straining at the leash like a greyhound who has sighted his hare. The ducks kept coming in closer and closer to the shore. From where I stood they seemed to be hardly twenty yards from the end of one of the walls. I was inwardly confounding my messenger, morally convinced that he was sipping beer in the servants' hall, and about to slip down to the river and try my luck with my own little gun, when the object of my objurgations appeared at the "double," trailing the great gun, and panting and perspiring as if he had been racing all the way, instead of from the first corner only.

We had some difficulty in loading. The weapon was not only heavy in hand, but such a great "bore," that, having no proper wadding, we had to administer an alarming "bolus" of paper to bring her up to the mark (about two and a half hands on the ramrod, so said the tailor), and no cap could fit her properly; however, at last I was off with her in my arms, and with stealthy stride and humped back I gained the shelter of the wall without attracting the attention of my quarry. Now for a moment's rest and a change of hands for the gun. Didn't my arm ache, that's all? and wasn't I puffing and blowing like a young grampus? It was a mercy the ducks didn't hear me. However, I shut off steam as well as I could, and paddled down the soft, muddy ditch behind the wall as noiselessly as I could, for a hundred yards or so, when I thought I would take stock of the relative positions of the ducks and myself. So I doffed my hat, and clambering up the green, slimy stones, peeped over the wall. I do not think that I shall ever forget the scene before me a wild stormy sunset in the western background, with every symptom of a dirty night brewing in the offing; a stiff breeze hissed through the coping stones of the wall charged with the many flavours of the sea, and occasionally whisked a splash of salt spray into my face; the air was full of weird cries of wild sea birds, discoursing sweet music to a sportsman's ear; the lap-lapping of the tide on the other side of the wall seemed to keep time with the thumping of my heart. Three curlew, taken for once in their lives off their guard, flapped lazily past within a few yards of me. Happily for my chance at the ducks, I had left the gun at the foot of the wall or I do not think I could have resisted the temptation to give them a salute. But, oh! culmination of excitement! there was a big patch of ducks dancing on the waves, well within range of the wall, about 150 yards farther down. I slipped back into the ditch in no time, seized the big gun, and, grovelling down under the shelter of the wall, crept along till I thought I was about opposite them. Another shin-grazing climb and a peep, with the mortifying result of finding the ducks had

moved a good bit farther down. Back again into the ditch, and another exhausting stalk. I am by this time almost at the end of the wall, and the tide is swirling up past me and creeping round behind me. I calculate that there must be three or four feet of water on the other side of the wall, and deepening every minute. And now, with cocked gun, and all in a tremble with excitement, I make my last scramble up the wall, secure as firm a footing as I can, poke the muzzle of the gun over the coping-stones, my foot slips a little, the gun barrel grates against the stones, and in a moment up rise the ducks with fifty quacking power, and the whole sky is alive with winged fowl, informing all whom it may concern with their discordant and reproachful cries that "There he is, the sneak! Behind the wall! There he is! There he is!" The ducks wheel back overhead; with a mighty effort I hoist the big gun up to my shoulder, and blaze into the brown of them. Ye Gods! what a kick my shoulder got, and how I napped it on the right cheek bone! But little I recked of that, for didn't a great quacker come flop down into the water quite close to me! Yes, but how am I to secure the same? Hooray! the tide is floating it up right towards me. Slowly and surely that noble bird, with its red webbed feet turned up to the sky, sailed up to me, but no nearer than some three or four feet would it come. Horror! the tide is taking it past me. Oh for a retriever, or fishing rod, or anything! Happy thought! perhaps I can reach it with the muzzle of the gun. I make a wild, despairing poke with the same in the direction of the bird. The laws of gravity are upset-in plain words I lose my balance, and before I can say "Jack Robinson" I am over head and ears in some unknown depth of water. Need I say that the instinct of self-preservation being omnipotent, I instantly surrendered the gun to Father Neptune, as a tribute for trespassing on his domains, and rose, not a little frightened, and sputtering and gesticulating a good deal, to the surface, and with a stroke and a kick or two reached the wall, and clambered on to it once more?

I could almost have cried for very vexation; not a vestige of the duck to be seen, nor of my uncle's gun either. What on earth was I to do? There would be an awful blow up about it when I got home. The water was too muddy to see anything of it; besides it was getting dark, and the tide was rising fast-in fact, I had to clamber along the top of the wall, to high water mark, to avoid a second involuntary bath.

"The Little Tailor" was fearfully excited when I related my misfortunes. He had a lively reminiscence of the master's words to him after his little exploit with the gun, and did not prognosticate a very

happy interview between me and my relation when I should come to relate my sad story to him—in fact, if I remember well, a hundred pounds was the fancy figure at which he valued his non-participation in the present catastrophe. We held a consultation about it, and came to the conclusion that, as there was some probability of recovering the gun at low tide, it would be as well, perhaps, to avoid raising the avuncular wrath that evening by saying nothing about it. I pointed out exactly where I had fallen in, and "The Little Tailor" promised to be up at "grey dawn" next morning, and narrowly inspect the "flotsam" and "jetsam" about the spot, and see what he could do to recover the lost property. And so we parted on that disastrous evening.

