182 The Old Dover Boad. 



was a riotous county if the people once rose, and prompt 

 measures were requisite. I had these facts from an old 

 cousin of my own, the magistrate who sent for, and went 

 with, the soldiers, and read the Kiot Act. 



Then we had all the migratory world en route to and 

 from London ; buy-a-broom girls, and Italian boys, and 

 dancing dogs, and dancing bears, and monkeys, and Punch 

 and Judy, and thimble-rig men (who always got " a month '' 

 as rogues and vagabonds if caught), and strapping big 

 Irishmen with linen from Belfast, and gypsies and 

 harvesters, whose bivouacs illuminated our lanes of a nighty 

 and beasts in transitu to the Paris Zoological Gardens : on 

 one occasion an enormous elephant with a young one march- 

 ing through, and on another occasion some camels and 

 zebras. And we constantly had regiments on the march, 

 and detachments billeted en route, and they made a brave 

 show in church on Sundays, though I am afraid the officers^ 

 credc an old maiden aunt of mine deceased, stared at the 

 girls all through the service. A.t racing times we saw the 

 racehorses travelling by road, and heard a great deal of 

 strong talk. Then one would meet absurd little men, 

 wrapped up in flannels and greatcoats in the dog-days, and 

 carrying theii^ saddles and bridles, and walking four miles 

 an hour, " wasting " by the way. Nothing surprised us in 

 that busy thoroughfare — which is now almost a desert. 



I often wonder that people with plenty of money don't 

 take a carriage and drive down the Kentish roads. 



In spring, when the orchards are in bloom, Kent is 

 exceedingly beautiful, and so it is in the hop- picking season, 

 and there being only one level mile — and that on the top 

 of Chatham Hill — between Shooter's Hill and the outskirts 

 of Dover, the scenery is remarkably striking from the high 

 ground, and the drive very pleasant. The views all over 

 the county from Boughton Hill, and of Canterbury and the 



