dered recovery hopeless, and it was taken off below the knee. His career began when he and Will Staples (now a comfortable sixteen-stone publican at Lea Bridge in Shropshire) weighed about 8st. 7lb. each, and whipped-in to Sir Bellingham Graham. His son, Joe Maiden, is whipping-in somewhere in Ireland, and old Will Danby is now the huntsman of the Hurworth pack. There is a rumour that Earl Fitzwilliam's hounds may hunt four days a-week this season. Harry Sebright is now whipping-in to Cox with the Duke of Cleveland's hounds, and one of the Tredwell's (a family as inexhaustible in the hunting-field as the Edwardses once were on the turf), has taken his place at Mr. Lumley's. Yorkshire has two wonderfully rising huntsmen in Ned Owen, of the Badsworth, and Ben Morgan, in Mr. Willoughby's country; the latter especially has quite astonished the Tykes by his riding. Tom Rance, of the Cheshire, still sticks to the whipper-in line, as he has done for these seventeen years there under Joe Maiden, Markwell (who has no hounds now); and George Whitmore, and he has few rivals, if any, in that line.

The Duke of Beaufort will, we believe, hunt his own hounds whenever he is out; but Will Stansby, who formerly whipped in to Will Long and then hunted the Worcestershire, is with them now as first whip. Will Long, who resides at Bertha Cottage, at the edge of Badminton Park, is often out 'cub-hunting with his old favourites. Nothing could be kinder or handsomer than the Duke's letter to him when he retired on a pension last season. He served four Dukes of Beaufort, and whipped in to Philip Payne for seventeen seasons, and then hunted the hounds for eight-and-twenty more. We hear that Mr. Assheton Smith is better, but it seems doubtful whether he will ever mount the scarlet again. He was not with his hounds last year, except in a carriage, and left everything to George Carter, whose son whips in to Tom Sebright. So far, the Harboro' country is without hounds. It is said that a fair-sized draft from Mr. Sutton's hounds were offered as a present to a gentleman in that neighbourhood after the last April sale, but that he declined them. The late Sir Richard's stud-groom is with Baron Rothschild, and old Tom Day is in residence at Quorn, whither Dick Burton has, we believe, also removed. Boothroyd has a strong task before him, and we trust to "report good progress" by the time November is out.

PIKE AND PERCH.

ENGRAVED BY J. H. ENGLEHEART, FROM A PAINTING BY H. L. ROLFE.

Pike and Perch, two of the most sporting fish Piscator ever struck, come happily associated. The former, according to Ephemera, is in "his body comely to look at; and if he could hide his head, his green-and-silver vesture would attract many admirers." Mr. Nobbs, another authority, writes thus on the sport he affords at

this season of the year:-"The weather is now temperate, and the weeds, which were strong and high before, are drying and falling to the bottom. The rivers are generally low, which is a great advantage, because the fish are more easily found in their harbours. They leave the shallows and sands, and lodge themselves in pits and the deepest places. A pike is now very firm and fat, having had the benefit of the summer's food; and if the weather continues open, and not extraordinarily cold, you may take in part of November, which will add much to your sport, because the weeds will be more wasted and rotten; but if a flood comes in October, or the beginning of Novem ber, you may lay aside your tackling for the season; for great rivers, like great vessels, being long in filling and slowly mounting to their full height, are again long in falling and settling, so that the water will be thick and out of order, unless frost or fair weather comes to clear it. In small brooks and rivulets it is not so: you may fish in them again within a week or less after the flood."

