In Colonel Cook's work on fox-hunting, there is a story told of the Belvoir huntsman, who, trusting implicitly to his hounds, and disregarding the judgment of the field, discovered a fox in a barn, when all supposed he had "gone on ;" and a parallel case might be mentioned with respect to this little pack. They were hunting a hare on Colonel Dawkins' property, to the right of the road leading from Chapel House to Chipping Norton. After a good run, and just as the hare was sinking before them, the hounds suddenly threw up their heads and came to a dead check near a small bridge; and although they made their own cast all round, but failed in hitting her off, the field could not be convinced that she was not still "forwards." The Captain, however, depending upon his hounds, and observing that one or two of them, having entered the stream, now swollen by rain, were showing symptoms of anxiety to reach the bridge, but, before they could do so, were swept away by the flood, declared that the hare was under the bridge. The announcement was received by a shout of laughter; and a labourer, to satisfy the field, was employed to proddle with a pole, but no hare appeared. The Captain, still confident, as his field became more impatient, exclaimed, in the words of the Belvoir huntsman, "If the hare is not there, my hounds deserve to be hanged." At length, some man, more knowing than the rest, contrived to dam up the water, and then suddenly letting it go, it rushed through, carrying with it the unfortunate hare, struggling and half-drowned in the torrent.

They usually find their own hare by trailing her rapidly to her form; but the Captain has a great objection to their dwelling too long on the unmoved scent, as he considers that such a practice is very apt to produce the serious fault of "tyeing." When a hare is found sitting, she is moved, if possible, without giving the hounds a view, by which means they settle at once steadily to the scent. This plan is also invariably adopted by that excellent sportsman, Sir Charles Morgan, who has hunted his own hounds for many years, and devoted much attention to the subject. I am speaking strictly within bounds when I say that Captain Evans' harriers kill ten out of every twelve bares they find; and this, taking one day with another throughout a whole season, it must be owned, is extraordinarily good work. Within the forest, they frequently have a very fine day's sport; and, notwithstanding the rabbits, foxes, and deer which abound in it, they carry their hunted hare through every stain and difficulty, and seldom fail to kill her. Alas! that such a pack should not be perpetuated in a country, and the inhabitants compelled to support what every man of good taste must appreciate and approve of. But the pack has now passed into other hands; a circumstance which, if I may venture to say so, I really believe the Captain has never ceased to regret ever since it occurred; and which I sincerely trust he will endeavour to remedy by again producing, if he can, another pack of equal merit and distinction. It has passed into the hands of Mr. Edward Marriott, a gentleman of Cornwall.

But it is high time to conclude this paper, although I might, with pleasure to myself, prolong the subject to a great length, and yet not say half as much of the "beauties" as I think, or they deserve. Seeing, however, that I belong to another lot, a kind of pen-and-ink dog pack, hunted by an editor, and whipped in by a "devil," I must e'en be content with the limited space assigned to each hound upon the benches, nor venture to encroach upon my neighbour's allotment.

ERNEST ATHERLEY;

OR, SCENES AT HOME AND ABROAD.

Birth, Parentage, and Education-My Tutor-A Burning Shame-Don't "give me a cigar."

"Communément le plus simple et le plus sûr est de ne jamais parler de soi, ni en bien ni en mal, sans besoin: l'amour-propre aime mieux les injures que l'oublie et le silence." So writes Fénélon.

"It is a hard and nice subject for a man to speak of himself," says Cowley; it grates his own heart to say anything of disparagement, and the reader's ears to hear anything of praise from him. Let the tenor of his discourse be what it will, upon this subject, it generally proceeds from vanity: an ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred of talking of his own dear person.' Some very great writers have been guilty of this fault-Tully and Montaigne, with a host of minor fry; but perhaps the greatest egotism on record is that of Cardinal Wolsey-" Ego et rex meus."

With these examples before my eyes, it may be deemed presumptuous in me to indulge in this single figure of speech, and by so doing lay myself open to Scaliger's remark upon the French essayist-" For my part," says the lively old Gascon, "I am a great lover of white wines." "What does it signify to the public," responded the other, "whether he is a lover of white or red wines?"

I believe it is Horace Walpole who says, quoting a remark of Gray, "that if any man would keep a faithful account of what he has seen and heard himself, it must, in whatever hands, prove an interesting one."

