Song singing, too, was a great delight of my father's. He used to sing a great many songs, nearly two hundred. Of these he taught me all those starred in the following list, and from the time when but a mere child, I learnt at his knee my first song, "Travel the Country round," I have never ceased to obtain, and I hope seldom failed to give, satisfaction in this, the best mode I know of expressing the feelings. In learning and retaining all my songs my memory has seemed to work quite spontaneously, in much the same way as the faculties of seeing and hearing: many of the songs I learnt at first time of hearing; others, longer ones, I have learnt upon hearing them twice through; none, not even "Tom Cladpole's trip to London," nor "Jan Cladpole's trip to 'Merricur," each of which has 155 verses, has ever given me any trouble to acquire. Besides those I learnt from my father, I also learnt several from my mother, and a great many more from various other people; my brother-in-law, Joe Hopkins, one of the old Horsham stone diggers; Harry Vaughan, boot-maker, who lived in the Causeway; Gaff Batchelor, tailor, Bishopric; Bob Boxall, labourer, Bishopric; Bill Strudwick, sailor, Bishopric; Jim Shoubridge, ex-soldier, Bishopric; Hoggy Mitchell, labourer, Bishopric; Richard Collins, the parish clerk, The Causeway; Michael Turner, bootmaker, Warnham; Tim Shoubridge, labourer, Bishopric; Jim Manvell, bricklayer, Queen Street. Jim could compose songs on any subject. "Now Jim, sing us a song about so and so," some one would ask, and perhaps in 20 minutes, or half-an-hour, Jim would have his new song ready, to which all were eager listeners. Besides these, many of the shoemakers, bellringers, and other workers with whom I came into contact, each and all of them knew several songs, and those to which I took a fancy I committed to memory: others again I learnt of "Country Wills" in the taprooms and parlours of public houses in the Towns and Villages round, where song singing was always regularly indulged in during the evenings all the year round, and where the words of many songs have been taught and learnt, exchanged or sold, for perhaps a pint of beer. The remainder I learnt from ballad sheets I bought as they were being hawked about at the fairs, and at other times from other printed matter. << less