Huntingdon was a quiet little town with less than
two thousand inhabitants, in a dull country, the best part of which was
the Ouse, especially to Cowper, who was fond of bathing. Life there,
as in other English country towns in those days, and indeed till
railroads made people everywhere too restless and migratory for
companionship or even for acquaintance, was sociable in an unrefined
way. There were assemblies, dances, races, card-parties, and a
bowling-green, at which the little world met and enjoyed itself. From
these the new convert, in his spiritual ecstasy, of course turned away
as mere modes of murdering time. Three families received him with
civility, two of them with cordiality; but the chief acquaintances he
made were with "odd scrambling fellows like himself;" an eccentric
water-drinker and vegetarian who was to be met by early risers and
walkers every morning at six o'clock by his favourite spring; a
char-parson, of the class common in those days of sinecurism and
non-residence, who walked sixteen miles every Sunday to serve two
churches, besides reading daily prayers at Huntingdon, and who regaled
his friend with ale brewed by his own hands.
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