Fragments of Two Centuries Part 16

It was for a lath and plaster structure without galleries, and was opened apparently in 1792.

The Old and New Independents continued to work side by side, the new overtaking the old, till 1841, when a serious fire happening on the premises of Mr. Warren, builder, near the site of the present John Street Chapel, advantage was taken of the opening thus made, and the site was purchased for a new Chapel from Mr. John Phillips, who, at the same time, by pulling down part of the premises facing High Street, threw open the present thoroughfare, which henceforth obtained the name of John Street, after Mr. Phillips. The new Chapel, erected on the north side, was built by Mr. Warren, at a cost of between three and four thousand pounds, and re-placed the old chapel in Kneesworth Street, which afterwards became converted into dwelling-houses (Mr.

Higgins' shop and houses adjoining). The new Chapel, opened in {126} 1843 by the Rev. Dr. Binney, as preacher on the first Sunday, and Edward Miall, who afterwards became the Liberationist M.P., on the next, has an imposing front elevation which it may be of interest to state is taken from the celebrated Ionic Temple on the south bank of the Ilissus at Athens.

The last meeting house of the Society of Friends in Royston was in Royston, Cambs., on the East side of Kneesworth Street, the burial ground of which still remains, with tombstones to the memory of Quaker families of former days. The old meeting house stood back from the street, reached by a narrow pa.s.sage between the cottages, with the small burial ground and a row of lime trees in front.

During the first quarter of the century a house in the yard behind Mr.

Hinkins' shop was registered "for preaching in the Calvinistic persuasion of Dissenters in Royston, Hertfords.h.i.+re"; for so runs the written application to the magistrates for the place to be registered as a preaching place.

Something of the old Puritanic feeling still prevailed in the town among the Dissenters against amus.e.m.e.nts as late as the end of the first quarter of the present century. Whether it was from the recollection of what popular amus.e.m.e.nts had been, or against worldliness in general, I know not, but there is a curious instance on record, where, in 1825, a townsman named Johnson, had his members.h.i.+p at the New Meeting called in question for having joined a cricket club in the town! The offending member defended himself from what he considered the injustice of expulsion, by stating that he saw no evil in cricket, and that the members of the club were "moral men," and that ministers and others had been known to join cricket clubs. The general body of members in meeting a.s.sembled, however, refused to relax their view of it, and decided upon his expulsion, but afterwards relented so far as to allow Brother Johnson to resign, which he did.

Political meetings belonged more to large centres than they do now--chiefly to the county town--but lest there should be any doubt about what was the prevailing political bias in the town during the first quarter of the century, it has been placed on record that Royston was called "Radical Royston." This soubriquet was probably earned by the large amount of "reforming" spirit which we have seen was thrown into the discussion of abstract questions by Roystonians of the time.

They probably earned it by their protests rather than by their policy.

Politics in public meeting were in fact in a bad way at the end of the reign of George III., when it was made unlawful for anyone to call a public meeting exceeding fifty persons, for the purpose of deliberating upon any public question excepting such meetings were called by the Lord Lieutenant, Sheriff, Mayor, or other officials responsible for good order.

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When George IV. came to the throne and divided the opinion of the country upon the subject of his treatment of Queen Caroline, the boys shared the prevailing differences of sentiment and became "Kingites" or "Queenites," and occasionally settled their differences in pitched battles after the manner of boys in all ages, in some cases actually wearing their colours--purple for the King and white for the Queen.

The prevailing sentiment was, however, in Royston so much for the Queen, that "the first gentleman in Europe," notwithstanding his patronage of and comrades in the prize-fighting ring, could hardly find enough champions for a fight, even among the boys.

In later years Chartism reached Royston and caused a flutter in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of those concerned with the _status quo_, for it appears that one Joseph Peat had "held forth" by permission of the landlord at the "Coach and Horses." The Magistrates had a meeting to prevent the spread of Chartism in consequence of this event, and the landlord was sent for and cautioned that if he allowed such a thing again he would lose his licence.

The beginning of all positive work set about by negative process is slow, and this, I suppose, would apply to keeping outside a public-house, for the Teetotal folk in Royston--handicapped, as in other places, by a name that has ever prejudiced and hampered a public movement--found out this to their cost.

They did not lack stimulants when they first began to hold meetings, for the opposition camp came to the meeting, took care to come provided, and, fortifying themselves with bottles of beer, raised so much clamour that the recently enrolled policeman had to try his hand at checking intemperance and some broken heads rewarded his exertions.

The publicans generally attended the meetings in good force and between the rival parties, instead of applause there was sometimes breaking of windows if nothing worse. The British School was one of the first public rooms used for these meetings.

Of popular entertainments, as we now understand them, there were very few, not one where we now have a score, and until the erection of the British School no suitable building. It must not, however, be supposed that the town was entirely without the means of occasional recreation.

