65th day [Wednesday, July 27]. Gypsies return from fair.
66th to 67th day [Thursday, July 28, to Friday, July 29]. No Belle.
68th day [Saturday, July 30]. Belle’s letter; Borrow sleeps soundly.
69th day [Sunday, July 31]. Landlord in luck; horse at public-house; Petulengro lends Borrow £50.
70th day [Monday, August 1]. Buys horse.
71st day [Tuesday, August 2]. Leaves dingle; rescues old man’s ass; puts up at small inn on the North Road.
72nd day [Wednesday, August 3]. Reaches posting house [Swan Hotel, Stafford].
So far as we have proceeded the accuracy of this calculation depends upon two dates only. Can we verify it by establishing the truth of any of the events recorded by Borrow? In reply to my enquiry whether the Wolverhampton Chronicle contains any reference to a thunderstorm occurring on July 18, Mr. J. Elliot, the city librarian replied by sending me the following extract from that paper for Wednesday, July 20, 1825:
‘On Monday afternoon [i.e., July 18] three men who were mowing in a field at the Limes, near Seabridge, in this county, took shelter under the hedge from a violent thunderstorm. They had not been long there before one of them was struck with the electric fluid, causing his immediate death. The other two men were a short distance from the ill-fated man above mentioned, and were stunned about an hour, but not injured further.’
Again, Borrow mentions attending a horse and cattle fair, in company with the gypsies, on the morning of the day when, looking backward toward the dingle, he saw Isopel Berners for the last time ‘standing at the mouth, [0g] the