72 SEVEN-YEAR SLEEPERS 



SEVEN-YEAR SLEEPERS 



FOR many generations past that problematical animal, the 

 toad-in-a-hole (literal, not culinary) has been one of the 

 most familiar and interesting personages of contemporary 

 folk-lore and popular natural history. From time to time 

 he turns up afresh, with his own wonted perennial vigour, 

 on paper at least, in company with the great sea-serpent, 

 the big gooseberry, the shower of frogs, the two-headed 

 calf, and all the other common objects of the country or 

 the seaside in the silly season. No extraordinary natural 

 phenomenon on earth was ever better vouched for in 

 the fashion rendered familiar to us by the Tichborne 

 claimant that is to say, no other could ever get a larger 

 number of unprejudiced witnesses to swear positively and 

 unreservedly in its favour. Unfortunately, however, swear- 

 ing alone no longer settles causes offhand, as if by show of 

 hands, ' the Ayes have it,' after the fashion prevalent in the 

 good old days when the whole Hundred used to testify that 

 of its certain knowledge John Nokes did not commit such 

 and such a murder ; whereupon John Nokes was forthwith 

 acquitted accordingly. Nowadays, both justice and science 

 have become more exacting ; they insist upon the unpleas- 

 ant and discourteous habit of cross-examining their witnesses 

 (as if they doubted them, forsooth !), instead of accepting 

 the witnesses' own simple assertion that it's all right, and 

 there's no need for making a fuss about it. Did you 

 yourself see the block of stone in which the toad is said 