The a.s.sembly Room at the Red Lion was still a place of importance for public a.s.semblies, and, for some years before Queen Victoria came to the throne, this room was the scene of some creditable displays of local talent. This talent took the thespian form, and the tradesmen of the town, banded together as the Royston Theatrical Amateur Society, were accustomed to draw the _elite_ of the town and neighbourhood into 3s. and 2s. 6d. seats (nothing less!) while they placed on the boards a rattling good version of _Bombastes Furioso_ and other pieces in popular favour at the time.

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Reference has been made to the reluctance of the Parish Authorities--once bitten, twice shy--to let the Parish Room again as a School after the legal difficulty about getting rid of the tenant, but to their credit be it said they made an exception in favour of music--with a proviso. The late Mr. James Richardson, when a young man, it is on record, applied to the Parish Authorities "on behalf of several persons forming a Musical Band of this Town, that they may be allowed the use of the Vestry Room to meet and practise in." "Allowed providing they pay the constable to attend and see that everything is left secure and to prevent the boys annoying them or doing mischief to the premises."

Music, though confined to a few choice spirits beneath fustian and smock frocks in village as well as town, played a much more important part with our grandfathers than is commonly supposed. It may seem a rash statement to make that in some respects we may have degenerated.

If we play or sing with better tune or finish it is because we have better appliances, not better brains nor more devoted hearts for music.

I am afraid that some of our extensive cultivation of music is a sacrifice of fond parents on the altar of the proprieties, whereas our grandfathers had a soul in their work, and the man with his heart in his work--whether sc.r.a.ping a fiddle, ploughing a furrow, writing an epic, or fighting a battle--must, by all honest men, be awarded the palm. In this over-riding of music as a hobby there is a danger that the salt may lose its savour, for if there is any individual more to be pitied than another it is the so-called musician standing up to play according to the rules of art with no response from the inmost soul of him.

I do not think, at any rate, that those of our grandfathers who directed their attention to the fiddle, ba.s.s-viol, flute, clarionet, or trombone, could be fairly considered to lay under such reproach, for though their music may have been sometimes flat and sometimes sharp, it was always natural and congenial in the highest degree.

These old fellows took down such instruments as they had, not as so many do now, because it was "the thing" to learn music, but because music had found them out for having a love of it, and of the pleasure derived from meeting in a homely circle of kindred spirits. Their instruments were often most dissimilar, but their spirit was one!

There was a good deal of free masonry and companionable relations existing between these old handlers of musical instruments, and as we hear them in imagination, rattling away round the old spirited fugues which had been carefully "picked out" with quill pen and ink into their old cheque-book shaped "tune books"; or, as we see the picturesque group, now with countenances beaming with delight over some well turned corner which brought up the rear, now mopping their {129} brows with a bright red handkerchief, or touching up the old fiddle, after a smart finish, as a man pats a favourite horse, it is not difficult to discover how it was that here and there, and in many places, music took care of itself so well when other things were at a low ebb!

Saxhorn, trombone, flute, cornopean, clarionet, ba.s.soon, fiddle, ba.s.s-viol, and others as various as the dress, trades, and characters of the individuals, made up the old chords of long ago; so well hit off by a writer (J. W. Riley) in the _Century Magazine_:--

I make no doubt yer _new band_ now's a competenter band, And plays their music more by note than what they play by hand, And stylisher, and grander tunes; but somehow--_any_ way I want to hear the _old_ band play!

These old players on instruments were nearly always found in the Church or Chapel Choirs. Thus in the early years of the century John Warren performed the double duty of ba.s.s-viol player and parish clerk at the Royston Church, and later on a rather full band of instruments led the service. A similar, but less organized state of things was found in some village Churches. It was the time when the wooden pitch-pipe was in its full glory. This was a square wooden implement, with a scale on one of its sides, upon which the leader blew the key-note, and then running up the octave with his voice--off they went to the tune of some old Calcutta, Cardiff, or other piece of arduous fugal work!

The disappearance of these old village choirs, in which the village blacksmith, the baker, the tailor, and other natives played on the clarionet, ba.s.s-viol, ba.s.soon, flute, trombone, and all kinds of instruments, while other grown-up men took their "parts" in those wonderful old fugues that seemed to make the song of praise without end--the absence of all this means a certain loss of that pa.s.sion for music which has never been thoroughly recovered!

We have many more players and singers now than in the past, but not, perhaps, the same proportion of lovers of music for its own sake.

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CHAPTER XIII.

SPORTS AND PASTIMES--CRICKET, HUNTING, RACING, AND PRIZE-FIGHTING--THE BUTCHER AND THE BARONET, AND OTHER CHAMPIONS.

Among winter recreations skating was hardly known, and not at all as an amus.e.m.e.nt for ladies, but then what a glorious pastime was that of sliding! Very few young people can slide on the ice now as the boy in 1800-20 could do. In summer cricket was played, but, as in all the multiplied facilities for acquiring skill and knowledge, to-day the youthful cricketers have the best of tools, while their grandfathers had a home-made bat, or even a pale, and as for stumps, they generally grew in the neighbouring hedge till wanted, and the scoring book, in the form of a notched stick, came from the same quarter! But even at that time some "grand matches" sometimes came off, and nearly always for high stakes, as the following notice will show.

