THREE:That summer old Mrs. Backfield became completely bedridden. The gratefulness of sunshine to her old bones was counteracted by the clammy fogs that streamed up every night round the farm. It was an exceptionally wet and misty summer��a great deal of Reuben's wheat rotted in the ground, and he scarcely took any notice when Tilly announced one morning that grandmother was too ill to come downstairs.The Fair had moved still further with the times. The merry��go-round organ played "Bluebell," "Dolly Grey," and "The Absent-Minded Beggar," the chief target in the shooting-gallery was Kruger, with Cronje and De Wet as subordinates, and the Panorama showed[Pg 429] Queen Victoria's funeral. The fighting booth was hidden away still further, and dancing now only started at nightfall. There were some new shows, too. The old-fashioned thimble-rigging had given place to a modern swindle with tickets and a dial; instead of the bearded woman or the pig-faced boy, one put a penny in the slot and saw a lady undress��to a certain point. There was a nigger in a fur-lined coat lecturing on a patent medicine, while the stalls themselves were of a more utilitarian nature, selling whips and trousers and balls of string, instead of the ribbon and gingerbread fairings bought by lovers in days of old.