

experience is that to the outward world they are treacher-
ous. Hounds are undomesticated dogs, and are like a great
public school ; they live together, work together, and have
ways and manners of their own, and look down on the
general public, though their extraordinary intelligence is
shown by obedience to the rating of the huntsman if unruly
and the honest answer to his voice when cheered on.

The dog with real reason is the family dog, who always
lives about the household. My dogs are a fair specimen of
dog-sense, so I preach on them. My favourites now which
constitute my canine establishment are a strong, shortish,
broad- backed, big-headed black retriever, somewhat like a
black bear, " Point," which I bred — his twin brother, " Slip,"
unfortunately died of distemper — and a Dandy Dinmont,
with a dash of the otter-terrier in him, " Rufus," who flew
at me one Sunday evening at a railway station, and whom
I threatened to " brain," for I was once badly bitten in my
life, and am fearful of strange dogs. The dog came to me
a minute or two afterwards, and took a lively interest in a
biscuit I was eating, and we made friends. His master,
to whom I was a stranger, though he knew my name, seeing
my wrath had cooled, apologised for his dog's bad manners,
and said that his wife would not have a dog in the house
and offered him to me if I would give him a home. If any
dog ever had a soul Kufus has. He is a favourite with the
whole family, and has ways of his own. He sleeps in my
son's bedroom, and comes down punctually at 8 o'clock and
sits in front of the fire in winter, and in a particular corner
of the carpet in summer, and on no consideration will he
notice anyone, except to fly at the postman, until 9 o'clock.
He listens to every word which is said, and I believe Avrites
shorthand notes of his own. Soon after 9 o'clock he goes
with one of the family across the common to the station,
and is ordered to return home, which he pretends to do,

114 Beason or Instinct,

but if he is not watc-hed he comes in another way, hides
behind the advertisement boards, and at the last moment
jumps into the guard's van and turns up at Croydon. He
goes out at intervals and fights the grocer's dog, and comes
back on three legs and tries to carry it off with a high
hand, but you can always find out the truth by asking him
if the dog with the gooseberry eye beat him, and if such is
the case, he retii-es in a state of high mental depression if
he lost, but if he won he invites you to go out instantly
with an eye to renew the fight. Only a few weeks since
Rufus had been set on by a large savage dog and badly
bitten on the neck, and the dog doctor was sent for. I
came home and found him in the doctor's hands, with his
mouth tied up, and struggling hard, for dressing the
wound caused him a good deal of pain, and the moment he
saw me and I held his paw he was as patient as a Christian
until it was all done. This must be reason. Rufus never
went into the kitchen, and if the family were all out in the
evening, he sat alone in the drawing-room, and the gas was
lit for him, and if he condescended to go out with a ser-
vant, when he came home he went to the front door, and
the servant had to go round and let him in. " Point " is an
outside dog, and is never allowed in the house under any
circumstances, except on Sunday ; and on every Sunday
punctually at 2 o'clock he comes outside the conservatory,
and walks into my room, banging the furniture with his
great tail, and puts his honest old head on my knee. I don't
feed him, and he simply wants to spend the day with mc
and if I go out he runs and digs up a large stone some
where and brings it to me in the garden, and I throw it
over a high solid fence into the middle of a large field,
sometimes, I am ashamed to say, when my neighbour's
meadow is in grass or laid down for hay, and the grass is as
high as my hips. The dog has to run a hundred and fifty

Reason or Instinct. 115

yards for an opening in the hedge, and never fails to find
that stone, though it is impossible for him to see where it
fell ; but he always brings the same stone. Sometimes he
goes to the River Wandle and dives down and fetches up
all the old pots and kettles he can find and lays them in the
grass. He is sitting by me now, for this happens- to be
Sunday, and I have read him the paragraph, of which he
thoroughly approves. In fact I always read my articles to
myself out loud, and he listens attentively.

The love of big and fierce dogs for children is extra-
ordinary. My eldest son, when a little child of a year old,
was with me at a large country house in Ireland, in the
Waterford Mountains, and the nurse used to take him into
the garden in a perambulator to sleep. There was a big
bloodhound which never was allowed to be about except
under control, and " Larry," a Httle gossoon, a hanger-on on
the estate, was generally with him, for he could manage
him. Larry came running in, " Oh ! Miss Mary, Miss
Mary, what will 1 do ? The bloodhound has run away into
the garden and the child is there." There was no cause for
fear ; the noble hound was sitting behind the perambulator
with his head on the child's shoulder like a sentinel. And
very much the same thing occurred at my father's not very
long after, when my son was about three years old. He
was utterly fearless of dogs, and had wandered out on his
own accord, and found a large dog in the yard. Tlie dog
was a big Russian kind of mastiff, so savage that he never
went out, and was only unchained at night to protect the
yard, and no one went within reach of him by day. To the
nurse's horror the boy was sound asleep, with his head on
the dog, and the dog's paw round him. This was a serious
matter, as the moment anyone went near the child a set of
teeth, like the guns of a frigate, appeared, and a most
disagreeable growl was heard, and nothing could be done
1—2

116 Reason or Instinct.

but to call to the child until he woke and came away. Poor
dog ! I suppose he had a bad name and wanted a friend —
what an old, old story that has been in real life with many
outcasts.

Now for my cats : the Deuce, a jet-black Tom, only
remains. Beelzebub, the wickedest black Tom I ever saw,
was probably killed by someone for bad manners, for he was
a thorough blackguard, though friendly with me. When
they were both alive, the Deuce always came in to dinner
at seven, and Beelzebub at nine o'clock to tea ; and on a
Sunday Beelzebub came punctually at five o'clock to
afternoon tea, and the Deuce came at nine o'clock to
supper ; they never came together, and were punctual to a
moment, and they did not come from the kitchen, following
a servant, but turned up promiscuously of their own accord.
The funniest things I ever saw in the cat world was when
a friend of mine brought home a small monkey from the
Brazils ; it was very tame, and lived in a cage in the dining-
room. My then cat — of the pre-Deuce era — a she-cat with
a kitten, came in at breakfast-time and saw the monkey ;
up went her tail like a furze-bush, and she stood on the
tips of her claws, her kitten doing ditto ; they backed out
and fetched the stable cat, and the three proceeded in
Indian file to interview the monkey ; and at last the fore-
most cat tapped the monkey's paw, and in a second master
Jacko nailed the cat, with his teeth meeting well in her
paw. I think reason steps in in a case of this kind^ when
the cat went and fetched the stable cat, which had never been
in the house before, and was, in fact, only on bowing terms
with the family. One more word, though, about dogs. A
neighbour of mine, who has a trout stream, is generally
accompanied by his dog Moses, a large brown retriever, who
has taken strongly to the sport. If his master hooks a
trout he is in wild excitement whilst he is playing it, and is

Beason or Instinct. 117

mad with glory when he lands it and takes it off the hook^
and the dog carries the fish and puts it into the basket ; and
if he plays the fish and happens not to land it, Moses howls
and refuses to be comforted.

Anyhow, whether animals have reason or not, it is a
great comfort to know that they are amply protected now,
both by law and by common consent of thinking men. Tom
Nero butt-ends the hackney-coach horse at his peril ; and a
costermonger who thrashes his donkey unmercifully finds
plenty of his own class to ask him to " put up his hands " on
Mr. Moke's behalf. Dog's tails and ears must not be
cropped, poultry must not be plucked alive, and calves must
not be bled to death ; but there is one thing which the
Royal Society should look after, and they must fly at very
high game, which is to summon the City authorities, who
are answerable for the asphalt pavement, for not roughing
it with gravel or some other substance in frosty and slippery
weather. Money and expense are of no importance as
regards the footway for stout aldermen — why neglect the
horses ? One winter I counted seven horses down near
Lombard Street within five minutes, and those which kept
their footing were in a lather of sweat from fear. No
animal knows better than the horse what he can or what he
cannot do, and no animal is more willing to do his best,
and to a horse in a two-wheeled vehicle it must be just the
same to feel himself slipping with a weight on his back as
it would be to any of us to carry as heavy a weight as we
could walk under on dry land across slippery ice.

And there are two other evils against which a wholesale
crusade should be made : the first is mostly found on Bank
holidays and Sundays, and such days, on commons and open
spaces, near London especially — which is the cruelty shown
to half -starved saddle ponies and donkeys by the owners.
Hour after hour these wretched animals are galloped up

118 Beason or Listinct,

and down until they are fit to drop from exhaustion, and
frequently they are ridden by great lubbers who weigh them
down. The other evil is the wicked overcrowding of carts
and wagons on Derby day, Hampton races, and such occa-
sions, when frequently unfortunate horses can hardly crawl
before they get half way. The Society ought to have
arbitrary power to seize the horses and vehicles and im-
pound them. It is a positive fact that an unfortunate mare
was taken out of a cart, and foaled on Ba,nstead downs on
a Derby day by the road side, and my son saw it occur.

I have not much faith in foreign missions, there is too
much talkee-talkee and platform oratory, but I do believe
in home missions, whether the promoters be Roman
Catholics, Church of England or Dissenters, for I know that
many kind men and women get the confidence of the very
poor and are the apostles of humanity. And now for once
I will be a home missioner, and respectfully ask the mother
of every household where these pages may find a home, to tell
the children whenever they see a big rough stone or brick or
anything of that kind, especially a broken bottle lying in
the road, to remove it to the side of the road in a town and
to throw it into the ditch in the country, as the doing so
may save many a horse and possibly somebody's life.

ABOUT BEEECHES AND
BOOTS.

My father took me when a boy at school on my way home
for the holidays into the old House of Commons three
months before it was burnt down, and the thing which
struck me most was seeing some honourable members dressed
in top-boots, and wearing their hats. This circumstance
connected with the fact that — as I was informed and verily
believe — I was brought into the world by a Wiltshire
country doctor who had on top-boots, breeches, and spurs,
induces me to think that I have a mission to preach upon
that costume. The doctor's story is unquestionably true, as
the old nurse told me that the doctor galloped all the way,
and was only just in time to meet me, as I made my bow
sooner than was expected, and began life by disturbing the
family arrangements.

I saw the last pair of tops which ever carried a peer to his
seat in Parliament in the year 1846. The members of the
Upper House were in that year sitting in the Painted
Chamber, pending the completion of their present House,
and the owner of the boots was a dear old gentleman, a
marquis, name forgotten, who stuck to his leather breeches,
top-boots, buff double-breasted waistcoat, blue coat, gilt
119

120 About Breeches and Boots.

buttons, white neckcloth, and broad-brimmed white beaver
hat, and drove down to the House daily in a yellow, old-
fashioned, high kind of gig with a head, much resembling
the vehicle in which Dr. Syntax is represented by Rowland-
son as driving Mrs. Syntax home to his vicarage at the end
of his third tour. I wonder how many men have '' passed
out" in honours in classics, mathematics, law, physic,
divinity, army, navy, &c., (fee, who are well posted up in
dates of imaginary deeds, which by courtesy are called facts,
out of compliment to so-called history, who have never read,
and possibly never heard of, Dr. Syntax's '' Tour," the best
record by far of some of the rustic life and manners in the
days of our great-grandfathers.

Top-boots, similar in principle to those of our grand-
fathers, were worn in the time of George II., in proof
whereof vide Hogarth's '' Rake's Progress," the gambling-
house scene, in which a highwayman is represented as sitting
by the fire in a pair of boots with tops made from a turn-
over at the top ; but our old-fashioned top-boot belonged to
George III.'s reign. In many of the pictures of George III.
as a young man, he is represented in private life in breeches
and tops, the Windsor uniform coat, and a cockade in his
hat, such as a footman wears now. No matter about the
exact date, the dress is nearly a century old, at any rate.
The villainous crew who belonged to Robespierre, Marat,
and the Girondists, copied the top-boots from us, and also
imported the bull-dog. In fact, from time to time other
European nations and ourselves have exchanged articles of
dress. We borrowed the Hessians from our foreign neigh-
bours ; they certainly were in vogue at the time of the Irish
rebellion, as Emmetfc, the Irish rebel, was painted in them,
and were common during the first quarter of this century
in the Theodore Hook days. The French copied our
" Wellingtons," and I suppose that we are indebted for the

About Breeches and Boots. 121

homely blucher, which, like the " Albert hat," was never
popular, to our ally at Waterloo, who, after we had won
the battle, took the whole credit of the victory, and joined
us in the occupation of Paris, and wanted to " loot " the
city. The Napoleon boot, or a boot of that character,
without the high front, and somewhat curtailed in form,
and commonly called " the Butcher's boot," has been common
for the last seventy years, at various periods, to the tyrant
of Europe, to Mr. Gommersall, who " played Nap," in the
battle of Waterloo at Astley's, to our modern hunting-men,
our firemen, our soldiers, our butchers, our ostlers, and our
bishops. There is a deal of character in that Napoleon
boot and its family, according to the wearer. It looks very
workmanlike on the hunting-man, the fireman, and the
soldier ; but when trod down at the heels and looped up to
the back of the breeches, showing an interregnum of dirty
stocking, and worn by a slovenly butcher or ostler, it has a
dog-fighting, beery appearance, and ought to go to the
station-house. On a bishop's legs it looks as if it had been
consecrated with the horse and saddle at the same time as
his lordship, and was part of the trappings of a solemn pro.
cession. I don't see why a bishop's boots should not last
him until he becomes archbishop, or goes the way of all
flesh, as he gets on his horse at his own door, and only walks
up the floor of the House of Lords, or of some drawing-room,
in them, and nowhere else. I always wish when I see a
bishop riding in Rotten Row, which, by-the-bye, is a rare
circumstance now, that he would go to Ascot and the opera
sometimes, and go the "whole hog." Bishops seem to me
to dabble in the shallow waters of Vanity Fair, and want
to take a plunge but are afraid. They are somewhat like
the strict moralists (?) who put down the cards in the
middle of a rubber at midnight on Saturday, but who, if
they were sitting up, would not object to play a rubber the

122 About Breeches and Boots.

moment the clock strikes twelve on Sunday night. The
bishop of bishops on horseback was the late Bishop Wilber-
force; he seemed thoroughly happy, and rode as if he
enjoyed it ; and his horse enjoyed it, too ; and he was, more-
over, as history says, a rare good judge of a horse. With due
deference to the late Lord Houghton, who, speaking of the
bishop in the "Fortnightly Review " of last March, says :
'' He was notoriously fond of riding, and had the reputation
of being a good horseman, which was not true, for he rode
very loosely," &c., I maintain that the bishop was a very good
rider, though unfortunately he was killed by his horse
stumbling, as were the Marquis of Waterford and poor
Whyte-Melville, both fine horsemen. True it is that he
had a forward seat on a park cob on the stones, but Lord
Houghton never saw him sit a spirited horse in the open.
I should be sorry to depend on Lord Houghton's opinion on
horses or riders, or even on art or literature, though he
fancies himself M^cenas of all England, and is always more
than anxious to play the part in public. I once saw an
archbishop in knickerbockers, and what is more he photo-
graphed me in profile with a short pipe in my mouth,
standing on a rock in the attitude of " throwing a fly." It
was in a Highland glen by the side of a splendid trout
stream, which I pine after in my dreams. The keeper said
the archSd^shop wanted some figures on the rock, and
he posed us and sat down himself; so we all went down to
fame.

In a water-colour sketch which is before me now,
'' swells," male and female, of the end of the last and
beginning of this century are introduced. The St. James's
Street dandy, who is arm-in-arm with a guardsman attired
in pantaloons and black gaiters similar in size to a High-
lander's gaiter of to-day, sports a pair of boots with deep tops,
from a little below the knee to the ankle, showing an in-

About Breeches and Boots. 12a

terregnum of stocking (probably silk). A gallant hussar
appears in pantaloons and Hessians, walking with a lady
whose feet and ankles, according to now modern custom,
are confined by a dress absurdly small at the bottom, and
who wears a fire-scoop bonnet, not unlike the fashion of to-
day. The dandy top-boot and the country top-boot in the
days of our grandfathers were very diflferent things. The
story has so frequently been repeated, amongst others by
Captain Gronow, that probably it is true, that Hoby, in St.
James's Street, on a customer complaining "that his boots
had burst the first time he walked in them," exclaimed :
*' Good heavens, sir, surely you never locdhed in those
boots 1 " There are, or a few weeks ago there were, in St.
James's Street some jockey boots — evidently nothing more
than a loose, black kind of kid stocking — marked to weigh
three ounces only, and I venture to say they would burst if
walked in. The home-made country top-boots of our grand-
fathers were a reality in wild country districts, and were
meant for wear and not for ornament, and were of good
strong leather, and made roomy enough to receive a woollen
stocking, and to allow of the circulation of the blood, and
strong enough to turn brambles and thorns in narrow
bridle-paths or in a thick covert. Country gentlemen,
farmers, doctors, and parsons who kept a horse could not do
without their tops and breeches ; the parsons sometimes
compromised matters by wearing a drab cloth top which
buttoned round below the knee and the top of the calf, and
which looked less like fox-hunting— not that parsons Avere
averse to hunting, by any means — but the fact was that the
farmers, being churchwardens, waywardens, overseers, and
fining all the parochial offices, would not spend a halfpenny
out of the rates if they could help it except on the main
road to the market, and country lanes, which really were
parish roads, were left to shift for themselves, and became

124 Ahoiit Breeches and Boots.

impassable in the winter to all but equestrians. The houses
were victualled for the winter at Michaelmas, as regarded
groceries, flour, and other necessaries, and bacon was laid
down, and beef put in pickle in case of accidents, in the
event of being snowed out or flooded in.

The Melton men and London dandies were very particu-
lar about their boots, and if you look in " Tom and Jerry
atTattersall's" in 1821, trousers were very rare, and you
may be sure that Cruikshank was accurate as regarded
details. Again, see in '' Tom and Jerry " the picture of the
Royal Academy, and observe the ridiculous trousers of the
period. The two neatest men who ev«r appeared in riding
costume were Jem Mason, the steeple-chase jockey, and a
dapper little man, Mr. Rice, the manager and principal
rider for Anderson, the horse-dealer in Piccadilly: from his
hat to his heels there never was such a picture of neatness,
and there was no one in London who could show off" a horse
in the Row better. He was a witness in the late Chief
Justice Earle's Court years ago in a running-down case, in
which a valuable hunter had been ruined by a brouo-ham
breaking its leg. Of course there was plenty of hard swear-
ing on both sides, as there always is in a horse case, and the
defence was that the man on the horse was drunk. On the
witness appearing, Justice Earle, speaking to counsel on
both sides, in gossip, intimated that the witness was an
expert whom he saw every morning. '^ Yes, my lord," said
witness, "I see you ride by every morning." ''Yes yes
witness," answered his lordship, who was very fond of riding'
and who had a very bad seat, "tell us, do you think
from his ridmg, the man was drunk or sober ? " '' Well'
my lord, that is impossible to say. I see your lordship
every morning, and did I not know who you are, and your
character, from the way that you roll about, first on the
pommel and then on the crupper, I should say, ' That old

About Breeches and Boots. 125

gentleman has had a little drop this morning.' " Need it
be added that the good-natured judge led the Court and
spectators in a roar of laughter at his own expense.

As to the little dainty riding-boots worn by ladies, they
ought only to be made by poetical bootmakers. You see
them in the hands of ladies'-maids, who pass you in a corri-
dor with a giggle as they pretend to hide some other part of
female equestrian attire. Apropos de hottes, a friend of
mine, a very light weight, whose back many a good man
has seen in the Leicestershire and Northampton country
was staying in a country house during the hunting season.
Like many good riders, he was a great dandy about his top-
boots, which were standing outside his dressing-room door.
On going upstairs to put them on, he found they were gone,
and he heard the pattering of ladies' feet in rapid retreat
down the passage, and in his dressing-room was a very
pretty girl, who, thinking the owner had gone out, had just
succeeded in drawing one of them on. My friend, poor
devil ! was married, and thus the groundwork of a sensation
novel was lost for ever.

Country gentlemen and substantial old farmers, who from
age or weight had given up riding, were faithful to the
breeches, and in their grounds, or on market-days, might be
seen in very fine light drab cloth breeches and long gaiters
of the same, coming down over well-polished roomy shoes.
The last pair of breeches and gaiters I saw in Parliament
were worn by Mr. Patterson, member for the City, an old
Radical, but a dear, fat, God-fearing old Radical, not one
of your foaming democrats of to-day. He always went by
the name of old " G — ts and Gaiters," and was very popular,
and Punch immortalized him by one of his best jokes,
" multum hi parvo — Patterson in smalls." Old Patterson
carried the Corn Bill up to the Lords in 1846 as one of the
" Message from the Commons," and the late Lord Shaftes-

126 About Breeches and Boots.

bury, a plain-spoken old Tory, and Chairman of the House
of Lords, a great character in his day, sotto voce made a
remark in fun about the Corn Bill, which would have
brought the roof of Exeter Hall down. I was at the Bar
of the House and heard what he said. Sir Tatton Sykes,
as I have heard, though I never had the pleasure of seeing
that grand old sportsman, always adopted the breeches and
gaiters when not in tops.

In books of my childhood, pictures of heroes of crime,
such as ''Dick Turpin," " Black Bill," &c., the bad man in
the " Gipsy's Curse and the Murderer's Doom," and stories
of a similar kind, always represented men in tops, yellow
breeches, red waistcoats, blue or green coats, and they wore
black mutton-chop whiskers. Doubtless Mr. Thurtell had
his top-boots on when he drove Mr. William Weare down
in a gig, and cut his throat, near Elstree, though the
ingenious Madame Tussaud, who, for the instruction of
future generations, exhibits the old gallows which she
bought from the authorities of Hertford Gaol, w^hen public
executions ceased, represents the figure of Mr. Thurtell
stepping to his doom, attired in the drab breeches and
gaiters, which I claim as an emblem of respectability.
Highwaymen, who always were hung in uniform, doubtless
went off the ladder in their tops and boots, which, so to say,
were " treed " at Tyburn or some suburban gallows.

