The Brighton of my Boyhood 



On the spot where to-day the Aquarium 

 stands, the fishermen held their market ; 

 and there, among a picturesque con- 

 fusion of wicker creels, heaped nets, and 

 the silver hillocks of writhing fish, you 

 might hear some very fine bargaining 

 between the townsmen and the fisher-folk. 

 And If, to your thinking, bulk and lung- 

 power Indicated superiority, you would 

 unquestionably have backed the latter ; 

 and yet It not unseldom happened that 

 a quiet determination to secure the best 

 at the lowest price, would outlast a deal 

 of honest bluster and the broadest Sussex 

 bawl. 



Down among the simple beach -folk 

 there came from time to time the beaux 

 and butterflies who were oruests at the 

 Pavilion, and sometimes the King himself. 

 The burly fishermen accepted the petting 

 and patronising with amused toleration ; 

 they taught the gentlemen to swim and 

 grinned at their first flounderlngs : and 

 they spoke of their anointed sovereign as 

 '' Jarge." The daintiest ladies delivered 

 themselves delightedly into the hands of 

 the fat bathlnof women in their short 

 petticoats, and, were they duchesses or 

 daughters of half-pay captains, submitted 

 merrily to their duckings and douslngs, and 

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