It is to be doubted if any county has a monopoly of silliness. The fault of Sussex people rather is to lack reserves, not of wisdom but of effort. You see this in cricket, where although the Sussex men have done some of the most brilliant things in the history of the game (even before the days of their Oriental ally), they have probably made a greater number of tame attempts to cope with difficulties than any other eleven. For the "staying of a rot" Sussex has had but few qualifications. The cricket test is not everything: but character tells there just as in any other employment. Burwash, however, must be exempted from this particular charge, for, whatever its form may be now, its eleven had once a terrible reputation. I find in the county paper for 1771 an advertisement to the effect that Burwash, having "challenged all its neighbours without effect," invites a match with any parish whatsoever in all Sussex. [Sidenote: THE DONKEY RACE] Mr. Egerton was not the first parson to record the manners of the Burwash parishioner. The Rev. James Hurdis, curate there towards the end of the preceding century, and afterwards Professor of Poetry at Oxford (we saw his grave at Bishopstone), had written a blank verse poem in the manner of Cowper, with some of the observation of Crabbe, entitled "The Village Curate," which is a record of his thoughts and impressions in his Burwash days. One could hardly say that "The Village Curate" would bear reprinting at the present time; we have moved too far from its pensiveness, and an age that does not read "The Task" and only talks about Crabbe is hardly likely to reach out for Hurdis. But within its limits "The Village Curate" is good, alike in its description of scenery, its reflections and its satire. The Burwash donkey race is capital:-- Then comes the ass-race. Let not wisdom frown, If the grave clerk look on, and now and then Bestow a smile; for we may see, Alcanor, In this untoward race the ways of life. Are we not asses all? We start and run, And eagerly we press to pass the goal, And all to win a bauble, a lac'd hat. Was not great Wolsey such? He ran the race, And won the hat. What ranting politician, What prating lawyer, what ambitious clerk, But is an ass that gallops for a hat? For what do Princes strive, but golden hats? For diadems, whose bare and scanty brims Will hardly keep the sunbeam from their eyes. For what do Poets strive? A leafy hat, Without or crown or brim, which hardly screens The empty noddle from the fist of scorn, Much less repels the critic's thund'ring arm. And here and there intoxication too Concludes the race. Who wins the hat, gets drunk. Who wins a laurel, mitre, cap, or crown, Is drunk as he. So Alexander fell, So Haman, Cæsar, Spenser, Wolsey, James. [Sidenote: A STRATEGIC DUELLIST]