Individuals were styled after their boots ; crede Dickens
in '' Pickwick " — " IFAo is there in the house?" said Sam
(Weller). " There is a wooden leg in No. 6 ; there's a pair
of Hessians in No. 13 ; there's two pairs of halves in the
commercial ; there's these here painted tops in the snuggery
inside the bar ; and five more tops in the coffee-room."

From what I remember of post-boys of the past, I
fear their boots and breeches were seldom found in the
attitude of prayer. They lived a very hard life, often com-

About Breeches and Boots, 127

mencing the world as hangers-on in a stable, and sleeping
m their clothes on the straw. Their manners and language
were not always agreeable, and their demands were exces-
sive ; their evidence in courts of justice respecting runaway
matches, smuggling affairs, prize-lights, elections, and so on,
were not received without much cross-examination, as their
memories were the longest or the shortest, as occasion served.
They were the bad men of female authors' moral story books,
though I remember a quasi-tract called " John the Post-boy,"
which pictured an imaginary hero who never rode on a
Sunday unless he satisfied himself that the job was a work
of necessity, and who always read the service to himself at
leisure hours, if he missed church. There might have been
one or two such post-boys, but I do not think they fairly
represented theii- party. I wonder by the way that tailors
do not reproduce a very useful part of the old post-boy's
dress, which consisted of double-milled cloth overalls,
perfectly weather proof, which came from the hips to the
ankle over the boots, and far superior to any indiarubber.

I remember a very wicked pair of tops in the dock at
Bow Street in 18J:2, after Ascot. The owner was a stout,
oily-faced man, with a juicy mouth and prominent front
tooth, dressed in blue and brass, buff waistcoat and cords,
who, in company with two others, very respectable-looking
men, had robbed a man of colour of some hundred sove-
reigns, watch, chain, rings and jewellery, on the road to and
from Ascot, and on the course. The late Mr. Lewis got
them off for want of jurisdiction, as the prosecutor, who was
hazy and frightened at cross-examination, could not swear
to any particular offence on the course within the magis-
trate's jurisdiction.

The owner of the tops was at Epsom in 1843 with the
same companions, and invited me to join him at thimble-
rig, and offered to go ten pounds for us both if I would

128 About Breeches and Boots.

deposit my gold watch. I was under twenty years of age,
and young-looking for my age, too, and I shall never forget
the man's face when I quietly asked him, " Who robbed the
black man at Ascot?" His language on being so " picked
up " by a boy would really have startled Old Nick ; it was over-
heard by a gentlemanly -looking man with a quick eye, who
simply said, " You are at your old games, are you ? olf the
course, or I shall want you directly." Need I say the
speaker was a detective ?

If the little tops and breeches which were worn years ago,
when every London dandy had his cab and tiger, could
have written their autobiographies, what stories we should
have of cabs waiting at houses of '' other fellows' wives,"
outside Crockford's, or at private hells, at Chalk Farm or
Wimbledon Common at daybreak, whilst the noble owners
were making targets of each other; of journeys to and from
Richmond with pink bonnets, and numberless other " fie-fie
stories," only mentioned now by gray-headed old gentlemen
over their wine when the youngsters are out of the way, or
by wicked old dowagers — who possibly were behind the
scenes — at early tea in Mayfair.

The last remnants of top-boots in cockney life belonged
to the low sporting school. Ben Caunt was fond of appearing
in public in white cords and tops, green cutaway, basket but-
tons, scarlet neckcloth set off by a large gold spread-eagle pin,
presented to him by Freeman, the American giant, and a
broad-brimmed white hat with green eaves; in fact, his
portrait taken in that costume was in a shop window in
Fleet Street, in which he was represented as pointing to a
table, whereon were placed a champagne bottle and glasses,
and box of cigars, and " Bell's Life," and underneath the
picture was a valuable certificate : " This is the best portrait
of me. B. Caunt, Champion of England." Old-fashioned
omnibus men and coachmen who drove the short stages to

About Breeches and Boots. 129

and from the suburbs clung to the tops until thev passed
away.

And now for the cause of the appearance of this gossipincr
paper. It occurred thus: On the Oaks day I met an old
friend, who was riding across Mitcham Green, with whom I
have had many a chat on many a cricket ground, and
whose name I do not know, who always wears top-boots,
spurs and cords, and whom I never saw in the streets or in
the country or in the suburbs except on a good horse I
know he is not a dealer, nor does he ride horses to sell I
was laughing with him about his tops, and told him that
i never remembered an Epsom week in which I did not see
him on the way to the races or coming back, or on the
course, and he said that he had been— I think— for thirty
nine years in the same dress. There was another thine
which put the subject into my head, and it was this • On
the 29th of May last, the anniversary of a day some two
centuries and a quarter ago, or thereabouts, when Charles
II. was '^ first for the oaks," after his father had lost a crown
by " a neck on the post," there was cricket at Lord's between
two elevens, most of whom, from boyhood upward, have
almost lived in breeches and boots. The players were the
huntsmen and the jockeys. I was very doubtful about the
'' Jockeys and Huntsmen's" match which we all remember
took place on the Saturday in Derby week. I fancied there
would be a lot of loafers, and especiallv our friend ^' 'Arry
the Cockney Cad," who -knew old Geor^y Fordham and
Freddy Archer, my boy," and ^' five-to-one-bar-one school "
It was "very much t'other," and proves exactly what I
always have maintained, which is that the betting rinc don't
care a straw for anything but the money. As to the match,
_ ±5ells Life " has a most elaborate and accurate account of
It, which any one can see. As regards the cricket, naturally
amongst the huntsmen there were many men heavily handi-

130 Ahout Breeches and Boots.

capped by age, and some of them were stiff. There was
some very good play on both sides, especially the bowling,
in proof whereof between 300 and 400 balls were bowled for
four wides ; and the wicket-keeping was good also, and,
seriously speaking, the Surrey and Middlesex counties,
whose match was broken off to make way for the " knights
of the pigskin " and " the honourable company of horn
blowers," might very advantageously have boiTOwed two
bowlers from the equestrian elevens.

Everyone who knows anything about cricket and about
the man must be aware that, but for his professional en-
gagements elsewhere, R. I'Anson would be a great acquisi-
tion to the County of Surrey, being much superior as an all-
round man to a large majority of those who play for it now,
as he can bat, bowl and field really well, and can keep
wicket on a squeeze, and is j)assionately fond of the
game.

Now for a glance at the ring at Lord's. There were five
thousand peoj)le at the least, at one time, a large proportion
being men of mark of the Nimrod stamp, and women of
mark, too, half-sisters to Diana Yernon, in four-in-hands,
mail phaetons, carriages, on horseback, (tc, ttc, a great
many genuine cricket lovers, and a large sprinkling of those
connected with racing and hunting, more of the former
than the latter, as naturally racing men of all counties had
been attracted to Epsom. The dirty short pipe and
<cabbage-leaf cigar were absent, and there were so many
ll^dies about that it became necessary, when one wanted a
quiet pipe, to get into an out-of-the-way corner. No rough
word could be heard anywhere, though there was plenty o£
fun and laughter. In fact, the match consisted of fair
cricket, which a great number of people of all classes were
watching, with real pleasure, a game between two elevens
out for the day, who were playing for the love of the sport

About Breeches and Boots. 131

^nd a summer holiday. All the " horsey world ^' were off
the stage for this day. One could not mistake the trainer
with his wonderfully neat hat, w^ell-trimmed hair and
whiskers," or clean-shaven face, carefully tied neckcloth,
rather long frock coat fitting exquisitely, rather light dra^
trousers coming over a boot polished with a blacking only
known to themselves — I expect those who clean their boots
■** hiss " all the time, as if grooming a horse. Trainers also
are especially recognisable by the quick, restless eye, which
betrays no expression of thought, but notices everyone
from an archbishop downwards, for fear he should be a
tout. Then the first-rank jockeys always betray themselves
by their neat little figures, well-cut clothes, dogskin gloves
and excellent cigars — where do they get them ? I can't get
them at the club. A few knowing stable-boys would have
looked happier, perhaps, with a little ground ash stick in
their hand, and a fox terrier at their heels, but all were
•"off the stage " for the afternoon, and the little sticks and
little dogs were left at home. I saw INI'George, the starter,
pass through them once or twice, but they looked as if they
had never seen him before, or had ever been anxious for a
start. The huntsmen were scarcer and less recognisable
most of them. One hardly ever sees a huntsman except in
his professional clothes, whereas jockeys and trainers
«warm alive on railways which run to and from a racing
•district, and very pleasant companions they often are. To
review the match shortly : 1 , the cricket was very fair ; 2,
all enjoyed themselves; 3, the match must have been a
great financial success ; 4, those of the press who prejudged
the question and talked about " burlesque cricket," kc, ttc,
^c, for once in their lives were icliolhj wrong, and as
our friend 'Arry, the slang cad, would say, 'Hhe 'unts"
men 'ad a fast thing that day with blood at the hend,"
and the jockeys *' sat do^^ii on their 'orses and walked
K— 2

132 About Breeches and Boots.

in as they pleased," and as regards the Kevilers, who ran
against them as far as theij were concerned, they weren't
in it, *' it was all a 'orse to a 'en " on the day's sport versus
failure.

THE COUNTEY PAESON

Those who have had to make their own way in the world
must call to mind times and seasons in their younger days
when the stress of business occasioned their burning the
midnight oil, night after night, and frequently not
'' dividing the Sunday from the week," for weeks or months
tof^ether. In the days when my lot was cast in the midst
of a very hard-working world, at the time of the railway
mania, I was fortunate enough to be ''semper welcome" at
more than one country vicarage, if I could get away on
Saturday evening; and, although a hot London church
would have been unbearable, the quiet village Sundays were
periods of rest which I recall with much pleasure. There
was no need to be awakened on Sunday morning. A tree
full of birds close to the window kept up a chattering early
enough, and the sun shining in, and the cawing of the
rooks, and the tramping of the cart horses going to water,
and impertinent bees who flew in at the open window and
levied toll on the flowers which stood on the table, to say
nothing of the church bells, which rang at 8 o'clock, made
sleep impossible. And who ever wanted sleep on a fine
June morning ?

It used to be a great treat to find that I was the only
idle man on the parson's busy day, though the time never
133

134 The Country Parson.

hung heavy for a moment. Sometimes we began with a
wedding at eight, the Sunday school after breakfast (at
which I only assisted occasionally as Mr. Spectator, listening
to some of the primitive answers*), church at half -past ten,
a chat for half an hour before with the patriarchs, who
represented the House of Lords amongst the villagers,
sitting about the blacksmith's shop in the week days, and
occupying the posts of honour on the benches under the
old yew-tree in the churchyard on Sundays. One of these
fogies sometimes might be a Trafalgar man, or a Peninsular
or Waterloo veteran, and better company I never met.
Then came the early dinner at one, church again at half-
past two ; after church a walk round the parish with the
parson, who went to see some very old parishioners who
were too feeble to come out, and to read to them a little
out of '* Pilgrim's Progi^ess," which is to the aged poor what
" Pobinson Crusoe " is to a school-boy ; pending the reading
whereof I would drop in and pay the churchwarden a visit,
and sit in his chimney-corner — which held six, three each
side — and have a glass of his strong beer and a quiet
smoke with an old she^^herd, who always ''rested on his
way home ; " in other words, had his pint of strong home-
brewed regularly every Sunday — accompanied by his rough
sheep-dog, a stout churchman, who always slept in the pew
and never barked in his sleep, and who never looked in vain
for some scraps in the churchwarden's outhouse. Then
about seven came a tea and supper combined, which makes-
me hungry to think of now. And I think that parson, wha
Jbad done eleven hours' honest work, aided and abetted by
Ms wife and dauofhters, who tausfht in the school and

* A country parson once told me that when his class could not
remember the shepherds as the first recipients of the great Christmas
naessage, he asked who were likely to be in the fields by night, and
one lively village bucolic eagerly answered " the poachers."

The Country Farson. 135

managed the singing, had f aii'ly earned his leisure and his
pleasant evening chat and cigar, and a quiet perusal in
" Bell " (which I always took with me) of the cricket or
rowing of the past week. This is not a theological treatise,
and if I attempted to make it so there would be a just and
indignant howl ; but I fancy that most of the readers are
in accord with me, that a good country parson is the salt of
the earth, and that nine sensible people out of ten, except
the ecclesiastical lawyers, think that the columns in news-
paper reports of religious squabbles about shadows are
evidence of wicked waste of money and fanatical temper.
And although every word of this paper is true and from
the life, it is not a sketch of A., or B., or C, but of a class
whom I have been fortunate enough to know, and of scenes
which I have witnessed.

First, as to our congregation. There was the conven-
tional bore, who exists everywhere, the most respectahle man
in the parish, who made a lot of money somehow, and
always came to church in shiny black dittos, and a shirt
frill (hke Mr. Chuck's, in " Peter Simple "), and stiff white
neckcloth, who said '"the minister did not preach the
gospel," and who encouraged the ranters, and bellowed out
the psalms, emphasising any damnatory clauses with a wave
of the hand and a satisfactory shake of the head. The
squire's family of course occupied one enormous pew, reached
by steps, with armchairs and a fire-place, and every con-
venience of a club, except the morning papers ; a second
large pew held the upper servants, and there was an
inferior pew for the under female servants, with benches
for coachmen, grooms, gardeners, ttc, outside. (Of course
this state of things has long since ceased to exist.)

Then came the farmers' families, the younger portion of
whom always expected me to make them a " clown's face "
just before the Litany — and were never disappointed —

136 The Country Parson,

though often reproved by the elder sisters, who were not
much displeased when the London stranger nodded his head
seriously and winked an apology. Another pew was
occupied by the blacksmith, a hale man of seventy without
a grey hair, looking noble in a black velveteen coat, and a
shirt-collar like a sail, and a *' bird's-eye fogle " tied once
round, showing the neck of a perfect Hercules ; and in
the same pew was an old superannuated huntsman,
who looked as if he was always feeling for the horn, with
his hair close cropped and white tie with long ends, a fox's
head for a pin, and a long frock-coat, breeches, and
mahogany tops. And next the old huntsman sat the
blacksmith's daughter, a snake-headed one, with jet black
hair and blue eyes, and the smallest of ears like shells ; and
next to her the under-keeper, a fine Yorkshireman, who
shared her book, attired in a brown velveteen coat, and
bronze buttons displaying every kind of dog's head. And
we were not surprised when their banns were put up, and
the old huntsman gave Vulcan a dig in the ribs, and we all
looked round at the handsome couple, and should have had
much pleasure in giving three cheers had it been decent.
No wonder that the old village poacher's j)lace was empty,
for you may be sure that some hare suffered that day. It
was quite time that the banns were put up, for I saw, a
few weeks before, the young keeper and the blacksmith's
daughter trying to catch a pony in the orchard, and never
were two people so long about a simple job ; and when the
pony was caught the captors' heads were as close together
as the two-headed nightingale's. I should like to have had
a hand in catching that pony, for the reward was very
ample remuneration for the trouble.

It was rather sad to see the numbers of very old, old
people who evidently could not read in those days, though
they had a simple creed of theii' own, as besides the cardinal

The Country Parson. 137

points of religion, they believed in the squire, the parson,
the devil, the gallows, and ghosts. For they lived in the
days when wicked boys and girls were taken to see the
men go in a cart to " Hang Fair," and believed that many
ghosts walked, and that certain corners were bad to pass at
night. But I will trouble you to find a man who could
burn a pig, throw down a tree, or take a swarm of bees like
" Old Joe." To see him burn a pig ; didn't he wet his finger
to see which way the wind was, and arrange the straw so
artfully that every bit of the hair was taken off '' wi'out
burning a hole in his breeches anywhere," as he said. Why,
the pig, within an hour of his disease, was like a beautifully
coloured meerschaum, and it would reconcile anyone to
cremation, if it was not carried further. The old man only
professed to do three things, viz., ''to tack bees," "vail a
tree," and " singe a hog," and he did all three things well,
though he never learnt to read or write.

It required some effort to keep one's countenance, when
the church was chilly, to see Farmer Jemmy, by way of
protection to his head, put on a fustian cap with a shade,
which he had bought at a fair, and decorated with crossed
guns and dogs' heads. He was a grand old boy who, as he
said, " went to bed wi' the buds (birds) mostly, and got up
wi' the buds ; who lived in his kitchen and swung the pot ; "
in other words, gave dinner-parties, one of which we shall
enjoy presently. We often had an interlude in the shape
of a raid on the schoolboys by the master after a contra-
band apple, which had rolled out and had been recovered,
and could not bs found, and a lot of heads were punched
and ears boxed on suspicion, probably the innocent suffering
for the guilty. The plough-boys and farm labourers
generally stared into vacancy, and clattered in with their
hobnailed boots, and clattered out again. Remember, I
am speaking now of the dark ages years ago, when farmers

138 The Country Parson.

employed every village urchin bird keeping, or as odd boys,
and parsons were unheard and unheeded almost as regarded
education, and could only fight against ignorance in the
Sunday schools.

I wonder how many sectarian sermons of all kinds I
have heard by " popular preachers " (that odious expression)
since those days, and how many I remember, or which I
cared twopence for ; possibly none ; but I bear in mind
many of those village sermons now, when men stood up,
and in their natural tone told a short story under twenty
minutes, and represented the dramatis personoi of sacred
history, walking and talking as they probably did in life ;
though one parson made the deadest failure I ever knew in
trying to say a few words about the late village cobbler and
parish clerk (who had been clerk for half a century) on the
Sunday after his funeral. He started as brave as a lion, but
he came to utter grief in a very short time ; for were not
the old clerk and the parson sworn friends ? and didn't those
two and your humble servant once dig an old woman's grave ?
This occurred in October, when the ground fortunately
was soft, and it occurred thus : A very old woman, Sukey

, was dying, and the parson used to see her every day-

"We were going out shooting, and on the way the parson
called to see how the old woman was, and heard, without
surprise, that "she had just passed off like a lamb." This
was on a Monday, and the people asked if she could be
buried at four o'clock on Saturday ; so to save them the
trouble of sending to the clerk, the vicar said he would let
him know about the funeral. On the Saturday we were
out shooting again some way from home, and the parson

said, " We must go back; I have to bury old Sukey

at four. By-the-bye," he added, " did you tell the old clerk
about her grave ? " The terrible fact came before us that
no grave had been dug. Back we posted, and found the

The Country Parson. 139

old clerk soling a boot. Q. "Have you dug old Sukey's
grave, George ? " A. " Xever heerd about it, zur."
Q. ''What's to be done? — it is now three." A. '"Don't
rightly know, zur; there be no one at home but me." There
was only one thing to be done ; and a man was sent on
horseback to put the funeral off till five, leaving us two
hours. The old clerk took his tools down behind the church
tower, out of sight, to a spot where no one had been buried
within living memory. We prospected with the boring-
ii'ons as quickly as possible, the clerk's little grand-daughter
fetching someone to toll the bell, and we three stripped to
our shirts, and in an hour and a half dug as good a gi'ave
as anyone could desire ; and if ever I did enjoy a pull at the
beer, it was in the vicarage when the job was done. At
five o'clock all were in their places, and no living soul but
ourselves ever knew who dug the grave.

We must dine with " Yarmer Jemmy," after all this talk.
He always used, out of compliment to me, as the Londoner,
to dine late, and our dinner was at twelve, instead of eleven
A.M., his usual time.

Old Jemmy was one of those cimous characters whom
one seldom meets now. He w^as a hale and hearty octo-
genarian, whose hours in bed were from 7 o'clock p.:\i. to 5
A.M. in the winter, and from 8 till 3 in the summer. Besides
his farm he dealt in timber, and had a saw-pit, and con-
tracted for farm buildings, always making money and never
spending it, hardly ever away from home, kind to the poor,
finding odd jobs for the men in the winter, and very
hospitable. He lived alone with an elderly female servant
who was near seventy. Jemmy was very warm in the
pocket. He trusted only to a canvas bag and specie, and
probably never had a cheque-book.

Our banquet-room was in the large bricked kitchen (for
Jemmy only used his parlour when ladies came to see him).

140 The Country Parson,

before an enormous fire-place, where, winter and summer,
the logs were smouldering on the dogs. The party consisted
of his brother-in-law the churchwarden, " Varmer Guy,"
who could never get within two feet of the table, owing to
his corporation, a nephew or two, the parson and myself,
and old Charlotte, who cooked the dinner, waited and
joined in the conversation, and cheered us on. The table-
cloth was like the driven snow, and, if j^ou please, there
were heavy silver spoons and forks for the visitors ; and as
to the dinner, it was so good that on the night before old
Jemmy's party we used to sit up very late so as to ensure
sleeping till eleven the next morning, in time for a tub, a
cup of cofiee and a pipe, but no breakfast ; for it would have
been a shame to have gone without an appetite. As to
roast S23are-rib3, chines, chickens, ducks, asparagus, peas,
and all the best farm and garden produce, gooseberry
pudding, and cream, the table literally groaned ; but the
wary and wise kept a place for the boiled ox-beef — the
Martinmas beef, I presume, which Macaulay speaks of —
beef which had been kept in pickle and preserved for months.
Probably it was the beef of oxen which had been at the
plough and fatted, but nothing ever beat it. And the
wise and wary likewise held aloof from the strong beer,
and took the lighter ale, and reserved themselves for one
glass of the celebrated home-brewed, the colour of sherry,
which flared like brandy in the fire, with some cheese which
was worthy of the feast. And when a man had done his
duty by all this, if he was not content with a quiet smoke
in an arm-chair and one more glass of the strong beer, he
did not deserve to live — that's all.

