Imagine your distress if, during the burial service of your dear departed, the vicar was seen to be chewing filberts! Or consider your consternation if, awaiting in her chamber the farmer's wife with whom you were about to commit adultery, the door crashed open to admit, not the object of your illicit affections, but a fearsome bear! You can read about these and other shocking incidents from the late eighteenth-century, including the discovery of a submerged hazelnut hedge, in my cupboard at The Dabbler this week.