this was the very place where it was fought!" He was seldom
contradicted.

The real history of Dorking has traditions of the table and the cellar.
Dorking fowls perhaps first came to the neighbourhood with the Romans,
and poultry and Dorking have been associated ever since. The true
Dorking fowl is a large, well-feathered bird, and walks on five toes
instead of lesser fowls' four. He has always been a great fowl for the
table and historians have written about him since the days of
Columella. Thus a contributor to the _Gentleman's Magazine_, in 1763:--

"An incredible quantity of poultry is sold in Dorking, and it is
well known to the lovers of good eating for being remarkably large
and fine. I have seen capons about Christmas which weighed between
seven and eight pounds each out of their feathers, and were sold at
five shillings apiece; nor are the geese brought to the market here
about Michaelmas less excellent in their kind. The town is supplied
with sea-fish from Brighthelmstone and Worthing, in Sussex."

[Illustration: _Dorking._]

The Dorking cooks knew well what to do with the sea-fish when they got
them from Brighton. Dorking was famous for a particular way of making
water-souchy, a delicious dish of various fishes, of which Mr. J.L.
Andre in the _Surrey Archaeological Collections_, has preserved the
recipe rescued from an 1833 cookery book 'by a Lady':--

"Stew two or three flounders, some parsley roots and leaves, thirty
peppercorns, and a quart of water, till the fish are boiled to
pieces; pulp them through a sieve. Set over the fire the pulped
fish, the liquor that boiled them, some perch, tench, or flounders,
and some fresh roots or leaves of parsley; simmer all till done
enough, then serve in a deep dish. Slices of bread and butter are to
be sent to table to eat with the souchy."

It looks rather vague, but the "Gentlemen's Dorking Club" used to
assemble every other Thursday from June to November to discuss the tench
and flounders at the Red Lion, and the King's Head used even to attract
diners-out from London, especially Dutch merchants, who were
particularly fond of the admirable dish. Wine, too, was grown in the
town. There was a particular kind of wild cherry, of which Aubrey was
told by John Evelyn that it made a most excellent wine, little inferior
to the French claret; it would even keep longer. With the cherry wine,
perhaps, you would ha