Although, especially as regarded education, things are
changed now, much of the primitiveness still remains.
" How do you manage to get on with everyone so well ? " I
asked the parson — who is still vicar — not very long ago,

The Country Parson. 141

" By minding my own business and trying to do my duty/'
was the answer. " As you know, I was never meant for the
Church, but this was a family Hving, and I had it ; and
when I began I liked the country, and liked the hunting,
but I very soon found that a man who is a man ought to
do his work ; and plenty I had to do. The farmers were
mostly fond of hunting, and were not sorry to see that I
went to the meet once or twice a week, but I found that
some of them were very loose, and very hard on the poor •
and they soon discovered that I didn't care about their
market-ordinary tales and flash stories, and though I enjoyed
a run with the hounds, I meant to do so like a gentleman.
Some of the magistrates were very hard on the poachers —
not your London gang men, but the unfortunate half-
starved fellows who found a snared hare and pocketed it ;
and what with talking to one and another, and a kind word
here and there, I got on without quarrelling. And then,
thinking I ought to teach in the school, I got accustomed
to it and fond of it, and liked the village children. The
secret of leading people is easy enough, if 3'ou make up your
mind that they won't be driven. I took an interest, too,
in preserving the foxes, and consoled the old women for loss
of ducks and chickens ; and the magistrates set that off
against my pleading for the small poachers and putting in
a word or two for a misdemeanant, pledging myself for his
better behaviour. But I attribute my success jorincipally
to one thing, which is this : I set my face against meddling
and faction and sensation, and, although often urged to
have anti-papal meetings, and evangelical alliances, and
heaven knows what besides, by all kinds of people, I kept
aloof from them all. Some clerical secretary wrote to me a
long time since, and said the bishop expected all his clei-gy
to petition against opening the British Museum and similar
places on a Sunday, and sent me a petition deploring *' the

142 The Country Parson,

desecration of the Sabbath by the lower orders, and praying
that no places of entertainment should be open on a Sunday ; "
and I replied, that I knew nothing of the wants of
London, and sent the petition back, altering ' lower orders '
to ' higher orders,' and praying that Tattersall's, the hotels
at Richmond, Blackwall, and Greenwich, the parks for car-
riages of the rich, and such places, should be closed on a
Sunday, with a request to the bishojD to present that peti-
tion— which, of course, he never heard of even. Then, too,
there w^ere some village revels which were village drunks ;
and, though there was much obstruction, particularly by the
young farmers, we have gradually substituted a good jflower-
show, athletics — in which I was supported by a fine young
fallow, son of a late well-known London prize-fighter —
winter concerts, and those things, and they all like them
now. In short," he said, ''if the world would read the
story of the pharisee and the publican every morning, and
aot on the moral, and believe that all people are fallible,
things would come right of themselves ; and so long as a
man has the courage to face the big men manfully, and to
ba firm and kind with the poor, and not pretend to be over-
righteous, both will respect you. ' Always disarm a man '
is my motto. The other day a busybody had a London
sar — a layman and a great Exeter Hall light — down to
p -each in a barn on a Sunday, and no doubt thought he
could annoy me. I called on the Londoner instantly, and
threw no impediment in his way, for the man behaved Hke
a gentleman, and did not preach in our church hours, and
he w^as perfectly astonished to find that I was not afraid of
his competition. Another day, a ' dissenting minister,' as
he called himself, whom I never saw before, came and
personally attacked me about hunting and about the
* Burials Bill,' and said that I was one of those who wanted
to keep him and his flock out of the churchyard ; and I told

The Country Parson, 143

him that I would bury him and all his flock for nothing
when they were ready, and that shut him up. Half the
mischief is done by giving a dog a bad name. When a poor
fellow has got into a scrape, the best thing is to give him
work, like old Jemmy does, and let him get his character
back. Why, look at that splendid horse-artiller}'man, whom
you saw in church, and who paid me a visit afterwards.
That fellow was the greatest scamp in the place, always
•drinking, fighting, and poaching, and when he enlisted I
persuaded his old mother, who was a httle above the world,
and who would have sold everything to raise the money to
get him off, to let him have his own way ; and he told me
that the sergeant of his company, or battery, prophesied his
fate at once — that he would either be flogged or make a
good soldier ; and he said he found his master directly, and
was determined to 2,0 strai^jht — and so he did. Beinsr fond
of horses, he soon became a favourite, and he has never been
in trouble, and is now a corporal. Bullying and psalm-
singing would never have done for that fellow ; and, take
my word for it, that the kind word in season is a power of
strength with all Englishmen. Promote then.' good, and
above all things theii' amusements, and give up lecturing
them morning, noon, and night, as if we were wholly
immaculate and they were all wrong, and all will go well.
Look at the charity of the poor, and see how much they do
out of almost nothing, and don't let those who go to parties
and clubs in London be always throwing the public-house
in their faces, A poor man who gets an unexpected pot of
beer always hands it round to friend and stranger. Do we
•do the same ? "

Now, all is from the life, and the moral is simple enough.
I suppose you have observed that the old-fashioned village
parson is very much supplanted often by cockneys of a
Jovver grade, very many of whom have not only not had any

144 The Country Parson.

university education, but are not gentlemen in manner or
feeling, and who are wholly incompetent for country
parsons. Some of these clip the Queen's English and talk
about 'oliness and 'eaven ; some of them, especially in
suburban parishes, make cliques among rich, vulgar people,
who live for show and originate mission meetings and
temperance meetings, and pepper people with stupid tracts
— all one-sided — with reference to the immorality of the
poor, whose ways and manners they never understood, and
whose amusements they don't support, though at their own
homes they are not above lawn tennis and claret cup, which
answer to the " beer and skittles " of the poor. They are
ready to go to extravagant stupid parties, and insist on all
people being very good on "the sabbath," and are horrified
at a parson playing a quiet rubber, or enjoying a run with
the hounds, or dancing, or going to the theatre. And why ?
Because they are muffs who can do nothing and have no
taste. What would they have said to the late Bishop
Selwyn's wish for the clergy to start theatres in large towns
for bringing out good plays for the edification of the
people ?

They are always wanting to start something new, but
won't use the materials they have. They will wake up
some fine morning and discover the Church to be in real
danger, and will be surprised to find that people will put
their hands quietly in their pockets and tell them it is their
own doing and they must save themselves, and that the only
places in which the real support will come, and /rowi which
it will take a hard fight to drive Mother Church, are
those in which the parson is the friend of rich and
poor, one of themselves, and living amongst them
r9C0gnising and taking part in all, which, properly en-
joyed, is harmless, and setting the example of goodness
and toleration.

TJie Country Parson. 145

A sporting parson and a parson who is fond of sport are
two very different beings. The man who is constantly
drinking and card-playing with his farmers loses their
respect and his own ; but one who appears at the covert-side
in his black cut-away and white tie, or in the village match ^
and says grace at the cricket dinner, is the right man in the
right place, and does a deal of good by his presence, and
makes his mark on Sunday, you may be sure. Men like
Charles Kingsley, the bold rider, who set his face against
vice, and who went to poor old^Cuffey, the Chartist,* because
he had no friends, and acquainted himself with the Chartist
grievances, are of the right stamp, too ; and so are some of
those splendid parsons, old university oarsmen and
cricketers, who understand roughs and work amongst the
costermongers and the lowest of the London poor, unseen
and unknown, who look at poverty and crime as their
battle-field. So are some of those on the mission
to seamen who go out to ships in the roadsteads
in the worst winter weather, one of whom, in advocating
the cause of his mission, said, " they only asked for food and
shelter, and assured his hearers that some of their body
were so poor, that the fishermen and boatmen on his station
sent anonymously a pilot coat and a tarpaulin suit for the
parson." And don't let us forget the late Bishop Selwyn,
formerly of iSTew Zealand, and afterwards of Lichfield, who
went on board of a frigate in the Pacific, against the preju-
dice of the sailors, and won all their hearts when they found
that he could pull as good an oar as they could, and could
sail a lugger as well as themselves. And when his cruise was
over, and he said a few kind, manly words, the crew asked
leave to man the yards and to give him a parting
cheer.

* Cattey was a Mulatto and Chartist leader, who had two year's
imprisonment under the Treason Felony Act.

146 The Country Parson,

If a voluntary church on the same principle as voluntary-
church rates is ever mooted, there is no fear for good old
country parishes or places (which have been unpolluted by
morbid fanatics who are all talk) in which well-educated
gentlemen profess to be men, like their parishioners, are the
parsons.

I PEEACH TO THE
PAESON.

^^ It is no use telling me that it is a harmless amusement/'
said the parson. " I will be bound to say that your
cricketers are in that room there at the Green Lion, drink-
ing and playing cards now, as I hear they are every
Saturday evening ; the police ought to indict the house,"

We were passing the Green Lion, a good old-fashioned
village inn, in which the principal common room was
bravely lit up, and from the shadows on the red blind there
■evidently was a numerous company.

" Now look here, parson ; you go on, and I will come in
presently, and tell you who are there and what they are
doing ; for I want to speak to them about a match next
week. I shall find most of them there."

The parson walked on to the vicarage, and your humble
servant went through the bar into the common room — ■
or, more strictly speaking, the icncom.m.on room, as it Avas
only for the use of the landlord's regular customers, and
strangers could not get in — and was greeted with a chorus
of " Good evening, sir ; what's the news ? " Not to spin
out this article with " padding," as is the custom in three-

L— 2

148 I Preach to the Parson,

volume novels, let me say that the news was that a match
was made, that an eleven was wanted, and, according to
ancient custom, a gallon of shandy-gafF was ordered in and
paid for to drink success to the eleven; and that being
done, the writer, having arranged the match, returned to
the vicarage to report as promised.

In this article I shall make the parson wholly a listener.
It must be understood that the Vicar and Mrs. Vicar too
were bombarding me with hot shot all the time, but conver-
sations in print are tedious. The talk, or whatever it may
be called, is a repetition of arguments which I have had
with very good men, who were cut the wrong way of the
stuff — I fear with no great success — in hopes of inducing
them to see the urgent necessity of looking after the village
sports, and getting at the people who delight in them.

" You are quite right, vicar," I said on entering; '' most
of the cricketers are there drinking, smoking, and playing
cards, and I have stood them a gallon of shandy-gafi, and
of course you say I set them a terrible example. The com-
pany present were, the landlord, the keeper, the bailiff's son,
and the beadle, who were playing four-handed cribbage, a
penny a corner and fourpence on the rubber ; which means
sixpence for a rubber of two games won, fivepence for a
rubber of three games, and the stakes w^ere all s^Dent on
shandy-gaff. The others are talking cricket, and some of
them watching the card-players, and bets of a j)int, or even
so much as a pot, were given and taken whilst I was there.
I know all the company, and they were very pleased to see
me ; they are all most respectable men, who work hard and
are sober and well-conducted ; and what you say is true,
they are always there every Saturday night, and probably
will be there for many a year as long as the present land-
lord goes on. It is quite true, as you say, that few of them
ever come to church, and that they hardly recognise you

/ Preach to the Parson, 149

when you meet them ; but they touch their hats to me
because I stand them beer. And there you are just wrong ;
it is not the beer, it is because my friends and myself get up
the cricket, and readings and concerts, and so sometimes
amuse them in the winter ; and pardon my home truths, your
party do not inaugurate a single amusement amongst them
to gain a laugh from New Year's Day to the following 31st
of December. The fact is, parson, you do not understand
what 2/ow call "the working classes," for the simple reason
that you were brought up in a cockney parish in London,
and don't understand village folk. You go on circulating
tracts on drunkenness and gambling, directed against men
such as I have seen to-night. Now listen to me. My
friends and myself have been with those men — for players
or non-players they are cricketers to a man — at home and
in out matches, and there is not a man amongst them with
a tendency to drink. They hold their Saturday night club
at the Green Lion regularly from eight till half -past ten,
and as regularly they play penny cribbage and talk village
politics or cricket ; in fact, the match which I announcd to-
night will keep them going till it is time to go home. I
know all you say about putting the money by in the
savings-bank instead of going to the Green Lion, where
probably each man will pay sixpence or eightpence ; but do
you talk so to your richer neighbours, when you go to their
dinner-parties and get indigestible green peas and young
potatoes in early spring, which are mostly imported from
the south of France and Algeria, and all sorts of extrava-
gances and expensive wines, which are produced for show
and not for hospitality, and the money spent on which
might go to the poor ? You have no idea how readily these
Green Lion men would rally round you if you would give
them the chance, and showed them a little sympathy.

*' They don't feel unkindly towards you, as you think ; it

150 I Preach to the Parson.

is just the other way, they don't understand you and you
don't understand them ; they give you credit for good
intentions, but they say they don't care about the Pope or
the missionaries, which are your two hobbies, and they
won'^b read the tracts ; and they won't come to your ser-
mons. To tell you the truth when the last grand garden
missionary party was held here, and the carriages were put
up at the Green Lion, the serious (?) coachmen and foot-
men, who were exhorted to band themselves together in
support of the poor negi^o, prefen^ed the cricket tent, and
turned out to be the most comical dogs, and spoke slight-
ingly of their black brother. Of course you say I ought to
have stopped the ridicule. Parson, I am only human, and
ridicule and the ' humorous ' are my weak points. I did
nob encourage them, but I died of laughter on the quiet ;
and so would you if you had heard a merry-eyed coachman
sj^eculate on his missus, an old maid in lavender silk that
would stand alone, marrying a nigger, and foreshadowing
the wedding festivities.

*' You know years ago the parson was generally one who
was bred and brought up in a country village, often a
country gentleman's youngest son, and would ride
and shoot and understand agriculture more or less^
and without being n-ecessarily a sporting parson, he
took his day's shooting^ or fishing sometimes; had a
knowledge and a sort of kinship Avith men of all classes,
saints and sinners, who want a friend in trouble.

" Remember this : the \allage Benevolent Club dinneiv
was never perfect unless the parson went and said grace,
and more than often it was so at the cricket dinner too^
and always so at the cricket supper, if — as was not unusual
— ^the vicar gave a haunch of mutton or a lamb to be played
for once a year ; i.e., the parson provided that much of the
east, and the losing side paid the extras. He just went in

/ Freach to the Parson. 151

and of course was asked to take the chair, which he never
dreamt of doing, and which they never expected him to do,
but they liked passing the compliment ; and he remarked :
I've just come to say a grace for you, and am glad you
have had a good match, and hope you'll enjoy yourselves this
evening, and mind to put the " stopper on " in time ; ' and
then there was a good laugh, and with that word in season
the parson said grace and went off, and they gave him a
linging cheer.

" You must know, parson, I am older than you, and I
remember the E,eform riots which spread into the country
villages more or less, and the parsons, who knew and were
beloved by their parishioners, had great power and influence
for good. Now what I want to draw your attention to is
this ; that a very little goes a long way, and it is not too
late to draw my friends of the Green Lion Club to you.
Mind, what I tell you is true ; it is not so long ago when
you we -e walking across the cricket-green, when a match
was going on, that one of the rough fellows made a
shameful remark about you, and that a man, who is your
favourite aversion, because he once fought another man in
a roped ring for £10 and a barmaid,* punched his head on
the spot. Yes, Mrs. Vicar, you may laugh, but it is true ;
and come now, parson, with your snake head, and broad
shoulders and sturdy figure, weren't you a good one with
the gloves at Balliol ? Of course you won't say ' yes ' ; but
depend upon it, Mrs. Vicar, when he was twenty, if he had
taken to the Prize Ring, and had appeared with his hair
cut short and in fighting trim as a novice, every one would

* This is literally true. I had " the office," but was afraid to go
because of " Mrs. Grundy." The winner pocketed the ten pounds
and refused the lady. It was a dona fide lovers' quarrel, and the
lady was very respectable. The ten pounds were only the ransom
of the "knights' armour "

152 / Preach to the Parson.

have backed him.'' [Here let me come in as chorus, and
say that the vicar and Mrs. Yicar and your humble servant
shrieked with laughing when I explained (what I believe),
that the vicar's head would have driven any man's knuckles
up.] " Now, if you will do what I ask it will make such a
difference, and it is simply this : The next time there is a
match, walk up to the tent and see how it is going, and say
* Good morning,' and that you hope they are enjoying
themselves ; you would be as welcome as flowers in May,
and I tell you what they would say : ' Now that vicar ain't
half a bad sort,' and that is just what I should like to hear
them say of you — and they iDoidd say the truth. They are
your enemies and mine who tell you that we let ourselves
down by going to the cricket suppers two or three times in
the year, and singing our songs at the Green Lion. You
never knew pei-haps, but it is no less true, that the gentle-
men who joined us in this move took this cricket up on one
condition, which was, that if any siager made a blackguard
of himself, we would never bring another eleven down ; and
the ladies, who at our request have come to the ladies' tent
will tell you that they never hear a rough word ; in fact
the people are their own police now, and the ladies' tent has
had a good effect. Now look here, parson, I tell you when
you missed a rare chance. If you remember when I brought
down the " Civil Service," who I told you they were mostly
old University men, and men of good family, and that they
were going to dine at two o'clock with our village eleven,
and I asked you to come and say grace, and to introduce
you to them, and at the last moment some one persuaded
you not to. It was a great chance, mind, but it is too late.
You see, parson, you were brought up amongst too good
people, and you have only seen one side of life. I know
and have studied roughs. Asa young man my delight was
10 mix in large crowds, and to study the rough as a brother-

/ Preach to the Farson. 153

man

...... I have known prize-fighters, navvies, long-shore men

by the Thames, men in night cellars, and what you call the
scum of the earth ; have smoked the friendly pipe with the
coster, and discussed burglary as a science with one of the
greatest burglars ever known in Newgate, and fished with
the late hangman, Mr. Calcraft — a good fisherman,
naturalist, and florist, who hated his calling— without his
having the remotest idea that I knew who he was. Jack
Ketch was fishing in Hertfordshire, and I did not know
who he was when our conversation commenced ; but when
I did know, though the situation was peculiar, I did not
see why I should shrink from him ; in fact, I was rather
pleased to think that he had an innocent amusement. I
have not gone as a missionary, but have sat down among
them as fellow-men. I have seen the most brilliant jewels
set in the roughest casket, and I have heard noble senti-
ments expressed, and seen deeds of charity done worthy of
the Good Samaritan, accompanied by language which would
make your hair stand on end ; and I will tell you a secret
—you may attract them all to you, but all the preaching at
them will not influence them the least, because the preaching
is not preceded by the kind word in season in private. That
is the antidote to the rough language.

" Now I want to get you on about these sports. You
say that you hear the fellows use bad language playing
quoits ; and the very name of skittles is an abomination.
Very true ; because all sports w^ere condemned by the
Puritans, and driven into low beershops. You want all
kind of amusements now, skittles — a manly game-
promoted and publicly played on the green, the same
as cricket, football, and parish organisation of all classes
for aU sports, and yourself as patron of all. We
don't want you to come; your friendly nod on
passing by will do it. When I was a boy at school, the

154 I Preach to the Parson.

King of Second Masters, whose windows opened on to
' Chamber Court/ sometimes heard ' tall talk/ which was
not intended for his ear, uttered in anger. How well I
pemember, days afterwards, in speaking on some school
matters, he would in the kindest way remind the offender
of what he had heard, and, prefacing his remarks with
* Mind, I am speaking to you as your friend and not as
your master,' he would say a few touching words to him
with his hand on the boy's shoulder. And, Yicar, I
often feel that hand on my shoulder,' as if he was with
me now sometimes. You must remember w^hen it was a
tight-fit Avith you, about three or four parish matters, when
those like yourself, who w^ere interested in cricket, got all
the cricketers' families, and all the people whom they could
influence, to back 3^ou ; and how the vestry had to be ad-
journed to the school-room, and all the ratepayers who,
to adopt the low expression, * used ' the parlour of the
Green Lion, and their friends, came and swamped your
foes. Let me talk to you like a man and a brother. They
did that because you subscribed a guinea to the cricket.
They all lament your apathy ; but the guinea was a living
proof. And see how injudicious some of you are, 'ram-
paging " about the iniquity of races, just in the race time?
when most of the congregation are going to them, or going
to have parties to see the people return, and every soul
in the parish hopes to turn a penny somehow or another.
Why, the dissenting linen-draper's shop is a blaze of green
and blue veils. I agree w4th you entirely, that it would
be no great loss to the parish if the Derby was abolished ^
as the crowd has now become very rough and disorderly,
and a lot of our fellows get drunk and keep drunk— not
our cricketers, mind you — but so they would if w^e had a
Royal procession through the parish or any other public
show or holiday. Nine-tenths of your audience who go.

I P reach to the Parson, 155

are going to see a good race or to enjoy a harmless pio-
nic, and ifc is H.9^ the racing wliich is iniquitous: it is the
contingent of London roughs who do the mischief.

'' What I am driving at all along, parson, is this : all
the parish want to put you at the head of all innocent
enjoyments, but unfortunately there are a clique whom you
allow to pull the strings for you; there always are a
puritanical set whom you are afraid of offending, who
neither care for art, nor music, nor fun, nor sports, and
who are muffs, and want to spoil sports in others ; who
will not allow their sons to play cricket with ' the vulgar
fellows' in the parish; and I am very glad they do not,
as they are muffs, and snobs into the bargam very often,
and who would faint if they sat down with the black-
smith and carpenter at a cricket supper. Why, when the
cricket was wholly in the hands of the public-houses, the
club-room windows used to be shut because the parishioners
complained of ribald songs which could be heard on the
green ; but now they insist on the wmdows being opened
that they may hear the songs, and often the audience on
the green carry an encore against ' the room.' They cannot
understand that men of that class never take a liberty with
gentlemen who mix with them occasionaUy ; and depend
upon this— when the struggle about the Chiu-ch comes,
which is not far off, the contingent brought in by those
who support the amusements of the parish, whether in the
cricket ground, at village concerts, or anything else, will do
you more good than all resolutions and speeches at public
meetings, and religious agitation.

