The where is in a country thinly populated, tolerably open, and not in the immediate neighbourhood of a large or mercantile town. The how, by the presence of small fields of real sportsmen, who will listen to reason, have patience, and who leave to the old men and boys the lane-riding, and themselves ride like sportsmen, turning from nothing practical, but going at it only when hounds are running and circumstances require it; but, above all, allowing hounds to hunt the hare solely by those means which nature and instinct have afforded them: rely on it, they know their duty better than all the huntsmen in England can teach them, and are as desirous to have themselves, and as willing to show to others, the best possible sport. No shouting, no hallooing, no interfering with dogs that are not yours, but which are kept at considerable expense and care by others for your amusement when you judge fit to join in the hunt-in fact, no interfering with hounds which do not belong to you. Keep to these rules, and be assured the sport which will be secured to you will soon prove the truth of our assertions.

(To be continued.)

SPORTING INCIDENTS

AT HOME AND ABROAD.

(From the MS. Life of the Hon. Percy Hamilton.)

COMMUNICATED TO AND EDITED BY LORD WILLIAM LENNOX.

[NOTE BY THE EDITOR.-The following sketches from the daily journals of an old friend and Westminster schoolfellow have been placed in my hands with a view of publishing them; and as I participated in many of the earlier "freaks and follies," and in some of the latter events, I have great pleasure in introducing to the public the Sporting Life of the Hon. Percy Hamilton.]

CHAPTER I.

Birth, Parentage, and Education - Christmas at a Country-house - Journey to London-A six inside Stage-coach of the Olden Time-The Lawyers' Clerk's Story of the Two Friends and the Highwaymen-Arrival in the Metropolis.-The M.D.'s of Forty Years ago-Introduction to "Mother Pack," Dean's Yard, Westminster.

"Oft does my heart indulge the rising thought,
Which still recurs unlooked for and unsought;
My soul to fancy's fond suggestion yields,
And roams romantic o'er her airy fields:
Scenes of my youth, developed, crowd to view,
To which I long have bade a last adieu!"

BYRON.

As I have assumed a nom de guerre, it would be perfectly needless to inflict upon my readers a full, true, and particular account of the birth and parentage of the humble individual who now makes his first appearance before the public; adopting, then, the phraseology of the apology

makers of the London theatres, I throw myself upon the indulgence of the sporting world, and, following out the system of modern melo-dramas, request my patrons will suppose that eight years have elapsed from the day of my birth until that upon which I am about to introduce myself upon the stage of the great drama of life. During that eventful period of pap, long-clothes, mewling, caps, rosettes, teething, crying, and sprawling, I was an average sample of juvenile humanity; as a matter of course, my nurse pronounced me to be the sweetest, prettiest dear, she had ever clapped her eyes upon. My mother would not for worlds, Gay quaintly remarks

"Have changed her booby for another."

as

My father hailed me as the most promising "young-'un" he had ever seen, and, before I had completed my sixth year, offered to back me against any one of my age and size, either across the country or in the pugilistic ring; for in the days I write of, the knife had not been substituted for the fist. The huntsman looked upon me as a most oudacious young varlet; the grooms called me an out-and-out trump; while the game-keeper declared that in the whole course of his life he had never seen such a hand at a sparrow, and that if I went on as I had begun, I should same day rival Colonel Hawker, the then crack shot of the day. At my christening an event occurred, of rather the sporting order, and which may, for what I know to the contrary, have given me a taste for dogs ever since. In the private chapel attached to the house baptisms were of rare occurrence; but a severe fall of snow having blocked up the neighbouring roads, it was decided that the ceremony should take place at home. Before, however, it had proceeded very far, it was discovered that there was no font in the building; the huntsman, old Tom Prior, soon detected this, and, rushing into the stableyard, quickly returned with a small stone basin that had been placed there for the use of a favourite retriever, Tip. In this was the ceremony concluded; and from that day I received a sobriquet which will be attached to me to my last hour, that of Tip. The nurses called me Master Tip, while my relatives and friends dropped the former title of courtesy. In after-life it has often puzzled my companions to know the origin of this appellation, and which until explained sounded as mysterious as those of Kangaroo, Punch, Bacchus, Teapot, Cupid, Pogey, Skirmish, Poodle, Ginger, Dodo, and others, which have been attached to bygone and present men about town. Of my parents, I shall merely say that I was the fourth son of a noble family, who, according to Burke, had done the state some service. The family mansion was situated in the western part of the county of Sussex; and there, upon the eighth anniversary of my natal day-the 6th of January, 1809-I must introduce my readers. A large party had assembled for the Christmas holidays. Hunting and shooting had been the order of the day, while dancing, music, round games, snap-dragon, had beguiled the long winter evenings; for at that period the dinner hour was six, instead of four hours before midnight, as it is at present in the fashionable country houses. All was gaiety and joy, and but for one dark thought, the writer of these pages would have been the happiest of the whole party. The gloom that occasionally would obtrude itself upon my then buoyant spirit, was caused by the remembrance that in three weeks

