An Autobiography of an Ancient Athlete & Antiquarian

AUTOBIOGRAPHY r47 Norwich Maps" which I had bought in the Smith Collec– tion and given to the Norwich Public Library. On the 14th I offered my whole collection of books and MSS. to the Corporation on certain terms as to storage and access, but nothing came of it, so I decided to hold them and leave them to the Corporation by will, which I have done. Here I may mention that the reasons which made me "go back on my word" (for I had promised to present the Smith Collection to the Norfolk and Nornich Archreologi– cal Society) was the extreme lassitude, not to say laziness, of the officials and committee of the society. I did my best to stir them up, but it was hopeless. They would smilingly agree to the necessity of reform and of work being done, but then took no steps to ensure it. So warned by the state in which their own Library and MSS. were kept I decided to pass the maps and. views over to the Public Library, where they could always be consulted by any and every one. That this was the right thing to do is, I think> proved by the fact that the late H.J. Hillen, who wrote a voluminous history of Lynn, was so pleased with the facilities given him to consult our Public Library that he left £500 to it rather than give a larger amount to the local Lynn Carnegie Library, which has very few local books. Some day Mr. Beloe, Mr. Lawrence, and Mr. Ingleby, M.P., will do great things, but at present Lynn, perhaps the most interesting place in the county, is in a state of absolute stagnation, despite the fact that the Town Clerk and his deputy are most ready and willing to help students. But they can't make students, of whom there hasn't been one since the dissenting minister Richards wrote a most able history of the place, which is infinitely superior to Mr. Hillen's lengthy compilation. This spring my sons began to pull down and rebuild r6, Golden Square, in which place my father and I had carried on business for 76 years. As a commercial speculation it was an excellent one, and their removal to No. r3, which they also built, and into which they moved, brought none of the " r3 '' ill luck, which stupid super– stition said it would. Personally J have dlways found the " r3" a lucky day for me, especially when it fell on a 1 Friday. At the spring Parliamentary election of 1906 I took some little part, and voted Conservative wherever I had