" You see, English people are not like foreigners, who
have a wonderful knack of amusing themseves. Go to a
garden in the suburbs of a foreign town on a Sunday
afternoon— ah ! I forgot; the idea horrifies you about
Sunday; but please remember that foreigners keep their

156 / Preach to the Parson,

vigil on Saturday, and thus Sunday practically is over at
twelve o'clock. On Sunday I said-well, I will add any
fete day-and then you will see them playing cards for some
wnie of the value of a sous a glass, perhaps, at dominoes or
nnie-pms, and dancing to a band without any rudeness or
vulgarity, or laughing at a punchinello or performing dogs;
and you hear shouts of merry laughter ; and the old people
sit by, the old men smoking their pipes, and their old wives
with them. Look at that country girl with her white cap
and long ear-rings, dancing with the man in the blue blouse.
My wigs ! what monkey-capers he cuts ! There is this
difference with us: a modest girl does not dare stand up
to dance in public in England without being insulted by
the insufferable 'Arrys, and so they fall to at kiss-in-the-
ring, and I grant you that is not a very elevating pastime.
'' You say that I want the continental Sunday in Eng-
land mc^ your ' Sabbath,' which I own is very sad, and
which I improve in my own way in my garden which
no one can see into, so I don't offend my neighbour. I
must tell you straight off, we play lawn tennis after the
early dinner, and the servants have perfect rest till 8 p.m.
I believe in Sunday rest from labour ; and I tell you the
actors would not act seven days a week, and people don't
want theatres and music-halls open— the idea goes against
the English grain And I would not bring out my viUage
eleven because it would make a crowd and annoy my
neighbours, but I do subscribe to a Sunday Cricket Club
of poor fellows who work all the week, and who get to an
out-of-the-way place and play cricket ; and their rules are
threepence fine for any bad language, and a shilliug for
bringing beer or spirits out, as they are honestly fighting
the question of ' harmless amusement v. public-house,' and
it is tJipAr battle captained and led by themselves without
interference.

/ Preach to the Parson. 157

*' So_, parson, do loosen the strings a little ; don't pass your
little edicts against the gallery for joining in a chorus, if I
sing a homely song with a tally-ho refrain at a penny
reading. Don't get up and say, ' Silence, if you please.'
Let them sing it if they like. The chorus may be
noisy, but there is nothing immoral in a good ' coal-
box.' Don't be hard on the club at the Green Lion,
and don't invite the police to interfere. The landlord of
the Green Lion never had a word against his house, as you
know ; and if the cribbage is beyond the law, take my word
for it there is no perdition in ' one for his nob or two for
his heels ' (' eels,' as Mr. Bumble, the beadle, calls it) ; and
if you saw Mr. Bumble at the critical points of ' Hole and
Hole,' at the bottom of the second row, which he calls
' level chalks,' putting down his pipe and wiping his face
with excitement, why, parson, you would burst out
laughing. You don't see it, parson, but I do, when I go in
to see them about cricket. The misfortune is that the
Green Lion Club cannot do what they would do if they
were foreigners. Mind, I am not one of those who go
abroad and abuse everything at home. Well, I say if they
were foreigners you would see half the club, in the summer,
sitting outside on the green playing that game of cribbage
boldly in the pubHc gaze, and you would see the \T.llage curey
with his umbrella under his arm, looking over Mr. Bumble's
cards, as interested as Mr. Bumble at the trjang ordeal of
' level chalks ' and first player. You w^ould see the skittles
openly played. What do you get now instead ? The black-
guard cocoa-nut men, whose language j)ollutes the air, and
whom you ought to put the police upon. I will give you
all in that ' Society ' have made cards and billiards and
theatres (many of them), as now conducted, quicksands for
evil, and that local racing has come to a blackguard jDitch ;
but do take it from me that your parishioners who are fond

158 I Preach to the Parson.

of sport and music and manly recreations want encouraging
by you, and if you would get a thorough gentlemen for
curate, who is a man of earnest purpose and a muscular
Christian, he would turn half the roughs in the place lound
his finger, and your church would not half hold the people.
Your feelings prejudice you. You are not friendly to old
Father Peter, the Roman Catholic priest ; he is an intimate
friend of mine, a dear old man, a rare scholar, a good
musician and florist. He has tried hard to convert me, and
only the other night I told him if there had been another
squeeze of potteen in the bottle, or a drop more hot water,
he could have done it. He offered to put the kettle on
again, but 1 preferred a return match and to begin de novo.
So I was within a glass of punch of being a Roman Catholic,
and of training an eleven of priests, as most certainly I
should have done. Ah ! yon say that you will give me as
^ood a glass of mountain-dew as Father Peter, and I may
have a pipe ; done along of you, parson, and — no, Mrs.
Parson, I won't keep him up late, and we will keep good
hours, as my friends at the Green Lion doP

PEE -RAILWAY LIFE IN
LONDON.

How shall I begin to describe " Life in London" at a period
between the early days of her present Majesty and the
railway mania ? After the model of Tom and Jerry, or of
Sir Mulberry Hawk, and Lord Yerisopht, those four dreary
snobs who never could have lived, or if they ever did, never
could have been in the society of any English gentlemen ?
Heaven forbid. Let me imagine myself standing, as I
often stand, in Westminster Abbey with reverent awe before
the statue of Joseph Addison, the busts of Macaulay and
Thackeray, my three favourite authors : and let me invoke
the shade of the second named to lend me a little of the fire
w^hich inspired him when he wrote the wonderful chapter
on the state of England in 1685. So here goes for the
Macaulayan veiu.

I purpose to write the history of London life from the
year 184:0 down to the year 1846 or thereabouts, a period
within the memory of all middle-aged men now living.

London of that period consisted of a large city sur-
rounded by numerous outlying villages and districts, and
not wholly shut in by houses as now. From Primrose Hill
to Highgate, Hampstead, or Hornsey, lay open tracts of
159

160 Pre-Bailway Life in London,

fields and meadows interspersed with villa residences and
rural retreats. Piinlico and Chelsea were comparatively
small suburban towns — in fact tea gardens stood on the
site of the present Post Office outside Buckingham Palace,
and from Battersea Bridge to Wimbledon the foot-passenger
found himself amid corn-fields and market-gardens, where
now a network of railways and Clapham Junction Station
occupy the ground ; and the beautiful park of Battersea
was a large swampy district, where, in hard winters, the
sportsman would not ba surprised to find the plover, the
snipe, or even an occasional wild duck. The fashionable
quarter of London might be included within an area roughly
defined by imaginary lines drawn from Belgrave Square to
Portman S.][uare, thence eastward to Cavendish Square,
thence southward to Palace Yard, the base being a line
drawn from that point back to Belgravia. Almost the
whole of modern South Kensington w\is in the hands of
market gardeners, and in the Bayswater district beyond
Kensington Gardens Gate semi-rural places of entertain-
ment still existed, in Avhich on Sunday afternoons the cheap
dandy shop-boy would smoke his Cuba cigar and imbibe his
beer, whilst the faithful Anna Maria, his fiancee^ w^ould
consume her tea and shrimps.

For some reason or another the London season proper
never set in until after Easter, in consequence of a prejudice
against the fashionable world going to balls or operas, or
marrying or intermarrying in Lent; and "Society" being
more restricted than now, the dread of " what Mrs, Grundy
would say " prevented people from doing as they pleased to
a great extent.

Possibly at the period of which we write, which was
within a year or two of the commencement of the reign,
and the early married life of the present Queen, London
en fete ^vas a spe3tacle which it is dilfioult to realise now

Pre-Bailway Life in London. 161

Beyond a few trunk lines of railway's between the metropolis
and Southampton, Birmingham, Brighton, and a few other
places, London was isolated from the world at large, except
to those who had time and money for long and expensive
road journeys, and the - gaiety of the season " was as much
a mystery to the majority of Her Z^Iajesty's subjects, as
now It is a commonplace treat to our country cousins, who,
at a little cost, can witness with their own eyes the
splendoLU" of the modern Babylon.

A Queen's birthday in the earlier portion of the fifth
decade of this century, was a day to be marked with a
white stone. There was not much romance about the
reigns of George IV. and William IV., but a young Queen,
who ascended the throne in her eighteenth year drew all
hearts to her. First, on the morning of the birthday, came
the early review of the Household Brigade, when the Queen
would arrive on the ground surrounded by a brilliant staff,
at the head of which would be the Iron Duke, accompanied
by the old Peninsula officers. There might be seen the
Marquis of Anglesea sitting on a charger, which required a
bold rider and a steady hand to manage, and Lord Fitzroy
Somerset and Viscount Combermere, the Marquis of
Londonderry, and Sir Henry Hardinge, and many others,
who had perilled life and limb in putting down the tyrant
of Europe, and estabUshing a peace which lasted for 'forty
years. Afterwards would come the drawing-room and the
grand show of rank and beauty, and of horses and equipa-es
which were unrivalled in Europe. Then came later on,
after the drawing-room, the display in the Park, when the
Royal party would appear, and receive the silent and
respectful homage of a brilliant crowd of the fashionable
world; and at night most probably the Queen would be
found as one of the audience at the Opern.

And what an opera it was. There being but one the

162 Pre-Bailway Life in London.

managers were enabled to collect the finest talent in
Christendom. To the outside world, who were not
subscribers, going bo the opera required much care and fore-
thought. On a subscription night, with the exception of
the galleries and gallery stalls, and close, stuffy boxes high
up, where seeing and hearing were almost impossible, the
only refuge was the pit, the seats of which were not only
as uncomfortable as they could be, but were, from some
unknown cause, generally occupied before those who had
paid some four or five shillings beyond the nominal price of
eight shillings and sixpence, reached the much-coveted
destination ; and the ticket-holders thought themselves
fortunate if they could obtain standing room with their
backs to a wall or a column. No one could pass the doors
except in full evening dress, and woe be to the unlucky
wight who came in a black neck-cloth, as he would be
certain of refusal, in spite of all remonstrance. It was a
glorious sight on a birthday night to see the boxes crowded
with beautiful women wearing their Court plumes, and
jewels which vied with the flash of bright eyes, and it was
not difficult to know when the Royal party had arrived, as
without any commotion or bustle, faces were all turned
in the same direction, and the words "the Queen,"
passed from lip to lip throughout the audience.
How fresh the scene all comes to one's mind now ; of old
Lablache in the supper scene in " Don Giovanni " singing,
and eating the macaroni from a side table the while ; of
Grisi in the poisoning scene of " Lucre tia Borgia," keeping
the door with outspread arms, and giving the antidote to
INIario. It is a well-authenticated fact that Grisi felt this
and many similar scenes so keenly, that frequently she came
oflf in a violent fit of hysterics, and required medical aid to
restore her. Again, one hears the grand " Suoni la tomba "
in " Puritani," the ghost chorus in *' Sonnambula," and the

Fre-Bailivay Life in London. 163

noble quartette in the " Don ; " and reminiscences of the
great singers come back to the mind ; and the figures of the
dancers, Taglioni, Elsler, Cerito, Carlotta Grisi, and Lucille
Grahn, not forgetting Perot and St, Leon, flit across the
stage. People should have seen the old ojDera ballet of the
past to understand what ballet dancing was when the
danseuses had to tell a story in dumb show. When the old
basket-maker, who drank on the sly from a bottle concealed
under his chair, was found sitting outside his trellis-work
cottage at early morning, scolded in good-humoured dumb
show by his old wife, who was preparing an al fresco break-
fast of wooden loaves and indiarubber grapes, and paper
apples, and the audience saw impossible peasants, male and
female, coming down an impossible mountain, the males
with gold reaping-hooks, and atcired in striped stockings
and the girls with striped stockings too, and carrying
bouquets of paper and muslin flowers ; everybody knew
what would happen. The villagers would all come round
the old lady and shake hands, whilst the old gentleman had
another pull at the bottle, and would point to a lattice-
window with smiling expression, whilst the men clinked
their reaping-hooks and drank bumpers of nothing out of
gold cups, filled from a bottle the size of an imperial pint ;
and the girls danced for glee, and in dumb show offered
their tribute of flowers, whereon the old woman would enter
the cottage, obviously for the purpose of calling her
daughter — for of course nobody else could be upstaii's. And
when the villagers had danced themselves out, and retired
to rest on banks and seats, the daughter would come to
family prayers in the way that is common to the beauties of
Spain or Ttaly ; in fact, the reigning favourite woidd reach
the centre of the stage with two or three bounds, and turn
a pirouette, and drop into a curtsey to the crash of the
orchestra, and would receive an ovation which an emperor
M— 2

164 Tre-'Railway Life in London.

might covet. Of course the old wounded soldier with a
wooden leg, who enters and tells the horrors of war in dumb
show, excites the compassion of all, and naturally enough
the old lady places him in a chair and provides another
banquet, and the villagers retire, and the old gentleman
goes to sleep ; and what more natural that the old soldier
should throw off his venerable locks, kick away his wooden
leg, and come out a brilliant young cavalier, and bound
about like a cork with the basket-maker's daughter ? And
of course no one but Perot or St. Leon could have done
this.

The ballet dancers required to be good actresses as well
as dancers. Without following the Paul Pry fashion of
describing great people at home, the writer of this records
that he heard, only a week or two since, from the lips of
possibly the most distinguished dancer ever known, now a
charming grey-headed lady, who was the 'premiere danseuse
in the celebrated j9as de quatre, her opinion of the modern
ballet dancing. I need hardly say the lady was Madame
Taglioni.

In answer to his question Avhether she had seen the
modern dancing, she said : '' Oh ! it is terrible ; to think
that women should so dress, and that ladies should go to
see them. No ! Taglioni," speaking of herself, '' never
danced so." It was very pleasant to bring all the old
puppets out and put them before her, in memory, again,
and to witness her dehght at having their names once more
presented to her mind, amongst others, that of a dis-
tinguished exile who was afterwards an emperor, and
long since dead. " Ah, poor Prince Louis Napoleon," she
exclaimed; "he had not much money then, but he was
very nice, and they never refused him a box."

The opera naturally brings us to the omnibus box and
Fops Alley, the rendezvous for the dandies and men of

Pre-Bailway Life in London. 165

fashion in London, who had the entree behind the scenes
and paid their respects to the grand opera stars. The
London men of fashion mostly consisted of officers in the
Household Brigade and members of military clubs, elder
sons who were idle men, gay young members of either
House of Parliament, and cadets of noble families who
were in the Treasury or Foreign Office, or those who
fancied they were reading for the bar. They were always
well bred and weU dressed, and if there was a taste of
puppyism about some of them, it was only external and not
very unnatural in young men who had been spoilt from
childhood. There was no doubt about their pluck, as has
been proved from time immemorial, by the graves of many
a hard-fought battle-field, and they never were rude or
obtrusive in any way. They were scrupulously particular
about good breeding, and would never have dreamt of
appearing at the West End with a cigar in their mouths
after twelve o'clock in the day, or of nodding to Phryne or
Lais in the parks, unless they wished to receive the penalty
of ostracism by the dowagers who ruled society. They
were just as much at home by the ring side, or in a boxer's
sparring room, when they put on the gloves with Tom, or
Jack, or Harry, or any other rising novice, for what was
usually called a " bellyful," as they were in a drawing-room
or the opera. The crowd styled them the Corinthians, or
the Swells, and nothing pleased them better than seeing a
young lord riding his own horse in a steeple-chase in the
Harrow country, and coming in a winner one mass of mud
from head to foot.

The race-course was a great place for the swells. Their
well-appointed drag, not so common as now, attracted
general attention, and it was great fun to hear '' Jerry,"
the king of the card-sellers and turf characters, attii^ed in a
cocked-hat and wearing an eye-glass, go up to a four-iu-

166 Pre-Bailway Life in London.

hand, on the roof of which sat men of the highest rank,
and invite himself to some kmcheon and champagne — which
he was sure to have — and — regardless of rank — to hear him
remark to a well-known earl, " Ches, my boy, George (a
prince of the blood) looks a little peaky this morning ; and
' Maidstone ' does not seem up to the mark, and handsome
Jamie looks as if he was crossed in love." The dandies of
those days were far different from the class who, on the
return from the races, drink champagne out of tankards by
the roadside in some country village to the admiration of
suburban snobs.

Some of them lost fortunes at hazard or on the turf, and
occasionally were locked up in a sponging-house for debt,
but many set manfully to work again, and in the colonies
or elsewhere made for themselves a name and position.

The ruffianism of London was supported by a class whose
natural history was written by Albert Smith under the
name of " The G-ent," and an odious class they were. For
them the Haymarket taverns and night saloons and supper
rooms were kept open all night ; and they were the last
supporters of Greenwich Fair, and the orgies of Yauxhall
masquerades, where, under a bright morning sun, Eichard
Coeur de Lion and a Troubadour might have been seen
engaged in a drunken fight, aided and abetted by their
companions who, as Mary Queen of Scots and a nun
respectively, backed their male companions with a volley of
oaths which exceeded the Billingsgate of the men.

The fact was that " complimentary " tickets for masquer-
ades were issued wholesale amongst the lowest of the low ;
as was proved by a young " lady " behind the bar of a very
flash drinking-shop in the Haymarket remarking to a
friend — " We are all going to the feet " (fete) " at Vauxhall,
dear, as shepherdesses ; and Mrs. B. (the landlady, a stout,
red-faced woman, with fingers like Cambridge sausages.

Pre-Bailioay Life in London, 167

covered with large rings) " is going as DiAanner ; and she
looks very 'andsome in a blue and silver dress, with a bow
and arrers in her 'and, and a 'alf moon in her 'air." Most
men " did the rounds of London " once or twice, but that
was quite enough for anyone with a mind.

Weippart provided a band and a good ball-room for
gentlemen who wanted a little quiet dancing — at a tariff far
beyond the reach of "the Gent" — at which no one was
admitted except in full dress ; and, though the dancers were
mostly members of the corps de ballet of the Opera, of a
higher grade than the ordinary ballet gir\ of to-day, no one
would know, from their dress, manners, and appearance, that
(but for the fact of the paucity of chaperones) it was not a
private ball. Perhaps it was rather a bore to be constantly
asked by your partner to take a ticket for her own or her
sister's ball for the next week ; but the dancers, who were
many of them dancing mistresses, and probably received some
small payment for attending the balls, found the amusement,
and wanted the money, and it was hard to say " No."

One very funny scene occurred at one of these balls
many years ago. A young member of the legislature had
made his maiden speech in Parliament that night, and they
stood him on a table in the ball-room, and made him give it
all over again.

Whether the story is accurately true in all its details or
not matters little, as tales of this kind, which were freely
circulated and believed at the time, show the spirit of the
age, as Macaulay says. On a certain occasion one of those
underbred fellows who poison every rill and stream of
innocent pleasure, and miike it impossible to have dancing
in public as they do abroad, obtained an entree to one of
Wieppart's ballet balls, and being much enamoured of a fair
danseuse, invited her to a Richmond dinner on the following
Sunday. The fair dcmseuse said she would not come alone,

168 Pre-Railway Life in London.

but must bring a friend. The offer was gladly accepted,
and arrangements were made that the beau should bring a
friend also. A boon companion readily agreed to share the
dinner and the expense, and a private room was engaged at
the Star and Garter, and a banquet, regardless of cost, was
ordered, with bouquets for the ladies. The two amorous
swains arrived and heard that the ladies were before them.
With rapture the founder of the feast beheld his fair partner,
wearing a charming bonnet which he had sent her, waiting
for him in the garden, and accompanied her into the hotel
for the purpose of introducing his brother Lothario to the
other lady. On entering the room the young lady intro-
duced a stout, middle-aged woman with a squint (who in
private life kept a greengrocer's shop), temporarily occupied
pending the dinner hour with a glass of rum and water,
strongly flavoured with sugar and lemon, as '^ her mamma."
And before the hour of departure arrived that middle-aged
lady, who displayed a wonderful power of digestion and
thirst, somewhat sharply wanted to know the young man's
intentions towards her " darter," whom she took home under
her own wing.

As regards the sports of the period they were quieter
than those of the present day. The Oxford and Cambridge
boat race which was rowed before the days of outriggers
from Westminster to Putney attracted a few thousand
spectators who were interested in rowing or belonged to
either university, and there was plenty of room for all to
see or for equestrians to ride along the banks. The Public
School matches at Lord's — which were stopped through the
pig-headed obstinacy of a few dons — attracted a goodly
assemblage of relatives and friends of the boys, without any
extravagant crowds. Lord's was then, as now, the head
centre of cricket, and crowds such as are seen now never
assembled, except when Kent v. England, or Gentleman v.

Pre-Baihvay Life in London. 169

Players was the match, at either of which the best talent,
amateur and professional, were sure to be present.

