336 NIMROD'S NORTHERN TOUR. 



for the weekly returns. He did " walk," but not to Liverpool ; for, 

 stopping short at Chester, he mounted the box of the London mail, for 

 the purpose of seeing a fight that was to take place the next day but 

 one, somewhere in the neig'hbourhood of London. He saw the fight, 

 and returning on the box of the Shrewsbury mail, and walking thence 

 to Wrexham, appeared in the mess-room of his regiment on the fifth 

 night. But the hardships he endured on this expedition, must prove 

 unendurable by any other man. For example — to avoid the suspicion 

 of his Colonel — he did not even take a great coat with him, much less 

 had he any change of clothes ; and before he reached Lichfield, those 

 on his back were saturated with rain and sleet. He dried them on his 

 back when he got to London and straightway went to the fight. On 

 his return to the metropolis, he went into a hot bath, and having had 

 two hours' sleep in a bed, started on the box of that night's mail for 

 Shrewsbury. It should here be observed, that in those days the boxes 

 of the mail were not on springs ! 



When speaking of the Captain, Pierce Egan thus writes — " Captain 

 Barclay's mode of living is plain and unaffected. His table is always 

 abundantly supplied, and he is fond of society. His hospitality is of 

 that frank and open kind which sets every man at his ease." Nothing 

 can be more true than this. At Ury, the good old-fashioned roast-and- 

 boiled cookery is the order of the day ; and a man may as well expect 

 to find the cook's shoes in reality, as any of your " quelqiies choses'' 

 on his table. A pot of brown stout, or home brewed ale, is likewise an 

 invariable accompaniment of the smoking sirloin, or leg of fine new 

 Leicester wether. — " Weell Jock," said a neighbour to a celebrated For- 

 farshire yeoman, " what did ye see at the Captain's?" (He had gone to 



