heavy, remorseless hand upon her sunny brow, upon which no cloud of sorrow had ever darkened then. The "old familiar faces," too, are thronging round: alas! where are they now? Scattered in every direction over the earth-east, west, north, and south. Of all the sworn friends and gallant comrades who started with ourselves to run the race of life, not one has been permitted to take the mountain with us to-day. Death has removed some for ever; and strange as it appears, they seem less changed than many of the others" the dead are always faithful;" but who can foretel how the companions of our childhood may turn out? Racing stock are not more uncertain. Some who promise fairly enough cut up curs not worth their salt; others, unable to go the pace, retire into private life, and are no more heard of; many worthless breeds break down in the training. How few, and they perhaps the most unlikely of the lot, run on honest to the end!

But we must try back here, or we shall get out of our depth directly. Fortunately the heat has abated, and there is work before us that will try our mettle once more. We grasp the guns, and after scrambling up the precipice, direct our steps towards a great brown savage-looking mountain, the very sight of which makes our bones ache. No dastard thought of retreat, however, comes into our hearts now-

"With twopenny we fear no evil:

With usquebaugh we'd face the devil."

Nor are we unrewarded for our toil; the dogs are working admirably, even the reprobate has got steady, and except chopping a stray leveret (for which he comes up dutifully to be flogged), commits no crime worth recording. We never recollect to have seen the grouse stronger on the wing than they are here, or a greater abundance of plover: stand after stand keeps wheeling round us, unmindful of the incessant fire of grape and canister which we keep pouring in upon them. The hares, too, are starting out every moment before us—not the fat lazy-looking animals one sees in a preserve; but small, brown, muscular, wiry mountaineers, that go off like a shot, and vanish we can't tell where, as if the earth had swallowed them, requiring a quick eye and steady hand to bring them down.

The shadows begin to lengthen now, and forward is the word, "over the hills and far away"

"Past many a lonely tarn,

Haunted by the sailing hern,
By many a cairn's grey pyramid,
Where urns of mighty chiefs lie hid."

Sliding down the ravines, and clambering up the cliffs: now plunging to the hips in the tall heather, then threading our way cautiously through a morass, we hold on our course until the whole party, "little dogs and all," breathless and weary, fling themselves down upon the grass at the entrance of an immense glen, deep as the sea, and already darkeniug visibly before our eyes.

There are some men never content, unless, like Satan, they take you to the top "of an exceeding high mountain," where they keep twisting you about like a weathercock upon a steeple, directing your attention to some object of attraction in the distance. We have often been amused watching an unfortunate sinner whom they have got into their clutches,

holding a desperate gripe of his hat with both hands, and pretending to see something twenty miles off, while he has quite enough to do to keep his eyes open, and prevent himself being blown away by the strong wind which is sure to be blowing in these elevated regions. For ourselves we never took much pleasure in these bird's-eye views, and would almost as soon see a model of the country in plaster, or consult the Ordnance map, if we wanted information. How infinitely more beautiful is the scene we now behold, though confined to a few simple objects-that dark glen, stretching out before us like the "valley of the shadow of death," the magnificent amphitheatre in which we are seated, the huge masses of granite scattered around in such wild profusion, as if they had been rained down from the sky, or that the spot had been the battleground of Milton angels, and now far away in the west the sun pausing for a moment to lay

"His head of glory on the rocking deep,"

then plunging beneath the wave; while the great solemn-looking mountains by which we are surrounded seem to dilate, and draw nearer and nearer still in the fast-fading twilight, until we could almost fancy they were closing in, and hemming us round, to prevent our returning to the world we appeared to have left for ever. Stirred by one impulse, we all spring to our feet, and glide like ghosts through the gigantic portals of the glen, silent now as the grave, until a white owl wheeling down from his eyrie among the thunder-smitten pinnacles above, keeps sailing round us, uttering his mournful boding cry, and high overhead

we hear

"One voice, the solitary raven flying,

Athwart the concave of the dark blue sky-
An iron knell, with echoes from afar,
Faint and still fainter."

