All the accustomed accompaniments of Fairs
were there--The Two Fat Sisters (outside whose booth a notice was posted
begging the public not to prod with umbrellas to discover whether the Fat
were Fat or Wadding); Trixie, the little lady with neither arms nor legs,
sews and writes with her teeth; the Great Albert, the strongest man in
Europe, who will lift weights against all comers; Battling Edwardes, the
Champion Boxer of the Southern Counties; Hippo's World Circus, with six
monkeys, two lions, three tigers and a rhino; all the pistol-firing, ball-
throwing, coconut contrivances conceivable, and roundabouts at every turn.
All these were there, but behind them, on the outskirts of them and yet in
the very heart of them, there were other unaccustomed things.
Some said that a ship from the East had arrived at Drymouth, and that
certain jugglers and Chinese and foreign merchants, instead of going on to
London as they had intended, turned to Polchester. How do I know at this
time of day? How do we, any of us, know how anything gets here, and what
does it matter? But there is at this very moment, living in the
magnificently renovated Seatown, an old Chinaman, who came in Jubilee
Year, and has been there ever since, doing washing and behaving with
admirable propriety, no sign of opium about him anywhere.
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