12 WAYFARING NOTIONS 



for a lifetime instead of having to be constantly 

 renewed, as is the case with the misguided victims 

 of conventionality who occasionally wash. The 

 same children, or later editions qualified to person- 

 ate those now grown up, chant the same doggerel 

 about mouldy coppers, call you Johnny, and shout 

 *' Hooray " with identical enthusiasm. The same 

 farm hands continue to regard racing and all its 

 works with bovine indifference, save on the Cup 

 day, when, possibly with a little outside assistance, 

 they may over-celebrate the event of the day in 

 evening beers at the pub. The same sort of dust 

 millers the driving passenger on parts of the road 

 not watered by the South Coast Railway Company 

 and the Duke of Richmond. A lucky dog like 

 me meets with the same free-handed hospitality 

 from his friends with the fine tables under his 

 beechwood shelter. The harvest presents much 

 about the same appearance. The same wild 

 flowers deck the hedgerows and struggle for life 

 in the turf. You have to go through the same 

 routine as ever — at least, I do — to get a news- 

 paper or a shave, that latter being obtained at 

 the cost of a three miles' walk each way to the 

 excellent barber and amateur nigger melodist 

 Wright, late Clark — poor old Clark of Mid- 

 hurst — or after a similar in distance excursion to 

 Singleton, where you sit in a tent at the back of 

 a pub, and find that a scrubby chin like adver- 

 sitee makes you acquaint with strange company. 

 A foot-padder, which is not the same as a footpad, 

 finds the usual difficulty in dodging hospitality in 

 faring through the hamlets. I regret to say that 

 the same sports do not appear to be carried on in 

 the villages of an evening — there used to be good 

 fun with the foot-racing. 