We begin to breathe more freely, as we emerge from that gloomy ravine, and see the light from our tent twinkling like a solitary star in the distance. Another long and wearisome tramp over rough and smooth, and we are skirting the sandy margin of the little loch, where we come unexpectedly upon Monsieur Leroux, who receives us with as many compliments upon our prowess as if we had returned from the slaughter of Guy of Warwick's dun cow, instead of a few harmless grouse. Our game bags are over-hauled forthwith; every bird undergoes a separate examination before being stowed away carefully in a larder which he has constructed behind the tent, and from whence in a few moments, out of a few simple materials, he furnishes a supper fit for an Emperor, but which only a tired and hungry sportsman is competent to do justice to.

We begin to feel the truth of Nimrod's adage now-that "it is the pace which kills." The excitement of the sport is over, and the re-action which is sure to follow has set in; so we betake ourselves to the hammocks, and lie down to rest-not, we trust, ungrateful to Heaven for permitting us to pursue our favourite amusement to-day, when many better men have been prevented from enjoying it by sickness, misfortune, or some of the other" thousand ills which flesh is heir to."

RUSSIA, AND ITS FIELD SPORTS.

BY LINTON.

(Continued.)

In the autumn of 1854 I returned once more to St. Petersburgh, where, in all truth, I must admit having been received with cordial and unaffected hospitality. All my sporting friends appeared determined, if possible, to place me in a position to efface the memory of my previous ill fortune; in fact, I was selected as the destroyer, instead of the witness to the destruction of, at least half the bears which caused so much excitement to the sportsmen of the City of the Czar. Thanks to their attentions, no sooner had the autumnal snows covered the earth again with a white carpet, which remains for six months, than opportunities without ceasing offered themselves in which I might show my prowess; yet, notwithstanding all my perseverance, added to the efforts of my companions, the same ill luck pursued me throughout. I shared in the pleasures of innumerable battues, I assisted at the death of some score bears during the winter, solely to witness the success of my neighbours. During the summer season-in order, if possible, as it is vulgarly termed, to change my luck-I took part in the destruction of a bear under singular circumstances; in fact, the animal was his own destroyer. Few persons are ignorant of the extreme love which bears possess for honey, or with what address they are known to destroy a hive of bees.

When a Russian peasant discovers a bee-hive in the hollow or summit of a tree, he feels certain that a bear will thrust his paws and tongue therein; and consequently he sets the most simple trap in the world for his destruction. At the end of a cord fastened above the hive, and descending beneath it, a large heavy stone or leaden weight is attached. When the animal, attracted by the smell of the honey, climbs up the trunk of the tree and meets with this obstacle, with a shake of his paw he turns it sharply on one side, when it immediately swings and strikes him on its return; he then casts it away with greater force, and it hits him harder; enraged, he at length dashes it afar, and with redoubled force it swings back with a stroke on the head so violent that he falls not seldom to the earth, if not with a broken pate, at least unconscious of all around him; and it is then that his enemies rush from their hiding-places and give him le coup de grâce. I might be enabled to detail a variety of similar means of bear-hunting during the summer months; I prefer, however, the more practical sport which winter offers.

On one occasion we proceeded at least a hundred and fifty versts on the high road to Kowno, travelling from sunset to sunrise by the light of the lanterns which line the telegraph from St. Petersburg to Varsovie. Two bears having been promised in recompence for our fatigues, they were both killed the same day-one in the morning close

to the spot where I was posted, the other under my nose in the evening. Notwithstanding they were enclosed within a circle of beaters, who made a most terrific uproar: nothing could induce the first to leave his retreat; the second was literally forced therefrom by blows. Once on foot, however, growling with rage, he apparently directed his steps towards me, passing several of my companions. Already I heard his heavy steps scattering the frozen snow; I beheld him approach me beneath the underwood, which gave way like reeds before him. I awaited only that he should clear himself from a small enclosure of young pines, in order to fire at twenty paces' distant, when ill luck again assailed me: a friend on my left fired, his ball entering the ear; it passed through his head, and he fell dead almost at my feet.

