For the word's ago wer Come mud pep
Kastrat always fies, mi s

Joan of hers move shows for Don's smiles

Tram that young chief, Wach of the Isis"

its savely necessary to say that Mr. Francis Grant, in his admoirepetre of The Melon Breakfast," has ensured posterity for the New Club. Beside the members pourtrayed in it already specified, there are Bring likenesses of Lord Wilton, Sir W. M. Stanley, and Mr. Rowland Errington.....

"Wilton! our Croxton champion, proudest thou,

To ride and win the laurel bough.

On Stanley, on!'

Marmion.

was the philosopher and friend of the hunting field: who, when symptoms of pounding" manifested themselves, pointed how best the bullfinch might be charged-and led the way.

"Shall Joe be all forgot? Diana! No!

I lose thy favour if I name not Joe.

I ne'er saw rasping fence or hedgestake bare,

That balk'd Joe Craddock, or his good grey mare.

I ne'er saw bosky brook or steeply linn,

But Joe would at it, over it, or in."

The lyrist's tribute, too, to Captain Ross is admirable, both in the spirit and the letter:

"Another highland laddie' comes across

The spirit of my dream-the gallant Ross!
Not he whom Pope belauded, liberal soul!
Nor he whose country house was at the Pole;
But one yclept Horatio-one whose style

Is at the Smite, like Nelson at the Nile.

Then why should lords and dukes all praise engross,
And none be given to thee, thou Man of Ross?'

*

Such was the metropolis of the chase when Harry Goodricke was king: not without its crosses, indeed-but peopled with such a colony as rarely has been founded by the disciples of woodcraft. It has already become more cosmopolite, and the frequent stranger may now be seen in its streets, and eke its fields. The government is lapsing into a social democracy. After various phases-and, it must be admitted, "varios casus," in the sense Virgil applies the expression-during the vice-royalties that intervened from the death of the sporting baronet to the accession of the present sporting master, Melton is again the cream of English fox-hunting. The direction of such a country could not have fallen into better hands than those of Mr. Green, of Rolleston. He is a gentleman of very general, popular, and considerable local influence. Moreover, he has his heart in his work, and is a thorough practical man, both in the kennel, in the cover, and in the chase. His position as a landowner and a neighbour ensures him a certain prestige among the farmers; and his management evinces a prudence that always begets respect. In the Quorn country, at this instant crisis of the chase, may be seen the admirable adaptation of "The Hour and the Man." Green is only a subscriber to the Melton Hunt, I believe, to the amount of £100 per annum; the rate of subscription varying from £300 to £25-the latter being the lowest sum accepted. When he is out of pocket, it is only to call a meeting of the habitués of the hunt to secure the necessary supplies. Still, notwithstanding those affect Leicestershire who never did so before, Melton is an epitome of May Fair. To give a list of those who live in it, and visit it for the one grand purpose, would be but to recapitulate the catalogue of chivalry given in the fashionable returns of Almack's and the Opera. Of the Old Club, however, all had departed to the bourne which returns no travellers, so far back as 1844. The last of all the Romans was Sir James Musgrave; as choice a spirit, and as gracious, as ever shed life and light upon a boon company.

Mr.

But, peradventure, our affair is not with by-gones. The fiery aspirant for a first-flight day, or month, or season, among first-flight men would

first know how stands the economy of Melton; how he is to win that El Dorado of the sportsman; and, having made the desired port, how he is to "live, and move, and have his being.' "Melton Mowbray, siys Mr. Brooks, in his gazetteer, "is seated on the river Eyre; and is the best place in the country next to Leicestershire." But Mr. Brooks has never a word about its vicinity to the Midland Counties Railway; just now a much more interesting feature in its geography than its contiguity to the river Eyre. This line passes through the county town ; in itself far from bad head-quarters for the sons of Diana. Indeed, everything had in account, for the miscellaneous visitor it offers the best abiding place of any. It is almost central for the best country, and abounds in accommodation. Its inns are many and excellent, and the reckoning is as well as can be expected, under all the circumstances. Melton is, indeed, as Nimrod well observed, " an earthly paradise to a man fond of hunting, and with a good account at his banker's ;" but its an inflammatory place for weekly bills-that's the truth. Besides its public accommodations, Leicester is famous for its private hospitality, some of the snuggest of our insular provincials dwelling in it, and in some of the completest epitomes of comfort to be found under the sun or moon. There is also a village about four miles from Leicester, on the Market Harborough road, hight Oadly, where good quarters are to be met with. People also are said to live at a place called Houghton-on-theHill; but this wants confirmation. Scraptoft is negotiable enough; and so also is the New Inn (I think they call it) hard by Squire Greene's, at Rolleston.

If you must bivouac, however, at Melton, the George, for a modern rural hostel, is as near perfect as anything to be expected from a publican-and sinner. There are also plenty of private lodgings in the town, from five guineas a week to one, according as you descend the scale of cheap and nasty. With respect to the department of the horse, should you purpose any prolonged sojourn, the best way is to hire a range of stabling, large or small, according to your necessities, and supply yourself with provender. You can get them of all dimensions, or at so much a stall. It is not very common for hunters to stand at livery; but it may be done tolerably well at London prices. When I speak of the possibility of a gentleman living" all over the country," of course I set him down as a bachelor. For such an unfortunate there are cribs of indifferent solace; such as Lutterworth-from which the Pytchley may be reached-and Armsby; but, single or double, Melton's the place. Here you are continually within easy distance of the Belvoir, seldom out of hail of the Cottesmore; and, with Northampton to fall back upon, you can call the Pytchley your own. It must be had in mind that the Quorn country is not all a Tempe: Tuesday given to forest hunting is not the occasion I should counsel a young beginner to cultivate; and the Six Hills and Widmerpool country is rather too rife with plough and unnegotiable fences for the sport that carries body and soul with it.

