e ride of twenty-six
miles and the jolting of the carrier's cart along the dusty roads.

As I look into the mirror of the past, I see, alas! but a faded picture
of that wonderful banquet in Norwich to celebrate Reform. There was a
procession with banners and music, which seemed to me endless, as it
toiled along in the dust under the fierce sun of summer, the spectators
cheering all the way. There were speeches, I dare say, though no word of
them remains; but I have a distinct recollection of peeping into the
tents or tent, where the diners were at work, and of receiving from some
one or other of them a bit of plum-pudding prepared for that day, which
seemed to me of unusual excellence. I have a distinct recollection also
of the fireworks in the evening, the first I had ever seen, on the Castle
plain, and of the dense crowd that had turned out to see the sight; but I
can well remember that I enjoyed myself much, and that I was awfully
tired when it was all over.

Another memory also comes to me in connection with the old Dragon,--not
of Revelation, but of Norwich--a huge green monster, which was usually
kept in St. Andrew's Hall, and dragged out at the time of city
festivities. Men inside of it carried it along the street, and the sight
was terrible to see, as it had a ferocious head and a villainous tail,
and resembled nothing that is in the heaven above or the earth beneath or
the waters under the earth. I fancy, however, since the schoolmaster has
gone abroad, that kind of dragon has ceased to roar. I think it was at a
Norwich election that I saw it for the first and the only time, and it
followed in the procession formed to chair the Members--the Members being
seated in gorgeous array on chairs, borne on the heads of people, and
every now and then, much to the delight of the mob, though I should
imagine very little to his own, the chair, with the Member in it, was
tossed up into the air, and by this means it was supposed the general
public were able to get a view of their M.P. and to see what manner of
man he was. It was in some such way that I, as a lad, realized, as I
never else should have done, the red face and the pink-silk stockings of
the Hon. Mr. Scarlett, the happy candidate who pretended to enjoy the
fun, as with the best grace possible under the circumstances he smiled on
the ladies in the windows of the street, as he was borne along and bowed
to all. From my recollection of the chairing I saw that