66 AUGUST JA BROADLAND. 



' Law, 'tis a pity we < Norfolk dumplins ' can't make good use on 'em when 

 we've caught 'em. Seems such a pity to chuck a catch of three or four stun on 

 the bank tu feed the flies an' rats with an' breed most fearful stenches. They tell 

 me in some parts they make 'em a credit tu the fryin' pan. I doan't see why we 

 shouldn't hev better kinds of fish introduced, sufnn' as we ken eat. Jest yow try 

 your cook with a couple of bream, sir; if she don't chuck 'em to the cat, and fry 

 yew a haddock instead, my name ain't Sharman ! Yew see they doan't fare tu 

 know how tu make 'em tasty. 5 



* Fish are queer 'uns. They hev whims an' fancies jest like Christians, and are 

 a sight more knowin' than we think 'em.' 



Such is a sample of our factotum's extempore lecture. The man seems a 

 kind of talking machine and a Broadland encyclopaedia in one, as most of your 

 fen-folk are when fellow-feeling makes us kin. But once break through that thin 

 crust of reserve, and edge them out of their monosyllables, and they unwind to 

 an extent that is surprising. 



Header, did you ever escort a lass to the railway station after a day's frolic in 

 the country ? You know what packages went out, and what an increase, alas ! 

 came back again; such bundles of flowers and reeds and grasses, and what not. 

 You were glad when your faltering footsteps reached the station threshold. Pity 

 us, then, with a brace of them, with the weight of our own paraphernalia, and some 

 of the largest of the fishes, for they've determined to cook them, cook them mark 

 you. And then those bundles, and 



Yet we have some pleasant recollections of that delightful August day in the 

 Broadland. 



