All this I was once told by an old man who helped me to take my boat down Breydon.  He wore trousers of a brick red, and the stuff of them as thick as boards, and had on also a very thick jersey and a cap of fur.  He was shaved upon his lips and chin, but all round the rest of his face was a beard.  He smoked a tiny pipe, quite black, and upon matters within his own experience he was a great liar; but upon matters of tradition I was willing to believe him.

Within the town, when I had gained it from that lane which has been the ferry-lane, I suppose, since the ferry began, age and distinction were everywhere.

Where else, thought I, in England could you say that nine years would make no change?  Whether, indeed, the Globe had that same wine of the nineties I could not tell, for the hour was not congenial to wine; but if it has some store of its Burgundy left from those days it must be better still by now, for Burgundy wine takes nine years to mature, for nine years remains in the plenitude of its powers, and for nine years more declines into an honourable age; and this is also true of claret, but in claret it goes by sevens.

* * * * *

The open square of the town, which one looks at from the Globe, gives one a mingled pleasure of reminiscence and discovery.  It breaks on one abruptly.  It is as wide as the pasture field, and all the houses are ample and largely founded.  Indeed, throughout this country, elbow-room—­the sense that there is space enough and to spare in such flats and under an open sky—­has filled the minds of builders.  You may see it in all the inland towns of the Fens; and one found it again here upon the further bank, upon the edge of the Fens; for though Lynn is just off the Fens, yet it looks upon their horizon and their sky, and belongs to them in spirit.

In this large and comfortable square a very steadfast and most considerable English bank is to be discovered.  It is of honest brown brick! its architecture is of the plainest; its appearance is such that its credit could never fail, and that the house alone by its presence could conduct a dignified business for ever.  The rooms in it are so many and so great that the owners of such a bank (having become princes by its success) could inhabit them with a majesty worthy of their new title.  But who lives above his shop since Richardson died?  And did old Richardson?  Lord knows!...  Anyhow, the bank is glorious, and it is but one of the fifty houses that I saw in Lynn.

Thus, in the same street as the Globe, was a facade of stone.  If it was Georgian, it was very early Georgian, for it was relieved with ornaments of a delicate and accurate sort, and the proportions were exactly satisfying to the eye that looked on it.  The stone also was of that kind (Portland stone, I think) which goes black and white with age, and which is better suited than any other to the English climate.