Addison, too, no mean authority, writes-"In works of humour, the talking of one's self may give some diversion to the public." Sincerely do I trust that the following pages will not only be humourous, but savour as little as possible of "self;" and in order to avoid as far as possible the charge of egotism, I shall touch lightly upon events of a personal nature, and draw largely upon others which have come under my immediate observation.

As I write under a fictitious name it would be needless to inflict upon the reader a detailed history of my birth, parentage, and education; suffice it to say that I was the fourth son and seventh child of a family of thirteen; the truth of the old adage "medio tutissimus ibis" was not realized in this instance, nor can it ever be so long as the law of primogeniture remains, for the younger boys were doomed to be food for powder in the army or navy, while the elder one was, in due course of time, to hold the sinecure situation of receiver of rents.

The "Human Stud Book," as the Peerage" has not inaptly been termed, dated the family pedigree from the period the eighth Harry ruled over the destinies of the land; but it was not until the days of the Virgin Queen that my ancestor was ennobled. This distinguished individual served in the most brilliant naval enterprises of the day, in the expedition to Normandy in aid of Henry the Fourth of France, and took a prominent part in the capture of Cadiz, which the impetuous valour of the English troops, under the gallant and high-minded Essex, had carried sword in hand. Elizabeth, who loved valour, was profuse in liberality: she gave this new favourite a present of thirty thousand pounds, thus realizing the common saying of the time-"The Queen pays bountifully, though she rewards sparingly;" fortunately my ancestor reaped the benefit of this munificence. Captain Atherley was raised to the peerage, a large sum of "secret service" money was presented him, and some valuable manors, pillaged from the see of a newly promoted bishop, were settled upon him and his descendants. Rumour, "upon whose tongue continual slanders ride," had assigned other motives beyond a reward for bravery for these royal acts of favour: some imagined that the handsome person of Robert Atherley had produced a favourable impression upon the heart of the spinster sovereign. The courtiers attributed the rise of the young soldier to his friendship with Essex, who then occupied that place in the Virgin Queen's affections which Leicester had so long enjoyed; while a rival propagated an insinuation of a scandalous nature, to which I am bound in charity not to refer, and for the honour of my ancestry trust that in this instance common report was as mendacious as she is universally represented to be.

The broad lands that had descended from the first Lord of Atherley, were situated in the most beautiful part of Warwickshire, and produced a rental of nearly thirty thousand a year. The manor house was an Elizabethan building, and had been erected upon the site of an old abbey founded in 640, and which in the reign of the eighth Harry had shared the fate of other religious institutions of England. Part of the ruins of its magnificent church and cloisters still remained, and the present mansion, built during the days of the Vestal Queen, combined the ideas of ancient baronial grandeur with those of modern date.

In the onset I promised my readers to spare them all particulars of

my

"cockadehood," as the talented authoress of "Cecil" calls it; suffice it to say, "time had rolled its ceaseless course;" the splendid satin riband, the flowing robe of embroidered cambric, had given way to "short clothes ;" I had fallen from my nurse's arms to the " go-cart, and in a few years found myself in jacket and trousers. The first striking incident in my life was the practical illustration of the old adage, with cuts, of

"Spare the rod, spoil the child."

However much the latter might have been carried on from my cradle, the former was no longer to exist.

I was on a visit to a relation, a great horticulturist, who prided himself on his garden of choice fruits and flowers, his pineries, melon beds, and all "other means and appliances to "-fruit; when, like our common mother, I fell a victim to a forbidden delicacy. The scene of the French little Pickle, in one of Scribe's admirable farces, was performed to the life.

"Est ce que tout à l'heure tu n'as pas cueilli des pêches ?"

"Oh! trois ou quatre; pour les prunes, je n'ai pas compte, mais pour les abricots je n'ai pas pu en manger beaucoup, parcequ'ils etaient trop haut, et que pour en battre il fallait jeter des grosses pierres." "Ah! pardi! et ma melonnière qui est dessons, mes cloches de verre bleu, et mes vases du Japan.

"Tout cela a été brise, puisque je m'en faite des castagnettes.'

