cater for the morbid taste of those who may derive a questionable kind of pleasure in prying into the sacred mysteries of private life. My object shall be to set before the sporting world, with all deference and humility, a review, to a certain extent, of those hunting establishments which circumstances will enable me to visit; to describe the improvements made in some, and the peculiar characteristics of all, without, by too minute a scrutiny, causing disgust or annoyance to any one connected with them.

On the twenty-third I returned to town, when, after spending a few days in having my hair cut, and executing a few other equally necessary commissions, I proceeded on my travels in search of other adventures.

Throughout the whole five months devoted to regular hunting, it is impossible to find one period more replete with vexatious disappointment to the followers of hounds, and which causes more anxiety to masters of packs and huntsmen themselves, than that time of the year which forms "the very dead of winter." During an average season, taking one year with another, we are pretty sure of our share of frost, whether it may visit us in the shape of long-continued snow-storms, or merely for a few days at a time, just sufficient to stop hunting for a day or two; or even, what is after all still more tantalizing and vexatious, the catching up of one or two nights' frost, but only to such an extent as to leave every sportsman in doubt whether he shall send his horses to the cover side or not. I have heard many old foxhunters affirm that according to the old rules and regulations by which things were managed in their early days," one night's frost never stopped hunting. The climate must certainly have become more severe than in the olden time, for during my experience in the matter, I have known multitudes of instances in the midland counties, where from the intense hardness of the ground, especially in a plough country, and upon land situated in a poor or clay district, one night's frost has rendered it not only impossible to throw off but absolutely to travel the pack on foot to the place of meeting, without the imminent danger of cutting the balls of their feet with the splinters of cat-ice in the most distressing manner, or of letting down their toes by allowing them to walk over that hard and rugged surface which usually presents itself on the side of every bye-road, or where the land has been much cut up by horses and cattle, as it usually is along every bridle-road at this season of the year.

This hunting season has certainly been one of not only great severity to the cavalry on account of the deepness of the ground after the immense quantity of rain which seemed perpetually to be falling during the whole of December, and the first fortnight in the month of January of the present year, but also from an almost total absence of frost; in fact, hounds have been only stopped two days since the commencement of the season, until the morning of Wednesday, January the 19th, on which day an effectual hindrance was put to all hunting, until the weather broke up and allowed the field to be again taken on Monday the 31st.

The frost occurring at the time it did, happened to be exceedingly unfortunate to the contributor of these pages, as the celebrity of Mr. Selby Lowndes's flying ladies had induced him to accept an invitation from a friend in Buckinghamshire, to spend a week and witness a good day's sport or two (as is generally the case with these hounds) and see

them kill a fox in that fine wild country which surrounds the quiet and agricultural little town of Winslow.

On Monday, January the 17th, Mr. Lowndes's hounds met at Drayton Cross-roads; but as the mor. ing was rather frosty the pack were late at the place of meeting, when they proceeded to draw some small covers in the neighbourhood of Liscomb House, the seat of Miss Lovat, without finding; this was rather unfortunate, as, independent of the country being exceedingly good, and likely to afford us a run, a good wild fox had been disturbed by foot people, or some cause or other, and had moved himself, going through a great deal of our day's draw, where he had been repeatedly seen travelling along, which was corroborated by the hounds showing the road he went occasionally, but with so low a scent as never to be able to speak to it, much less work up to him. Wing Gorse was then drawn, together with one or two other small covers at no great distance, but without any success, although it was well known that there were plenty of foxes in the neighbourhood. We then trotted away four miles to Salden Wood, where another good wild fox had taken the alarm, and although halloed away at the bottom, the long start he got before the hounds could be brought to the halloo lost us our chance again, and a tremendous storm of rain coming on at the moment entirely dissipated the scent, and the pack were unable, after they crossed a railroad which was being formed at the bottom of the cover, to hunt him above two fields. Mr. Lowndes, however, who hunts his hounds himself, cast them forward through that part of Wadden Chase which is still remaining, without being able to get the pack to regularly settle to their fox, although they repeatedly showed the line he had gone; and it was not until they had proceeded to College Wood that they were really enabled to proclaim him found. At first, from the circumstance of the hounds being very close to their fox, and from his running up-wind it was supposed that the scent was a good one; but as the distance between the pack and their game became greater, and when he made his turn and headed short back down wind, it became but too evident that the storm, which then was descending under the auspices of Jupiter Pluvialis, had entirely dissipated all our hopes of experiencing a run attended with anything like pace on that day; and that those who were game enough to stay out to be drenched to the very skin must content themselves with a slow hunting run round the few covers which still remain on the site where, till within a year or two, there stretched over an immense district the far-famed woodland of Wadden Chase. After describing a circle through the covers which I before mentioned, the fox came away in a direction for Wadden House (Mr. Lowndes's place), but bearing to the left he faced the flat open country which stretches away for the North-Western Railway, in the direction of Becchhampton Grove, where the hounds were defeated for want of scent; and night coming on, and no chance of sport remaining, they were taken home; the worthy master having done his utmost to give us a gallop over a very fair country, a good deal of which was turf.