I am sorry to have to confess that I had to "draw the long bow" to account for my wet clothes and late appearance at the dinner table, and very trying were the frequent remarks as to the "absence" displayed in my demeanour, and general falling off from my usual flow of spirits. Happily no awkward questions were put about the gun in fact, I do not think my uncle knew anything about its having left the security of his library. I will draw a veil over the horrors of the night which followed that uncomfortable evening, of the fearful dreams of a jury of ducks finding me "guilty" and sentencing me to be secured by the neck to the big gun and drowned in "full fathom five." I couldn't sleep after the first streak of dawn appeared, so slipped on my clothes and sneaked down to the kitchen with the wariness of a burglar, and out of the back door off to the scene of my last evening's performance. Oh! what a relief it was to meet "The Little Tailor" marching home with the lost piece of ordnance, none the worse, beyond a little mud and rust, for its night's pickling in the briny. In a secure outhouse we cleaned her ladyship up, much sand, oil, and tow being expended on her toilet, and watching my uncle safe out of the way I smuggled her back to her old berth in his "sanctum,” which I believe she occupies to this day.

Many years elapsed before I told "the master" of his gun's second adventure, when he, good-humouredly, seemed to think (but then distance lends, &c.,) that the recovery of his gun was as nothing compared with the hard lines of losing my first duck, and ducking.

CLEAVELAND: ROYALIST, WIT, ·

AND POET.

BY EDWIN GOADBY.

T the commencement of the seventeenth century Loughborough was one of the quaintest of Midland towns. Situate on the top of a knoll on the left bank of the sleepy River Soar, with rich slopes of intervening meadow land, silted up by the river in earlier times, and a long range of high-arched bridges to carry its main turnpike safely over the flats during the regular floods, the town was still true to its old name"The place by the lake." Behind it rose up the unenclosed wooded heights of the Charnwood Hills, where William the Conqueror declined to hunt because he declined to break his neck, and wild game abounded, and foresters held their yearly open courts at the coped oak, perpetuating their old Saxon customs. The town within was quaintness itself. Thatched houses, narrow streets, a market, and a market-cross; wine and ale houses, with their devices painted over the doors; and members of the guild of carpenters and other trade associations moving about, not too anxiously, or peeping out of their shops; now and then a long string of pack-horses passing through the street with corn or salt, or a lumbering waggon jolting along on its way to Leicester or to Nottingham, or possibly London or York; or rubicund yeomen crowding in, with their white-aproned wives and daughters; or a wayside minstrel, singing his songs or playing his conjuring tricks; or an irruption of boys from the highgabled Grammar School by the church, which had sent many a poor scholar to Oxford or Cambridge; or a grand peal from the noble old tower of the church itself, which stood out in the surrounding landscape, bold and ubiquitous,—all these made it quite a curiosity to neighbouring villagers not less than to passing travellers or beggars, sure of a night's rest in a farmstead, and a few pence from the dispensers of the various local charities.

Our business, however, is with the Grammar School. It was a plain building, but it gave a free and substantial education to all the youths of the town, and it had a remarkable history. One Thomas Burton, a native and a merchant of the staple, had left lands in the

fifteenth century for pious purposes, which had subsequently been diverted and devoted to a free school, the payment of town taxes, and the support of the poor. The school itself dated from June 28, 1569, and its rules show that education was once a serious business. The school-doors were to be opened at six o'clock in the morning from Lady-day to Michaelmas, and at seven from Michaelmas to Lady-day. One hour was allowed for breakfast, and two hours—— from eleven till one-for dinner. It was the duty of the master and his assistants to teach the boys "to read in psalter or testament," to teach them "writing and accounts, sufficient for being put to apprenticeship," and "to instruct youths in classical learning, beginning with ye grammar, untill fit for ye Universitie." Many famous men have been educated in this school, including Dr. Pulteney, the botanist, and Bishop Davys, of Peterborough, who acted as tutor to Her Majesty Queen Victoria.

At the date I have mentioned the schoolmaster was Mr. George Dawson, a scholar unknown to fame, and his assistant was Thomas Cleaveland, M.A., father of a more famous son, in the person of John Cleaveland, orator, wit, royalist, and poet. There has always been some doubt as to the position occupied by Cleaveland, and as to whether his son was born at Loughborough or at Hinckley, whither the father subsequently removed; but I am able to settle both points by the very best evidence. An examination of the accounts of the bridge-master, who was the financial officer of Burton's charity, shows that Thomas Cleaveland was an usher in the Grammar School, possibly acting as curate to the Rev. John Brown, the rector of the parish, at the same time. His salary was small, as appears by the following entry, which occurs first in 1611, and every year subsequently until his removal to Hinckley :

"Item, paid to Mr. Cleaveland (usher), Simon Mudd's legacye, due as before (i.e. half yearly), XLs."

Four pounds a year could hardly have been the whole of his salary, but as the schoolmaster himself only received £12 13s. 6d. a year, and could not hold other preferment-though he acted as clerk in the town, keeping the public accounts, and writing out the parish register-I assume that Cleaveland supplemented his wretched salary in one way or another. Coin had been debased between 1543 and 1560, so that in the early part of the seventeenth century the shilling contained but ninety-three grains of silver, and wheat had risen to 38s. 6d. per quarter. Under these circumstances, no man could be "passing rich" upon four pounds a year. Four children were born to the Rev. Thomas Cleaveland, as the register styles him,