ISLE OF WIGHT 1 29 



King Edward VII. will have," said one. " What 

 d'ye mean by that?" cried several. "A long 

 rain," said our humorist, and the rather doubtful 

 joke was received with applause. After waiting 

 there an hour and a half, and the rain steadily 

 pouring and not intending to stop, we resolved, 

 all unprepared as we were, to make a dash 

 through it, and we reached our home like 

 drowned fishermen at eleven o'clock. 



While we were fishing our eldest boy, Ted, 

 had biked over to Ryde to see the Review and 

 then biked home again, a ride of about twenty 

 miles. Not content with that he went off again 

 at seven o'clock to see the Fleet illuminated 

 the storm came on before the lighting up began. 

 He started back at nine o'clock, and reached 

 home not to put too fine a point on it rather 

 wet. The night was as dark as Erebus, and he 

 came through all that downpour from which we 

 had sheltered ; he seemed to have enjoyed the 

 trip, only the rain put his lamp out twice, and 

 his chief fear was that a policeman might be 

 calmly doing his duty in the deluge and be 

 down upon him a very likely contingency ! 

 It took three days to dry his clothes. Many 

 scores of thousands who had gone out clad in 



K 



