ilt the Market House in 1566,
and wrote on it his riddle:--

"You who don't like me, give money to mend me,
You who do like me, give money to end me."

The Local Board of 1866, looking round for some worthy object on which
to spend their money, liked the old house so well that they ended its
existence on the spot.

No parish church is more difficult to drive up to than St. Andrew's at
Farnham. If you know the way you can come to a corner of the churchyard
by a side street, but Farnham goes to church chiefly by alleys and
footpaths. The churchyard is more striking than the church, much of
which is new. The thick turf, shaven and level, runs to the foot of
mossy brick walls; an avenue of pollarded elms leads from the south
door; all round stand little, old red houses. Six o'clock on a sunny
autumn evening is the time to wait in Farnham churchyard. Every three
hours the mellow, feeble bells ring a chime which suits September
twilight:--

"Life let us cherish
While yet the taper glows,
And the fresh floweret
Pluck ere it close.

Away with every toil and care,
And cease the rankling thorn to wear;
With manful hearts life's conflict meet,
Till Death sounds the retreat."

Vernon House, a Tudor building changed from its old name, Culver Hall,
and altered so as to front on West Street, has an unhappy memory of the
Parliament wars. Charles the First lodged there one December night, a
closely guarded prisoner on his way from Hurst Castle to Windsor. A
month later he was to leave Windsor for Whitehall. He had little to give
his host, and gave him all he had. It was a white morning cap of quilted
silk, which Mr. George Vernon, inheriting from his grandfather, left in
1732 to his grandson, "desiring it may always go to the next heir male
of my family, as a testimony of our steadfast loyalty and adherence to
the Crown, which is the only bounty my family ever received for all the
losses and expenses they sustained for the royal cause, which amounted
to several thousands of pounds."

[Illustration: _In Farnham Churchyard._]

I had nearly forgotten Farnham's painter. He was Stephen Elmer, and a
picture of his, "The Last Supper," hangs in the church tower. But his
forte was painting fish and game, dead and alive. In a curious old
pamphlet, "_The Earwig, or An Old Woman's Remarks on the present
Exhibition of Pictures of the Royal Academy--a critical pamphlet
published in Fleet Street_,