little meadows or spots of green herbage, protected from the burning sun by the partial shade of trees. It was in this valley that the principal herd of deer was usually to be found, except sometimes at early morning, when they would come up from the fogs and spread themselves about upon the knolls before the castle. Such was the park. When I came to an age to take part in field sports, the property had fallen into comparative neglect. The new owner had not yet returned from abroad, and want of a master's care was beginning to be urgent. Out of the late household, the old butler and footman still resided in the castle, just to air the large and silent tapestried rooms, occasionally and quietly to regale themselves with the best wines in the cellar. As to women, none resided on the premises, though the gardener's wife used to come every day to prepare meals for the aforesaid old worthies. It sometimes happened, however, that days passed without either breakfast or dinner being cooked, or even the front windows, which looked upon the park, being opened. Mr. Villers and Thomas were then not at home, said the public-that is, visitors would have been very inconvenient at such times. As to old Dick, the gardener, he managed, by the help of his wife, to turn these temporary absences of his masters to pretty satisfactory account; and I have heard that he was often seen stealing back to the garden on such occasions, with anything rather than a steady gait, and a black, dusty, lime-stained bottle beneath each arm. Whether these whispers relative to the castle were well founded, may even now be doubted; one thing, however, is certain, that Thomas, who had been during the squire's life-time a steady-going, very lean, and very powdery-headed servant, became finally almost a constant martyr to the gout, and poor Mr. Villers ended his days quite unexpectedly, one morning, in a fit of apoplexy.

Thus much I have thought proper to say about the castle and its inmates, with whom we shall have more to do in a later page of the present memoirs.

Among the general decay of everything belonging to the property, were the park palings, so that the deer could stray out and return just whenever they chose so to do. For a time, however, they seemed little inclined to make any great use of this agreeable privilege, their excursions being generally confined to within a short distance of the park, but these were gradually extended further into the adjoining districts until at last every large wood in the county around was become as familiar to them as their home, and frequently served them instead; still for many months no evil consequences ensued, and it was only at the commencement of the severe winter of 18-, that the work of destruction was begun among them. My father made a hundred threats of prosecuting the killers of the squire's deer, and the farmers replied by asking compensation for injury done to their turnip and wheat fields by the said animals.

It was in this state of things that my father resolved upon keeping two or three hounds for the purpose of hunting home the stray deer; and accordingly he wrote to an old friend who kept a pack of harriers in the next county, in order to obtain them.

In a few days arrived two couple of as promising-looking dogs as

any man need boast of possessing. Among them was a black-tan bitch, with long ears, and a pretty good-tempered, playful face; ard a middle-aged, proud, surly, handsomely-mottled, black-and-white dog, the rich black of his coat dashed slightly with some rough grey hairs, that gave him somewhat of the severe, hardy caste of the wolfhound-a grey, stern countenance, and an uncompromisingly-stiff, coarse tail-that neither the longest day nor the hardest thong could humble. He was truly a glorious hound-amiable enough, though never playful, when kindly treated, but proud and fierce as Lucifer beneath the stripe: you might kill him, but subdue him never!

The first time we tried our little pack, I remember, was one wet, dark morning in Christmas week. It was a rapid thaw, and the air was loaded with a dirty smoke, like fog. The deer had been seen in a little cover very near our house, so that, having thus not far to go, and my father, who was an old sportsman, fancying the morning much too cold and raw to afford anything like good scent, it was determined that we should make our first trial on foot. Accordingly we reached the wood and threw in our hounds (four), I dashing my way through the wet brambles beneath the dripping trees, with their stocks black as ink from the draining moisture of the morning; and my father, keeping along in an open field at the top, cheering the hounds with his fine echoing voice (I recollect trying to imitate him, as well as I could, in an under-tone), and occasionally making the wood ring again with the loud crack of his hunting-whip. It was long since such joyful sounds had been heard in our parts, and I really believe my father was proud to hear once more the sound of his own halloo, even after a lapse of many years, and without the society of former friends: he must, however, have felt himself quite alone!