66

And then suppose you are not fond of hunting every day, or, as Byron the heathen ventured to suggest about matrimony, suppose you get a little tired" of all the spots on the globe, Melton's the best sportsman's lounge. It's full of fellows who think nothing of giving— and promising to give-five hundred for a horse; and populous with

Lord Wilton's groom

stables furnished with such like costly cavalry can show you the style of nag that Phoebus loves to drive in his team; or suppose you were to throw your eye over Lord Cardigan's string, or Lord Gardner's, or Mr. Gilmour's, or any lot to which you can gain access, it will considerably assist your taste as well as exercise your bile, let me tell you, unless Providence has hardened your heart against coveting your neighbour's goods. Yes; shutting your eyes to consequences, and anathematizing the tin, go to Melton, if it's only for once in your life should the worst come of it, be a philosopher, and thus reason with yourself:

'Twas all too bright, too fair to last;

But come what may, I have been fast!

There is altogether a false idea abroad about the formidable difficulties of Leicestershire as a hunting country. So far from being fortified with fences, as it would seem from all that has been said and sung of its impenetrable bullfinches and navigable streams, which Alken and other artists used to set forth, where half the hunters and their coursers " apparent rari nantes"—that is, being interpreted, are seen swimming like good un's--instead of all this raw-head and bloody-bones work, when anything like difficult riding occurs, it is the exception rather than the rule in this paradise of foxhunting. There is hardly more than one thing needful for him who desires to see a run, and to account for it satisfactorily, and that is that he be on the qui vive, and when he has got away, that he keep up his pace-in plain language, he must not be afraid to go. Let no one suppose the assertion paradoxical, that out of fifty men that will jump over anything there are rarely five that will gallop over everything. "In my experience of men riding to hounds," says Nimrod, "I have made the following remark: That it is not because a man is a good horseman, that he puts his horse well at his fences and is not afraid of them, that he can live with hounds; on the contrary, I have seen numbers answering this description that never could see a run when the pace was quick. The reason

of this was they were not quick; they lost time at their fences, and they would not gallop. I am willing to admit that the act of extending a horse over rough ground and among grips, particularly if that horse has a long stride and does not pull together, is a greater trial to nerves than the generality of fences, and is attended with more danger. The worst falls are those which happen in the open field when horses are going at the top of their speed; and it requires a finer finger to put a horse along his best pace over rough ground than to ride him, if he knows his business, over the stiffest and most difficult fences. In the one case he sees his own danger, in the other his rider must see for him, and, by the finger, caution him against it. It is in this way that I can account for so many persons that I have known and met with who, with all the necessary qualifications for riding to hounds, as far as fencing and horsemanship are concerned, yet never see a run at the best pace-because they will not gallop."

No one of course will dream of going into Leicestershire without an adequate stud. I don't speak of the amount of horse-flesh, for that may be regulated by the calls upon it--a man who hunts three days a week don't want a dozen nags to deal with-but of the quality. It

more

is a country that cannot be relied upon unless you have a hunter under you. The Quorn abounds in brooks; and when you meet one, which you do probably every day on an average, it's a rasper: over you must have a temperate horse. Without occasional screwing, nothing could cross some portions of it where the bullock fences are as compact as stone walls, and too high to be jumped. Indeed I have always been of opinion-as some one is said to have been of going to sea-that the man who goes a hunting on a hot horse for pleasure may go to purgatory for pastime.

The aspirant for Melton enjoyment will mount himself well; he will, peradventure, adopt some one of the suggestions for his abode and economy that I have offered for his solution. He will secure some introduction, if a stranger, to the authorities, that will entitle him to a good general reception. I do not intend to convey that it is necessary he should be received into the very exclusive coteries, but it will be uphill work at the best, unless he can negotiate the average society. His appointments should be all intrinsically excellent, without a spice of gaud or glitter about them; in all things-manner, personal appearances, equipage, servants, economy-let him adopt for his maxim Horace's specification of the true gentleman, simplex munditiis. Then let him essay his début with the Quorn, not as if he dropped from the clouds, but with enough of his pretension known to put him on the scene like a graceful actor. Prepared in such sort, when the hour of trial comes, he shall seek the place of meeting attired as becomes--

"The perfect fox hunter, from top to toe."

Let his eye be as keen as his ardour for a start; and when fox and pack are decently clear of the cover, let him send his heart before him and follow it, and, my life for it, he neither finds Leicestershire fields nor Leicestershire fences the impregnable things he has been taught to expect them.

LETTERS FROM A DEVONIAN.

THE HIGHLANDS.

"My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not here,
My heart's in the Highlands a chasing the deer."

Polkas, politics, and even railway committees must have an end; and I believe that, after one of the hottest and most laborious seasons that have occurred for many years, there were very few who did not rejoice at the arrival of those autumnal days when the pure air and the sports and pleasures of the country might be enjoyed far from the turmoil and bustle of the largest city in Europe. After the 12th of August, the eloquence of Brougham, the philippics of D'Israeli, “the