"Ma foi, tant pis, I will go just as I am, in my robe de chambre ; in these days of liberty, every one can do as they like I suppose." Happily he kept the key of his guns himself, never allowing any one to touch them but himself after they had been properly cleaned; he took one, and loaded it with two balls, and then watching his opportunity, slipped down stairs without being perceived. During these preparations le Chevalier de Riolet cried out to him, as he left his room, "Adieu, Fussey; I am going to have a hit at back-gammon with Monsieur le Curée." "Mind your double points," responded the Count. As soon as he thought that the Chevalier was clear of the place, he went down stairs as quietly as he could, which was no easy matter, hobbled off to the stable, and saddled the first horse he met with, and through a small hand-gate at the back of the buildings rode away into the country, and arrived at the spot he had fixed upon, before old Denis had had time to reach the wood on foot and uncouple the hounds. The place that he had selected was a narrow slip of cover, by which the chances were a thousand to one that the deer would pass; and even if he were not lucky in getting a shot at them there, there was still a second point to which he could cut across and meet them. As it happened, as soon as the hounds had found them, and forced them to leave the wood, a shepherd's dog seeing them running across the meadow where he was employed in watching his master's sheep, chased them, and drove them from the line by which the Count had made sure they would pass. In no way dispirited, he mounted his horse as quickly as his infirmities would allow him, and rode off as fast as he could to the second point; but the deer were going with the rapidity of the wind, and he had but about five minutes to gain the point upon which his last hopes were built. By the ordinary road, which led over a bridge that spanned a small rivulet now swollen by the autumnal rains, he would arrive rather too late; and the only way left to him was to plunge at once into the water with his horse, and cut off the angle. He knew that wetting his feet had been forbidden by his doctor, but his Esculapius had never said one word about his taking a regular bath; and whether he ever once thought about the matter, or whether his sole idea was to achieve one more good double shot before he emigrated, we have no means of judging. Denis and the Chevalier were plodding along as fast as their legs could carry them, to gain the point that they had fixed upon, and which was some distance from the narrow pass selected by the Count de Fussey, when suddenly their ears were saluted by a distant bang! bang! at intervals of regularity which indicated the master-hand that had directed the weapon. "If I had not known that Monsieur le Comte de Fussey was sitting in his arm-chair by the fire at this moment," said old Denis, "I could have sworn that that was his gun we heard. At any rate the deer are killed, for I cannot hear the hounds running any longer: we had better run as fast as we can, and see who it is." Away they went, and when they arrived at the spot, they found the Count as wet as a wild-duck, and as stiff as if he had had an attack of paralysis; he pointed out to them the stag and the hind lying dead at about fifty yards from where he stood. Your game of back-gammon has not been a very long one," he said to the Chevalier, laughing. “And your gout, my dear fellow, does not appear to hurt you much." shall see more about that to-morrow: I beseech you to have the goodness to help me up upon my horse, for I cannot move an inch."

"We

That was the last time that the Count de Fussey went to the chasse. A few days afterwards he emigrated to Germany, where his brother had already arrived. They neither of them lived a very long time after that; for they declared that the hunting in that country was so badly conducted, that they could not enjoy it, and within a few months of each other they died of broken hearts.

NOBS AND SNOBS.

BY HARRY HIEOVER.

It is a common observation, when we find anything to be of a more than usual complex nature, to say that "it would puzzle a Philadelphia lawyer to make it out." Now whether any peculiar statistic organization of matters of transatlantic origin cause a more than usual complexity of arrangement, or whether Philadelphian lawyers are endowed with more astute powers of unravelling mysterics, I know not, nor does it matter to us Englishers; but this I can truly say, I did once ask a veritable Philadelphian expounder of laws, if he knew the derivation of the term "snob." He admitted he was in a "regular fix;" therefore if I use a term of which I merely know the import, I may well be excused, Nimrod, that great authority of his day, uses it, but candidly admits himself as much in the dark as to its derivation as myself. We minor planets should not criticize a star that shone so resplendently; but, aware of the light in which Nimrod regarded the word, I think he has done something like injustice to the owner of "the little bay" in designating him by any epithet that savoured of decided inferiority; for our author states Snob "went well," so much so as to attract observation and admiration where to excite either is no easy matter, and that he went as long as he could: our author as a writer did the same-no man can do more. Again, Snob, though so designated, speaks of his horse as the best in his stable. This shows he was not one accustomed to get a day now and then, with always the same pair of ears before him. But much further than this, when such a man as Lord Alvanly could, on a five days' acquaintance in the field, ask Snob to his table, any one who had had the advantage of being known to the above nobleman must be quite aware he was not in the habit of inviting guests of vulgarity of manner, or of decidedly coarse address. A "rural-looking man," as some exquisite termed our hero, Snob might be; a provincial he was; and allowing Leicestershire men their " crown of bays," as regards their high breeding, fortunes, style, and riding, candour will not be silenced on asserting, that as finished gentlemen, and perhaps more perfect sportsmen, are to be found in the provinces, as are to be found located at Melton, Leicester, Quorndon, Oakham, Lowesby, or any of the many localities in which we find stabling and boxes to suit the extent of all studs, from the unpretending, but good and judicious rider, who with four horses gets regularly his three or four days a

