94 SEPTEMBER IN BROADLAND. 



Leaving our ' bikes ' in the care of the village innkeeper, we find ourselves at 

 length by the limpid waters of the Broad. We have been not a little amused and 

 interested in the droughty frequenters of the old 'Boar's Head,' some of whom have 

 arrived there earlier than ourselves, whilst others have been dropping in as we are 



munching our cheese and biscuits, and sipping our glasses of gingerbeer. Big 



strong fellows they are, with towy heads and tousled beards, whose lives have been 

 spent at the ploughtail and upon the fenland. Their attire is more accommodating 

 than picturesque, and more grotesque than fashionable. Fashions alter slowly and 

 stand for nothing in Broadland, save when Mary Ann has a few days' holiday from 

 her 'plaace,' and then she, in her less tasty than gaudy attire, becomes the transi- 

 ent envy of the village maidens. Our friends in ' wideawakes ' and fustians like 

 their beer, but generally have the good sense to avoid excess. There is the usual 

 small and tall talk that seems incidental to the pewter-pot and the ale-mug. Old 

 yarns are spun no doubt for the hundredth time, and it isn't all Grospel that is 

 dispensed in the village alehouse, any more than it is in the city ' snug.' But the 

 moral atmosphere in general is, fortunately, purer. The latest village intelligence 

 is sifted and dispensed in between their tippling; and by the time their pots are 

 empty each one knows that ' Gadder ' Duffel is blessed with his twenty-third baby 

 that Farmer Stubbs' colt has broken its knees and that the Squire's latest litter 

 of puppies is a likely * lot o' critters.' Much personal history has been raked over, 

 and even the 'wrong doin's of Parleymint ' have been rightsided by the village snob 

 and tailor, who are here, as everywhere else, ' the most knowin'some old fogies' in 

 the village democracy. 



A trifling episode does much to vary this dull, monotonous, diurnal round of 

 conversation. An itinerant quack-doctor drops in with his baggage; he is trudg- 

 ing on his way townwards, but is glad of a rest and a refresher to break the irk- 

 someness of the journey. He is a keen, ready-witted fellow, with an eye to busi- 

 ness; why shouldn't his halt be turned to some account? Straightway he begins 

 to 'patter.' The host rests upon his elbows; open-mouthed, the unsophisticated 

 rustics take in his lecture. A slight wink at us passes unnoticed by the others. In 

 minutest detail, every ill, and many others, to which mortal man is subject is 

 expatiated upon the usual ' pains in the back, dizziness in the head,' and all the 

 fearful catalogue a hotch-potch of wisdom and eloquence, chiefly strung together 

 from circulars advertising patent medicines. Burly men are led to believe they 

 must be suffering from one complaint or another or may do; and big freckled 

 hands dive deeply to where coppers are known to be in hiding. Boxes of the magic 

 pills, mostly concocted of soap and bread-crumbs, no doubt, are slipped in the places 



