FOR no other reason than patriotism - duty, some might say - the column found itself on Monday drinking to the Old Queen's memory at the Victoria in Durham.

That it is the North-East's best pub - the Grey Horse at Consett runs a close second - must be regarded as entirely coincidental. Though it was bucketing down, rainy day theories may also be discounted.

It was 100 years ago that evening, after all, and exactly 150 since the lady's only visit to the North-East, to open Newcastle Central Station.

Though the pub is something of a shrine to Queen Victoria - there is even a representation of her pulling pints, appropriately captioned "Her Majesty's pleasure" - the conversation was not generally in memoriam.

"I knew the centenary was about now, but I thought it was last weekend," said Michael Webster, the ebullient landlord, vaguely.

Warmed by the coal fire, fortified by a couple of pints of Durham Light from Hodges Brewery in Crook, we talked instead of more recent times, like the 1960s days when the Top Hat Club in Spennymoor had dancers in a golden cage and revellers might still nip over the road to Berriman's coal-fired chip van. The big debate centred round whether Berriman's sold fish and chips or chips alone. The former, surely.

The excuse may have been as thinly veiled as a Victorian courtesan, the allotted hour foreshortened because the bus conked out at Rushyford, but it was a wonderful wake, nonetheless.

AMONG those marked by his absence - though he and his dog, his Guardian and his Gauloises are long familiar in the Victoria - was Mr Peter Rowell.

Peter taught us history at King James I Grammar School in Bishop Auckland - French Revolution mainly. A moderniser, he'd have ranked with the sans culottes, though what we'd particularly hoped to talk to him about was the imminent threat to The Quad.

At Bishop Grammar the first form began in the Cube, then moved in the second year to the Quad. Some sort of geometric regression, presumably.

Possibly because it had echoes of Billy Bunter, or of Jennings and Darbishire, we were all foursquare taken with The Quad, nonetheless. It's where we learned about the sexual mores of the amoeba, the declension of irregular Latin verbs and that teachers' vacuum flasks didn't always contain tea.

Now Durham County Council wants to demolish the fine old 1920s building, says it has no use for it and that it has insufficient architectural merit to be retained.

Some zealous old boy should forthwith begin a campaign to convince them of the need for preservation: Quad erat demonstrandum, as probably we never once said in 4A.

PERHAPS the most famous quad was at New College, Oxford, when the Rev William Archibald Spooner was warden from 1903-24.

We have discussed Spoonerisms before - like his supposed toast, in Victorian times appropriately, to the "queer old Dean". At King James I Grammar School we only ever knew one Spoonerism, which may certainly not be repeated here. Perhaps the best, certainly the most convoluted, concerned Spooner's attempt to send down a recalcitrant student:

"Sir, you have tasted two whole worms; you have hissed all my mystery lectures and have been caught fighting a liar in the quad; you will leave Oxford by the town drain."

ANOTHER great anniversary falls tomorrow: it's Burns Night. Perhaps for that reason a lone piper busked in Binns doorway on Saturday lunchtime - tartan clad and colourful, smart as a parrot, altogether more wholesome than the average street musician who begs only to be bypassed.

As befits the son of a Cameron Highlander, Gadfly has great affection for the pipes - a second favourite instrument, after the church organ.

It is not Rabbie Burns to whom we turn for inspiration, however, but to the Bard of England and act four, scene one of The Merchant of Venice:

"Some men there are love not a gaping pig,

Some, that are mad if they behold a cat;

And others, when the bagpipe sings I' the nose,

Cannot contain their urine."

Though not stirred to spend a penny, we were greatly taken by the High Row soloist. It cost us ten shillings, instead.

WHILST perhaps not a Meerschaum among pipes, it was dismal to read that Teesdale Pipes and Drums may - through lack of numbers - soon be running out of puff. They rehearse, memory suggests, in Staindrop village hall and would greatly welcome those willing to learn. But where to recruit south of the border? As Holmes observed to the good doctor, a three-pipe problem at the least.

HAGGIS is another braw wee treat, though - like black pudding - best enjoyed without too much thought for the ingredients. For innards strength, as an advertising man might say.

Sadly, however, we shall be unable to address the beastie tomorrow evening since a Northern League management committee meeting again comes between.

We gather just outside Durham at the splendid Ramside Hall Hotel, which does carlins in season and for the rest of the year provides the committee - a novel but much appreciated sponsorship - with a handsome array of sandwiches, coffee, crisps and (for some reason) mint imperials.

Should the admirable Mr Robin Smith care on this occasion to change the menu to haggis and neeps, however - maybe even a spoonful of tatties, an' all - there's at least one Sassenach who greatly would appreciate it.

And if he feels unable to run to neeps and tatties, a haggis sandwich will do nicely.