THOUGH the column very nearly became betrothed to the daughter of the High Sheriff of Derbyshire - it was long ago, a salutary story involving tinned tuna, the demi-aristocracy and a red netty door without a sneck - that east Midlands county has remained largely unexplored.

Last weekend we made its brief re-acquaintance, particularly with the village of Eyam, roughly between Sheffield and Buxton.

Eyam is still known as the Plague Village. In 1665, material ordered by the village tailor from London arrived damp and was spread out to dry. Plague-carrying flies were released; the disease spread quickly and fearfully.

Some families left, carrying the plague with them. William Mompesson, Eyam's 28-year-old Rector, urged his flock to quarantine themselves to avoid greater pestilence elsewhere. Though his own small children also fled what Mompesson termed the "pit of destruction", his wife - the former Catherine Carr - insisted upon remaining by her ministering husband's side.

Like half the population of Eyam, Catherine Mompesson died from bubonic plague - "the destroying angel having taken up quarters within my habitation," wrote William, son of a Rector of Seamer, near Scarborough.

His letter to his children remains a model of Christian forbearance. She was the most indulgent mother that any poor little children could have, he writes, pious and devoted, the kindest wife in the world who refused all entreaties to flee.

Catherine Mompesson - "a saint in heaven" - was from the hamlet of Cocken, near Finchale Priory north of Durham. It's where Frank Nicholson, former managing director of Vaux Brewery and man about the North-East, now lives. With one leap of the imagination, we are home.

COCKEN is by no means the region's most resonant place name. Last week's column sought others and was rewarded with a veritable cornucopia from a satanic gentleman in Bishop Auckland.

There's Blomfontein (near Stanley) and Quaking Houses, No Place and Twizell in much the same direction. There's Seldom Seen and Never Seen, Nettlebed and Sparty Lea, Coronation, Wallish Walls and Pauperhaugh, Foggy Furze and Fell 'em Doon (near Ashington, apparently) and the North American trilogy of Quebec, California and Toronto. He might also have mentioned New York, near North Shields and Philadelphia, near Houghton-le-Spring.

David Walsh, leader of Redcar and Cleveland council and board member of One NorthEast, reports that in an idle moment - there are doubtless few - he took map, string and dividers to work out the exact centre of a previously proposed northern region.

It would have embraced an area from Barrow to Berwick, Carlisle to Boulby, in North Yorkshire.

The answer, David concluded, was a dot high up in the Pennines. The centre of the North was at Dirt Pot.

COUNCILLOR Walsh, a bus traveller like most of the best folk, also reports that on his journeys from Middlesbrough to Newcastle on the X1 - "Arriva's flagship" - he passes Basic Cottages in Coxhoe, a few miles south-east of Durham. They must not be confused with Bleak Terrace, in Cockfield. "Actually," says David, "Basic Cottages don't look bad at all."

ALL over the place, last week's column wrongly positioned a single letter in that preposterously elongated Welsh village - Eddie Roberts in Richmond not only spotted but effortlessly pronounced it - and also mucked up Piddletrenthide, in Dorset. Thanks for that vigilance in that direction to Kenneth Stoves in Ormesby, Middlesbrough.

Much the greater correspondence, however, pointed out that the Union Jack pictured flying high near Nova Scotia - the one in upper Swaledale - was upside down.

"The number of Union Jacks flying upside down during the Golden Jubilee has been beyond belief," e-mails a lady called Jackie.

"I learned as a Brownie many moons ago that the broad white diagonal stripe is always at the top, nearest the flag pole or whatever the structure to which it's attached."

Upside down, as everyone points out, it becomes a distress signal.

"Old Stager" from Barnard Castle also insists that if the flag is anything below three inches from the top of the pole, it's regarded as half mast.

Ted Storey in Darlington addresses the inverse with a simple poem...

To fly the flag, so high, so high,

But upside down, oh why, oh why?

We have responded equally simply....

We only try to raise the standard,

But once again Gadfly's crash landed.

Truly, it is an allegory of life.

PETER Crawforth in Chilton, near Ferryhill, is also feeling disorientated after receiving Arriva's "Summer savings bulletin" through the post. The whole thing concerned Merseyside. No wonder Arriva is having difficulty keeping services running, says Peter, if they don't even know whose side of the country they're on.

GRIST to the mill and salt to the wounds, last week's column also descended to put-downs, of which W S Churchill was the great master.

Ian McDougall recalls George Bernard Shaw's note to Churchill that he'd keep him two seats for his next premiere. "Come and bring a friend - if you have one," Shaw added.

Churchill's reply was brief. "Impossible to attend the first performance. Will attend the second - if there is one."

William Dick in Darlington recommends a whole book of put-downs - what might the collective noun be? - whilst Jean Foster in Hunwick recalls a judge becoming increasingly fed up with the fidgeting counsel for the defence.

"Are you trying to show contempt for this court?" demanded the judge.

"No, M'lud," replied counsel, "I was actually trying to conceal it."

Paul Wilkinson, once The Times man east of the Pennines, also sends a nadir of put-downs, some familiar like the row between the 18th century politician John Wilkes and the ever-peckish Lord Sandwich.

"Sir," said Sandwich, "you will either die of the pox or on the gallows."

"That my Lord," replied Wilkes, "depends on whether I embrace your mistress or your principles."

Chiefly, however, we are taken with Paul's recollection of an encounter in The Bell - one of old Fleet Street's most celebrated bolt holes - between Hilary Bonner, a statuesque blonde who shone for the Sun, and the diminutive Harry Arnold, that paper's royal correspondent.

Harry, well replenished, advised the lady that he'd like to take her to a hotel and make mad passionate love all night.

Ms Bonner peered down on him, disdainfully and from a great height. "Harry, if you did and I found out, I would be very, very cross."

...so finally, whilst the Echo no longer carries what properly may be called a diary column, these almost-daily offerings are the nearest that the paper chronicles.

It was therefore seriously disconcerting that, in denying weekend reports he is to stand down, Hartlepool MP Peter Mandelson pointed out that the story had first appeared in the Evening Standard diary.

"It isn't a news story, it's a diary item," said Mandelson. "If it was true, it wouldn't be in the diary."

Since the inference is obvious, we have (as they say) sought advice. Should a substantial out of court settlement immediately be forthcoming, the Gadfly column may never again darken these disciplines. Failing that, we return (from Piddletrenthide and places) in a fortnight.

Published: 26/06/2002