“Hans Saxs shoe
Maker and poet too.”
That’s not bad, particularly for a German.
But to return to Gotham, with which a consideration of Nottingham has nothing to do. We all know particular individuals who are shining stars, and even families of stars we know, but still that does not tell us how and why there should be a whole community of such extraordinary lights. We have confessed our inability to explain this in the case of Gotham, and therefore let us take a liberal view of the matter, and suppose that from generation to generation the children inherited from their parents such a happy development of brain, that it was utterly impossible they could be anything but wise. It might be worth a phrenologist’s while to go down there. But mind, I am only speaking of what the people of Gotham were, for, as I said, I know, personally, nothing of the place, and at the present day all may be materially altered.
I cannot tell you exactly when it happened, but on a certain day, in a certain year, two men of Gotham met on Nottingham bridge. “Well met, Neighbour,” said the one man, “whither are you going?” “I have just come from the market at Nottingham, and am going home to fetch my wife and child, whom I forgot,” was the answer; “and pray where are you going, Neighbour?”
“I’m going to the market at Nottingham to buy sheep,” said the first man.
“And which way do you intend to bring the sheep home?” asked the man who had come from Nottingham.
“Over this bridge,” answered he who was going thither.
“But you cannot,” said the one.
“But I must,” said the other.