io8 MEN OF PAST DAYS 



Eamsay, formerly an inspector of police, who for many 

 years resided at Abingdon. In madcap freaks he was as 

 thoughtless as Jack Mytton. Indeed, on one occasion 

 he helped that worthy, when passing up Milsom Street, 

 Bath, to throw a stranger, whom they happened to find 

 1 very jolly,' through an adjacent shop- window. At the 

 annual race-meeting at Abingdon, on one occasion, these 

 loquacious acquaintances, Messrs. Craven and Ramsay, 

 met at the Lamb Inn, for the express purpose of seeing 

 which of the two could clothe the greater number of 

 untruths in the pleasing semblance of reality. As few 

 men could have had more retentive memories than the 

 pair possessed, or a greater sense of the ridiculous, and, 

 I may add, a smaller regard for the morality of their 

 anecdotes, it may be imagined that the exhibition was a 

 unique one in its way. On another occasion they were, 

 for a trifling sum, pitted together to try which of them 

 could sing the greater number of songs with the fewest 

 verbal mistakes in the shortest time ; and Mr. Craven 

 was declared the winner at his 120th song, his opponent 

 having only reached No. 110. At this memorable scene 

 I was not present, and therefore 'only tell the tale as 

 it was told to me.' The only story, and that a fable, 

 which I call to mind as closely resembling this, was of 

 a Frenchman and a Yankee, who were pitted to talk 

 against time and one another, no matter on what sub- 

 ject, so long as the jargon was continuous. After talking 

 the umpire and witnesses to sleep, they went on with 

 unabated ardour until the Frenchman, from sheer ex- 

 haustion, fell lifeless from his chair; the Yankee con- 

 tinuing, being found by the umpire, on the latter's re- 

 turning to consciousness, whispering in the dead man's 

 ear, ' Truth appears stranger than fiction.' I may per- 

 haps add, as I have stated in my former work, when 



