It would be churlish to disparage those good Belgian beers, I'm sure they are quite excellent. I believe I once saw a raspberry-flavoured one. However, what could compare with a Summer's Afternoon, a pint of Golden 'Olde Stun'em' in hand, following play at a village cricket match. Fourteen white-flanneled men on the field. You could count all twenty eight of 'em after a few good pulls. 'Stun 'em' was the finest and deadliest brew in all of Gloucestershire, taking the enamel off your teeth and the varnish off the bar, yet tasting innocuous with its hints sunlit-orchards, malt and finest hops. Two pints of 'Stun'em' was enough to send hardened drinkers at 'shut-tap' reeling towards home backwards, usually to pass the rest of the night peacefully unconscious and upside-down in a hedge. To ask the Landlord, Jummy Simmons, of the 'New Inn' at Shortstanding, for a Second Pint was to elicit a Strong Warning. "Thou's 'ad One. Thic be Strung stuff, old buttee!" 'Stun'em' also got your legs inebriated first. In your Windsor-chair by the fire in the Snug, sober as a judge, up you get for your round. Suddenly your legs are off in another direction entirely, driving you relentlessly into a wall or the coat-rack.
Oh, to be in England now the cricket has started!
Alan
