The Fair Ground extends to either side of the long embankment, on whose steep slope the high road is carried up into Barnet Town; but the chief part of it centres around High Barnet station, on the right hand. The Fair begins on the first Monday in September, but at least a week before that date Barnet town and the roads leading into it, usually so quiet, are thronged with droves of horses and herds of cattle, and with the caravans of the showmen who hope to “make a good thing” out of the thousands of visitors to the Fair. Whatever private residents in Barnet may think of it, and however much they would like to see it abolished, its lasting success is assured as a popular holiday for certain classes of Londoners. The typical ’Arry of Hendon or of Epping would no more think of not visiting Barnet Fair than he would think of abstaining from deep drinking when he reached the place. For, now that all other fairs within reach of London have been suppressed, this is pre-eminently the Cockney’s outing. To deprive him of it would savour not a little of cruelty: it would certainly cut off from the travelling showmen and the proprietors of the giddy steam roundabouts a goodly portion of their incomes, while the pickpockets would miss one of the greatest chances in the year. Let those who know of fairs only from idyllic descriptions of such things in the England of long ago, visit this of Barnet. Nothing in it is poetic, unless indeed the language common to those who attend upon the Noble Animal may be so considered; and certainly that is full of imagery, of sorts. It is wonderful what a power of debauching mankind the Horse possesses. Your ordinary cattle-drover is no saint, but he is a Bayard and a carpet-knight beside these fellows with straws in their mouths, and novel and vivid language on their tongues.