In vain

I was to leave home for the first time to go to Westminster. did my youthful companions (some of whom were passing their holidays from that then celebrated school) attempt to convince me of the delights of Dean's Yard, the football in the cloisters, the cricket at Tothill Fields, the rowing and sailing on the river, the skating on the duck-pond, the shooting near the Willow-walk, the fights with the skies, i. e. blackguards, and above all, the jolly "tucks-in" at the establishments of the purveyors of edibles and buvables to the college, from Mouger the Jew, with his basket of sour oranges, flavourless grapes, acrid plums, and saccharine lollypops, to the tavern then patronized by the Westminster boys, in Bridge-street, near Palace Yard. But none of these anticipated pleasures could reconcile me to the thought of leaving home, to be separated from my younger brothers and sisters (for at this period I had as many junior to me as senior), to take leave of my parents for what I then thought an age-two months, to leave my pony Aladdin to the mercy of the groom, to part with Young Tip, the son of the canine friend of my childhood, and to bid goodbye to a troop of friends, the housekeeper Old Mother Burridge, as we then called a buxom widow of six or seven-and-thirty, Tom Prior the huntsman, Jem Curtis and Will Lathams, the whipper-in, John Farndale the gamekeeper, and last not least, Farmer Harris, who had enjoyed the delightful task of teaching my "young idea how to shoot," had "entered" me with the foxhounds, and showed me the way across the country, he being himself one of the fastest men in the whole county. But time circled on; and the day previous to my departure for Westminster arrived. It was a glorious morning, and there was a lawn meeting of the foxhounds: although sadly dispirited at the thought of where I should be "that time tomorrow," I mounted my pony, and, with a merry-hearted party, trotted off to a small wood within a mile of the house. There we immediately found, and in the ardour of the chase I had no time left me for reflection. After a brilliant run of five-and-thirty minutes we killed in the open a rare occurrence in the wooded and hilly county of Sussex; and I was fortunate enough to get the brush-more a mark of kindness than desert, for although I rode forward I was not up to my usual form. Upon our return home, a proposition was made that we should wind up the shooting season in the home preserves; and as the hour of the hounds meeting in those days was ten o'clock punctually, we were equipped for the field by one o'clock. Our sport was excellent, and I could not help contrasting this day with those of the next two months. Before dinner I gave strict injunctions to the groom to look well after Aladdin, and gave Young Tip over to the care of the gamekeeper. I then proceeded to my room, to superintend that awful task of packing; and what confusion here presented itself to me! Upon one chair lay my hunting-whip and spurs; my shooting apparatus on a sofa; while the floor was literally filled with articles of dress scattered about, like the leaves that strew the celebrated vale of Valambrosa. My fishing-tackle was stowed away in the wardrobe; my mantelpiece was stocked with shot-cartridges, flints, skates, foxes' brushes, wires which I had taken in the woods, fives'-balls and rackets, feathers for artificial flies, balls of twine for landing-nets, bonces and marbles; in one corner of the room was a selection of ash plants for whips and walking-sticks; in another, cricket-bats and stumps; and a huge glass case fitted with stuffed birds

66

and animals, which had fallen to my gun, or been ferreted by me, shewed what my prowess had been in the field. How all my necessaries," as they call them in the army, were to be put within the wooden walls of a schoolboy's deal box, was a problem I did not venture to attempt to solve; and I left the elucidation of it to that most useful of all useful helps"-the steward's-room boy, who valeted me. Making a most elaborate toilet-for I was a juvenile Brummel in those days-I descended to the drawing-room, where a large party of country neighbours were assembled. The dinner went off with great spirit; the Nimrods and ramrods were equally delighted with their day's sport; bumper toasts were given when the ladies had left the room, for at that period the continental fashion of retiring almost immediately after the fair sex had not been introduced. Unlike the present fashion, it was a very late hour before (to adopt a line of one of Planche's clever parodies) " John informed the company he'd taken up the tea." No sooner did we enter the drawingroom than a carpet-dance was proposed; and as waltzs and quadrilles were not even in perspective existence, we were compelled to be satisfied with what is now deemed a sad vulgarity-the English country-dance. This led to a cotillon, and it was nearly one o'clock before Sir Roger de Coverley wound up the amusements of the night. As I said " goodnight" to relatives and friends, I remembered that in five hours the carriage was to be at the door, to convey me to the coach which passed within two miles of the house. I will not attempt to describe my feelings as I entered my own room: a cheerful wood fire blazed on the hearth; it was a bright moonlight night; I looked out of my window upon the ancestral trees, and in the language of the novellist, "threw myself upon my couch, and gave way to a flood of tears." Nature came