In the autumn, gentlemen shot over dogs, and never
dreamt of selling their game, and they were the masters,
and the keepers were their servants. In the newspaper
world only a few morning papers and evening papers were
published in London. " Bell's Life " was almost the only
sporting paper. One or two scurrilous Sunday papers came
out, especially " The Satirist," edited by a very talented man
named Barnard Gregory, who was hooted off the stage, on
his attempt to play Hamlet, through the instigation of
^' Stunning Joe Banks," of the Rookery, who kept a very
^' rowdy " public-house in St. Giles's, a favourite resort for a
well-known Irish marquis and his companions when they
were out for a night's '' devilry." It was alleged tliat Mr.
Banks was hired by a foreign Duke to pack the gallery and
drive Mr. Gregory off the stage, and an action for conspiracy
was brought against the Duke and another, in which Mr.
Banks was examined, and swore that he packed the gallery
at his own expense in the interest of morality ! The judge
w^ho tried the case, and who lived in the parish of St.
George's, Bloomsbary, in summing up, told the jury that if
they believed the witness he should congratulate himself in
having such a moral neighbour as Mr. Banks! In 1846
came the railway mania, and then came chaos. All the
countr}^ towns were brought to London, and all England
gambled and went mad, and hundreds were ruined.
Millionaires arose, and not only took possession of the
world of fashion in London, but also of many of the country
seats, and classes got so mixed that it was difficult to un-
ravel the skein. A new description of people came into the
Legislature and the Government. Railways sprang up
ev^ery where, since which period telegraphs and telephones
have been introduced, and we boast almost of omnipresence

170 Pre'Baihoay Life in London,

and omnipotence. The Atlantic is only a ferry now, and
people think no more of going to India, or South America,
or Australia, or New Zealand for a trip than they used to
think of going to Scotland or Ireland forty years
ago. It is hard to say when H's were first commonly drop-
ped in conversation in Belgravia, and when peas were first
carried with the knife to the mouth ; but these eccentri-
cities are of minor importance compared with the intemper-
ance in language and in writing which have cropped up
within the last few years amongst people who have had the
advantage of good education and the society of ladies and
gentlemen ; but it is certain that in the so-called darker
age of which the paper treats, the flatly denying a gentle-
man's word, and throwing imputation on his honour would
have occasioned the burning of powder at Wimbledon Com-
mon or Chalk Farm.

It must not be forgotten that in 1841 " Punch " was
inaugurated, and within a few years of its commencement
possibly the finest staff of caricaturists with pen and pencil
ever known were brought together, and it is astonishing
that after nearly forty years the artists can find so much
novel wealth for amusement, and it is a matter of wonder
that even now sometimes the gossip runs through the clubs
that some careful reader has found a joke in the letterpress.

Few people would like to go back to the old days en-
tirely, and, but for the inexhaustible power of jaw displayed
inside and outside of the House of Commons, the world goes
on pretty comfortably, though it is hard for quiet citizens
to rest at a time when, from mere greed of power, so-called
" public men," are forgetting the boundaries of truth and
honour, and in bidding for the support of the lower orders
are utterly reckless of drifting into Communism, and the
link between the Swells of Society and the lower orders if
not actually broken is strained beyond recovery.

THE OLD DOVEE EOAD.

The sudden change from an isolated rural village in the-
Wiltshire downs, which was nine miles from any town,
and which could not even support a carrier, to a new home,
situate halfway between London and Dover, natm^ally
made no slight impression on the mind of a little boy, as I
was at the time of my removal, just half a century ago, and,
with your leave, good reader, I will set down a few memo-
randa. In busy times at least a hundred pubHc convey-
ances, including travelling carriages with post horses, would
pass our gate in a day ; and Sittingbourne and Eochester,
a few miles on either side of my home, being great posting
places, with ample hotel accommodation, I saw a great deal
of the pre-railway travelling in the olden tune. It was a
great treat to me to watch the rows of postboys sitting m
front of the principal inns, attiied in long white smock-
frocks, the yellow-white hat peculiar to their class, ready
booted and spurred, lazily smoking their pipes until sum-
moned. They sprang into action quickly enough at
the cry of " first and second turn out ! " and ran up the
inn-yard, and reappeared in their smart red jackets, striped
waistcoats, and white neckcloths ; and sometimes two, or
even three, carriages would arrive together, requiiing twelve
horses and six postboys, and I have seen the row of smock-
171

172 The Old Dover Road.

frocks reduced to a very small company in a short time,
when there was an exodus from London to the continent, or
vice versa. Then the argus-eyed ostler, whose duty seemed
to be to drink with every traveller, and whose notice nothing
escaped, would catch sight of a little feather-weight ex-
press-boy, on a long-legged, lean old thorougbred, galloping
up, and the cry would be heard, " Express boy on ! " and
another little feather-weight boy, attired in red jacket, blue
waistcoat bound with gold braid, gold band round his hat, a
cockade,and diminutive breeches and boots, would bring out
anotherlong-leggedjlean old thoroughbred,and would take the
despatch-bag, with the simple instructions," Government,"
'' Rothschilds," or " Press," as the case might be, and start off
at a hand gallop, and be as much bespattered with mud in
a few minutes as the little jockey who had just delivered his
budget of news, having ridden the eleven-mile stage in forty-
five minutes, and who had just dismounted and undone the
saddle-girths, turning his panting steed, which was in a
regular lather, with his head to the wind.

But landlords and landladies most rejoiced when the
courier, swinging himself off the rumble, would run up the
steps of the hotel with much importance, with an order for
" two sitting-rooms and eight bedrooms for the Duke of
Blank's, or Lord and Lady Dash's party." And wasn't the
order repeated loud enough ? and didn't all the bells ring ?
and didn't we all stare ?— that's all. And didn't the land-
lord and landlady come and hand them out, and give them
their titles? " Yes, your Grace," and "No, your Grace."
There were no pot-hats and ulsters then ; and Her Grace or
my Lady Countess wore an enormous big bonnet, with her
long curls full of dust, and her noble husband had on an
uncomfortable hat, very broad at the top, with shirt-collar
up to his eyes, and the collar of his greatcoat — which was
made with two buttons in the small of his back — up to his

The Old Dover Boad. 173

ears, and impossible outside pockets on his hips, which were
so tight that nothing could be got in or out of them.

Verily our dress has improved now — in proof whereof
we have set the fashion to all Europe — and so has our
social comfort as regards airy bedrooms, vice swell over-
furnished dungeons, lighted at night by a rushlight in a
horrible perforated bucket-like apparatus, w^hich made
ghost-eyes all over the room ; baths, and rough towels, and
brown Windsor, vice the small basin and jug, and hard
white soap which smelt like tallow and never lathered, and
soft towels like napkins ; iron spring beds and hau* mat-
tresses, vice enormous feather-beds and four-posters, shut in
with curtains and every kind of device which could produce
gout, apoplexy and indigestion. And then in winter they
warmed the bed with coals, and left a fine flavour of
Vesuvius for a niohtmare.

And you may be sure that the landlady herself showed
her noble guests into their rooms ; and if the weather was
cold, there was a fire ready burning in the bedrooms. And
you may be sure the landlord took in the first dish at dinner,
and called his Grace's attention to the fact that he had
ventured to add to the dinner some Rochester smelts, fresh
caught that morning, or — according to season — that the
Kentish filberts were from a celebrated orchard ; or the
Kentish cherries had only just been picked for his Grace's
dessert, and that the oysters came from the Milton beds
close by. Ah me ! native oysters were carried about the
villages then three for a penny. Why didn't I eat more ?
Dr. Johnson, when he was dying, said he had never had as
much wall-fruit as he could eat ; I expect the present
generation will say, when theii' time comes, they never had
enough oysters.

Our stage-coaches, with " the team all harnessed to start,
glittering in brass and in leather," and piled with luggage,

174 The Old Dover Eoad,

made a brave show, but they only promoted a brandy-and-
water and glass of beer trade by the way, as coaches seldom
stayed anywhere on our road, as the opposition was very
great, and the competition in rapid change of horses very
keen. I can see the foreigners now, all over dust in summer,
and miserable if it rained. They didn't enjoy their travelling
much, as I suppose the bitterness against England had not
worn out, and coachmen said it was a miracle to get a
shilling out of them, and some of them, when understanding
that a tip was expected of them, would bring out a few
sous, with " Ah, je comprends; c'est pour boire, monsieur ! "
And what pleasant music the horn, and the tramp of the
horses, and the rattling of the harness made, on a clear
frosty night, when we were all snug under the clothes ; and
how it cheered watchers by sick-beds to hear for a moment
the stir of life outside.

There were little amenities in those days which we miss
now. If a commercial traveller gave one a lift, or a visitor
was coming or going from the house, or the coachman had
to leave a basket of fish from London, a glass of sherry or
cherry brandy, or a bouquet of flowers, or a basket of
strawberries cost nothing, and were thought a great deal of.
Never shall I forget the astonishment of one of the coach-
men who ran in to have a glance at the garden, and a hasty
view from the drawing-room windows and a glass of wine.
" Good heavens ! " he exclaimed, " to think that I have
driven past this door for twenty years, and never knew of
this ! " As it is a sample of dozens of views equally beautiful
between London and Dover, I will try and sketch it. Take
for the immediate foreground a beautiful lawn like an
emerald cloth, dot it here and there with borders full of
American shrubs, plant some fine mountain ash, silver birch
and acacia trees, and surround it with thick shrubbery on
either side, and a high hedge at the end of the garden

The Old Dover Eoacl. 175

which makes a line of sight, beyond which are orchards,
and a sea of golden corn between the garden and the
Medway, which is a mile or so off. In the corn fields throw
in figures of harvesters and waggons. On the extreme left
don't forget a tract of green marsh land terminating with a
picturesque hill ; and on the right centre a broken line of
quays and wharves, and lazy barges with red and brown
sails going in and out ; intersperse the surface of the
Medway with any number of fishing boats with white sails,
and beyond the river in the distance paint the hundred of
Hoo and a long stretch of mainland, and beyond the main-
land a<yainst the horizon put in the Thames covered with
shippino-, and the Essex coast and Southend, and through
a vista between some splendid elms at the end of the garden
on the extreme right, and also in the horizon, is the Nore,
ten miles off, with the men-of-war standing out against
the clear atmosphere, and the shipping, and the dockyard
sheds with their skylights all ablaze in the evening sun.

Charles Dickens's story, incidentally mentioned in
"Pickwick" about the two brothers, one of whom drove
the up, and the other the down-coach on the Dover road
for many years, and who had no communication with each
other except the coachman's salute in passing, is quite true.
I remember the two brothers well, and no doubt Dickens's
story, that when one died the other pined, is correct. And
what nice fellows the coachmen were, many of them quite
gentlemen in their manners, though we had no " swell "
coachmen on that road.

The iron horse was ruin to many good men, some of
whom came to absolute beggary, and others had to drive a
'bus and luorh their sixteen miles on the stones in London.
The guards were all right enough, as they were sent with
the mail bags by railway. I met one of them at a railway
station some time after the Dover day mail was stopped, and

176 The Old Lover Boach

was horrified with his republicanism, as he pleaded guilty to
preferring a covered carriage sheltered from weather, and
his home every night, to the bitter drive in the dead of
winter, and his return home only three nights a week.

It must have been terrible work for coachmen and guards
in very heavy snow. The old pictures of digging out the
coach and sending for farm horses to pull it out are not at
all exaggerated ; and guards who wished for promotion for
extra zeal performed feats which were incredible almost,
such as taking the bags and mounting one of the horses,
m.aking their way at night across country through the snow.

Another kind of traffic, long since superseded by Act of
Parliament, may be found recorded in some of Seymour's
old caricatures of dog-carts. Fruit and fish, crockery and
light wares, were hawked in small carts drawn by dogs, as
they now are in Belgium. Bull-dogs and large S23aniels, if
I remember right, prevailed, and often you would see a
great hulking lubber riding in the cart, and the poor dogs
with their tongues out regularly beaten. Belgian dogs are
of a peculiar breed, and seem as well calculated for the work
as the Esquimaux dogs, the great diflference between the
English and Belgians being that dog-cart men treated their
dogs cruelly sometimes, but in Belgium my experience was
quite the reverse. The travelling circulated a great deal of
money naturally. The Rose at Sittingbourne had the
credit of making up sixty beds, and having twenty pairs of
horses on call in the stables ; and the George, another good
inn opposite of smaller dimensions, did a good trade too, as
did the Bull, and Wright's at Rochester. Head chamber-
maids and head waiters of long service became hotel keepers
very often, and numbers of people who made a good mark
in the world sprang from the local towns which were the
centres of travelling. If the truth was really told, there
was a great deal of smuggling, too, behind the scenes, both

The Old Dover Boad. Ill

by land and water, and I know one excellent gentleman,
now, whose bill I should like to hold for £100,000 for dis-
count in Lombard Street, who commenced life by hawking
fruit and fish, and who attributes his success in the world
to having earned something every day, and only spending
sixpence out of every shilling. '' How did you manage,^
asked an old friend, ''when you were in Maidstone gaoffor
smuggling ? you could not earn money then." " Yes, I
did," he answered, '' for the barber was ill, and I contracted
to shave the prisoners at a halfpenny a head." Smuggling
went on to a great extent, as, independently of the sea''-
board, there were many villages on the Medway in which
ilHcit trade was carried on. The undertakers, whether
innocently or not, once assisted in a large smuggKng trans-
action. An announcement appeared in the papers that an
English lady, the wife of some celebrated foreigner, had
died abroad, and the body was to be sent home for burial.
The time of its arrival was communicated by the undertaker
to the clergyman in each village through which the body
was to pass, and a guinea was sent for having the bell tolled,
which was duly done. The hearse and six, and two mourn-
ing coaches and four, with black velvet trappings and
feathers, made a grand show, and the foreigners who
accompanied the body as mourners received mucl^ attention
where they stopped for refreshment. The Custom House
officers knew that a large cargo of lace had been landed, and
searched all suspected coaches and carriages, and racked
their brains to trace the smuggled goods in vain, but they
never suspected " their dear departed sister," in the shape
of a cargo of lace, packed in a very large coffin, was taken
to London and buried, and dug up again. Let us hope
that the beautiful service for the dead was not read over
it ; but smugglers were not over particular.

On another occasion a quantity of lace was known to

178 The Old Bomr Boad,

have been landed, and the scent was lost. A special order
had been received at Dover for post-horses to be in waiting
for a very expeditious journey, and a rumour was carefully
circulated that it was for the smugglers, as the money for
the horses was paid in advance. A carriage was to go to a
place a little on the other side of Dover and pick up a gen"
tleman, who got in without any luggage but a portmanteau,
and the postboys, according to private orders, dashed
through Dover to Canterbury as hard as they could go.
The officers, who suspected that the passenger was going to
pick the cargo up at some of the notorious places for
depositing smuggled goods, ordered a carriage in pursuit.
They arrived at Canterbury a few minutes after the sus-
pected vehicle, hurried on with four horses, at any price, to
catch the runaway, followed just at the heels of the other
carriage through Faversham, Sittingbourne, Rochester, and
Gravesend, where they found the old return heavy night
coach — an extra, which carried the newspapers and the
bulky part of the foreign mails once a week to Dover, and
took its own time going back, pretty much at its own pace.
'' Did you see a chaise and four, at full gallop, pass you ? "
they asked of the old coachman, a kind of half superan-
nuated whip. ''Yes," was the reply, "and I think one
horse of their last change was lame, so if anything is wrong
you may catch them yet." Away went the custom-house
men, and caught the carriage at Dartfoid, where it was
waiting for fresh horses, whilst the passenger had his
supper. They walked straight into the traveller's room,
and found a gentlemanly stranger, who asked their busi-
ness. " We shall search your carriage in the King's name,"

was the reply. " Search, and be ," was the answer.

There was nothing in the carriage but a portmanteau, and
the only thing for the officers to do was to apologise, and
the matter was at an end. And where was the lace ? In

The Old Lover Boad. 179

the old heavy mail, the driver of which who was generally a
superannuated crack whip, had been '^ squared," and he
doddled along at his leisure without suspicion, dropping his
Vtduable contraband goods in one of the suburbs of London
on the way. The guard of the old Dover day mail told me
this.

The most uncomfortable vehicle was the postchaise,
generally painted a bright yellow — made to run light and
carry two. The bumping of those carriages, the draughty
doors and rattling windows, and damp straw at the bottom,
haunt me now. The best horses were always kept for
private carriages, and two screws and a half -drunken post-
boy often fell to the lot of the postchaise traveller.

But those coachmen, and guards, and postboys, and inn-
keepers, and smugglers, and dog-cart men, and express boys
have become things of the past, and the bulk of them
probably have gone to the happy hunting grounds long ago,
with some of the animals, too, if poor Whyte-Melville's
wishes come true, when he sings —

" There are men both good and wise who hold that in a future
state,
Dumb animals we have cherished here below,
yhall give us joyous gieeiing as we pass the golden gate ;
Is it folly that I hope it may be so 1 "

Well ! T shouldn't mind meeting my old donkey ' " Pug "
some day, and an old cat called " Mother Bunch," and all
my favourite dogs, though I fear that " Jerry," whose life
was one warfare, would have a turn-up with Cerberus off-
hand, and disturb the harmony of the meeting.

And what strange wayfarers we had ! One day a car-
riage broke down and an old gentleman was stranded at the
village inn opposite, who refused to come in, and who turned
out to be Rowland Hill, the great preacher. Surely he
could not have been such a bigot as to be afraid to enter
the vicarage ! Then we entertained an angel unawares in
N— 2

180 The Old Dover Eoad,

the shape of a very polished foreign lady, the wheels of
whose carriage caught fire, who was very diffident about
coming into " the priest's house," as she called it in French*
and was no less a person than Taglioni, and who made her-
self most charming, and was enraptured wdth the garden
and the flowers and the scenery. Another day we had a
Pole, very shabby and travel-worn, evidently a gentleman*
and the old governor had him in to luncheon (which he
ate like a famished man), and lent him — for the man would
not take the money as a gift — five shillings. How he was
chaffed about lending the foreigner the '' five bob," and
especially about his credulity in thinking that he would
ever see it again; and didn't he turn the tables on the
scoffers when three months afterwards he received a letter
from Constantinople, all cut and slashed and perfumed as a
disinfectant from plague, with the money returned, and a
letter, which was worth its weight in thousand pound notes,
saying that the loan enabled him to reach London and saved
him from starving, and that he had atained a good berth.

Then we had a black man in the runaway slave business,
if I remember rightly, who was on the tramp and said he
was very ill. My mother, who, a la parson's wife, physicked
the whole parish, fully believed him, and said, *' I am sure
he is bilious by the look of his eyes ; " and she made him a
strong dose of rhubarb and jalap, which Mr. Snowball took
on trust, thinking it was something good, and put it down
at a gulp. If any " corner " man in an Ethiopian band
could make the face that nigger did, and fly to the pump as
that man did, it would make his fortune. A great hunch
of bread and bacon to cheer him up, when he got better,
consoled him ; but we never had another nigger to beg.

Then we had a coach upset, and a member of a poor
French family was seriously injured. The Frenchman's
purse was very nearly empty, and the luggage was almost

The Old Dover Eoacl. 181

of a phantom description ; but the people at the inn trusted
to Providence and took them all in, and the villagers made
the family's misfortune their own during their sojourn.
The gratitude of the head of the family was only equalled
by his surprise at English sympathy, and his farewell was
very characteristic of his nation, " I thought English were
cruel people, but they are angels." I suppose the poor
fellow only knew us formerly as natural enemies to France,
and expected to find us all with fixed bayonets and drawn
swords. If the good Samaritan had lived in our time he
would have found his hands pretty full on the old Dover Road,
and it is a pleasure to think that he had many successors.

As a variety we had the rick-burning riots and the
Reform riots, and the yeomanry were constantly trotting
about with jingling spurs and clattering sabres. And we
became notorious, owing to the Bosenden Wood riots in
1837. A madman, by the name of Thoms, who called
himself Sir William Courtney, Knight of Malta, and who
said he was the Messiah, and invulnerable, raised the county
about Canterbury and Faversham, and shot a constable who
went to apprehend him for riot ; in retaliation wherefore a
company of the -i^th Regiment was sent after him, and
Thoms and eight of his merry men were shot dead, an(i several
wounded, one fine May morning ; unfortunately not before
the ringleader murdered Lieutenant Bennett, the officer in
command, who, in hopes of stopping bloodshed, asked him
to surrender. Everybody who saw Thoms said he was a
magnificent man, with a fine beard and moustache, and in
face much resembling the sacred portraits. This sudden
rising showed what could be done by road in those days, as
the magistrate who sent for the troops to Canterbury,
sixteen miles oflf [i.e., thirty-two miles there and back),
received an answer in two hours and a half that a compmy
of soldiers were starting in carriages for Faversham. Kent

182 The Old Dover Boad.

was a riotous county if the people once rose, and prompt
measures were requisite. I had these facts from an old
cousin of my own, the magistrate who sent for, and went
with, the soldiers, and read the Kiot Act.

Then we had all the migratory world en route to and
from London ; buy-a-broom girls, and Italian boys, and
dancing dogs, and dancing bears, and monkeys, and Punch
and Judy, and thimble-rig men (who always got " a month ''
as rogues and vagabonds if caught), and strapping big
Irishmen with linen from Belfast, and gypsies and
harvesters, whose bivouacs illuminated our lanes of a nighty
and beasts in transitu to the Paris Zoological Gardens : on
one occasion an enormous elephant with a young one march-
ing through, and on another occasion some camels and
zebras. And we constantly had regiments on the march,
and detachments billeted en route, and they made a brave
show in church on Sundays, though I am afraid the officers^
credc an old maiden aunt of mine deceased, stared at the
girls all through the service. A.t racing times we saw the
racehorses travelling by road, and heard a great deal of
strong talk. Then one would meet absurd little men,
wrapped up in flannels and greatcoats in the dog-days, and
carrying theii^ saddles and bridles, and walking four miles
an hour, " wasting " by the way. Nothing surprised us in
that busy thoroughfare — which is now almost a desert.

I often wonder that people with plenty of money don't
take a carriage and drive down the Kentish roads.

