e things smart and business-like, a dozen
strong chairs were bought for the use of the Committee room. There was
also a rule about attendances, and any member failing to put in an
appearance was fined sixpence, and if he happened to be the overseer,
the enormity of his offence was marked by a fine of a shilling--"unless
a note be sent to the meeting" [explaining cause of absence]. Here was
a model authority, the like of which the town of Royston has never had
since, considered as a working body, and having a due regard to the
light in which things were then regarded as compared with the present
time.

In glancing at some of the things for which the Parochial Parliament
was responsible, I must ask those readers who, though not resident in
Royston, may take an interest in these pages, to bear with me while I
refer to a matter which exclusively affects some of the townspeople of
Royston. As it was, whether rightly or wrongly, brought into the
parish accounts for Royston, Cambs., for many years during the last and
the present century, it may be convenient here to make some reference
to the property in Melbourn Street, Royston, Cambs., now generally
known as the Cave House and Estate, and its management during the
period of which I am writing. In the first place then, it has really
nothing whatever to do with the Cave, as a property, excepting for the
accidental circumstance that nearly at the end of last century the then
occupier of the Town House, as it was called, Thomas Watson by name,
and a bricklayer, set his men to work during the hard winter of 1790,
at cutting the present passage down through the solid chalk into the
Cave from the house by which it is now entered. An interesting
advertisement of this event which I have {36} found in the Cambridge
University Library is given below. It bears the date 1794.

"ROYSTON CAVE OPENED.--

"T. Watson respectfully informs the public in general and the
antiquarians in particular, that he has opened (for their inspection) a
very commodious entrance into that ancient Subterraneous cavern in
Royston, Herts., which has ever been esteemed by all lovers of
antiquity as the greatest curiosity of the kind in Europe. T. Watson
hopes that all those who may think proper to visit the above Cave will
have their curiosity gratified to the full extent. The passage leading
to it is of itself extremely curious, being hewn out of the solid rock.

"N.B.--It may be seen any hour of the