Now to my credit be it spoken, I was not half so mischievous as the continental Spoiled Child," for finding the peaches out of my reach, I provided myself with a haymaker's rake, and helped myself to one or two of these blushing beauties, with no further damage than robbing the tree. This misdemeanor was duly reported to my parents, and a tutor was to be looked out for me preparatory to my being sent to school. I had an instinctive horror of school-a vision flitted before my eyes of birch, bread and butter, highlows, corduroys, leathern cap, fagging, tough mutton, Latin grammar, and a hard-hearted and hard-hitting

dominie.

In less than a month my tutor arrived. The appearance of Mr. Taylor, so my instructor was named, was not very much in his favour; for he was an attenuated man with a sallow visage, bushy eyebrows, dark piercing eyes, a high forehead, and coarse jet black hair. His passion was smoking, a habit not quite so fashionable in the days when George the Third was King, as it is in those of Queen Victoria. From some unaccountable fancy, I took the greatest dislike to "sublime tobacco," and showed my feeling by always absenting myself from the room whenever the dominie appeared with cigar in mouth. His pleasure was to try and break me of this piece of affectation, and he lost no opportunity of whiffing the smoke in my face. Never shall I forget that my earliest grief and first pleasure was caused by the Nicotian weed, which that abject flatterer and servile courtier, Raleigh-who addressed his royal mistress, when in her sixtieth year, as a nymph, Venus, and Diana-originally introduced into our country.

My tutor, in consequence of an imaginary fear of asthma, had been recommended the moderate use of tobacco; but little did Doctor Slow, the provincial practitioner, know to what extent the abuse had been car

ried. At the period I refer to, my father and family were absent, he having the command of a military district in the north of England, and this enabled the dominie to indulge nightly in his favourite habit.

One evening in the month of July, after fatiguing myself at a game of cricket, I tried to fall asleep in the study, when Mr. Taylor, who had the knack of ingeniously tormenting his pupils, began to puff away his cares, not regarding mine, and amused himself with "smoking me out." No sooner were my eyelids closed, than a whiff of the strongest tobacco assailed my olfactory senses, and set me sneezing. I had suffered throughout the day from head-ache, which commenced over a difficult problem, was brought to maturity by a "back-hander" from the irascible preceptor, and reached its climax from a severe blow by a cricket ball. These accumulations of troubles had made me rather captious, and I evinced my displeasure at the smoke nuisance by hiding my head within my hands: puff followed puff, when of a sudden I started up, burning-alas! not figuratively-with indignation, and began rubbing my neck. The more I rubbed the more the pain increased.

Absurd!" said my tutor, "making such a fuss about a little smoke!"

"Oh! oh! oh!" I still cried, making the most hideous contortions; "Oh! oh! oh! it hurts me dreadfully.'

Silence!" exclaimed my persecutor, losing his temper (no great gain, be it said, to any one finding it), and pinching my ear. What is the matter? you will never make a soldier.'

tor.

Writhing with agony, I felt too proud to reply.

"The very

smell of powder would upset you," continued the instruc

At this unfeeling speech I struggled hard to keep down my rising anger, and grinding my teeth together, did my best to subdue the acute pain I still suffered. Happily for me, at this moment the door opened, and Harry Arthur, a superannuated butler, made his appearance, attended by the steward's-room boy, who placed a tray before the tutor. A cold leg of lamb, the most fragrant mint sauce, a crisp lettuce, a cucumber, a jug of home-brewed ale, formed his repast, while a plate of porridge was alone left for mine. "Why, Master Ernest, you are surely unwell," said the kind-hearted domestic ; if you'll come into the housekeeper's room I will get you something that will do you good; I've a nice bunch of grapes and some peaches," he continued, sotto voce, fancying that my mind and not my body was suffering from my hard-hearted taskmaster.

This sympathetic feeling so entirely overcame me that I burst out crying, and sobbed so piteously, that Arthur began to suspect that more than an ordinary grief had caused my tears.

"Over excited at cricket," said the callous Mr. Taylor, as he sliced one of the ingredients for his salad; "John, pray give me the oil-not much stamina I fear-and the vinegar-the mind's always at workthis egg is scarcely boiled enough-I really must consult Doctor Slowa little anchovy sauce and just step into my room for the small mahogany chest, my asthma threatens me to-night."

The foot-boy hastened to do his master's bidding, stimulated with the prospect of a guinea at Christmas, which hush money kept many a peccadillo from becoming public.