THOSE recent notes about long drop lavatories prompted a reader to send me another story from the past.

He says: “Years ago, especially in the Holme Valley, people would build outside toilets of wood supported by planks over the river. They were called thunderboxes. After using these, anything would simply drop in the river and float away.”

Which was a shame if you lived down river.

One day, one of the thunderboxes was pushed into the river and floated off. The owner called his son and asked if he had pushed it in the river, but his son denied it. The chap then told him the story of George Washington who cut down a cherry tree.

“When George’s father asked him if he had done it, George said: ‘Yes, I cannot tell a lie.’ His father forgave him for his honesty and George went on to become president of the United States.

“Now, son. Did you push the thunderbox into the river?”

“Yes,” said the son, impressed by the story. “It was me.”

Upon which, the father gave him a good hiding.

“Ow,” yelped the son. “George Washington’s father didn’t give his son a good hiding.”

To which his dad replied: “George Washington’s father wasn’t sitting in the cherry tree when he chopped it down.”