Dennis recently reminded me of the wondrous occasion when I and he were children the people of Grunty Fen and surrounding villages held a re-enactment of the terrible day in the 16th century when the the Revenue men of Cambridge came to the fens. But I’ll let Dennis describe this himself with words “out of his head”.
A Ren'actment eh? We 'ad one of them in Grunty Fen once. We Ren'acted the occasion from the olden days when the revenue came from Cambridge to the Fen to discuss with the roobab men how much tax they owed. Yer see, back then rhubarb grew in the wild and was basically free food to yer average fenman. But some folks took to making roobab wine, then they distilled it an' sold it as rooshine. which upset the Revenue them not getting any share so they work pretty hard to discuss it with the roobab men. The roobab men discussed it just as hard back agin. Eventch'lly as ya know the rhubarb died out and the revenue lost int'rest.
In the ren'acment the roobab men was armed with sticks of roobab (jus' like the real event) an' the revenue rattled chains as they try to catch the roobabs to arrest 'em. Still remember the chant of "rhubarb, rhubarb" from the roobab mob.
So there you have it. It was a rather unruly mob stumbling around, as I recall, waving lengths of rhubarb. As you would expect some ended up in custody.
Yours sincerely
Miss Edwards
Grunty Fen General Stores and Post Office
