An Autobiography of an Ancient Athlete & Antiquarian

204 AUTOBIOGRAPHY This day gave me another strong hint of the impending end of my cycling, for Purdy on his bicycle certainly got away from me. Hitherto I had been ahle to beat him easily, for though he was two or three years older than I, I was riding a trike to his bike. My knees took to achi11g continually. Next day we rode through Wells and saw the "Fleece" and on to a good lunch at the new house at Cley, and by Lethering– sett to Holt, where he left me to go home by rail, and I slept at the '' Feathers.'; At the station I saw my old athletic acquaintance, C. J. Ash of the T.H.H., whose son was oue of the first victims of the war. On the Sunday I rode home after calling on Hales and seeing his garden. Very tired and slow all the way. Some sort of food at Aylsham en route. Our first red roses (under glass) on 3rd May. On May 7th Purdy met me at Buxton Station, and we rode over to see the great heath fire at Horsford, and ·rode on to lunch at Drayton. Coming back I got a nasty '( toss," turning too quickly on sloping ground, and cut my left knee very badly. Luckily, however, I had the sense to ride home fast and keeping the grit out by letting the blood run. Sunday, the 9th, I had my knee strapped up, and went by motor with Ficklin to B. Lennard's and on to Tasburgh. After two days' rest Ficklin's motor took me to Thorpe, but I had to have my knee dressed by a local doctor with little effect till I had Dr. Starling to do it at Norwich on the 23rd, and it soon got well. The Vicar of Tunstead called on the 14th with his wife, and left the Manor Rolls to go through, and find a buyer towards restoration of his Church. (This I was unable to do, and I restored them to his successor on Wednesday, 2nd of February, 1916). At the Dereham Meeting on the 26th I shot absolutely worse than ever. On the 27th I went to London to F.G.R.'s at Hamp– stead to talk over and make researches about his big Strand wall case. Next day I searched the St. Martin-in– the-Field Rate Book with negative results, but incidentally found a John Shakespeare in the Strand, who may have been an hitherto unsuspected kinsman of the poet, as the locality was almost opposite the '' Globe," and no distance