they were returning from a festive meeting,
each man performing on his several instrument.

He was an attendant at the debates at the Cambridge Union, _e.g._, at the
one when the question debated was, "Will Mr Coleridge's poem of 'The
Ancient Mariner' or Mr Martin's Act tend most to prevent cruelty to
animals?" The voting was, for Mr Martin 5, for Mr Coleridge 47; and
"only two" says a note written by my father in 1877, "of the seven who
took part in the debate are now living--Lord Houghton and the Dean of
Lincoln. How many still remember kind and civil Baxter, the
harness-maker opposite Trinity; and how many of them ever heard him sing
his famous song of 'Poor Old Horse'? Yet for pathos, and, unhappily in
some cases, for truth, it may well rank even with 'The Ancient Mariner.'
And Baxter used to sing it so tenderly."

Meanwhile, of the Earl Soham life--a life not unlike that of "Raveloe"--my
father had much to tell. There was the Book Club, with its meetings at
the "Falcon," where, in the words of a local diarist, "a dozen honest
gentlemen dined merrily." There were the heavy dinner-parties at my
grandfather's, the regulation allowance of port a bottle per man, but
more _ad libitum_. And there was the yearly "Soham Fair," on July 12,
when my grandfather kept open house for the parsons or other gentry and
their womankind, who flocked in from miles around. On one such occasion
my father had to squire a new-comer about the fair. The wife of a
retired City alderman, she was enormously stout, and had chosen to appear
in a low dress. ("Hillo, bor! what are yeou a-dewin' with the Fat
Woman?"--one can imagine the delicate raillery.)

A well-known Earl-Sohamite was old Mr P---, who stuttered and was
certainly eccentric. In summer-time he loved to catch small "freshers"
(young frogs), and let them hop down his throat, when he would stroke his
stomach, observing, "B-b-b-b-eautifully cool." He was a staunch believer
in the claims of the "Princess Olive." She used to stay with him, and he
always addressed her as "Your Royal Highness." Then, there was Dr
Belman. He was playing whist one evening with a maiden lady for partner.
She trumped his best card, and, at the end of the hand, he asked her the
reason why. "Oh, Dr Belman" (smilingly), "I judged it judicious."
"_Judicious_! JUDICIOUS!! JUDICIOUS!!! _You old fool_!" She never
again touched a card. Was it the same maiden lady who was the strong
believer in hom