thor of undying verse. To this day it is
impossible to make him understand that reminiscences of FitzGerald are of
greater public interest than any recollection of him--Posh.

It was not easy to explain to him that it was his first meeting with
Edward FitzGerald that was the thing and not the theft of his (Posh's)
father's longshore lugger which led to that meeting. However, time and
patience have rendered it possible to separate the wheat from the tares
of his narrative; and what tares may be left may be swallowed down with
the more nutritious grain without any deleterious effect.

In the early summer of 1865 some daring longshore pirate made off with
Fletcher senior's "punt," or longshore lugger, without saying as much as
"by your leave." The piracy (as was proper to such a deed of darkness)
was effected by night, and on the following morning the coastguard were
warned of the act. These worthy fellows (and they are too fine a lot of
men to be disbanded by any twopenny Radical Government) traced the boat
to Harwich. Here the gallant rover had sought local and expert aid to
enable him to bring up, had then raised an awning, as though he were to
sleep aboard, and, after thus satisfying the local talent to whom he was
still indebted for their services, had slunk ashore and disappeared. Old
Mr. Fletcher, on hearing the news, started off to Harwich in another
craft of his, and (fateful fact!) took his son Posh with him.

Both the Fletchers were known to Tom Newson, a pilot of Felixstowe Ferry,
and they naturally looked him up.

For years Edward FitzGerald had been accustomed to cruise about the Deben
and down the river to Harwich in a small craft captained by one West. But
in 1865 he was the owner of a smart fifteen-ton schooner, which he had
had built for him by Harvey, of Wyvenhoe, two years previously, and of
which Tom Newson was the skipper and his nephew Jack the crew. According
to Posh, the original name of this schooner was the _Shamrock_, but she
has become famous as the _Scandal_. It happened that when the Fletchers
were at Harwich in search of the stolen punt, Edward FitzGerald had come
down the river, and Newson made his two Lowestoft friends known to his
master.

There can be no doubt that at that time, when he was twenty-seven years
of age, Posh was an exceptionally comely and stalwart man. And he was,
doubtless, possessed of the dry humour and the spirit of simple jollity
which make his race such