Winkle: the Eel-Man 147 



every one knew him, should have been a 

 product of Poverty Cross. 



A word here as to this strange place. It 

 is where two old long-abandoned bridle- 

 paths interse&ed, near the middle of an 

 irredeemable traft, one where Nature had 

 tossed aside all the rubbish, after fashioning 

 a goodly land. Originally it was known as 

 Poverty Cross-roads, as one old deed attests ; 

 but recently the interest in folk-lore and local 

 history has brought to the front the champion 

 of this strange explanation : that the name 

 is derived from the facl: that a missionary 

 set up a station here, and, failing to make 

 one convert, called the place Poverty Cross. 

 This is how much local history is " made." 

 But what better can be expedled? This 

 place, and much of its surroundings for 

 many a mile, offers no foothold for ambition. 

 Those who remain are content with little, 

 even intellectually, and were charmed re- 

 cently by a pickwickian lecture on the 

 " Oneness of Unity and Differences of the 

 Diametrically Opposite," even speaking of 

 it, months after, as a '* learned discourse." 



But let us back to Winkle, the nearest to a 

 savage of them all, and so worthiest of con- 