week, and usually sees his fox killed, to the one who with ten, and a second horse each day, could not, perhaps, give in as good an account of noses he saw run into.

That a man may do this we know, and if his means do not admit of his doing more, he is a sensible man who is content to get what hunting he can with a short stud. I have, at times, hunted (for a time) six days a week with four horses; have had half-a-dozen to do the same thing; sometimes only half the number, to get as much hunting as keeping my horses up to the mark allowed. It was not, however, choice that induced me to bring my stable so low in number; but not having a fortune to keep up what could be termed a stud of hunters, without an occasional pull on the right side of the book, I often sold out when a tempting price was offered me, and have often parted with a horse for the consideration of the two hundred, that had I had a large fortune, and been asked his price by a nobleman, I should have said, Your estate.' From my not being in such enviable situation, probably Nimrod might have called me a Snob; so be it: we are told in dramatic language that it is the fate of some mortals to bear "the proud man's contumely;" why should not I the author's? for we are not all Nobs. But as such proceedings as I have mentioned are much more in use among sporting men than it may be supposed they are, let us see how far they may or may not merit reprehension.

A noble lord with whom I had the honour of being acquainted, has more than once told me he calculated on five hundred a year as about the sum it usually cost him in, as we technically term it, "wear and tear of horseflesh :" the sum appears a large one no doubt, but I believe it was about fact, and is to be accounted for. In the first place, for himself, his huntsman, and whips, he had usually about five-and-twenty horses in his stables; six or seven carriage horses; then his own hacks, ladies' riding horses, phaeton horses, ponies, servants' hacks, two or three kennel hacks, and a supernumerary or two that were for any and everybody's use; thus, he really had about five-and-forty at rack and manger; his horses of every class were of the first-rate sort, and among such a lot there were always a moderate stablefull of, as he termed them, the lame, halt, and blind. He was one who would not part with a favourite horse if a principality had been offered for him; in proof of which, his lordship was told by his huntsman a most extravagant price was offered for one of the horses he rode : "Well," said the truly noble master, "if the horse carries you as you like, say he is not to be sold; but if you choose for your own advantage to give him up-he cost me eighty as a five-year-old-put the extra money in your pocket, buy another, and make a hunter of him as you have of Broadcast." lordship's veterans on the superannuated list would have furnished a troop for a veteran cavalry battalion, if such a corps existed, for he never sold a good, or kept a bad one; so when, from age or accident, three hundred was reduced to thirty, and occasionally death or severe injury sent a high-priced horse to feed the hounds he had followed, five hundred might be the amount of wear and tear to a man who never made a shilling by any horse in his stable.

His

There are men who are quite content with a couple of hunters, or at most three, and would hold it infra dig. to let it be known they sold a horse to put fifty or a hundred in their pocket. I quite applaud them,

admit their habit as more commendable-nay, more gentlemanly than mine; but I had an unfortunate mania for seeing a certain, or perhaps rather uncertain, but still a number of uniform suits of clothing, and horses under them, in my stable; and although no man detested more than I ever did anything like horse-dealing, and never volunteered the sale of any horse to make money by him, my love of walking behind a number of full stalls was greater still; so I sold out when asked to do so: thus far, I was a Snob. Had I owned ten thousand a year, I should have acted differently.

a

It might be asked, why should any man wish to have sixteen or six hunters in his stable, if three would give him all the hunting his time or opportunity afforded him the means of enjoying? I can only reply to such question by asking, if a man has a gallery full of pictures, why should he purchase more, when he would be puzzled to find a place to hang them up? The answer is easy: he sees a picture that he has not; the subject, the drawing, grouping, or colouring pleases him; he buys it. Another man has as many horses as he wants, but he sees another that has some attribute that pleases; he buys him. No man of sense can deny but that a wish to possess a fine specimen of artistic talent shews a more refined taste than a wish for a specimen of mere animal creation; but the thirst for possession of what we wish, but do not want, is only the more justifiable, or its reverse, in the estimation of persons of different habits and pursuits, or in the thing itself.