My next adventure merits a few more details. During one of the last days of a long and severe winter, when the sun rose somewhat higher on the horizon, still without apparently melting the thick covering of snow which four months' frost had cemented on the earth, but which nevertheless softened the air by its rays, some peasants left a village called Zabrich, in the government of Novgorod, and proceeded to St. Petersburgh, to propose to my faithful sporting companion, M. K., a grand expedition. According to their own account, they had marked a herd of large deer of the north, and six bears, all safe at home, calmly waiting to be killed. Here was a cause for excitement! At length my hopes were to be realized! The offer was indeed most seductive; having referred to the map, however, we discovered that this said village of Zabrich was no less than 200 miles from St. Petersburg. Nevertheless, this great distance did not prevent us; and we accordingly arranged to form a little sporting party of five, with the determination of enjoying the chase for several days. It was therefore necessary to provide ourselves accordingly, which we did, as the following list will prove

all frozen, with the addition of a magnificent "pâté de foie gras," and a box of well-selected Smyrna figs, with some Malaga raisins for dessert; tobacco and cigars ad libitum. Thus provided, we might have traversed Arabia, and fancied ourselves dining each day at the "Café de Paris." I may, indeed, assert that Russian sportsmen never forget -without ever being fully sensible cf it themselves-the Spanish proverb (who having made it, know not how to practise it), "Tripas lleran corazon"; and I find that Russian sportsmen are correct—

"Good cheer warms the heart."

Thus provided, forewarned, and forearmed against hunger and thirst, we started on our journey with much glee. Although we did not halt on the high road to Moscow until we arrived at Tchoudova, a hundred

and-ten versts, our horses did at least five leagues an hour, a pace almost equal to railway travelling. But subsequently, on arriving at Grousina-a place celebrated for the sumptuous building follies committed by Count Aratcheef, the detested favourite of the Emperor Alexander-we were obliged to change our sledges and reduce our horses to two in each, thus simply travelling at the pace of a mail; being finally obliged, when quitting the high roads, to submit to a simple village-sledge, drawn by a small active horse, whose harness was composed of cords. I may here add with much truth that sixty versts are somewhat a long distance thus to travel during a night bitterly cold and dark, with a frozen wind which penetrates to the heart's core, and blinds you with frozen snow fine as salt. It is then, notwithstanding great-coats and furs, that the rigours of a Russian climate finds some hole through which to penetrate.

But it would be very unjust, even when frozen, to accuse the poor beast who drags you; on the contrary, we ought to give him the greatest possible praise and consideration for showing the most unequalled patience and courage amid storms and danger, evincing an extraordinary instinct in reference to the snow-covered tracts which are daily re-covered by wind or fresh storms, however previously beaten and demarked; in fact, an unfortunate animal, without apparent form, nerve, or strength -in fact, a horse scarcely deemed sufficient to convey vegetables to market-will trot sixty versts without halting, over snow-clad fields, through woods, over hedges, and ravines, into which you descend like an avalanche, and rise again by a miracle; and yet, how are these poor beasts-so strong, so patient, so precious, notwithstanding their ugliness-treated when they arrive at their journey's end? Why, they are permitted to suck up with their lips a little frozen snow to refresh themselves; and then turning their heads towards the sledge they have so patiently drawn, they are granted the happiness of eating the hay which has served as litter to warm the feet of its recent occupants. And thus horse and sledge are left generally in an open court-yard, where they are under the covering of heaven day and night. If it snows during the night, an apparently inanimate object may be seen standing immovable by the sledge in the morning. It is the gallant animal who yesterday drew you fifteen leagues, to return the same distance to-morrow.

Notwithstanding the difficulties offered by the roads, the frequent change of equipage, the long suppers and tea-drinkings at the stations, we arrived in twenty-four hours at the village of Zabrich. It was mid-day; consequently we were desirous to make the most of the remainder of the day; nevertheless, it was necessary to calm the illusions of hope. Such is life! Moreover, the deer had quitted that part of the country; in fact, I am not quite satisfied they were ever seen there; while the peasants, to satisfy their consciences, showed us some woods which had been cut in the autumn, whereas we were all but in spring. This argument was unanswerable, as deer always feed on the young shoots. To add to this, out of the six promised bears one had been killed by the officers of the garrison of Novgorod, another sold to the keeper of the forest, and another had followed the example of the deer, and quitted the country; all, therefore, that remained to us were three bears. The first, from want of proper sportsmanlike care, bolted through the beaters before the guns were well placed, and we heard no more of him; the other two