John and his pals, who had hunted over that country, did know, and went carefully round, John eventually getting the spear, and I the poor consolation of being laughed at and told I was a fool not to know. So he had his revenge on Vivian and me for the Kadir. The final was left to these best of sportsmen and good fellows, the late Lord Chesham (then Compton Cavendish), the late John Watson-where are you going to find their like!—and one other, a light-weight, and a good man all round, Webbe of the Indian Cavalry, on Robin Hood. Compton had won his two heats on his bay waler Fop, 15 hands; John his on Lamplighter, 16 hands; and little Webbe his on a 14-hand racing quality Arab, which had the heels of the other two. I was umpiring that heat, and got the usual pleasant abuse for not letting them go at several pig, but I was determined they should have a good ride, with a fair field and no favour. At last the beaters drove a nice galloping pig out of some nullahs, who streaked away across the open. I let him go nearly out of sight-what language they all used!-before I shouted "Ride!" and we all sat down in earnest; Vivian and I enjoying it, I think, as much as they did. Then a curious thing befell. When within a hundred yards of the pig, Compton was keeping a line straight behind him, whilst a good twenty-five yards on his right was John on his tall waler, with Webbe on his small Arab a few yards on his right again. To this day I cannot under stand what John could have been thinking of, unless he was riding cunning, waiting for the chance of a jink to the right: as it was, Compton overhauled the pig in a fairly thick crop, about three feet high, and before he could jink speared him. He of course pulled up, showed me the blood, and John and Webbe went on in pursuit. They shortly got into a field of dhal where they lost sight of the pig, and whilst hunting about John went down, and I saw Webbe get away at the far corner. On getting through, I found he was riding a pig gently and cautiously, which, on hearing me coming up behind him, he rushed and speared. Pulling up and seeing it was me, he shouted: "Hurrah! I've won the Cup!" But fearing piggy would escape I went on and quickly killed him. Riding back, I found little Webbe beaming all over. "Hurrah!" he "Hurrah!" he said again, "I've won the Cup!" "Why," I said, "Compton got the spear five minutes ago," and I had to explain it to him. I shall never forget his face. I was really downright sorry for his disappointment. It appears he was on the off-side of John, and could not see what had happened, and when John fell in the dhal, and he could see no one, thought he had it all to himself. It was a terrible sell for him, poor fellow, but the beauty of it all was, that on examining the pig I had killed, there were only the one mark of Webbe's spear and the one with which I killed him. On the beaters coming up, they drove another one out, which we killed, and found he had just been freshly speared, and was the original pig they were started after. Webbe had got away out of the dhal on a fresh pig. but we took our polo team and a few pig-stickers down for the Meerut Meeting. Little Vivian was in training for the big Galloway race there, which he easily won for me with a nice stake, and I relied on Fop, who was really a fast horse over bad ground, though a slow one on good level going, for the Kadir. We won our first two heats, and were left to fight it out with a waler mare of Grant of the 4th Hussars, ridden by Hutchins, one of his brother-officers. Luck though there is in it, they were betting long odds on Fop, but unfortunately we were let go It was a great disappointment also to John Watson, who, among many first-class men, was quite the best with the Cawnpore Tent Club for several years, winning each year he was there the Silver Spear for the greatest number of first spears during the season, and would have dearly loved to have taken home a Ganges Cup. The glass passed merrily round that night, "the Mighty Boar" being freely at a very small pig in bad toasted and many a chorus sung in his honour, whilst John Watson, in true sporting spirit, paid tribute to his victor, the hero of the day, by adding the following verse to Crooky's (Cruickshank of the B.C.S., a charming fellow and noted spear of the Cawnpore Tent Club) realistic song with its exciting chorus of— ground. We made all the running, but the pig was very small and the ground difficult: however, I got him fairly beat and took it easy trying to make sure, as my adversary was never within fifty yards of me. He at last got into a little narrow cattle-track with stiff short reed on either side, down which I had to follow. At last I rushed him, he tried "Over the valley, over the level, Through the dak jungle ride like the to jink when I should have devil. Hark! forrard a boar, away we go! "To the Ganges Cup they come from far, It was carried off by a 10th Hussar: Before the year following Compton had exchanged to the 16th Lancers and gone home, most kindly making me a present of Fop, with the hope that I might land another cup. The 10th Hussars had moved up country to Rawal Pindi, had him, but the reeds were too strong for him and he rolled head over heels right under Fop's legs, and as we galloped over him I drove my spear down at him, but unfortunately only into the ground an inch to one side of him. He went straight back down the track, right into Hutchins, who was some sixty or seventy yards behind us. Hutchins got on to him, but could not spear him, and I had turned and caught him, and Fop's head was alongside his knee, when he leant forward and just pricked him, and the next second I was past him and rolled the pig over. It was a case of an inch and a second, and it was with difficulty the umpire could detect the sight of blood on the extreme tip of my adversary's spear. It was no fault of Fop, who carried me brilliantly over very nasty ground after a wretched, little, jinking pig. I was the duffer, as I made sure I had him, and ought to, for I was never hustled. Such is the fortune of sport. Fop and I followed on from there to Cawnpore, but after winning our first heat we were put out in the second after a bad pig, by Chapman on our old Kadir antagonist, King Koffee, whom he had purchased from John Bullen. Though left three times in the finals Chapman was very unlucky in not securing