An Autobiography of an Ancient Athlete & Antiquarian

AUTOBIOGRAPHY 31 -probably of dysentery, for which I was attended by the late Dr. Lowe, of Lynn (who afterwards pulled Edward VII. through his attack of typhoid), and of which I felt the results for over a year, and even now am not free from them. Athletic matters were very stirring about the end of the year, the L.A.C. being determined to take matters out of the hands of the self constituted body called the Amateur Athletic Club, which was being mismanaged by J. G. Chambers of Cambridge, 1 and I was elected at the head of the Committee on the 15th November. During 1871, I printed my second book, '' An account of the Churches of St. Peter and St. Paul of Cromer,'' which was an extension of an article I had issued in the transactions of the Norfolk and Norwich Archceological Society. In the spring of 1872 a vacancy having arisen for the Vestry Clerkship of Wandsworth (which would have then for a young practitioner have come in very useful), I was run for it by several of the local tradespeople. Without being unduly conceited I think I may say that my qualifications were better than my opponent, but he was the son of his mother, and she the widow of the late Vestry -Clerk, and I just lost it. He was not, however, a success for he had a taste for the drama, and indeed lost his job, rather dramatically, for a vestryman seeing the Town Hall open one night found the office safe also open, and after that he was thought hardly a safe custodian for the archives of the post. I bore the parish no illwill for my defeat, for afterwards I volunteered to calendar and print a catalogue of the Parish Deeds at my own expense. The summer of this year was painfully noticeable to all of us by my dear brother Frank showing the first sign of the consumption 1 He was a strange character who tried to combine aristocratic sport with ruuuing the "Amateur Athletic Club" for his own benefit at Lillie Bridge, and a little shop for the sale of "Welsh produce" in Arthur Street, Chelsea, in which his trainer, Harry Andrews, acted as his salesman and manager (see "Rubbish and Nonsense," p. n5). Uu<loubtedly he was au enthusiastic sportsman, and especially a good sculler and oarsman, but as a walker he was of a very poor class, and far from fair in his style. His best athletic performance to my mind was running second to his great friend, "Friday" Thornton (afterwards M.P. for Battersea), in a West London R.C. Half-mile Handicap.