It was just previous to this transfer that Sergeant Borrow had his
famous encounter in Hyde Park with Big Ben Bryan, the champion of
England; he "whose skin was brown and dusky as that of a toad." It
was a combat in which "even Wellington or Napoleon would have been
heartily glad to cry for quarter ere the lapse of five minutes, and
even the Blacksmith Tartar would, perhaps, have shrunk from the
opponent with whom, after having had a dispute with him," Sergeant
Borrow "engaged in single combat for one hour, at the end of which
time the champions shook hands and retired, each having experienced
quite enough of the other's prowess." {4a}

At East Dereham Thomas Borrow met Ann {4b} Perfrement, {4c} a
strikingly handsome girl of twenty, whose dark eyes first flashed
upon him from over the footlights. It was, and still is, the custom
for small touring companies to engage their supernumeraries in the
towns in which they were playing. The pretty daughter of Farmer
Perfrement, whose farm lay about one and a half miles out of East
Dereham, was one of those who took occasion to earn a few shillings
for pin-money. The Perfrements were of Huguenot stock. On the
revocation of the Edict of Nantes, their ancestors had fled from
their native town of Caen and taken refuge in East Anglia, there to
enjoy the liberty of conscience denied them in their beloved
Normandy. Thomas Borrow made the acquaintance of the young
probationer, and promptly settled any aspirations that she may have
had towards the stage by marrying her. The wedding took place on
11th February 1793 at East Dereham church, best known as the resting-
place of the poet Cowper, Ann being twenty-one and Thomas thirty-four
years of age.