The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-12-14

l
 on that Saturday evening-just a week
 from now-when the village bellmen are
 entertained by the vicar at one of the village publics. At this time sump- 1 tuous supper will be served in the good | old English style, and the vicar of the | parish will preside over the bellmen
 and the beef and mutton and the flow | Ing ale like baron over his retinue in
 the merry days of feudalism.
 These English villages are not such dull places in the winter season as the 1 short days and long nights might lead one to suppose they would be. You have to light up" little after four
 on cloudy days much earlier--and from
 then until national bed time is a long
 spell of life by the fireside. How is
 this time passed? To begin, there are two meals after that hour for even the poorest, tea at five or six, and supper just before retiring. Very unfortunate IS 1t that in this particular village there
 are so many drinking places. Seven of these for a population which is only about six hundred, including the many
 babies. Of course not a few of the men
  houses and pass considerable time in this way. But far less vicious are these village drinking places than the kind which abound in big cities. The most tempting thing one sees in them is the
 blazing fire place. The staple refresh
 ment is weak beer, and pint of 1t will serve man as pay for snug seat and more or less interesting confab with his neighbors for an hour and half at least and often longer.
 AS an offset to the attractions of seven public houses there is reading room in this village. But it is only a reading room, and when inadvertently spoke the other evening of going over to the Library" I was very properly corrected. There are no books-only a few papers, fewer magazines, and, alas, still fewer readers. The charge for using this reading room is a penny a week, and the few who patronize 1t, to make sure of getting their moneys worth, will often, late in the evening, make up little party and indulge to- gether in a quiet game of cards. For young folks bent on improvement the
 
 advantages of a well-conducted night school, but the trouble Is that young folks bent on improvement are so few in English villages. The contrast ed- ucationally between town and country is far greater in England than in the United States So, too, are English vil- lages far behind those of America in popular lecture courses. Such things are almost unknown here Occasional ly, however, the dull routine of village life is relieved by concert, and this is not any less, perhaps, when its musical numbers, so- called, are at the mercy of home talent than when something bet ter is secured from the neighboring un- iversity town.
 But feasting seems to be the princi- pal diversion. Every winter brings it's stated occasions for village blow out" and by these delightful fixtures" Is the flight of time measured. Ear Hest in the list is the annual supper of the Cricket club. Then comes the bell ringers feast, and then the annual feed indulged by the Conservative asso- citation, at which latter the village vo- ters are honored by the presence in their midst of the county member of Parliament, and good many lesser po- ltical lights. But of all the feasts by which this. village, like hundreds of others, breaks up at intervals the dull of its long winter nights, that which is most enjoyed by the ben eficaries and which best illustrates what is distinctly characteristic of Eng fish life is what is called the shooting supper. There are really two of these and there have to be to accommodate the crowd, for the shooting supper is a complimentary banquet to all the farmers and farm laborers in the neigh borhood, given toward the close of the shooting season by rich Hebrew, who, from the farmers and landowners, has purchased the Shooting rights" of | this district at half crown an acre.
 This banquet Is held at famous hos- telry which abuts on the Newmarket | road and is a sort of halfway house | Newmarket and Cambridge | Few were the Cambridge students of | the past who did not at some time pay | ! visit to this well-known roadside l m. The present ,landlady has kept it | 'or twenty-five years and before that l Tor fifteen years her aunt was the mis- rcss of it and she an assistant. The | 'emniscences of this female baniface | ire worth listening to. She can tell ,ou of many an escapade by Cambridge | Often have they reused l Ter at two in the morning in their de- hands for drinks, and more than once when she was slow in coming, have hese obstreperous youths whiled the
 me away by breaking dindows and )attering in doors. Fortunately, hough, as you are very glad to learn, hese rowdy proceedings all occurred in he distant past. University men are lot in these days so thirsty a crowd as hey used to be, and in going to the Newmarket races do not make so many tops for refreshment and diversion. Such was the testimony of this hostess md nothing could better illustrate the .reat change in university manners ! within twenty years Largely, too, this hange for the better is observable in he manners and habits of the English eople in general.
 A rare distinction enjoyed by this alf- way house of refreshment between