that may mean) at Gumber Corner, ran right through the combe (which,
by the way, is one of those bits of land which have been stolen bodily
from the English people), cut down the Sutton Road, across the railway
at Coates (and there he showed the cloven hoof, for your liar always
takes his hounds across the railway), then all over Egdean, and killed
in a field near Wisborough. All this he told, and there was not even a
man there to ask him whether all those little dogs and horses swam
the Rother or jumped it. He was treated like a god; they tried to
make him stop but he would not. He was off to Worthing, where I have
no doubt he told some further lies upon the growing of tomatoes
under glass, which is the main sport of that district. Similarly, I
have no doubt, such a man would talk about boats at King's Lynn,
murder with violence at Croydon, duck shooting at Ely, and racing
anywhere.

Then also if you are in any doubt as to what they want of you, you
can always change the scene. Thus fishing is dangerous for even the
poor can fish, and the chances are you do not know the names of the
animals, and you may be putting salt-water fish into the stream of
Lambourne, or talking of salmon upon the Upper Thames. But what is
to prevent you putting on a look of distance and marvel, and
conjuring up the North Atlantic for them? Hold them with the cold
and the fog of the Newfoundland seas, and terrify their simple minds
with whales.

A second way to attain respect, if you are by nature a silent man,
and one which I think is always successful, is to write before you
go to bed and leave upon the table a great number of envelopes which
you should address to members of the Cabinet, and Jewish money-lenders,
dukes, and in general any of the great. It is but slight labour, and