We can so bring on our fish in the height of the season, either for sport or mere eating. You may try for him at "great advantage," and he is moreover "firm and fat." At such a period he is perhaps worthy the cook's art, though, for our own part, if we do ever land another pike, it will certainly not be as a pot-hunter. A far more delicate fish is the perch-good in almost any way, of any size, or at any time whether you simply dine from the strength of your own basket, or recognize him in all that good company Mr. Quartermaine introduces you to, at Greenwich. As far as fishing for him goes, any one ought to be equal to it. With a man to bait for you, it is nice easy sport, and we shall never forget the pleasant evening we had but last summer, when on Windermere: the only end to the fun was when you got tired of pulling them out. Mr. Stoddart, of high repute in those quarters, calls the perch " a simple fish and one easily captured." The only proper sport appears to be, when they get to a size:"Large-sized perch, however, are not so easily provoked to bite as the small fry, and will frequently despise the worm or maggot, so acceptable to their juniors. To these saucy epicures, no greater delicacy can be presented than a live minnow; and the manner of baiting the hook with this lure is extremely simple, although I confess somewhat tinged with cruelty. It consists merely in running it, from side to side, through the back-bone below the dorsal fin. When this is properly done, and the minnow gently projected forwards to the spot which the perch are presumed to occupy, it will be found to retain life for some time, and, while struggling at the requisite depth, by support of the float, prove irresistible to the wariest and daintiest fish. But I have no intention to enlarge further on the subject of perch-fishing. Proficiency in capturing this simple fish is easily acquired; and the few instructions which contribute to its speedy attainment are to be met with in almost every treatise upon angling." That last sentence is certainly a stopper. The art of perch-fishing, like the art of getting in debt, or in love, or in liquor, is "easily acquired;" and so we don't prompt aspiring youth any further. Let him help himself.

LEAVES FROM MY NOTE-BOOK.

BY WOODCUTTER.

FOREST LIFE IN INDIA.

In consequence of the lateness of the monsoon I did not enter the forest till the end of July, and came out in November, having led the life of a sporting angel. There elephants were scarce, owing to our cutting teak in their favourite haunts. I was fortunate in killing four out of the five tuskers I fired at. The first I dropped at the second shot; the second gave more trouble. Having in the morning stumbled on a brace of bears, they took nine shots before they would deliver up their skins to me. This made a hole in my small powderflask; so that when I had fired twelve shots into the tusker's head, I had not a grain of powder left. The elephant, still strong, but stoneblind, with one eye shot out and the nerve of the other cut right across, I had what I imagine few people have had, namely, a game of blind-man's buff with a wild elephant. I tried to drive him home, but it was no go; so I stood guard over him all that day, and the next morning I found him dead. The ivory brought me £25; so you may imagine they were not sucking teeth. With bison I was not so lucky. I could not at first hit them in the right place, and lost numbers; however, I got more in the way of it before I left, and bagged in all thirteen: two of them such fighting devils. Having expended all my bullets on one iron old buffer, I was reduced to the necessity of tying my hunting-knife to the end of a bamboo, and finishing him in that novel mode: an uncommonly ticklish one, I can tell you, and one I should not like to try often. I bagged a very fair sprinkling of elk (Sambur), spotted deer, and jungle sheep; but, strange to say, only one pig. I had only two shots at the unclean beasts: I wounded the other badly, but he got away. I saw no tigers, though I was precious close to them on more than one occasion. I lost a very fine bear, to my intense disgust: the conical ball I was loaded with must, I fancy, have glanced; for I took a deliberate pot at the old fellow at about fifty yards, and down the hill-side he went three steps and a roll over, till he got safe into the dense jungle.

I got an attack of fever, which has stuck to me on and off ever since, and has obliged me to give up campaigning after elephants, which requires a man in the most robust health. The only visitor I had came during my fever bout. He fired but at one elephant; and whilst up with the herd, the man who was carrying the spare gun got so frightened that he pulled the trigger, and sent a two-ounce brass bullet into my best scout's head. Fortunately it only scalped him, and in a month or two he was all right again. A narrow escape for the poor fellow!

FOUR DAYS' SPORT IN THE DECCAN.

A friend of mine who kept Shikar elephants had just returned from his annual two months' trip to the jungles, when I proposed we should