26 HOAX. 



desirable part of the visage to commence 

 operations on, convinced ine that they were 

 journeymen barbers. The rest of the com- 

 pany were doubting or affirming the truth 

 of some doggerel rhymes published in 

 their provincial paper, which gave a lu- 

 dicrous description of some persons who 

 had been dupes of a hoax announcing 

 that a man would walk on the water from 

 Lynn to Cambridge,* many of whom were 

 then in the room. Such things did not 

 give me a favourable opinion of the intel- 

 lectual acquirements of a community among 

 whom I had a very good chance of taking 

 up my abode for some considerable time. 

 Nevertheless, I continued on the box, 

 and did not, as I had expected, meet 

 with any hindrance or interference from 

 my predecessor. I could not boast of 

 my coach being overloaded, except with 

 packages of those little crustaceans so 



* One Zachariah Whitmore; a trick of some wag in 

 the University. 



