ster, and was for
many years represented by some of his Lordship's family. The right of
election was in the burgesses at large, of whom there were at that time
one thousand. The Reform Bill did little to improve the state of
affairs; it led to greater bribery and corruption and intimidation than
ever, and now, as a Parliamentary borough, Yarmouth has ceased to exist.
'Sugar,' it seems, was the slang term used for money, and the honest
voters were too eager to get it. Alas! in none of our seaport towns is
the standard of morality very high. Yarmouth, at any rate, is not worse
than Deal. In old days the excitement of a Yarmouth election much
affected our village. It lasted some days. The out-voters were brought
from the uttermost parts of the earth. As there were no railways,
stage-coaches were hired to bring them down from town; and when they
changed horses at Wrentham, quite a crowd would assemble to look at the
flags, and the free and independents on their way to do their duty,
overflowing with enthusiasm and beer.

Sir Astley Cooper was much connected with Yarmouth in his young days,
when his father was the incumbent of the parish church. Some of his
boyish pranks were peculiar. Here is one of them: 'Having taken two
pillows from his mother's bed, he carried them up the spire of Yarmouth
Church, at a time when the wind was blowing from the north-east; and as
soon as he had ascended as high as he could, he ripped them open, and,
shaking out their contents, dispersed them in the air. The feathers were
carried away by the wind, and fell far and wide over the surface of the
market-place, to the great astonishment of a large number of persons
assembled there. The timid looked upon it phenomenon predictive of some
calamity; the inquisitive formed a thousand conjectures; while some,
curious in natural history, actually accounted for it by a gale of wind
in the north blowing wild-fowl feathers from the island of St. Paul's.'
On another occasion he got into an old trunk, which the family had agreed
to get rid of as inconvenient in the house. In this case he had to pay
the penalty, when he emerged from the chest in the carpenter's shop. The
men, who had complained terribly of its weight, were not inclined to
allow young Astley to get off free. One of Astley's tricks had, however,
a good motive, as it was intended to cure an old woman of her besetting
sin--a tendency to take a drop too much. In order to cure the o