CROSS-TALK WITH PETHERTON.
Petherton and I have just emerged from another bombardment. Certain correspondence in The Surbury Gazette and North Herts Courier gave me a welcome excuse for firing what I may term a sighting shot. I wrote to my genial neighbour as follows:—
DEAR MR. PETHERTON,—No doubt you have seen the recent letters in the local paper anent the remains of the old Cross, which are at once an ornament to Castle Street, Surbury, and a standing menace to the peace of mind of the local antiquarians.
I am exceedingly interested in the matter myself and feel that the views of one who, I am sure, adds a wide knowledge of archæology to the long list of his accomplishments, would be both interesting and instructive to myself and (if you would allow your views to be published) to our little community in general.
If therefore you will write and let me know your opinion on the matter I shall take it as a friendly and cousinly (vide certain eighteenth-century documents in the Record Office) act.
Yours sincerely,
HENRY J. FORDYCE.
Petherton replied with a whizz-bang as thus:—
SIR,—I have read the idiotic correspondence to which you refer, and am informed that you are the author of the screed which appeared in last Saturday's issue of the paper. If my informant is correct as to the authorship of the letter I can only say it is a pity that, with apparently no knowledge of the subject, you should venture into print. Anyone enjoying the least acquaintance with the rudiments of English history would be perfectly aware that the remains have no connection with QUEEN ELEANOR whatever. The whereabouts of all the crosses put up to her memory are quite well known to archæologists.
Yours faithfully,
FREDERICK PETHERTON.
I replied with light artillery:—
DEAR PETHERTON,—Yours re the late Mrs. EDWARD PLANTAGENET to hand.
Though not a professed archæologist I do know something of the ruin in question, having several times examined it and having heard, perhaps, most, if not all, the various theories concerning it. I have been here a good deal longer than you have, I believe, and cannot think that you know more of the subject than I.
Have you read Wycherley's treatise on the Eleanor Crosses? [I invented this monograph for the purpose of inducing Petherton to reload.] If not, why not? Perhaps you would like to dispute the existence of a castle on the site where the Castle Farm now stands, and where such shameless profiteering is carried on in eggs and butter?
By the way, how is your poultry? I notice that your seizième siècle rooster wants his tail remodelling. Perhaps you are not worrying about new plumage for him till after the War, though it seems like carrying patriotism to absurd lengths.
Yours sincerely,
HENRY J. FORDYCE.
I hope you will allow your letter to be published in The Gazette.
In reply to this Petherton discharged with:—
SIR,—I am not concerned with the castle, which may or may not have existed in Surbury, nor am I interested in your friend's monograph on Eleanor Crosses. Other people besides yourself have the impudence to rush into print on matters of which they are sublimely ignorant.
Perhaps I had better inform you that EDWARD I. reigned at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth centuries (1272-1307), not in the fifteenth, and a very slight knowledge of architecture would convince you that the Surbury relics are not earlier than the fifteenth century.
Trusting you will not commit any further absurdities, though I am not too sanguine,
I am, Yours faithfully,
FREDERICK PETHERTON.
My views are not for publication. I prefer not to be mixed up in such a symposium.
It was evident that my neighbour's weapon was beginning to get heated, so I flicked him with some more light artillery to draw him on, and loosed off with:—
Dear Old Man,—What a historian you are! You have JOHN RICHARD GREEN beaten to his knees, FROUDE and GARDINER out of sight, and even the authoress of the immortal Little Arthur could not have placed EDDY I. with greater chronological exactitude. In fact there seems to be no subject on which you cannot write informatively, which makes me sorry that you will not join in the literary fray in the local paper, as it deprives the natives of a great treat.
But—there is a but, my dear Fred—I cannot admit your claim to superior knowledge of the Surbury relics. Remember, I have grown up with them as it were. Yours ever,
HARRY FORDYCE.
Sir (exploded Petherton),—What senseless drivel you write on the least provocation! Whether you grew up with the Surbury relics or not, you have certainly decayed with them. Every stone that's left of that confounded ruin (probably only a simple market-cross) proclaims the date of its birth. Even the broken finial and the two crockets lying on the ground expose your ignorance. Eleanor Cross, bah!
Yours flly., F. PETHERTON.
I thought it was time to emerge from my literary camouflage and let off a heavy howitzer; which I did, with the following:—
Dear Freddy,—I am afraid you have got hold of the wrong end of the stick and laid an egg in a mare's nest. [These mixed metaphors were designed to tease him into a further barrage.] I did not write, and I do not remember saying that I had written, the letter to the paper which seems to have given you as much pleasure as it has given me. I had no hand in the symposium, but the way you have brought your Chesterfield battery into action has been so masterly that I, for one, can never regret that you were misinformed. I believe the particular letter to The Gazette was written by one of the staff, a native of the place, who probably carved his name on the base in his youth, and has felt a personal interest in the Cross ever since. I hope with this new light on the affair you will favour me with your further views on history and archæology.
Yours ever, Harry.
How lovely the blackberries are looking after the rain!
But I couldn't draw Petherton's fire again, for his gun had been knocked out by this direct hit.