In spring, when the orchards are in bloom, Kent is
exceedingly beautiful, and so it is in the hop- picking season,
and there being only one level mile — and that on the top
of Chatham Hill — between Shooter's Hill and the outskirts
of Dover, the scenery is remarkably striking from the high
ground, and the drive very pleasant. The views all over
the county from Boughton Hill, and of Canterbury and the

The Old Dover Boad. 183

valley of the Stoiir from Harbledown, and of Dover Castle
and the French coast from Lyddon Hill, and the Maidstone
valley from Boxley or Blue Bell Hill, are as beautiful as
anything of the kind in England, mostly within fifty, and
all within seventy miles of London. Few people ever go
and see Rochester Castle, and the west gate of the
cathedral, and the dockyard, and fortifications, and Cobham
Hall (Lord Darnley's seat), and the Medway, though they
are all worth a visit, with plenty of reminiscences of Gad's
Hill and Falstaff and other old memories historical and
Pickwickian, and young men with good thighs and sinews
who have no carriages, would find a walk from London to
Dover a very pleasant change.

So there is a long yarn about nothing but happy
memories, which so much infatuated me that I made a
pilgrimage last week to scenes of my boyhood which I left
behind me nearly forty years ago. The lads of the village
little thought that the stranger who had some refreshment
was peopling the old village inn — the Lion Hotel, once the
" Green Lion " — which used to be painted standing on one
claw and sparring with the whole world — with ghosts of
those who have long since joined the majority, and was
chuckling with inward delight to see that the same old
clock, of unknown age, was ticking away in its own corner.
I was in dreamland, and, in fancy, saw the coach draw np
to take me back, as a little boy, to the hardships of a public
school, and I was fighting hard to " die game " on leaving
home. If I saw with a sigh that houses and brick-fields
and cement works had supplanted orchards and cornfields
here and there, and that the old cricket field was built over,
it was a comfort to think that heaven is not built with
hands, and that no builder or contractor can desecrate it
with staring cottages with green doois and brass knockers,
and a violent red-brick Ebenezer.

BANKRUPTCY IN
AECADIA.

It is the nature of man always to talk of the " good old
times," and so it will be, I suppose, to the end of the world.
Goldsmith, in his " Deserted Village," sings the same tune,
and Nyren, in his immortal " Cricketer's Guide," deplores
the glorious times of the old Hambledon Club, contrasts the
superiority of the ales and the punch then with those of
the day on which he writes, and the superior excitement in
the matches of the past compared with those of his own
time. I am by no means sure that the name of laudator
temporis acti is not more a term of honour than of reproach,
as being convicted of the failing of looking back on the
happy days long since past simply proves that those to
whom it is applied enjoyed their boyhood and their youth.
I hope I am thankful for those halcyon days which bring
back pleasant memories of great events, such as a pair of
shoe-stirrups for my donkey-pad for learning the multipli-
cation table ; my first watch, my first pony, my first gun,
my first match, and, in looking back on the dear old
governor's judgment, I now see how just and wise he was
In not letting me go up to Lord's when I was first in the
eleven, keeping me back for another year, as an inducement
184

Bankni])tGy in Arcadia. 185

to be a better boy. And I must tell a story of the old
governor, to show how I inherited my old Tory notions.
The evidence lies before me now in the shape of a child's
book called '' Scenes in England," in which book is an
account of the Cornish wreckers, who, as the writer says,
were brought to a better state of mind and humanity
through the exertions of an excellent body of men called
" The Wesleyan Methodists." But the stout old English
parson li^ould have history written his own w^ay, and struck
out " Wesleyan Methodists " with a broad pen and inserted
in good round text "The Clergy of the Established Church
of England."

As a matter of course, railways, telegraphs, and the
enormous increase of the Press, have been the cause of our
living much more in public in the present day than formerly.
The spread of education and public agitation have disturbed
the rustic simplicity of our village homes. Mr. Arch, the
agricultural labourers' champion, has invaded Arcadia, and
made our Meliboei and Tityri strike against Pan and Ceres
and Flora and Pomona, and the squire and the farmers are
in no little trepidation about labour in the event of an
abundant harvest. Our Titp-us is smoking his pipe now
in a beershop brewing treason, and Meliboeus is " picketing
knobsticks " who are ready to do a fair day's work for a fair
day's wage. In fact, the tie between master and man is
loosened to everyone's loss.

The day is gone by for restrictions as to servants' dress,
and you may see now in a country village church a parody
of the latest London fashions in the dress of the rural
population; the village louts wear flash, ill-cut, shoddy
" swell" clothes, and the time will arrive ere long when a
smock-frock will be kept in the British Museum as a record
of the costume of the English peasant in the so-called
comparatively " dark ages."

186 Bankruptcy in Arcadia.

The change which has so much aiFectecl the lower order
of rustics has grown out of the change which has been
going on in those above them. Anyone who reads the late
Miss Mitford's " Tales of our Village," will see how a
village used to be self-supporting for its interests and
amusements, and how the humbler classes who followed
sport, or every-day duties, were distinct characters who
stood out individually.

We read in her charming book of the rat-catcher, the
bird-catcher, the mole-catcher, records of the country fair,
haymaking, harvest homes, and the many minor incidents
and events which made up the little history of a country
village. And above all, don't let us forget her account of
the "village cricket match." I verily believe that had
Miss Mitford lived for ever, and had been ubiquitous, and
had reported cricket, that *' Bell's Life " would have put
up his shutters during the summer, and the " Sportsman "
would have been going about trying to borrow half a-crown
of the " Sporting Life."

Cricketers of England ! I beseech you, take down Miss
Mitford's tales and read the account of the Sunday evening's
practice before the match. Mark you the Sunday evening's
practice, when villagers all went to church like '' Christian
men," also played cricket in the evening under the same
name. And I will back Miss Mitford's evidence as regards
real Christianity against the field.

But it is no good crying over spilt milk, and our losses
are much counterbalanced by our gains. It is twenty times
better to have Mr. Arch stirring up strife, and Tityrus in
the beer-shop, and Melibceus " picketing," than to have the
ricks all ablaze — as I well remember — threshing-machine
riots, and the military firing into the mob, hang-fair after
the assizes, putrid fever from overcrowded cottages, and
many other evils which were things of course forty or fifty

BanJcnqjtcy in Arcadia. 187

years ago. The professional agitators are the lowest
scoundrels outside a certain place which is not usually
mentioned in polite society ; but you cannot, except when
life is threatened, put a Martini-Henry bullet through a
poor devil of an agricultural labourer who has been misled
by some cold-blooded outside body in London, who don't
know a cucumber from a vegetable-marrow, and whose sole
object is to fatten on strife.

But there are things we do miss. The village cricket
match is one of these. The downfall of this old institution
is easily accounted for— because there are very few cricket
fields, as land is too valuable and people are too busy, and
the consumption of country produce in London since the
railway days is so great, that everything which can be made
to grow by scientific farming and otherwise must grow :
and the farmer has become a man of business who puts his
capital into the soil, and probably attends three markets a
week, whereas in days gone by he would only attend one.
The leisure is gone ; and as regards the young gentleman
class, their ideas are of a higher order now, and they belong
to some club within hail, and aspire to be matched against
the Zingari, or the Civil Service, or. Incogniti, or the
Garrison, and prefer a " dress cricket match," with crowds
of ladies, champagne, and a dance in the evening to the
sound of a military band, to the homely village match and
the half-crown dinner at the Cricketers.

Then as regards our country races, where are they?
Numbered with the past pretty much. Take the Wye races,
for instance, on the punch-bowl course, between Canterbury
and Ashford. I remember them when they were very
insignificant races, attended by the farmers, the rural
population, and the officers from Canterbury. The stakes
were very small, and it was sometimes difficult to make a
field ; I don't suppose any bets above a sovereign were often

188 BanJcru])tGy in Arcadia.

made, ^w the Wye races are placarded aU about London,
and special trains are run, and it is a real meeting. Should
anyone be fortunate enough to go to Wye races on a fine
day, he will see racing in a natural amphitheatre and some
of the most beautiful scenery in England, though our Wye
primitive races are gone ; and to betting men it is a business
meeting, far more attractive than the Canterbury races ever
were to the London world; although it is only about a
century ago since the Canterbury races on Harbledown were
preceded by a public breakfast, and were commemorated
also by a public dinner, with a wind-up of a '' grand main
of cocks " in the evening, under the patronage of the mayor
and corporation of the city.

Then there were our old local hunt steeplechases, open to
the members of the hunt only, for horses which were ridden
during the year over a hondfide hunting country which had
been the scene of a run during the season, artificial fences
being barred. Those are dead and gone too. The last of
these which I saw was in Kent, in 1845 or thereabouts,
when the prizes were ten pounds for the first horse, a new
bridle and saddle for the second, and a silver-mounted whip
for the third. I know nothing about steeplechasing, but I
remember it was rare fun. It was purely a local meet of
the neighbouring farmers, and one big suttling booth
sufficed for all comers.

It was a place for cordial meeting. Everybody knew
everbody, and a great many who entered merely did so for
the fun and the gallop, without any idea of winning ; and
it was a genuine hearty day's amusement without gambling,
and possibly 500 people only were present. A real local
sport of this kind being discontinued is a great loss, for it
made young fellows ambitious to acquire the noble art of
horsemanship, which was within their power. The sport
was good enough to incite a youngster to try and ride across

Banhnij^tcy in Arcadia. 189

country, and was not so appalling as to dissuade him from
the attempt to do as well as Mr. A., or Mr. B., or friend C.^
all of whom he knew and had seen dozens of times with the
hounds, or going to or returning from covert. It was all
fair riding without roping or besting.

Even the flower shows are almost impossible to keep up,
and there is " roping " in these pure arcadian amusements.
Unless the prizes are large enough gardeners won't exhibit,
and even then there is a great deal of " squaring " amongst
them, and private agreement about dividing the schedule,
so that a few only shall compete for each class, and thereby
secure prizes for all. And in the cottagers' department it
is necessary to have the gardens inspected many weeks
before the show, to insure competitors not buying fruit or
flowers and exhibiting them as of their own growth. Even
the village children who show wild flowers and grasses have
to be severely cross-examined sometimes as to whether the
collection is really their own. The auri sacra fames is
eating us up, and Astrsea herself could not in these days
satisfy the disappointed.

The village bell-ringing, too, is now purely a matter of
money, and the inter-village contests for a supper do not
exist. Eingers want now a guaranteed sum per annum,
and expect a subscription for a summer excursion, and a
heavy honorarium in the winter ; and in many places they
think a crown somewhat shabby, and half a sovereign by
no means too much.

The country fair is becoming another thing of the past.
The manufacturers of colossal gingerbread cocks with gilded
sides must have a poor trade of it now ; the fat lady, the
John Bull dwarf in top-boots, the little old w^oman of seventy
years of age (who was shown to the audience, and who was
probably " doubled " in her part by the showman's child),
who was put in a small barrel and rang a hand-bell through

190 Bankruptcy in Arcadia.

the bunghole, are no more ; the man who drew a dozen
yards of tape out of his mouth, and *' Middleton's Fan-
toccini," and the Hottentot Venus, who carried a cavalry
soldier on her panier, and pitched him over her head, would
find no audience now, as the fair would be stormed by the
scum of the earth from some neighbouring town, and a
dozen police would be required vice the parish beadle, who
was man enough to keep order, and who was wont to take
the exceptional wrong-doers — who had their ten days for
rioting and drunkenness — handcuffed in a cart to the county
^aol next morning ; the keeper and prisoners being on the
best terms, and refreshing themselves on the way, and
probably talking over the fair.

I miss the rat-hunt in the barn too. The old barns of
unknown age are replaced by substantial buildings, bricked
and slated, and comj^aratively rat-proof. The old flail is a
thing of the past, and so are the piles of golden gi^ain in
the corner of the barn ; and there is now no necessity for
farmer Broadbean's rat-hunt, where every boy and every
dog in the parish were welcome, and there was as much
dog fighting as rat-hunting. The corn is carried, threshed
by machinery, and packed off before the rats can get at it.
In fact, I complain of the abolition of " the rat which ate
the malt," (fee, who acquired, if possible, additional immor-
tality through the agency of Mr. Caldecott's inimitable
drawings in his little Christmas book, " The House that
Jack built." Some of the sheep-shearing and harvest
suppers, and village revels under no control, are not much
loss, as bucolical youths, overloaded with beef and beer and
pudding, were not nice specimens of humanity, and often-
times were remarkably objectionable, and showed dis-
positions little less than savage and brutal.

What is most missed now is the sociability which existed
when neighbours in a county were at home mostly all the

Bankruj^tci) in Arcadia. 191

year round, and all our little excitements made fun for all,
and we were dependent on one another for amusements.
Near friends then made a little holiday occasionally at very
.small expense, and got up a little archery and cricket, and
the grand old game of bowls on a summer afternoon, with-
out any fuss or ceremony, with a syllabub and cold supper
at dark ; and the guests were not afraid to walk home three
or four miles afterwards, if they did not keep a carriage.
I wonder if a syllabub is ever made now, and if any one
knows how to make it ? Or, again, in the winter, someone
would have a rabbit-shooting, or small coursing meeting of
a few friends, who Avould be content with luncheon, con-
sisting of a colossal piece of hunter's beef, and other farm
produce, plenty of home-brewed ale, and home-made cherry
brandy. This was before the days of champagne, a wine
which I never saw or tasted until I was eighteen years of
age, and which I drank as cyder, to my cost, in happy
ignorance, and tried to persuade myself that a soft corner
of a by-lane was a comfortable place to sleep in, and found
it so until a good Samaritan, whose opinions differed from
mine, picked me up and kept me until I was fit to enter
polite society once more.

Then we had our three subscription county balls in the
winter, and our pic-nics in the summer, and in all ou^
amusements we were dependent on one another.

The fact is, the country has become Londonised to a
great extent, and we have lost our simplicity thereby. The
mania for foreign travel has made people comparatively
regardless of the old home pleasures, and they look to
taking their excitement anywhere except at home. Even
lawn-tennis, the most charming amusement and exercise for
young ladies as well as gentlemen, is getting demoralized
by fashionable toilettes, and champagne cup and competition
matches, and prize rackets, and is becoming a business more

192 Bankruj^tcy in Arcadia.

than a pleasure, too often. The soi-disant match-player is
the greatest nuisance imaginable on a country lawn —
rushing about playing with both hands (which I believe to
be a prostitution of the game of rackets, the essence of
which is the back-handed play), and taking every ball, and
spoiling everyone else's amusement. It is the old, old
story — self -aggrandisement ! I don't think our grand-
mothers, as girls, would have competed in public before a
crowd, the qualifications for whose admission was only by
paying a shilling at the gate.

Poker, blind hookey, and " Nap," are ousting the solemn
old rubber at silver threepennies, and it is not too much to
say that a large majority who touch a card now play for
money, and not for the amusement. Give me a game of
six-card cribbage with a Deal boatman, on a cribbage-board
punctuated on an old oak table, with gigantic pegs, against
all the modern card-playing of to-day. The solemn silence
of the spectators, which is only broken by a muttered
"Jack," or "heels," as the knave may turn up, shows the
undying interest in the game ; the beer remains it/itasted,
the quid w^iturned, the cavendish ?«/idrawn at the critical
moment when it is " hole and hole " within five of the
game, and the only chance of the dealer is playing out. It
is a match for glory and fame of "The Saucy Nancy"
against the London stranger, for twopence a game and
sixpence on the rub, with the " Saucy Nancy's " crew
looking on. The Bank of England and Barclay and
Perkins's Brewery wouldn't square the Deal boatmen. This
is real sport.

I confess to more than a sneaking liking for the Deal
boatmen, as I like the company of men who will go out on
a night when sky and sea are a roaring chaos to save life,
without any salvage money, too often at the loss of their own.
I don't believe in all the virtues belonging to conventional

BanTcru^tcy in Arcadia, 193

life. Now this is an impertinent intrusion on my part,
for it has nothing to do with Arcadia, but I am reasoning
by analogy, on the charms of simple amusement amongst
simple people who play for pleasure.

The real matter of fact is, that money now has got into
the hands of a few, and the world is going too fast, and
the confession of poverty is almost a crime. Luxury and
show have supplanted comfort and simple recreations. The
University boat race, and cricket match, and the Eton and
Harrow match, have become almost a nuisance owing to
sensational excitement, and the French are not far wrong
when they say '' we take om- pleasure sadly."

Thanks to Lord Harris the old Kent eleven has been
restored ; but there is no doubt that until he revived its
glories, by searching the county through for players, the
previous downfall of Kent was attributable to all interest
almost in cricket having been centred in the Canterbury
week. Now other towns in England are having a cricket
week and all the Saturnalia, in imitation of Canterbury,
and they may depend upon it, it will do their home cricket
no good, as centralising a game for a short period spoils the
taste for home cricket. The effect of this is seen in the
county of Surrey. The Oval is doubtless one of the best
cricket theatres in England, and being within reach of most
of the old cricket centres, people make a day at the Oval,
and neglect theii^ village greens. Every youngster of
twenty years of age, who can bowl a decent ball, fancies
himself a player, and won't play without being paid ; the
young gentlemen aspii-e to the county eleven, or to a
travelling eleven of "Bounding Britons," or "Flvino-
Cherubims," or some such name, and all the money goes
out of the parish, instead of being spent in it ; and the
stay at-home fogeys button up their pockets and won't
subscribe to home clubs which produce no cricketers, and

194 Bankruptcy in Arcadia.

the county eleven (?) is recruited from strangers imported
into Surrey ; and country elevens are not encouraged.

Fishing has by no means escaped the sensation mania,
Pot-hunting for club-prizes, and the " testimonial mania."
the '^ keeping dark " a good stretch of water for the pur-
pose of " wiping your neighbour's eye," would not have
been approved by old Izaak Walton, who told his " Scholar "
all he knew, as they sat under the sycamore tree, and he
said his simple grace before their homely meal. Wliat
would I not have given to have been out with that good old
man, and have been his companion at an honest ale-house,
where the sheets smelt of lavender and there were plenty of
ballads on the walls ?

When one does find a primitive village where old fashions
prevail it is necessary to keep the information very dark
for fear of invasion. I know two or three of such in tlie
heart of Surrey, at the foot of some of the hills, where eggs
and bacon and home-brewed ale are not unknown ; whei'e,
for the sum of one shilling, excellent tea and home-made
bread and butter can be obtained, in a brick-floored kitchen
with a chimney-corner ; and where samplers and ballads
yet hang on the walls, and where people are as simple as
they were in my boyhood ; where each of the umpires take
a bat in a match, and. where the smock-f rocked crowd sit
round. In many of such places as these, late in the season,
there is a wind-up match, in which all comers are welcome,
and there are generally some very good players on either
side, and some real " yokels ; " the winning or losing being
of no importance, as the object of the meeting is a day's
fun and a supper. I played in one of these matches, some
forty miles from London, last October. A gamekeeper
six feet high, without the remotest idea of science,
holding his bat at the end of the handle, threshed away
with wonderful success, in a style and manner which Mr.

Baiikruj^tcy in Arcadia. 195

C. J. Thornton might have admired ; and the better the
bowling the harder he hit, to the great delight of a beery-
patriarch (the only beery man there), who kept on shout-
ing " Well be-ay-ved " (behaved), and who in his excite-
ment tried to clap his hands and missed them, and pitched
on his head off a form. One of the umpires, who was a
regular villager, would not give 'anyone "out "unless he
was bowled. In the evening I asked him : Q . " Were you
ever umpire before?" A. " JSToa," he answered. Q. "Did
you ever read the laws of cricket ? " ^. " Noa ; never lie'erd
on 'em." Q. "Then why did you stand umpire?" A.
" Because they offered I half-a-crown and a soopper, and I
never guv nobody out, and then I couldn't offend nobody."
This is literally true, and occurred on October 1, 1878.

I cannot help my old-fashioned notions, and shall die as I
have lived in them ; as, though the simplicity of our home
amusement has practically died out, the love of that
simplicity exists amongst " many men now alive," as Lord
Macaulay would have said. I say to those who may outlive me,
please do)it let them burn me — that is treating a Christian
like a Hampshire bacon-pig — but I have no objection to
being stuffed and put in the British Museum as " the last
of the Fogeys."

O— 2

WHEN WE OLD FOGEYS
WEEE BOYS.

DoiSr'T let us ask how many years ago it was, but we fogeys
of the present once were boys ; were flogged, learnt impo-
sitions, went through the rugged channels of grammar-
navigation, had hopes and fears, fights and friendships —
and, strange to say, those friendships at intervals of many
decades grow again stronger than ever when old school-
fellows meet. Many sketches of school-life have been
written with more or less exaggeration and colour, occa-
sionally with no little cant and goody-goody stories, in all
of which the preponderance of good on the one side, and of
evil on the other, are quite out of proportion to the balance
of character in real life ; just as in our nursery-books the
wicked boy who went out sliding on a Sunday was always
drowned, and his companions whom he tempted to the
awful crime of Sabbath-breaking were rescued by the good
boy, who appeared to have been a combination of the
Beckwith family. Captain "Webb, an otter, a Royal Humane
Society man, a Hercules, and a Low Church parson, all in
one.

