The Saturday town crier

Text 1: Sam Tullett’s bell, by Frances Oldridge

An original diary written in a nineteenth-century voice; a period simulation, not an archival document.

Our town crier, old Sam Tullett, walks the market place every Saturday at ten with his bell and his scarlet coat. Today he cried a lost pony, a sale of furniture at the Grange and a reward of five shillings for a silver brooch dropped near the Corn Exchange. He is paid sixpence for each notice, though the auctioneer pays him a shilling, since a sale must be cried at every corner of the square. Many of the farmers’ wives cannot read the bills pasted on the church wall, so they pause in their bargaining and listen with their baskets on their arms. I have seen Sam stride from the fish stalls to the horse lines without a pause for breath, and I have never once had to ask him to speak up.

Give one phrase that suggests the crier has a very loud voice.