At 22:08 16/06/2003 +0200, you wrote: >If only you lot would try and read some Hardy (Thomas). In chapter I of the >Trumpet Major we have an exact description of their uniforms, and we learn >that they are called 'The York Hussars', (foreigners to a man). > >Sometimes hard going to read, but Dorset-wise there ain't no better social >historian than old Tom (I am allowed this familiarity because I have read >all his novels!!). > > Geoff > > >I hate to admit this, Geoff....but I don't like Hardy! I have never been >able to get into his books at all. I have tried but they leave me cold. I >know I should read them but.................................................... I will probably be hung drawn and quartered for confessing this on a Dorset list. I am otherwise pretty well-read but Hardy.....sorry...no! My Mother loves everything he wrote, so does that excuse me at all? Sorry Helen, hanging her head in shame! Helen Jones, Weymouth, Dorset http://www.melcombe.freeserve.co.uk List Admin Rootsweb Eng Dorset & Scammell Lists, and British Genealogy Eng-Dorset, Surnames & Forenames list

OK Helen, in view of your past record and the vast number of brownie* points so far accumulated, we'll let you off this time! Promise me though that one day when you have nothing better to do (???), please try Under the Greenwood Tree. This is his first novel and the tribulations of the Mellstock Quire (choir) are a real laugh. Unfortunately he started taking himself seriously after that and tried to put some 'intellectual depth' into later books, which do make them hard going. He wasn't very good at 'intellectual depth' actually.... Your mum must be a very nice person! *For our foreign visitors, brownies are little girl-guides/scouts who earn points for good deeds! Nothing to do with chocolate cakes!! Geoff I hate to admit this, Geoff....but I don't like Hardy! I have never been able to get into his books at all. I have tried but they leave me cold. I know I should read them but.................................................... I will probably be hung drawn and quartered for confessing this on a Dorset list. I am otherwise pretty well-read but Hardy.....sorry...no! My Mother loves everything he wrote, so does that excuse me at all? Sorry Helen, hanging her head in shame!