But if my father had any dash of sadness in this renewed pleasure, my young heart was throbbing with strange and untasted joy. It was the first time in my life that I had heard the sound of a hound, or the thrilling voice of a huntsman. Oh! how the echoes (or was it the agitation of my own bosom?) repeated the glad notes! No, no; every hollow tree had a voice that morning to answer my father's halloo-voices that had slept for years! As to myself, though I was pretty well versed in the mysteries of shooting, I knew literally nothing about hunting-not a whit. It was well that I was alone, for, as I trust to be forgiven, I was so completely ignorant of the art, even of the most simple word of encouragement that may be becomingly addressed to a hound, and so unlearned in the gamut of sylvan intonations (the poetry of the chase, to know which thoroughly a man must be born to the calling), that I was actually compelled to insult our gallant hounds by speaking to them as I would have done to so many spaniels; and you may judge, brother sportsmen, how little I was therefore obeyed-nay, I declare to heaven, I saw they despised me. But to prove to you that I had, nevertheless, the sentiment. within me, and was, in fact, blindly inspired by the muse of the chase the rosy-cheeked, blue-eyed daughter of the chaste Diana of old, I no sooner heard the clear and sonorous voice of the playful, busy "Countess" (the black-tan bitch with the long ears), than I

became half conscious of my error. I heard, with the quick instinct of a naturally good ear for the sweet music of hunting, that I was not in tune; and so I wandered along in silence, unable to give suitable expression to the gladness I felt within me-like a young poet, meditating his early lays of amorous joy. Indeed, I felt half ashamed of my ignorance, in the presence of such noble hounds. It was in vain for me to repeat, in my insipid, every-day shooting tone of voice, without echo, without soul or enthusiasm, "Hie in here!" or "Hie in there!" I was paid no attention to, and stupid enough I felt at the contemptuous glances they gave me ; in short, I permitted them to lead me as they chose, for they evidently knew more of the business than myself; and very respectfully did I follow them, without any further attempt at intermeddling with them. All this time my father was cheering lustily (not a vibration of which escaped me), and I observed that at every peal of his voice the whole four hounds contentedly wagged their tails, blew the moisture out of their noses, and then carried them along the surface of the fallen leaves so closely as to brush away the sparkling dew-drops with their pendent lips.

Presently little Countess, who had been busied upon something here and there, but without any great confidence it seemed to me, seeing that directly either of her companions ran to consult her upon the subject, she invariably moved away from the spot; Countess, I say, at last made a dead halt, and thrust her nose so furiously into the leaves that I really fancied she had found a mouse or an earthed rabbit. At the emission of a long deep sniff, two of the other dogs rushed towards her, when, stiffening her tail, and throwing up her head, but without moving a step, she set up a howl-good heavens! the like of which I never before heard; it was so loud and hearty, that the sound went winding down the valley until it ended like the spiral end of a corkscrew, miles away as it appeared to me in the dis

tance.

Here began the cry, and away they went rattling over the dry leaves; twenty couple would hardly have produced a finer chorus. I can even now see the green path they left behind them as they dashed along, and shook down the grey water-drops from the underwood. In a minute or two after, I heard my father hallooing in the fields

above me.

The hill I had to ascend was steep, and the ground slippery and tangled with weeds and briars. My heart was throbbing ere I got half way up it so desperately, that I could hardly breathe; my eyes seemed covered with a thick haze from the exertions I was making to be in time; my ears were confused with the sound of ringing bells or pouring water, and the cry of hounds gradually growing fainter: I was ready to drop, and yet I still strained on. I fell from weakness and over-haste, and seized upon hard prickly brambles, or the muddy ground, to regain my legs: nothing on earth is like the sound of hounds to give a man energy. At last I saw the edge of the cover, and in a bound or two more I was upon the light sward.

And now I recovered my breath; and my chest, though it felt raw and bleeding, seemed to have grown more capacious. On I went across the grass field, my legs seeming literally to run without con

sulting my will, but so strained by previous efforts that I felt as if placed upon a pair of long, slender, pointless stilts. At the bottom of the field ran a broad lake, and its grey, muddy waters on that occasion were brimming along even with the two banks. On the other side was a meadow, and then another wood, beyond which the hounds appeared to me to be running: my only thought was, how to overtake them.

Let no one say that I have not a true love for the chase. The day was cold and dark, and I was alone: the waters looked half frozenthe current was wide, and filling the little valley with its angry roar. No matter; long before I had reached the middle of the field, I was resolved upon leaping the lake, come what would of it.