The country which Mr. Selby Lowndes hunts, and which he has occupied during five seasons, is part of the old Duke of Grafton's country, to which has been added that part of the county of Bedford hunted by the Oakley hounds, known as the Woburn country, and which has been

lent to Mr. Lowndes by the Duke of Bedford, to enable him to carry on the war three times a week, which the Winslow country is far too small to allow of. The pack, which consists of upwards of forty couples, is entirely composed of bitches, of the very best blood in the world, embracing Mr. Drake's, the Oakley, the Duke of Rutland's, and a good deal of Mr. Osbaldeston's old sort through Lord Southampton's kennel, And I have no hesitation in saying, that hardly any other master of hounds, of much older standing than Mr. Lowndes is, can bring such a kennel of bitches before the public as he can, not only in their fashionable blood-like appearance, but in their work, in which they are remarkably steady, moving to the huntsman's hand with as much ease and quickness as a brace of highly-broken pointers would do. Ned Dickens, who is the first man in this establishment, has turned the hounds to his master ever since the pack were established: he is a first-rate hand, a light weight, and in his manner much reminds one of the far-famed Jack Stevens: he was brought up under one of the cleverest artists of the present day, George Carter, who hunted the Duke of Grafton's hounds, and who went with that pack into Wiltshire at the time Mr. Assheton Smith purchased them; Stevens, the other whipper-in, being appointed as huntsman to the Warwickshire hounds. The second whipper-in is named Wells, a son of the well-known Wells who was a great favourite in the Oakley country so many seasons, and afterwards with Mr. Wickstead and Sir Thomas Bowey, as kennel huntsman, in Staffordshire. Mr. Lowndes has fed his hounds entirely on the meal made from Indian corn for the last two seasons; and their condition has been considered to be excellent during the whole time they have been eating it. Now this is a description of feed I never much fancied, for many reasons; and upon talking the subject over to Ned Dickens after hunting, he acknowledged that hounds invariably lapped a great deal when out in the field, and that "it would not do to give much flesh with it." The hounds certainly looked most beautifully bright in their coats; but when we consider that Mr. Lowndes has upwards of forty couples of effective hounds to hunt only three days a week, in a country which seldom is known to lame them, as some flinty countries do, and that each pack seldom comes out oftener than three times a fortnight, light feeding on Indian meal may be found to answer the end required; but very much question, if it were used in those kennels where they hunt occasionally five days a week with only fifty couple of hounds, and where the highest feeding is constantly required to keep the animals up to the highest pitch of condition necessary to endure the laborious work they are put to, whether the opinions of its advocates would not be entirely changed; and I have no hesitation in saying that the hounds would fly all to pieces ;" and I am thoroughly convinced that to produce the highest state of condition in hounds, where it is tested by work of the severest description, nothing has ever yet been discovered but old oatmeal, except it be wheaten bread baked, and then that, from its expensive nature, is entirely out of the question, when we speak of feeding a pack of foxhounds for any length of time. Upon enumerating the forces, of which the establishment I have just been speaking of is composed, we shall find that the strength of the kennel is very effective, there being no hounds of a more advanced age than five season hunters, of which there are five couples; of the fours