Public schools proper were very few and far between in
196

When ive Old Fogeys were Boys. 197

the earlier half of this century, though in these days, since
railways and enlightenment in all parts of England, great
schools have risen up where the very best education, and
everything which is manly and noble, can be acquired in
small worlds of boyhood ; and the class lists at the Univer-
sities, and results of contests in the cricket-field, athletics,
and competitive examinations, show that all the virtues and
talent do not by any means lie amongst the old schools*
Now I am not going to write a history of Winchester, but
simply mean to put forward a few tableaux of boys as they
were in College some forty years ago. The full complement
of the school was seventy College boys — supposed to repre-
sent the seventy disciples, though I fear the representatives
hardly came up to the example — and 130 Commoners, who
were the same as Oppidans at Eton, except that they lived
in one large building, under the Head Master, and not
with dames or tutors. I may state at once that everything
is altered now, and the school, under the Public Schools
Act, is very like the Irishman's knife with four new blades
and a new handle. The College boys, I think, were not
poor scholars, as William of Wykeham intended, but were
elected by the wardens of New College and Winchester,
the head masters, and two examiners, who were called
" posers," and the result was the College to a great extent
became a family party, consisting of gentlemen's sons^ many
of whom had rich fathers, and the same names in many in
stances appeared for generations. College boys, contrary to
the status of Foundation boys generally, had rather the best
of things as a rule, as Commoners were dependent on them
for the schoolroom and the chapel, and, in public matches
in which all joined against an aggressive foe, for a cricket
ground also. Moreover, the head College boy was com
mander-in-chief and autocrat over the whole school when-
ever Commoners were inside our walls, or the school as a

198 When we Old Fogeys were Boys.

whole when outside College walls; whereas Commoner
prefects had no power over College boys. No anecdotes
about bullying. A bully was a bully ; and many a good
fellow who was not competent for the extraordinary power
entrusted to him in boyhood, in after life has expressed his
regret for hard things done in his youth.

Fancy the following state of things for public school boys
of this present day ! — I am only speaking now of College.

The discipline was Spartan. Imagine yourself a junior
in a chamber, and at six o'clock, on a winter morning, being
aroused by a shoeblack shouting your name into the
chamber, hearing which, you had to arise and let him in,
call all the chamber, put on a faggot and light the fire, go
into the quadrangle and fill all the prefects' washing basins
at the open conduit (for no one except prefects and seniors
in chambers were allowed to perform their ablutions in-
doors), and perform your own toilet there also with the
snow on the ground, with the thermometer anywhere ; see
that everybody got up ; watch for the master's coming at
*' bells down," and be in your place in chapel to answer
your name. After chapel, you had to run to every prefect
who called ''Junior!" and you had to do anything he
wanted — send for cofiee into the town, brush his clothes
(but never black his boots — that was menial work), and be
obliged generally to fag till school time ; your next duty
was to air your eye at a keyhole and watch for the second
master's arrival, and give the " hiss " to warn the school of
his approach ; then you went up to your lessons till break-
fast time, 8.30, probably never having had half time to
leain them. At breakfast time you were washing butter
and baking toast for your master, and waiting on him, and
possibly after breakfast would have to pick up balls at fives
until 9.30, having managed to get a mouthful of breakfast
yourself or not, as the case might be ; you then aii^ed your

When we Old Fogeys were Boys, 199

eye at a keyhole again, waiting for the head master, and
you were in school for two hours and a half — possibly with
a little bye-fagging, such as going round to borrow a book,
or, in summer, you would be made to " shiik out " to go
long-stop to some fellows who were having an unlawful
game of cricket. In the summer you fagged at cricket
from 12 till 2 (and on holidays all day, more or less), and
in the winter you would be fagging at football, kicking in
the ball. At 2 o'clock you would air your eye at a key-
hole for the third time to watch for a master, and then
there were four hours of school before you, out of which
you would be up with your class twice ; and in these four
hours a junior had time to learn something, especially if he
had a good boy-tutor. At six o'clock you would be carrying
things into chambers for prefects; be fagging all dinner-
time from 6 o'clock till 6.30; get something to eat how and
when you could,^and be in chambers at 6.30 to put on the
faggot — for we had blazing fires ; light the candles, sweep
up the chamber, put things in order, and do everything
that you vvere told till 7. Then would ensue a blessed
interval of rest and quiet till 8.30, whilst the boys did their
work for next day, unless you were in some bullying
chambers, where fellows played cards, in Avhich case you
had to watch for a master ; then chapel ; then bed. I
remember that card-playing and drinking had not many
followers, and prefects who did it were not in the best set.
Your chamber was like a little parish of its own, with two
or three prefects in it, as the case might be, and if you had
a kind fellow for head prefect, it was a very happy home,
provided you were good-tempered and willing ; and many
kindnesses were shown, the memories of which are pleasant
to record. In a boy's second year a junior's position was
materially improved, as he would have a lot of boys under
him, and he would be promoted to fielding out at cricket.

200 When ive Old Fogeys ivere Boys.

instead of being semper long-stop, be allowed to go off
fagging if he made a catch, and if a good field, he would
be chosen as a regular fag in single-wicket matches, and
would probably pass into the junior eleven, which corres-
ponded with " Sixpenny " at Eton, and if he really stuck to
the game, he had a prospect in view of eventually passing
into the second eleven, with visions of some day being in
the "Lord's eleven," tlie ambition of all. Anyhow, a fag
who made the best of matters, and tried all he could, would
become popular with prefects and would not have half a bad
time of it.

In his social life also he would have a definite status, and
become valet to one of the prefects in his chamber, looking
after his cricket and football things, and always in attend-
ance on him before and after all sports ; and better still,
in hall and in chambers he would be initiated into the
mysteries of cooking, frying kidneys, potatoes, chops,
making coffee, and coming in for the debris, for good
fellows always had enough for their fags, as well as them-
selves, and the slavery was divested of many of its hard-
ships. So a boy had three natural protectors— his boy-
tutor who was assigned to him, the prefect to whom he was
valet, and also the prefect to whom he was breakfast fag ;
and when in trouble he could go to one or all, and they
always took his part, and not unfrequently the boy who
bullied the little junior got a good licking on the spot, with
a promise of double allowance if he did it again.

There always was a class, mostly muffs, who, when
prefects, would have six fellows to watch out at cricket,
when three only were wanted, and who thrashed little
boys for missing balls which they could not have stopped
themselves ; who would call " Junior " for the sake of
hearing their own voice, to bring them a book which was
six yards off; just the same kind of fellows who in after

JVhen IV e Old Fogeys to ere Boys. 201

life make the lives of club servants unbearable, and who
are a terror to those under them, in whatever station of
life they may be, and make servants, clerks, governesses,
and sometimes, if parsons, even curates tremble before
them. These were the kind of boys who had three fags
to wait on them at breakfast ; that meal consisting of
College rations and a pot of jam from home, which was tied
down and lasted a week; who were always finding a speck
of dirt on a knife or on a cloth, for which they thrashed the
unfortunate junior. Juniors delighted to be one of a
number of fags who waited on a breakfast mess of three
good fellows — good at football and cricket — who had a dish
of kidneys, a dozen eggs, fried potatoes and chops for
breakfast, with endless toast and coffee. A fag might get
a flea in his ear sometimes for clumsiness or carelessness,
but masters and fags formed a little family party of their
own.

Then as regards the inmates of the school generally.
Winchester being one of the capitals of the West was easy
of access to West of England men, many of whose sons
came there ; and the advantage of having a boy under the
discipline of one of the oldest public schools w^as thought
more of in many cases than education, and sons of many
country gentlemen would go there, and be perfectly content
to remain in the lower forms until they left at seventeen or
eighteen years of age. So much w^as this the case that one
year an eleven from the three lowest forms played all
Commoners at cricket and beat them. It looked funny to
see big fellows in tail coats and more than incipient whiskers
standing up by the side of little fellows of twelve years old,
in an awful fog over an easy passage in Ovid, which, though
easy to the youngsters, was a terrible stumbling-block to
them; but so it was. On the other hand, it was for
nobody's good when a very young fellow with immense

202 When we Old Fogeys ivere Boys.

ability ran rapidly up the school, and became a prefect
without any long apprenticeship to fagging, and possibly
physically weak and practically inexperienced. These were
the class who, immediately they got off fagging, abandoned
every sport and took to " constitutionals " in the summer
and fire-side coteries in the winter ; and by these fire-side
coteries much bullying was brewed, in the absence of manly
fellows who were engaged in athletics.

Now as regards our sports : cricket and football were of
course the chief, and as we had no professional we learned
our cricket by ourselves ; and to show that we must have
learnt it pretty well, Harrow beat us for the first time in
1837 on their own ground, though they collared and headed
us in after years, the school matches having commenced in
1825. We held our own too, well, against Eton. Fielding
and hard hitting were our proclivities, and the Winchester
barter, the half -volley — named after Warden Barter, who
was a giant in strength and stature — is not unknown.

To show what coaching will do, old Lillywhite in 1851 — 2
the first professional ever engaged — cetat 59, trained the
eleven in that and in the following year, and the Winchester
boys won both matches at Lord's two years running, in
1851-2, after losing both matches for five years. Oh ! why
did the Dons ever stop those glorious matches at Lord's ?

We had one great drawback at Lord's, which was, that
not more than six or seven of our real eleven were ever up
there, as the school broke up a fortnight before the matches.
And we made one vital mistake, which was, not to make
long stop, as it is now, one of the most important places in
the field; and boys who had been excellent as juniors gave
it up as drudgery when they got into the eleven, and the
consequence is that our list of byes at Lord's looks very bad
now, as does that of other schools of that era.

In the winter badger-hunting was a favourite sport, and

Wheji lue Old Fogeys zvere Boys. 203

we always kept a badger and a huntsman, who provided
two terriers and a bull-dog daring the winter. It was a
sporting school, as Hampshire was a very sporting county,
added to which a large number of the boys were sons of
fox-hunting country gentlemen, and many of their boys
hunted in the holidays.

Perhaps it would astonish the dons now to see boys going
on to St. Catherine's Hill (part of the Portsmouth Downs
range) in white cord breeches, brown cloth leggings, tight
at the knee and falling loose over the boots, green cut-away
coats and gilt basket buttons, coming out of College on a
holiday morning : but such was the usual dress of many
Commoners on holidays, and the big College fellows high up
in the school, who wore gowns, adopted the cords and
gaiters. The badger-hunting was excellent fun, though I
suppose we should be fined five pounds by the magistrates
now for following the sport. The badger was turned out
of the sack and started up the downs, and it was a good
fine breather, running four or five miles, mostly uphill, on a
winter's morning. When we had had enough the bull-dog
was let go to pin the badger, and after a stiffish tussle some-
times the badger went into the sack to live to fight another
day. Not a few boys kept guns, and many a stray hare and
partridge came to hand, and I have known such a thing
as a duck or goose turn up, but it did not much matter, as,,
when old Warden Barter was king, farmers got paid for
College damages. Foot steeplechasing from the top of the
downs to St. Cross, across two rivers and the water-
meadows, was also a favourite amusement for a change.
Then there was the sporting fraternity, who took in Bell'^
Life, got up lotteries, and had a small Tattersall's of their
own, and made shilling books, and paid up too ; but I
never knew little boys urged to subsci-ibe or anything of
that sort, as recorded in '' Tom Brown." Any boy trying

204 When we Old Fogeys were Boys.

on such a game would have been sent to Coventry by the
whole school, and I fancy the betting was a very small
matter.

Sometimes prisoners get restless and break out into
insubordination, and it is the case too in lunatic asylums
and occasionally in schools. I never can understand to this
day why or wherefore a large number of boys, seventy or
eighty at least, suddenly took a violent dislike to half a load
of hay which was left on a canal bridge. The waggon had
been overloaded, and the farmer had carted half away, and
the waggon was waiting for the return of the horses.
Someone suggested "Let us pitch this waggon into the
river." Now the farmer was a popular man, as he never
split upon us if we did any mischief, and he winked at the
fellows shooting in the water-meadows and on his farm.
No doubt, being a tenant of the College, he took care of
himself when he paid his rent. Somehow the demon of
mischief was abroad, and in a few minutes the waggon,
under the influence of many hands and a lever or two
toppled grandly sideways ; there was a crash, the side of
the bridge disappeared, and nothing was visible but four
waggon wheels in the air, above the water, to the great as-
tonishment of some bargees who were coming with a barge
quick round the corner, and who, with great difficulty stopped
her " way " before the barge charged the waggon, for which
event we were anxiously looking. Again, one window of
new Commoners — an ugly, workhouse-like building, which
looked into the school quadrangle — being accidentally
broken, the boys suddenly hated all the windows and
smashed the lot, just as they did with the new slates of
College Mill, the colours of which they disapproved. The
curious part of their eccentric proceedings was, that all the
school seemed seized with the same madness, and the steady
fellows who never fell into scrapes hardly, broke out the

Wke7i we Old Fogeys ivere Boys. 205

worst. We never heard anything about that waggon-load
of hay, directly, though an uncle of one of the boys who
was staying with the warden let the cat out of the bag^
and told his nephew that the wiirden laughed heartily
about it. I suppose the truth was that it was a second crop
of water-meadow hay of little value, or the waggon was not
hurt, and it went into the tenant's bill.

Ah, the dear old warden ! he was the king of men, the
greatest athlete of his day at Oxford, and the hardest hitter
ever known at cricket, and the Winchester " Barter hit,'^
the half volley, was named after him. He was as big as
Alfred Mynn, and the kindest-hearted man in the world,
though very impetuous. When in a scrape it was always
best to receive his fire and let him pass sentence of death
on you unheard. It was usually the same thing : you were
ruining your prospects for life, were bringing do^vn your
father's grey hair with sorrow to the grave, &c., etc. And
when he had quite done, the thing was to ask to be heard,
and to tell him the whole truth right out, and say you were
very sorry. He was ready enough to help you over the
stile, and it usually ended with a few kind words, for any
condonable offence, and a parting word, " If you are
writing to your father, will you remember me very kindly
to him ? — good bye. Now remember what I say."

When Freeman, the American giant, a prizefighter, came
over here with Gaunt from New York and fought the Tipton
Slasher, after a short London career his health broke down,
and he was taken in at Winchester hospital. He stood
nearer seven than six feet, and weighed twenty-one stone
when in health ; but the poor fellow was sadly wasted, and
his brother giant, the warden, took care of him, and bap-
tized him himself, and watched him daily through his last
illness, and attended him when dying.

When the Eton boys went to Winchester to play their

206 When we Old Fogeys ivere Boys.

matcli, the warden entertained the two elevens and all kind
of Eton dons royally at dinner, and when the warden died,
and the Provost of Eton preached on him in Eton chapel,
and alluded to the cricket and the warden's hospitality to
the eleven, there was not a dry eye amongst the Eton boys.

We had a little world of our own, and never recorded
our sports, except our cricket scores. Fighting, except
amongst the little boys, was not much cultivated, as boys
who had been juniors together and fellow sufferers in early
hardships grew up pretty much knowing their own powers ;
but occasionally there would be a real fight, with the cogni-
sance and full concurrence of the prefects, and that was
when two big fellows had a deadly feud and neither would
apologise. I remember two very memorable fights, in one
of which two inferiors — i.^"., not prefects — of eighteen years
of age, who were high up in the school, and both of them
in the football team, fought. They were larking with two
switches, and one hit the other accidentally in the face,
which was immediately returned by a left-hander. They
were separated, but they both determined to fight, and fight
they did at twelve o'clock in Commoners, and I went in to
see it. There was little science, but awful slogging, and
one was clean knocked out of time in twenty minutes, and
the doctor had a hard job to get him round, as there was
much threatening of blood to the brain. He had to go
home after a few days. His opponent, who was a very good
fellow was in great distress about the effect of his own
handiwork, and was constantly with his former foe ; and
they both agreed they had been a couple of fools, and
nothing but the dread of being considered cowards prevented
them from shaking hands without fighting.

Another fight between a College and Commoner inferior,
mtat each about seventeen, was an equally bloodthirsty
affair ; and the vanquished had to be put to bed and kept in

When we Old Fogeys ivere JBoys. 207

a dark room for a considerable time. No doubt these are
things of the past ; but boys of that age, who have a keen
sense of injured honour, and reckless as regards conse-
quences, and without science, ought never to have been
allowed to fight. It was downright dangerous. According
to the legends of the prize-ring fatal accidents were not
commoner than those in the hunting-field or steeplechase,
and many other sports ; but then the men were trained and
scientific, and, moreover, the seconds interfered in cases of
danger.

In 1824 the Hon. Mr. Ashley, brother of Lord Shaftes-
bury, I presume, fought two hours and a half, and was
killed, at Ebon ; but then both boys were plied with brandy,
as was admitted on the inquest.

I had only one fight of any consequence, and that was
when sixteen years old. A practical joke was played on Die
by another boy of as nearly my own age and size as possible.
I hit him straight in the face just before chapel on Sunday,
and we were separated; and although mutual friends tried
to pacify us, fight we would, as we hated one another, being
about equals in school position and everything else, and we
felt one must be master. My antagonist was, when at the
Bar, the author of the " Log of the Water Lily," and was
the pioneer who, in 1850, went up the Rhine in a four-oared
boat. He was seconded by his cousin, who now is Rector
of Rew in Devonshire. We fought in the schoolroom on
Monday morning forty-eight rounds in an hour and a
quarter, and were interrupted by school-time, and agreed to
go on again at twelve o'clock. The prefects then interfered
and made us shake hands, which we did most willingly, as
being thrown on an oak floor was no joke, and we were both
of us very stiff and tired and a good deal punished ; and
from that day forward he and I and his second messed
together, and were firm friends as long as we remained in

208 When we Old Fogeys ivere Boys,

the school; and, curiously enough, the Eector of Rew,
whom I had not seen for years, came and stayed with me
during the last Australian match at the Oval, by his own
invitation ; and my former foe, whom I had not seen for
twenty years, walked into my chambers most unexpectedly
as I was luriting this very article.

It was a curio as life in past days, as boys were mostly left
to form their own characters ; and in those days Commoners
remained at school till nineteen very often, and College boys
who were of the founder's kin and waited for a New Collef^e
vacancy sometimes remained till twenty, and in known
instances one or even two years longer. One well-known
cricketer was at Lord's from the year 1839 till 1843, both
inclusive, and was captain for three years, and he had cut
all his teeth, as he was of the '' Founder's kin," over twenty-
two years of age, and was waiting for a fellowship at
Oxford. Every Wykehamist of that era will remember
that captain Villiers Chernocke Smith, the immortal
" Podder," so named after one of the champions in the All
Muggleton and Dingley Dell match. On reference to the

list of men in Church and State, I think our ''output"

to use a mining term— was equal to that of most schools.
The principle was self-government without masters' espion-
age. When not in school or chapel the whole discipline
was left to the boys themselves. There were eighteen
perfects in College and a few subordinates with limited
power, and the management was very much assimilated to
that of a regiment. Two things were certain — which was,
that the governors and the governed amongst the boys
knew what their powers and duties were, and the governed
knew that what had to be done must be done, and they soon
learned that willingness and good-humour saved them a
great deal of trouble and annoyance, and, without knowino-
it, they acquired habits of obedience and discipline which

When IV e Old Fogeys ivere Boys. 209

lasted them for life. Correspondents who know nothmg
about the value of school discipline write a lot of rubbish to
the papers about " the lads having ushers." Tf instead of
writing they would go down and address the boys on the
subject, and the river was handy, what then ? In every
place, and at all hours of the day and night some prefect
w^as answerable for what was going on, and if he neglected
his duty and countenanced things which he ought not, his
power would be taken away at once^ and he would prac-
tically be reduced to the ranks ; and great was the downfall
of that boy. In cases of this kind came out the real boy-
character, and if the deposed prefect was a bully all the
juniors would rejoice in his fall and not move a hand for
hiui, but if he was a good fellow every junior would antici-
pate his wishes and volunteer to do everything for him as
if he had the power to fag them. As regards discipline and
tunding — tunding by prefects' court-martial was a great
institution properly used — abused it was positively infernal.
Big fellows, tribunes of the people, were the victims gener-
ally ; and if they chose to be guilty of breaches of discipline
and loould play cards, or get in spirits, or go into the town
out of bounds, and a prefect who was answerable for dis-
cipline caught them, they had their choice of a dozen or so
with a ground ash across their shoulders before the school^
or go before the authorities. In nineteen cases out of
twenty the culprits took the tunding. It was soon over ;
all the boys knew what it was for, and if the offence was
uncontaminated by anything low or sneaking or dishonour-
able, no one thought the worse of the prefect who did it or
the boy who suffered the punishment ; and you would some-
times see tunder and tundee playing in the same match at
football or cricket as if nothing had happened, just as I
once saw a second master who had flogged a boy in school at
12 o'clock, caught out by the culprit at 12.30 in a match

210 When we Old Fogeys were Boys.

It is needless to say that both " smoled a smile." As I said
before, bullying prefects belonged to the fireside coteries,
who wore rings and used bear's grease, never dirtied their
boots or rujffled their hair or neckcloths, and asked one
another little riddles, ergo, milksops.

And now, perhaps, you will ask, what good did this kind
of discipline ever do to me ? I will tell you. It taught me
a kind of rough-and-ready code of laws of fair play and
honour, and stamped out false pride ; and if I had to bring
a brown paper parcel to you, and could not afford a cab, I
would walk through London with it under my arm and
would not be ashamed to do it. And, secondly, if you and
I were in the wilds and we came across any eatable animal,
I believe I could cut him up and cook him in a way which
would make your mouth water, cook a pudding in a pot-lid,
and could do hundreds of things for you and me which I
should never be able to do but for my boyhood's apprentice-
ship. Why, if the Prince of Wales sent word that he
would come and breakfast with me — how could I do him
most honour ? Would I send for a professed cook from
London ? Never ! I would write to my old schoolfellow
and former breakfast-fag, Frank Buckland, the best cook
and coffee-maker in the world when a boy, and would say,
" Frank, my boy, do your best ! " And I will venture to
say that H.R.H. would remark, " My mother would like to
knight your cook." The manly feeling generated in the
little world of a public school has made it an impossibility
to me ever to offer three fingers of my left hand to a man
who is supposed to be below me in life ; for that is the
special privilege of the purse-proud snob, whom I should
remarkably like to have for a fag now, and I would do
what I was not fond of doing as a boy, and lick him within
an inch of his life.