There was a wooden bridge a meadow or two further down, but I was too impatient to think once of taking it, for it was with difficulty that I could any longer hear the hounds, and all behind them seemed a frightful solitude to me. What did I care for the cold aspect of the grey lake, though darting swiftly as light around the corners of its serpentine course, or rolling the full weight of its volume, smooth and gliding, in the deeper and less interrupted channel, like a vast sheet of oil! As I approached, I saw the barmy foam circling in perpetual round in little bays here and there along the banks, and the long green blades of two-edged-sword grass streaming off into the current, like long and quivering streamers upon the bosom of a brisk wind. At a glance I saw all this, and I felt my legs tottering beneath me. The next moment, without fear, without alarm, without even a shiver, I found myself dropping, with the weight of lead, into the very centre of the stream. I felt as if I had leaped into a furnace of boiling water, and scrambled for the opposite bank as well as I could against the force of the current; but my legs seemed bound to the heavy waters by some load-stone power. For a few seconds I lost all other sounds in the deafening roar of this fresh-water tide; and then, a minute or two after, the stream was pursuing its course even as before-I, wet to the middle, running across the opposite green meadow, and the voices of the hounds ringing in my ears, fresh and sweetly as marriage bells. After half an hour's fatiguing run, I managed to join company with my hounds.

Not a soul seemed to be stirring abroad, for it was now near the rural hour for dinner. Since the morning the fog had continued to thicken, and, driven by almost a gale of wind, was rolling in long dense white waves along the surface of the land. Never was day more miserable, and yet I was in my glory! The scent was growing every minute colder, and it was with difficulty that my little pack could any longer pursue it; but I cared nothing about that, for, profiting already by my father's lessons, I was exclusively occupied in hallooing as scientifically as possible. In fact, amid obstacles before which many other sportsmen would have given over in despair, I felt as gay and happy as a lark in the sunshine of a spring morning. Indeed, I may safely say that after near another hour of cold slow hunting, in which space of time we had not advanced more than about half-a-dozen fields at most, I had thoroughly perfected myself in the most approved method of cheering a pack of hounds. Long

after my dogs had ceased to hunt, I perseveringly continued to halloo! At last I felt convinced that I had done all a huntsman could do, and began to think of returning, quite content with my day's sport; not a little of which pleasure, I can assure you, arose from the pleasant fact of my being covered from head to toe with cold wet mud. I had seen my father return so from shooting a hundred times, and the comparison pleased me.

My sport thus ended, I speedily found that I was most hawkishly hungry; and as I had fortunately two of my pockets, of very comfortable dimensions, tolerably stored with dry bread, I sought the shelter of a neighbouring hedge, for the purpose of dining before I commenced my homeward journey. Accordingly I chose the most protected spot I could, which I very well remember was in the corner of a large wheat-field, at the base of an old black-thorn hedge, the bank of which was conveniently covered with a quantity of long dry grass, which rustled almost like a bundle of straw as I sat myself down upon it. My hounds crept around me, and the wind came whistling drearily through the bushes above our heads in front the rainy fog was still driving in waves across the fields. At sight of the first crust which I drew from my pocket the mouths of my four companions all ran water; they all licked their lips and looked up in my face. I am not sure that I should have given way to my generosity, plagued as I was myself with the gnawings of hunger, had it not been that little Countess, with her good-tempered hazel eyes and long satin ears, stood shivering before me with wet and cold. I broke my bread and gave her half of it, and was then going to eat the remainder myself, when I caught a glance from the proud eye of old Lifter. "No! old fellow," said I, "I am neither unjust nor selfish. Thereyou may take it all, if you think that." The cold-hearted old rascal drew the remaining half slowly out of my hand, and when he had it fairly in his own mouth, threw up his head and swallowed it at one gulp, with a loud smack of his lips. The other two had evidently never been accustomed to receive particular favour or attention, but had humbly preserved the rank of common hounds. They had enjoyed no privileges, but been condemned to maintain their place in a populous kennel, amid a thousand hardships and hard fights; oftener striped with the whip than caressed with the hand-two honest, serviceable, unpresuming, gallant hounds: in short, one of them, finding that I regarded him kindly, approached and laid his head upon my knee, while the other hardily sat down upon his rough haunches on the wet ground, and began licking himself dry, which he occasionally intermitted to cast a hopeless glance at the food I held in my hands. I broke off a piece of my bread, and held it out to him. The poor fellow's eye brightened for an instant at the goodly prospect, but seeing Countess advance, he patiently again turned away his head, and recommenced his process of licking himself dry. I thought there was something so good in his quiet uncomplaining behaviour, that I put the morsel I had at first intended for him into my own mouth, and threw him the larger piece I had reserved for myself. My last piece of bread I divided between myself, the remaining hound, and my pretty favourite Countess; so that at the end of our repast, al