a cup, as he was a keen pig-sticker and was for many years hon. secretary to the Cawnpore Tent Club, which he managed to the comfort and pleasure of the Club and its visitors. He richly deserved one of those coveted trophies. The following year the 10th Hussars were in Afghanistan, and the next year I was at home, and did not see the Kadir or Cawnpore again till many years afterwards, though I got some good sport pig-sticking in Bengal and other places. I have at times had a few days at pig over the black cotton soil, with its wide-gaping fissures, also among the cactus hedges, as well as in low rocky hills, where a horse can often hardly keep his legs. All these are very trying countries to hunt pig in, and not fair on the horses. Those that I have described are difficult enough. I fancy there are many more falls, comparatively, riding after pig than over a stiff hunting country or steeplechasing-at any rate, I found it so. I eventually found myself in command of the 8th Hussars at Meerut, when I again got some grand sport with pig in that glorious Kadir, though never another cup, nor did I ever again possess two such clinkers at it as Vivian and Fop. The two regiments with which I served in India-the 10th and 8th Hussars were very fortunate during their time there, the 10th carrying off the Kadir Cup I have described with Vivian, George Bryan (Buldoo) annexing two others. Cavendish and Bryan each won a Ganges Cup. For the 8th Hussars Clowes, Mahon, and Le Gallais won the Kadir, Mahon the Hog Hunters' Cup also, and Vesey the Muttra Cup. Both these regiments are back again in India, the 10th Hussars at Rawal Pindi, a nonpig-sticking country; but I am glad to say the sporting element is still strong in the regiment, much fostered by their present C.O., Col. Vaughan, who last year journeyed down to the Forbesganj district of Purneah, in Bengal, with some of his officers and others, making a party of eight spears, with thirty-two horses. They were fortunate in finding a country that had not been hunted for years, and was overrun by pig within a small radius, in fact too much so. In the twenty- varieties of ground in which two days in which they were he is hunted; what riding a out they killed one hundred young galloping pig in the and eighty boars. How pleased Kadir grass-through which the villagers must have been! you have, not to ride, but to Of the eight men, one was hors race him-really means, and de combat four days; another also conjure up visions of the three days, and afterwards could old grey boar when he is only use his spear in his left brought to bay, hand; and two others seven days each. Of the thirty-two horses, two were killed, five severely and seven slightly cut by pig, two broken down, and six stubbed and staked, and only one, Mr Wienholt's Feu-dejoie, went through the twentytwo days without a mishap. There are some who assert that pig-sticking is a tame and onesided sport, and that a pig is mobbed to death by a lot of men on horseback with spears, who run no risk themselves and give the pig no chance. The marvellous record I have quoted above should convince these sceptics that the mighty boar is no mean antagonist, and that the hunting of him is attended with some danger to his pursuers. The 8th Hussars have only this year arrived at Lucknow. They are a sporting lot, with a sportsman, Col. Deare, at their head, and an old 8th Hussar, General Mahon, who is second to none in soldiering or sport, in command of the Lucknow Division, so I feel sure they also will quickly re-establish the excellent record their predecessors gained in the country. I trust these little descriptions may give some real idea of the wild boar, and the excitement and pleasure that can be obtained in the pursuit of him; some idea of the different "And game to the last, with defiant eye, In silent courage he faces to die." In pig-sticking many sports are combined-racing, steeplechasing, hunting, and (is it not sport?) fighting-and all Indian sportsmen agree that "The noblest sport in that sporting land Is a boar in front and a spear in hand." Ah! I wonder how many good sportsmen and good pals, who rode well and true after "When age has weakened manhood's And every nerve unbraced, When youth's wild course is run, T. A. ST QUINTIN. ONE BATTERSEA WARD. BY A BATTERSEA CANVASSER. "I had rather be their servant in my way Than sway with them in theirs." WHEN I turned into the first street I had been bidden to canvass—with my heart in my mouth and my canvassingcards well inside my muff,-I saw a large stout man standing on the edge of the pavement, looking out upon the world with an exceedingly humorous and benevolent countenance. When he glanced round and saw me, there came a comprehending twinkle into his grey eye. "You a canvasser?" he said politely. "Yes," said I; "are you?" "I don't wait for no elections to go a-canvassing," said the stout man, smiling. "I'm always about, I am. You a Unionist ?" "Yes," said I; "are you?" "Goin' to begin with me?" said the stout man, twinkling. "That 'ud be a waste of time. I've been a Unionist sixty year. I thought you was a Unionist." "Why?" said I. "Well, I didn't think you was a Suffragette, any 'ow," said the stout man evasively. "There was one come along this way yesterday in a billycock 'at and a tiger-skin.' I endeavoured to conjure up the vision of a cross between a Bacchus and a stable-help -Coriolanus. this description appeared to indicate, and the stout man said, "They aggeravate the people, them wimming, though they say they're workin' for us. I know the people down 'ere. I've been sixty year in Battersea.' "Then you must also know, said I, "whether we're going to get in or not?" The stout man looked up and down the street, twinkling meditatively. "It's early days to say yet," he said. "Shirley Benn's done well down 'ere these last four years. He's always in the place, any'ow, which is more than Burns is. But I go about, I go about, an' I 'ear 'em talking." "What do you hear them say?" said I. "Well, there's a lot of Socialists down this way,' said the stout man. "But they've issued that manifesto," said I, surprised. "So they 'ave," said the stout man. "They've issued a manifesto." "And they say they aren't going to vote at all," said I. "So they do," said the stout man, with his benevolent smile. "They say they aren't goin' to vote at all, of course. Where |