Could such a lusus naturæ be produced as an animal who could, with ease to himself and pleasure to his rider, carry him with hounds six days a week, a sensible man and true lover of hunting would highly prize such a specimen of all but perpetual motion; he would see the find, the chase, and the kill. Lord Plymouth, with his once nearly or quite thirty hunters, could do no more. But I am free to say, that could such an animal be produced and presented to me, carry me as he might, I would at once decline hunting rather than everlastingly ride THE bay horse; and I could mention many others who would do the same. This may be attributed to pride and vanity: I cannot refute such allegation; but independent of this, there is (at least I and many others have found it so) an indescribable pleasure in seeing a fresh pair of ears before us. It is really something like the gratification of dressing for dinner. We are not perhaps more comfortable in an old thread-bare coat and trowsers, than in an easy shooting-jacket, and certainly not more expensively attired; but if we only sit down to a herring and a mutton chop, we feel something like the gentleman if we have doffed the gaiters and see a stocking below the trowsers, albeit that stocking

be a cotton one.

There is, moreover, to a riding man, a certain pleasure in humouring or counteracting the different habits and tempers of different horses. But beyond this, oh! the pleasure of a servant coming in-" The men are gone to stable, sir." This, when a pint and an extra two glasses of port, furtively as it were stolen from yourself, has put you in a mood to be pleased with all that can afford pleasure; we will say a friend is with you; you sagely reflect that the remains of a bottle of port are only available for lunch, so "let to-morrow take care of itself," you take care of what remains for the day; this, with the half-a-dozen half-glasses of sherry at dinner, just about puts you and your friend in the cue to de

light in seeing half-a-dozen nice ones, neatly bedded up, hoods stripped off their loins, and your ears saluted by a gentle grinding operation of mouths, that indicates he that has gone to-day is none the worse for it, and that either of his companions is more or less fit to go to-morrow. "Be this eternity!" a man might, in the language of the poet, say; but he recollects, or is reminded, "Coffee waits, sir; " and then higher attraction in the drawing-room calls him from the contemplation of what is only surpassed by objects of far higher order that he knows he shall meet there, and to challenge the smiles of whom he is precisely in the humour to call forth every attribute he may own, to please. It would be improper to call this heaven, but it is an earthly elysium that only those who have lost its presence can appreciate. Let me hope there is nothing Snobbish in this, though a little judgment in buying, nerve and hands to make a hunter, may conduce to a man's keeping down stable expenses, by letting the last season's five-year-old go a year after at a hundred over cost price. The bit of steel worth only a halfpenny, made into a razor is worth five-shillings. Hunters certainly do not bring such advance on cost to the manufacturer of them; still they may be made by an artist a means of bringing the corn-merchant's bill into small compass, and to a man who does not require them to pay for his living, may more or less be made to pay for their own. More than this no man can expect, and at the same time to hold his position as a gentleman. The amateur in pictures will consider an insatiate desire of fresh purchases as natural and commendable; but no powers could make him think a desire for more horses than would be absolutely necessary for use could be entertained by any sane man; he would hold the man who did so, as meriting an appellation (if there is one) synonymous to a Snob. Some amateurs of horses, but let us hope only a very few, would hold the other in about the same estimation, though there can be no possible doubt as to which of the two evinces in his taste and pursuit the most refinement of idea. Let a man admire both, and we will set the one predilection against the other, and the admiration of that which is admirable—the one the production of art, the other of nature-shews a mind capable of estimating anything beautiful in its way; but if a man can merely admire a living horse, he comes much into the character that Somerville, true sportsman as he was, satirizes in the following biting terms of reprehension and contempt:

"See how mean, how low, the bookless sauntering youth,

Proud of the seat that dignifies his cup,

And rusty jingling couples by his side!

Be thou of other mould."

-observations that alone would show that, if our poet was versed in all the mysteries of kennel discipline, kennel management, and hunting craft, he was versed in matters and ideas of a far higher order.

There are two opposite characters, that in the field would both be termed Snobs-one knowing little or nothing of sporting; and one who knows all about hounds and horses, but nothing or little of anything else. Both would deserve the title, though the last might pass muster with the huntsman and whips, but certes with them only, or those whose ideas soared no higher.

This brings to my mind observations I have lately read, eulogising