The earliest announcement of a grand match in this district, I have met with, is the following for the year 1771--

"Tuesday, se'n night, a match at Cricket was played between the gentlemen of Saffron Walden and Stanstead Abbots, for 44 guineas, when the latter were bungle beat, that is, 51 notches in one innings."

What is the precise meaning which the old chronicler meant to attach to the phrase "bungle beat" in this instance, I must leave to lovers of the game to determine for themselves. But it was customary to play for much higher stakes than the above. Thus, in the memorable year of scarcity of 1801 when people were longing for the deliverance of harvest--

"A cricket match was played at Stanstead Marsh, Herts., between 11 gentlemen of Homerton and 11 of Stanstead, for 500 guineas. The Homerton side won by 15 runs."

Another thing these old cricketers did which may be commended to the modern clubs--they set about the game as if they meant to finish it.

"Stumps to be pitched at _nine o'clock_" says the announcement of a fifty-guinea match between Hertford and Hoddesdon in 1812. I have found no record of a match of this description for high stakes on Royston Heath, but cricket was undoubtedly played there, especially a few years later than the above dates.

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Of other forms of sport, the meets of Squire Wortham's harriers were notable events, and especially on such occasions as "The Little Fair Day"--the second day of Royston Fair--when they were taken to the top of the "One Hill" on the Heath, where the meet attracted not only a large number of the regular followers of the hounds, but a great many irregular ones as well; and, under the management of "Old Matt," the huntsman, with the stentorian voice, whose holloa could be heard at Therfield by persons in Royston, the chase excited no little interest and excitement. Thriplow Heath was also a favourite place of meeting for Squire Wortham's harriers, and, among the many hors.e.m.e.n who followed the pack, a notable figure was that of Sir Peter Soame, of Heydon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE HUNT BREAKFAST.]

Sir Peter was a dark, handsome man, of great muscular power and activity. It was commonly said that he could plant a dozen hurdles only a yard apart and clear them one at a time. As a horseman he had few equals, and was famous for the condition of his horses, which were the best turned out in the hunting field, and Sir Peter himself made a notable figure in his skin-fit leather breeches. It was the fas.h.i.+on then {132} to wear the hunting breeches so tight that it would have been impossible to get into them but for the expedient of hanging them in the cellar or some damp place overnight! Even then, to put them on was no child's play, and Sir Peter, it is said, used to put his on by sliding down the bannister! In this way he got into garments which fitted him like a second skin, and, regardless of the dampness of them, rode out in the pink of condition, on the best horse in the district!

Unless reports did him injustice, the sporting baronet was devotedly attached to the bottle, and more than once came to grief when driving his pony home from Cambridge, when he would be picked up by one of the "fly" wagons and given a lift to the Black Horse at Fowlmere. Of Sir Peter in other sporting aspects more will be said presently.

The Heath appears to have been a.s.sociated with other forms of sport, from the following lines taken from a local poet, to whose picturesque descriptions and facile handling of the heroic measure, I must be indebted in this chapter. I refer to a book ent.i.tled "Visions of Childhood," by W. Warren Butler, of Barkway, printed and published by John Warren in 1843. Of one questionable form of sport on the Heath, he writes--

Here on this very spot, here have I seen Such b.l.o.o.d.y deeds performed upon the ground; And men have search'd the secret coverts round, Where ev'ry harmless rabbit could be found.

The innocent collection in a sack, Are carelessly slung round their murd'rer's back And one by one let loose with joy they fly; This moment they are free--the next they die, The savage hound set on amidst the fray, Seizes and tears their little lives away, While laughter from all sides his valour draws, And even fair ones pat him with applause.

As to other kinds of sport, it may be mentioned that sportsmen then not only managed with flint guns, but were often mounted on ponies; for, while the open field system enabled them to mark and follow the birds in any direction, it often meant a longer journey for a bag than under more modern conditions of sport, while dogs played a much more important part in sport than to-day.

Then, it was no uncommon thing for the inhabitants of this, as of other districts, to go a long distance to be present at some sporting event.

As late as 1831, every available horse, cob or donkey, that could be mounted was ridden to Newmarket, where about 20,000 persons a.s.sembled to witness...o...b..ldiston's astonis.h.i.+ng feat of riding two hundred miles in ten hours, or twenty miles an hour on horseback for ten successive hours, for one thousand guineas! He was allowed {133} eight horses for changes, standing constantly saddled for him to jump off one on to the other, and on again in his flying career at each time round the "Beacon" course of four miles. The feat was accomplished in a little less than the ten hours.

To come back once more to sport on Royston Heath in the years immediately following George III.'s reign, I find the following with reference to the revival of the Royston Races, which had flourished so famously during the last century under the name of the Odsey Races.