Dempster, over his third glass of brandy and water,
would overwhelm a disputant who had beaten him in argument, with some
such tirade as: "I don't care a straw, sir, either for you or your
encyclopaedia; a farrago of false information picked up in a cargo of
waste paper. Will you tell me, sir, that I don't know the origin of
Presbyterianism? I, sir, a man known through the county; while you, sir,
are ignored by the very fleas that infest the miserable alley in which
you were bred!"
[Illustration: SOUTH FARM, ARBURY, THE BIRTHPLACE OF "GEORGE ELIOT"]
We left the "Newdegate Arms" at Nuneaton early in the morning, on our
way to Lutterworth, our next object of interest, and passed by the
village of Hartshill, where Michael Drayton was born in 1563. He was a
lyric poet of considerable fame and a friend of Shakespeare. His
greatest work, _Polyolbion_, a poetic description of different parts of
England, was published in 1613. He became Poet Laureate, and at his
death, in 1631, was buried in Westminster Abbey.
We again went astray owing to the finger-posts being without names, but
at length reached the Watling Street at cross-roads, where there was a
very old public-house called "The Three Pots," and here we turned to the
right along the Street.
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