24 Tom Sj^r big's Back Far I our. 



insisted, against the rules, on giving five instead of one 

 and on being remonstrated with for his over-KberaHty, 

 answered, '• Put down one for me, and four for Lord 

 Shaftesbury." I went to the Tottenham Court Road to 

 see Sayers' funeral start, Avhen the crowd was so great that 

 all traffic was stopped. One of the morning papers stated 

 that the only respectable person present was Tom Sayers' 

 dog. 



Well, good-bye to Tom Spring. He died in 1851, at the 

 Castle, in Holborn, as he lived, respected. Sevei-al testi- 

 monials were given to him ; one, many years ago, after he 

 beat Langan, by the " lads of the cider country." It was a 

 very handsome silver cup and cover, with a cider cask for a 

 handle; the last, in the year 1846, a very massive silver 

 flagon, which was well lined with sovereigns. 1 remember 

 one very amusing incident about the Spring testimonial in 

 1846, which was an announcement that a special extra 

 meeting of the subscribers would be held at the Castle 

 Tavern, Holborn, with a remark in large type, " Mr. T. 

 Spring has kindly consented to take the chair." 



Although I had a horror of ordinary " sporting houses " 

 and of ''sporting gents," I was in Spring's house for 

 luncheon many hundreds of times ; and I suppose that 

 ninety times out of every hundred my refreshment was 

 bread and cheese and a pint of stout. Though, on state 

 occasions, I have been in very good company in his sanctum, 

 when old members of the Pugilistic Club and men of rank, 

 too, gave him a call, and had a bottle of wine, and talked 

 over old times. 



I never heard him say an unkind word, or saw him 

 sponge upon any one, or do a shabby trick of any kind ; 

 and I look back on his memory with something very near 

 affection, and I believe him to have been a kind true man. 

 The clergyman who attended his death-bed wrote a vei-y 