One word about the biof idle fellows. Hear what General

When ive Old Fogeys ivere Boys, 211

Shute, V.O., an ardent Wykehamite, said at the 'Wykehamist
dinner some few years back in the presence of Wardens,
Masters, Judges, and Bishops. The general was returning
thanks for the army, and claimed Winchester as his first
teacher in military matters, as he was there grounded in
punctuality, discipline, and obedien'3e ; and he added, almost
in these words : '^ And if you would think less of the
competitive examinations for the army, and let us have your
strong, idle football-players and cricketers who cannot learn
much Latin and Greek, and send them to us at seventeen
years old, any good colonel or adjutant will either make
good soldiers of them in twelve months, or return them on
your hands, Queen's hard bargains." General Shute was quite
right; for out of the idle division of my day, many
left their bones in the Crimea, India, and other foreign
countries, and many, fortunately, are either good and
gallant soldiers or useful in other walks of life, and would
be very handy now to bring Shere Ali (whom for the con-
venience of memory has been christened Mr. Shire Lane)
out of Cabul. How much twaddle have we not heard at
school dinners about ^' our gallant brothers who sleep in
the Crimea and India," not spoken by men who rode in the
six hundred, or who relieved Lucknow, but by after-dinner
table-thumpers, who are the very men who support the
head masters in their hobby of keeping out manly back-
ward boys who want teaching, and to whom the school
discipline would be advantageous — and who used to b3
the material from which ''our gallant brothers" came —
in favour of competitive examinationers, who come in vvitli
a supply of grammar ready laid on and thereby save the
masters a deal of trouble.

The late Lord Herbert, when Mr. Sidney Herbert, Secre-
tary at War, said, in the House of Commons, that the
qualifications for a staff-officer were: 1. Knowledge of
P— 2

212 When we Old Fogeys were Boys.

French or German. 2. A quick eye for a line of country^
with power to make an intelligible sketch of it. 3. To be
able to ride well across it — which last qualification, he said,
was most important of all. And I am not singular in
believing that Lord Herbert was right. I am not preaching
that our discipline and manners and customs were perfect
by any means, but I believe that, as boys, we had to cut our
own way pretty much by ourselves, and I don't think that
boys of the present day would be much hurt if some of
their luxuries and expenses were curtailed.

One thing is quite certain, which is that masters of large
schools have now run up the costs as high as possible, and
if their predecessors, the Consuls of our boyhood, buttered
their bread on one side, a good many of the present masters
and school authorities take precious good care to butter it
on both sides, and I think headmasters' conferences would
be more valuable if paterfamilias had his hearing at them.

DE SENECTUTE.

If we are allowed to see the ancient writers in the next
world I hope to have the pleasure of punching the heads of
Livy and Tacitus, my two favourite aversions, of thanking
Publius Virgilius Maro, Esq., for writing pretty rural
sketches in the Eclogues, the shipwreck of ^neas, quite as
good as " Robinson Crusoe," the visit of ^neas to Lady
Dido — on which occasion Pater ^neas did not prove his
p iety — and the description of the sports in the ^meid,
especially the mill between Dares and Entellus, quite equal
to " Bell's Life." At the same time I should make my
lowest obeisance to Marcus Tullius Cicero for his writing
his two works, " De Amicitia " and " De Senectute," which
used to be, and I hope still are, the first strong food in
Latin prose, which schoolboys learnt. I suppose the scheme
of introducing two old fogeys Lselius and Scsevola walking
and talking in their garden gave a reality to the first work.
At any rate, under a good master who thoroughly appre-
ciated the authors, Cicero and Virgil always went with a
stamp and a go, and I never grudged the time and trouble
of learning a good deal of both by heart. And one word
about that master. He was an old Harrovian, now Bishop
of St. Andrew's, and a splendid athlete, and could beat any
boy in the school at running, jumping, swimming, rackets,
213

214 ^'De Senectufer

and rowing, and played with the straightest bat I ever saw.
I never shall forget his horror when a boy in the hunting
scene in ^n. lY. (when, by-the-bye, Mr. ^neas changed
his quarry and found himself with Lady Dido in the
summer-house), in which the boy Ascanius is described on
his pony cracking his whip, construed '' insonuitque flagelW
" played on his pipe," taking a shot ixtflacjello as " flageolet.''
I forget what was the eventuality, but I hope that boy was
flogged for not using his dictionary, and for the awful"
murder of Mr. Virgil his poem.

It is about a green old age that I am talking now, and
the question is, who are the men who attain it as a rule ?
I believe the athlete and the active man of business have
the best chance, provided that they lead a sober life. We
all know that, as a rule, the old shepherds on the downs
are like the donkeys and never die. This question of old
age was discussed in some of the papers when Mr. Budd
the cricketer and sportsman, died a few years ^ince, aged
ninety, also when Lord Lyndhurst died at a very gr'eat
age ; and the average age of the old " B eleven " (an Eleven of
cricketers, em-olled by Lord Frederick Beauclerck), whose
names began with B, of which Mr. Budd was one, added up
after theii- deaths, came to over eighty years each. We
all remember the jaunty way in which Lord Palmerston
jogged down to the Derby, and the light quick step with
which the late Lord Campbell and the late Lord Chelmsford
used to walk down to the court of a morning, and, by-the-
bye, the present Lord Chief Justice of England is not the
slowest man on his feet. And we remember how Arch-
bishop Sumner, when an octogenarian, as upright as a
dart stepped out on his way to the House of Lords; that
grand old man who, in his old age, wrote seven volumes on
the Epistles, and at his death- sent a presentation copy to
every incumbent in his diocese ; working on the quiet to

"Be Senectuter 215

the last. Parson Russell, we know, was a living example of
an iron constitution, and so was Wenman, the old Kent
Avicket keeper ; and although feeble in limbs, at ninety, the
late Lord Lyndhurst made a celebrated speech in the
House of Lords, every word of which was as clear as a bell.

I tell you what I believe, good reader, and it is this. We
go upon wheels more than we ought, and we travel too
much and too quick ; it is all railway and hansom now, and
we are always running a race against time, and we have
our heads in the manger too much, and it is too much
refreshment bar wherever we are. Except on Sundays,
perhaps, when there is nothing to do, we hardly ever do
what was the custom when we were boys, when we used to
take an eight or ten mile walk to the races or a cricket
match, or a good stretch to a meet of the hounds and a run
with them afterwards. An athlete who leads a life of
indolence after he has laid aside his weapons, whether
cricket bat, the coestus, the oar, or what not, and indulges
in dissipation is a sure victim for the undertaker, in proof
whereof I can quote Pierce Egan's lecture on self-defence,
delivered in 1845, which contains the history and career of
all the great prize-fighters from the earliest period till the
date of the lecture ; and it is melancholy to see how many
died of drink ; and unfortunately in our own experience
how many of our best athletes have done the same on their
retirement ; whereas, on the other hand, fortunately, we see
how tough some are.

I came across two specimens of the old school lately, such
as one seldom sees, one of whom broke the King's peace as
often as most men, and the other had helped to preserve the
peace of Europe, early in this century ; the first named is
aged seventy-nine on Christmas-day next and the second
eighty-eight, and both of them are as hale and hearty as
any two men in England. I met the first some two or

216 "Be Senectute:'

three years ago at a benefic in Cambridge Hall, Newman
S!:r33t, at which it wa3 announced th3 best men in London
would appear, and that the non-commissioned officers in the
Household Brigade would contend with single-sticks and
broadsword and the gloves. It was a high-priced benefit,
and the bill was an arrant sell, and the only thing which I
gained was sitting next to a bright, lively, elderly man who
evidently had been a frequenter of the ring and a performer
also, as, on speaking of Crib's final benefit a short time
before his death, which occurred somewhat over thirty years
ago, he said to me, " I put on the gloves with Tom Spring
that night." " Then who are you ? " I asked. " Jem Ward,"
he replied. Accident threw me in his way the other day,
and I spent a couple of hours with him, and it seemed hardly
possible that I was talking to a man who received the
champion belt from Spring in 1831 at the Fives' Court, and
who had been in the ring as early as 1816, and had fought
White headed Bob, Tom Cannon, and men who seem to me
to have lived before the Christian era. He fought over
twenty battles and has led a regular active life from youth
upwards, and there he is now, one of nature's gentlemen,
just as poor Tom Spring was, in manner, fit to sit at
anyone's table, f uU of information, with innumerable anec-
dotes of days and people and things long past, and as he
is going to put his recollections on paper shortly, he will
tell his own story much better than I could. He is now an
inmate of the Licensed Victuallers' Asylum at Peckham, a
most admirable home, where he has his comfortable quarters
and goes on with his painting, which has been the hobby
of his life. He leads an active life in his seventy-ninth
year, holding a place of trust at suburban race meetings.
It is needless to say that he is abstemious in living, and his
great delight is a good cigar of an evening. He looks much
more like a retired country gentleman than what people of

"Be Senectuter 217

strong imaginations paint as a prize-fighter of the past, but
then he belongs to the old school, when prize-fighters were
supported by the greatest and noblest in the land, and
their followers acquired the manners of their associates.

Turning to legitimate warfare, let us look for a moment
at another sample of old English stuff in the shape of an
old soldier cetat 88, a hale, hearty, bright-eyed, cheerful old
man, from whom now I should be very sorry to receive a
cut from the soft end of an oak stick, let alone a sw-ord.
Let us imagine that it is a fine Sunday afternoon, and that
we are sitting in a comfortable little house in a Surrey upland
at Carshalton, near Sutton, and that round the walls of the
room hang pictures, and on the tables are books about
Napoleon, the Duke, and Waterloo, &c., and that there is a
cavalry sword hanging up against the w^all of one room,
faced by an old Russian musket opposite. Let us carry our
imagination a little further, and that we have refused the
ofier of sherry or grog, and that a handy maid has pro-
duced some beer after our w^alk. On the table lies a very
excellent plan of Waterloo (which I took him over), copied
from an official plan which I am fortunate enough to
possess, prepared in 1815 by order of the Duke of York,
Avhich the writer of this has travelled over again and again
and compared with other French and Enghsh plans against
the Duke's dispatches, " Gleig's Waterloo," and most known
books on the subject, besides having on several occasions,
when in Belgium, surveyed the ground itself ; and imagine
that, for once in his life, the writer is listening and not
talking.

Room, if you please, for Mr. James Simmonds, formerly
of the 7 th Hussars. " In answ^er to your question why I
became a soldier, it was thus : My father was a farmer and
market gardener, well to do, on Mitcham Common, holding
what is now Watney's farm. I was drawn for the Militia

218 "De Seneduter

in 1812, and was always being wanted to go to Tooting
Common and Clapham Common, and was bothered to death
by a sergeant who kept me with old Brown Bess at ' present
arms,' recover arms,' till my own arms were fit to drop off,
and I said to myself, ' I'll do the regular thing sooner than
this,' and went off and enlisted in the 7th Hussars at
Mitcham, along with a neighbour, Bichard Alfrey, who was
in that Begiment in 1813. I was with the depot, first at
Guildford and then at Arundel, and afterwards the Begi-
ment had come home and we lay at Brighton under Lord
Uxbridge as colonel. We had been wanted once or twice in
London for bread riots, and lay at the King's Mews, where
Trafalgar Square now is. The news came in 1815, that
Napoleon had escaped, and we were ordered to the Low
Countries, and marched to Dover and embarked for Ostend,
we carrying our saddles and kit on board ship, and waiting
at Ostend for our horses, which were shipped separate.
When we got our horses we marched first fifteen miles from
Ostend, and then went into cantonments, and subsequently
marched across to the scene of the three great battles, on
the 15th of June being in the neighbourhood of Quatre
Bras and Genappe. On that day we were ordered to
sharpen our swords and prepare for active service, and to
draw double rations on the morning of the 1 6th ; but at
3 o'clock a.m., the trumpet sounded, and officers and ser-
geants were rushing about calling the men to turn out at
once, so we went without rations ; and from that moment
until after the battle of Waterloo on the 18th, we had no
rations, and were never off duty. The horses had a glorious
time of it, as they ate as much standing corn as they
pleased everywhere, but as for us, beyond a chance piece of
bread and biscuit which we sometimes came across, and
some bad spirits which we bought from sutlers, who hung
about, we went without. But then you know w^e were too

"Be Senectute:' 219

busy to think, we were doing picket and patrol duty all
during the battle of Quatre Bras, and all night, and next
day we had to clear the road, which was blocked with carts
and waggons and guns, on the 17th, for the army to retire
on Waterloo, and our regiment protected the rear for the
passage of the army at Genappe. There was a ford there,
and the way was very narrow, and we were attacked by
French cavah-y and were ordered to charge them. They
were Lancers, but only one troop of ours could get at them
at a time, and we could not move them ; and I can see and
hear Lord TJxbridge now and could swear to what he said,
' Get back, 7th, for God's sake ! — threes about ; ' and we
were re-formed, though we lost our major (Hodge) and
adjutant (Mears), and as we were clear, we let the 1st Life
Guards through, and saw them go at the French cavalry ;
and they regularly crashed into them with sheer weio-ht
and having once broken them they cut them to pieces, or
took them prisoners. The Life Guards went aU fresh and
excited as they saw us driven back, and they went at them
like madmen. Most of the French soldiers were drunk, as
they had sacked the liquor stores at Genappe. Well, to go
on to the Battle of Waterloo. We we on the Mont St.
Jean side of Hougoumont on the morning, but we had
been mostly on patrol duty and picket at night, as there
were so few light cavalry, and the Belgians did not do
what was expected of them, and we had to snatch a bit of
sleep and get a bit of bread and biscuit and a drop of
spirits as we could. The first shot, which reached us on
the 18th, was a round shot, and I can see her now ; mv
next man was a tailor, and a good soldier too, and he
laughed and said, ' What do you think of that, Jim ? ' but
the next shot took Sergeant Haslop's horse and thigh, and
I asked him, ' What do you think of that, then ? ' As you
know we did our bit that day, protecting the guns and

220 "Be Senectuter

supporting the first line, and when we made the last charge
my horse was shot under me, and I caught a French horse
and charged with the 18th Hussars, having lost my regi-
ment, and we rested for that night near Belle Alhance, on
the position the French held in the morning ; and we got
our first real meal early on the 19th. We afterwards
moved on to Cambray and saw the reduction of the town,
and then our fighting was over, and we marched on to
Paris."

The rest of the old gentleman's narrative contained the
incidents of the occupation of Paris, the grand review by
the Duke of Wellington, and Mr. Simmonds' subsequent
service when the regiment came home. At St. Omer he
was soldier-servant to three different officers, from time to
time, and his anecdotes are very amusing. It is no use
mentioning names and particulars, as the families of the
officers might not like it, but they may depend upon it that
their forefathers did not lead anchorite lives when peace
came, and 1 expect they were pretty much what the old
soldier described them, " the most dare-devil lot in the
world, sj)lendid officers under whom no man would be
afraid, but by no means ' a regular family.' " He stuck to
the regiment till it came home, the last which landed, and
on being offered his discharge after seven years' service
accepted it, the fighting being over ; and, like Oincinnatus,
returned to the farm and did the early Covent Garden
business for his father. On the sale of some of the horses
he bought one, which had a bullet in the thigh, called
*'■ Button Stick Joe " — so called because his rider lost his
kit and everything except his sword, his horse, and his
button-stick — and having made his purchase, he rode the
horse home to his father's house on Mitcham Common, and
made not a little sensation in his hussar jacket and cap,
which are now under a glass case at the museum at

''Be Senectuter 221

Waterloo, which he visited two years since, on the "Waterloo-
day, and had a special dinner of his friends at the inn,
where the museum is ; and which he would visit again had
he not been crippled for life owing to an accident
on the South- Western Railway in getting out of a
carriage on his way home from Aldershot, two years since,
for which he had the pleasure of paying over £100 in costs
in an action which he lost, against the company. That
action is a little sore point, though, soldier-like, he says,
"If I could have got those d— d lawyers of mine in the
wigs out of the way, and told the judge my own story, I
should have won."

Don't make any mistake, the old gentleman is no brag-
gart, and very truthful, with a real soldier's heart in him,
in his green old age ; and he says, " If I wasn't a cripple I
should like to go again now, though it would be my turn to
go as officer, I think." He is no laudator temporis acti, but
I believe what he says, which is that England was saved
by the sheer pluck of every individual who fought those
battles, and the campaign, short as it was, was decided, as
regards the hand-to-hand work, by English physique and
English horses.

One question I asked him, which was about army flogging.
He is dead against it, and says, " If a soldier deserves to be
flogged, kick him out and let him starve, and no one will
pity him ; if he has the making of a good soldier flogging
would ruin him ; if he is a bad one it will make him a
thorouijh blackguard."

When an admirable article appeared in Baihjs Magazine
on Owen Swift, one of the London press was good enough
to say it was vulgar : a little bird at the asylum whispered
to me that the writer was very kind to the dying pugilist in
his latter days. I have no doubt but that the Priest and
the Levite said the good Samaritan's twopence was a plant

222 ''I)e Senectuter

for his own benefit. Chacun a son gout. The writer of the
article forgot that all the London papers made a pretty-
penny out of Sayers and Heenan within the last twenty-
years, and would do so again to-morrow if they had the
chance. Now for old Jem Ward. My humble creed is that
men who have lived, like Jem Ward, in a rough and ready
world, and have followed a calling which abounded with
rascality and swindling, and have come out with clean hands,
are an honour to their country and an example for us all ;
for let us remember how carefully we were brought up and
how crooked has been our course in many cases. I remem-
ber— reverting to school days — a boy who is now a dignitary
of the Church, reading out in Prefect's library, amidst
much applause. Deaf Burke's speech on returning from
America, in which (exhibiting an American bowie knife) he
informed his audience that he would sooner be hung in this
world, and —omitting the Deaf un's words, which were un-
Shakesperian — would go to everlasting perdition in the
next, than see such a weapon in the hands of an English-
man. The Deaf un was not much of a preacher, and fell
into the Slough of Despond in his latter days, but I say
that those words have a wholesome moral ; and I only wish
I was a magistrate, or a judge, and had the power of in-
flicting punishment on every knifing ruffian.

On the first occasion of my being in a criminal court I
heard old Baron Gurney, at Maidstone, give a jury a
tremendous wigging for insisting on a verdict of man-
slaughter, when he summed up for murder, in a case where
a sweep had quarrelled with a man and had gone away for
some time and had got a knife and sliarpened it, and came
back and stabbed his enemy; and some years afterwards I
read an account of a trial at which Baron Alderson, the
kindest and best of men, gave a man a heavy sentence for
using a knife, to the best of my recollection in these very

"Be Senectuter 223

words : *' If men will quarrel and fight, nature has provided
them, with the proper weapons ; and, prisoner, you have no
excuse."

Looking back to an old school roll I picked out the
names of a few fellows older than myself, who really were
good at boxing when I was a little boy. Every one of
them was kind to me and never bullied ; two are very
known clergymen, one of whom is immortalised by his
fighting and beating the town bully named Jupe, in
1836, who was a man of five and twenty, in five
rounds, at Twyford cross-roads. I held his clothes and
saw it. The fight is recorded in Adams' " Wykehamica.''
For a wonder the boys were in the right, as the roughs, of
v>'hom Jupe was one, had cruelly beaten some little college
boys. To do the roughs justice, they kept a fair ring, and
their man fought fair, and was knocked clean out of time.
Another bowled in Gentlemen v. Players when a boy at
school ; another is a very distinguished retired cavalry
oflicer, a fifth is a well-known church architect, who pulled
in the Cambiidge boat, and the sixth was a fine steeple-
chase rider and rare good officer, who fell by the colom\s
of the 23rd at the Alma in 1854. The best man I ever
knew in London died last year : he was one of young Reed's
best pupils (ranking with Billy Duff and Thomas Knox
Holmes, and amateurs of that stamp), as was each of his four
sons. His theory was that all boys should swim like otters,
and be igorant of fear, and from the time they were little
boys his sons learned the noble art thoroughly. The
eldest was in the army, and died after the West African
campaign ; the second passed an admirable staflT examina-
tion, and now is on active service ; the third has a high civil
appointment in India, and the fourth is in an irregular
cavalry regiment now. One son received a medal from the
Eoyal Humane fSociety for swimming out in a heavy sea

224 ''De Senectuter

and saving life at Ramsgate, and the father's body, on its
way to Highgate cemetery, was carried across a canal bridge,
off which he jumped, in 1849, at twelve o'clock in a ter-
rifically stormy night in November, and saved a woman who
was drowning in the basin. He had left my chambers that
evening, when a regular tempest was raging, and refused to
take a bed, as he said that " he enjoyed a walk in a storm ; ""
and, on reaching the canal bridge, in Camden Town, h&
found an excited mob shouting, but doing nothing practi-
cally, to help the drowning woman. The bridge is close to
Grafton Street East, and the woman was close to the lock-
gate, a considerable distance from the bridge.

The late warden of Winchester was an astonishing athlete,
and at Oxford was champion of the University. When a tutor
at New College he constantly walked from Oxford to London
and vice versa ; and on one occasion, when a passenger on the
coach w^as using very blasphemous language and declined to
desist, he seized him and held him over the side of the
coach, and threatened to drop him in the road unless he
promised to behave better. Lsfc it be remembered also that
he attended Freeman the American giant's death-bed all
through his last illness.

So there is something in muscle after all.

V\/ebst8r Family Library of Veterinary Medicine
Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at