to my relief; and after a few hours' repose, in which the scenes of the day flitted before me, I was awaked by the entrance of the housemaid, to light my fire. The window-curtains were thrown open, the candles lighted, and, to my dismay, I saw that the ground was partially covered with snow shivering and shaking before a wood fire, that emitted more smoke than heat, I made my toilet, and descended into the breakfastroom, where a footman, in rather a slovenly attire, who was suffering from the effects of late and early hours, and no small quantity of negus and punch which he had appropriated to himself between the drawing and stewards' room, was now laying the cloth. My meal was prepared, but I turned from it with disgust; and rushing into my parents' rooms, took an affectionate farewell of them and my brothers and sisters. The carriage was at the door, my box placed within it, with a huge hamper containing school-boys' luxuries, the gift of the housekeeper, by its side, and a small paper gave me the list of the condiments Mrs. Burridge's kindness had prepared for me :-plum-cake, oranges, apples, almonds, raisins, currant jelly, biscuits, and strawberry jam. A brace of phea sants and a hare for my new tutor, my father's old schoolfellow, were hung on the lamps, while a basket of provisions for the road, enough to satisfy the appetites of the six inside passengers - should the coach be full were handed to me as I took my seat by the side of the underbutler, who was to escort me to Dean's Yard. After a dull and miserable drive through fields and plantations, that were most familiar to mescenes of youthful joys-we reached the "Load of Hay," a small wayside inn; and at the door of it, to my great delight, I saw my friends Tom

Prior and the gamekeeper waiting to receive me. They had bestirred the whole house, and I found a cheerful fire blazing in the kitchen. But I was not allowed to enjoy the comfort of it for many minutes, for the ostler, who had been upon the look-out, speedily entered and told us that the coach was in sight. The huntsman pressed both my hauds, and wished me health and happiness, at the same time presenting me with a most beautiful hunting whip, as a remembrance of his regard; while honest John Farndale, the gamekeeper, merely said—“Take care of yourself, Master Percy; I'll look after Young Tip, and perhaps you'll allow me to put this collar round his neck," displaying at the same time one of chain steel, with my names engraved at full length upon the plate. I tried to thank my two old sporting companions, but had scarcely uttered a word, when the landlord informed me that my luggage was packed, and that Jem-so the coachman was called-was ready.

"No hurry, young gentleman;" said the above-mentioned knight of the ribands, "I've a few minutes to spare."

This was a delicate hint to me, as I was told by the huntsman to "stand a drop of purl," which I accordingly did; and after warming himself thoroughly both without and within, the coachman-a specimen of that class in those days, fat, burly, and bloated-handed me in, then mounted the box, and after "hying," "ya-hipping," and "gy-alonging,' succeeded in getting the heavy vehicle, a six-inside coach, and its lumbering cattle into a trot. I then turned round to look at my companions, but although no great studier of Lavater, their physiognomies did not please me. There was an over-fed London grazier, rude both in health and manners; an antiquated spinster, redolent of musk and Macassar ; a fat nurse and a squalling child, whose appetite could not be satisfied with gingerbread nuts and oranges, and whose temper could not be controlled by certain shakings and scoldings; a pert bread-and butter Miss (niece to the venerable specimen of virginity), who was returning to a finishing establishment at Clapham, and who divided her time between reading a dog's-ear'd book of sonnets, and ogling the only other passenger left me to describe. He, as I afterwards discovered, was a lawyer's clerk in a celebrated firm in Lincoln's Inn, and was as complete a buffoon and practical jester as it ever was my misfortune to encounter. Billy Sanders-so he was called-had attempted to be the Theodore Hook of a small coterie of limbs of the law. He had got up a stupid second-hand hoax, which flashed in the pan; and having failed in this, he was content to show his humour by breaking lamps, flooring "Charleys," wrenching off knockers, and sending barrels and hampers of stones, dead rats, and oyster-shells as Christmas presents to his friends in the country, who, seeing them marked game, with occasionally a pheasant's feather or hare's foot protruding, never discovered the joke until the carriage was duly paid, and the handsome cadeau opened amidst the smiles and jeers of the servants. Sanders was a buck of the first water; for in those days the terms " dandy" and "exquisite" were scarcely known. His costume was a caricature of the dress of the time, which, being the period of the Peninsular campaign, had given rise to a military style; and the Bond-street lounger appeared as did young Latitat upon this occasion, in a lightish grey great coat and cape, imitation military buttons, trousers, or rather over-alls of a darker colour, strapped with white leather, with an opening on the sides, near the