g of a most improving character, _The Child's
Grammar_, _The Mother's Grammar_, _A Short History of Insects_, and
_Cobwebs to Catch Flies_ being of the number. The forty-fourth edition
of _The Child's Grammar_ by Mrs. Lovechild appeared in 1851, and the
twenty-second edition of _The Mother's Grammar_ in 1849. But it is her
husband that her name most recalls to us. Sir John Fenn gave us the
delightful Paston Letters--of which Horace Walpole said that 'they make
all other letters not worth reading.' Walpole described 'Mr. Fenn of
East Dereham in Norfolk' as 'a smatterer in antiquity, but a very good
sort of man.' Fenn, who held the original documents of the Letters, sent
his first two volumes, when published, to Buckingham Palace, and the
King acknowledged the gifts by knighting the editor, who, however, died
in 1794, before George Borrow was born. His widow survived until 1813,
and Borrow was in his seventh or eighth year when he caught these
notable glimpses of his 'Lady Bountiful,' who lived in 'the
half-aristocratic mansion' of the town. But we know next to nothing of
Borrow in East Dereham, from which indeed he departed in his eighth
year. There are, however, interesting references to his memories of the
place in _Lavengro_. The first is where he recalls to his author friend,
who had offered him comet wine of 1811, his recollection of gazing at
the comet from the market-place of 'pretty D----' in 1811.[23] The
second reference is when he goes to church with the gypsies and dreams
of an incident in his childhood:

It appeared as if I had fallen asleep in the pew of the old
church of pretty Dereham. I had occasionally done so when a
child, and had suddenly woke up. Yes, surely, I had been asleep
and had woke up; but no! if I had been asleep I had been waking
in my sleep, struggling, striving, learning and unlearning in
my sleep. Years had rolled away whilst I had been asleep--ripe
fruit had fallen, green fruit had come on whilst I had been
asleep--how circumstances had altered, and above all myself
whilst I had been asleep. No, I had not been asleep in the old
church! I was in a pew, it is true, but not the pew of black
leather in which I sometimes fell asleep in days of yore, but
in a strange pew; and then my companions, they were no longer
those of days of yore. I was no longer with my respectable
father and mother, and my dear brother, but with th