190 PROCEEDINGS OF THE COTTESWOLD CLUB 



man that there is so little to say of him in a sketch like 

 this : but very different is the area he occupies in the 

 thoughts of one who has enjoyed his intimate friendship 

 for thirty years, and his company in hundreds of miles of 

 walking over the Cotteswolds and the Severn Valley, the 

 moors of West Cornwall, and the Volcanic district of 

 South Central France : the latter area being described in 

 one of his papers in the Transactions of the Club. 



I am able to testify of him, as a friend of mine did 

 sometime ago of the late Alfred Lloyd Fox, of Falmouth, 

 " He is the best man to travel with I ever knew ! " 

 "Why?" — "Because he can go anvhow : he can sleep 

 anywhere : and he can cat anvthing ! " Even now a 

 cold shiver comes over me at the recollection of the 

 dirty hovel we went into at Thuyets, a few leagues 

 from Vals, close under the slope of a volcano that 

 unfortunately became extinct before it had had time 

 to swallow up and melt the establishment in question. 

 Your respected ex- President forthwith made a con- 

 vention with the unkempt hostess to prepare us 

 an omelette — which the present writer declined as 

 promptly as he would a slice of the cold missionary 

 said to be on the King of Timbuctoo's table everv day at 

 two o'clock : producing instead, from his own pocket, a 

 pot of Liebig, and modestly asking for " un peu de pain" 

 and a kettle of hot water. Kettles were not known at 

 Thuyets : and a damsel, unkempt, to match the mistress, 

 brought in a vast saucepan of boiling water, which she 

 managed to splash over the basin on to the table, and 

 to the raw back of a mangy dog — (who became a minus 

 quantity, all but a shriek) — forming a steaming puddle 

 in the mud floor. One ate, under such circumstances, 

 simply to keep soul and body together : not for enjoy- 

 ment ; but your leader held on his way, and made the 

 best of things, — praising the omelette as excellent ! As 

 we left the house, he looked back with a smile, and said : 



I 



