From: hjkhjkhd@hhhh.com   
      
    wrote in message   
   news:1167946581.259638.147380@q40g2000cwq.googlegroups.com...   
   >   
   >> Many people would have shown   
   >> up at the hanging with some beers and chicken legs and a few gags. A fair   
   >> afternoon out.   
   >   
   > I'm in the middle of reading Nothing like the Sun by Burgess and was   
   > reading the Tyburn scene on the train on the way home this evening.   
   >   
   > 'There was the tree.  Crouched on the platform the hangman's assistant   
   > was securing a plank with busy hammer.  The hangman himself, masked,   
   > with brawny arms folded, strutted like Alleyn, an Alleyn that needed no   
   > glory of words.  The eternal kites wheeled above in the pure and blue   
   > and crystalline air, as yet unpolluted by men.  From afar came a roar.   
   > The hurdles were approaching, dragged over dry ground, raising a   
   > coughing dust.  One of the draggers, with a toothless idiot's face,   
   > greeted friends from a black and panting mouth.  There were jeers, men   
   > spat on the still figures roped to the hurdles, a young woman in front   
   > of WS began to jump, partly to see better, partly in a kind of   
   > transport of expectancy. Children were lifted on to parents' shoulders.   
   > Some further hangman's assistants brought, severally, a great metal   
   > bowl and four steaming kettles.  There were cheers as the near boiling   
   > water was jetted, splashing, into the bowl.  One kettle-carrier made as   
   > he would pour a scalding stream over the spectators nearest the tree;   
   > they retreated in a scurry, screaming their laughter to his grin.  The   
   > hurdles had reached the end of their journey.'   
   >   
      
   By the way, am I supposed to feel ashamed? (I was only epatering les   
   liberales)   
      
   ROBBIE   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)