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there are six couples; of threes five couples and a half; of the twoseason hunters there are seven couples; of the one-season hunters eight couples; and young hounds entered this season twelve couples: total, forty-three couples and a half. The horses which compose the stud which belong to these hounds are of a good stamp, and show a deal of breeding: the nag the worthy master rode himself during the day of which I have made mention was a snaffle bridle chesnut mare, up to any weight, and showing a great deal of blood; a more perfect huntsman's horse it would be difficult to meet with in any country, or, indeed, for any country, however severe and cramped; she seemed to know her business perfectly, and was as quiet as a sheep, and as handy as a fiddle. It was a sad disappointment to see the ground, previous to the 18th in capital order for riding, bound up on that unfortunate morning in the iron bonds of frost, as the hounds were to meet on Wednesday the 19th at Nash Common, a very good fixture and only four miles from the town of Winslow, where our horses had been sent on to be ready for that day. The consequence was that we considered it the wisest plan to beat a retreat, and the week which was to have been devoted to fox-hunting was most agreeably and healthfully spent in some good cover-shooting at the house of a friend with whom I happened to be then staying. However, after the frost breaks up, I hope to avail myself of an invitation to pay a second visit to that wild and sporting locality, and to witness another day's sport, more propitious than the former one, with one of the most effective and workmanlike foxhound establishments which can be found in the present day.

(To be continued.)

DEER-STALKING AND GROUSE SHOOTING

IN SCOTLAND.

BY OLD BRAN.

Mr. EDITOR

Your valuable monthly publication conveys to the sportsman a fund of amusement and information, all of which I read with much pleasure, and often enlighten the minds of my inexperienced friends in sporting matters, by reference to your well-written pages. pages. But there are one or two subjects to which your numerous readers and contributors have not yet sufficiently directed their attention, when information on those points is so essentially necessary, and acceptable to the parties who travel annually to Scotland for the noble sport of deer-stalking and grouse shooting. I intend not to battle the opinions of old sportsmen who have searched glen and corry for the antlered stag long before ever I trod Scotland's ground, or ever saw a blackcock or grouse on the wing.

The remarks I venture to throw before the sporting public are made with a view to guide the unbroken-in young-uns, who contemplate travelling north of the Tweed with rifles and smooth barrels

next August, wishing them good sport and comfortable quarters at a moderate expense.

The good old-fashioned English sport of killing pheasants and partridges appears in some degree to have lost its attraction, and English gentlemen now run madly in opposition to each other, offering rents for sporting districts in Scotland that are outrageously extravagant, and far beyond their value, compared with rents paid only ten years since. If every stag's head secured was worth £20, and every brace of grouse 15s., nine shootings out of ten in Scotland would not repay the killer at the present rental, setting aside the pleasure of the sport-at what rate that may be valued is in proportion to the ability to kill and zest for field sports.

We are now in the year 1848. Only go back to '28, and I venture to say, the number of sportsmen at the present time, who congregate in Scotland from England and Ireland, are increased ten-fold. From Dublin, Cork, Waterford, and Belfast, Irish gentlemen and Irish setters find an easy conveyance by steam to Glasgow, and on to Inverness, where a good sprinkling of them is to be seen between the 1st and 12th of August.

I know many of these Hibernian gentlemen, and jolly, merry fellows they are good shots-excellent walkers over a moor-few men handle a rod better on loch or river. A visit to an Irish party at a shooting lodge is sure to be a jovial affair. No end of champagne and claret; quality the best from Sneyd's wine vaults in Dublin. The quantity imported is generally enough for a voyage to China, but not too much for a couple of months' sojourn in the Highlands. The last cork of many dozen is drawn on the eve of departure for home, with a bumper toast to a merry meeting next season, and good sport.

To judge of the increased number of English gentlemen who travel north every succeeding season for deer-stalking and grouse shooting, it is only necessary to state that additional steamers the last two years have been put on to convey the multitude to Aberdeen and Inverness. The market is now full of sportsmen, but badly supplied with game the last two seasons. The returns of killed in the "Inverness Courier" of 1844 exceed in number, by one half, the amount killed in 1847. This falling off of head bagged is easily accounted for by the immense slaughter of past seasons, disease in birds, two bad breeding springs, and non-protection from vermin by factors and keepers, who care no more about the breed of game than they do about the breed of mermaids. The only thing a factor looks after is, a shooting tenant willing to pay an extravagant rent. I know noblemen and gentlemen in Scotland who are generous and liberal, but they are not often to be approached in matters of business; to the factor is confided the letting of shootings in nine cases out of ten, and a very cannie sort of a gentleman he is to deal with. The late Major Price Gordon, speaking of his countrymen, once said, "A Scotch factor will beat ten English Jews in money matters." I believe many proprictors are ignorant of the rent obtained for their shootings till they get the money in their pockets, and then they are surprised at their factors finding English and Irish fools to pay. The rapacity of some plundering factors is not always carried out to its full extent.