"To WILL CROOKS, L.C.C.
In memory of many years
Of delightful comradeship in Poplar."
When, after the big victory in Woolwich, Crooks was able to add M.P. as well as L.C.C. after his name, there came among hundreds of other congratulations a cabled cheer from South Africa. It was signed "Chandler."
CHAPTER IV ROUND THE HAUNTS OF HIS BOYHOOD
Proud of his Birthplace—Famous Residents at Blackwall—Memories of Nelson's Flagship—Stealing a Body from a Gibbet—A Waterman who Remembered Dickens.
Of many interesting days spent with Crooks in Poplar, one stands out as the day on which he showed me some of the haunts of his boyhood.
Poplar is always picturesque with the glimpses it gives of ships' masts rising out of the Docks above the roofs of houses. With Crooks as guide, this rambling district of Dockland, foolishly imagined by many people to be wholly a centre of squalor, becomes as romantic as a mediæval town.
It was not always grey and poor, as so many parts of it are to-day, though even these are not without their quaint and pleasant places.