140 MR. PARKER 



for the last glass. Cock-fighting, badger-baiting, and 

 man-fighting, in all their hideousness, could be provided 

 on the shortest notice. With the razing of the Quad- 

 rant to the ground, and the closing of the public-houses 

 at 12.30, the night-houses were done away with, and the 

 worst features of this ' life ' swept away ; and it can 

 scarcely be that any more sensible steps were ever taken 

 by the guardians of the public peace and morals. 



Mr. Parker's courage, as I have shown, was un- 

 doubted. In fact, as we say in racing parlance, he came 

 of a good stock, and was well bred for a pugilist. His 

 father delighted in the science, and used to thrash his 

 farm labourers if they offended him in anything. The 

 old man broke his thigh after he was sixty years old, 

 and amputation of the leg followed. But he recovered, 

 and with the assistance of a wooden limb and a crutch 

 he used to attend Chester market most weeks, and had 

 several battles there. He would throw away his crutch, 

 and plant his back against a wall (if one could be found), 

 and hit his opponents with such terrific force that they 

 soon gave in. Mr. Parker himself was in height about 

 5 feet 11 inches, and weighed twelve stone. He walked 

 extremely upright in rather a swaggering style, and 

 cared for no man. At the age of twenty his hair was 

 quite gray a peculiarity of the family and soon after 

 became white. He received a liberal education at a 

 grammar school in the neighbourhood, at Farndon, and 

 amongst other accomplishments wrote a splendid hand. 

 In all business transactions he was precise, and paid 

 his training and other accounts with punctuality to a 

 penny. 



Mr. Parker was a prudent man in every sense of the 

 word, and remarkably free from prejudice. On any 

 matter on which he was not thoroughly informed of his 



