VII STOCKS 129 



saw explained to him. If a novice, it will be well 

 also to ascertain that he knows a Dog-Eose when 

 he sees it. When I was ill one winter, I was 

 pleased to hear that a parishioner had brought me a 

 nice lot of stocks at a reasonable price. One of the 

 first acts of my convalescence was to inspect their 

 quality. And alas ! not only were the majority 

 practically useless from chops and other injuries, 

 but a third of the whole were not Eose stocks but 

 blackberries ! 



This reminds me of another amusing incident, 

 which I will relate exactly as it occurred. It refers 

 to the spelling of the word briar, but throws no 

 light upon the debated point whether an ' e ' should 

 take the place of the 'a.' The occasion was the 

 examination of a night school for the Government 

 grant, and at that time the teachers were allowed to 

 conduct it subject to the rules sent to them. A 

 young East Anglian labourer was going through the 

 reading ordeal, and his teachers, of whom I was one, 

 were anxiously watching his struggles. He had sunk 

 twice — I mean he had made two mistakes in his 

 allotted piece — and three would mean failure. He 

 came to the word in question, stopped dead, and 

 spelt it slowly. We encouraged him, and patted 

 him on the back, for he had all the appearance of 

 having a word in him but of being afraid to part 

 with it. At last, after much exhortation to play 

 the man and "out with it," he spelt it again very 

 carefully, " b-r-i-a-r," and then the word burst forth 

 quite suddenly like an explosion, " brumble-bush ! " 

 " Well ! well ! yes, oh yes ! " said my dear old 

 colleague (long since deceased): "eh? pass that — 

 oh yes ! he knows what it means." I said nothing, 

 and I am afraid the Education Department was 



K 



