pened to be a stranger to Dick Knight. Moreover, he was clad in a blue coat, which added nothing to his appearance and character in Dick's eyes. At length the gentleman got an awful fall, his horse rolling over him, and he lay as if he were dead. There,' exclaimed

Dick; thank God we have done with you!' In a few minutes. however, Mr. G--was in his place again, when Knight, observing him, coolly said to himself, A resurrection before the time, to a certainty. I had hoped never to have seen you again in this world. I wonder what you'll do next?'"

"What a funny fellow that Dick Knight must have been, papa !" said Frank.

"But we have omitted the best anecdote of him," said Mr. Somerby," and my young friend there must have that, Dick was a great favourite with his noble master, and, like all favourites, now and then presumed upon it. Having taken a tremendous leap one day, on Contract, Lord Spencer, who was next to him, pulled up at it, and paused. Come along, my lord,' roared Dick; the longer you look the less you will like it.'

"The incident that led to the masterly execution of these prints was a spirit of jealousy between Mr. Assheton Smith* and Dick Knight, when they met together on one particular occasion, in the field, the former riding a celebrated hunter called Egmont, and the latter the equally celebrated Contract. In fact, it was Quorn versus Pytchley. The prints were first published by Jukes, a great printseller in London, who is said to have realized fifteen hundred pounds by the copyright, which was made a present to him by Mr. Loraine Smith.

"Loraine Smith, on another occasion, sketched himself in the act of fording a river after hounds, with his coat skirts tucked up to his shoulders, and thereby getting a considerable start of the rest of the field, with the exception of Lord Maynard, who chanced to follow him; and these lines are written underneath the print:

"By following Smith, a cute chap at a pinch,

Who knows all the depths of the brooks to an inch ;]
Lord Maynard, too, followed, and both did embark,
Only wetting their tails just below water-mark.'"

"I conclude," said Mr. Raby, "that Mr. Loraine Smith is a good man across a country."

"Few better, for his weight," replied Mr. Somerby; "his great excellences, as a rider to hounds, are, his judgment, and fine eye to direct him in taking his line. On the 12th of December, 1792, he went to the end of, perhaps, the finest run that Leicestershire had afforded up to that period, called the Whetstone day, the fox having

Father of the present Thomas Assheton Smith.

been found in Whetstone Gorse, between Lutterworth and Melton. It lasted upwards of two hours, with only one check, and all over grass. Still, the person who most distinguished himself was Jacob Wardle, who, although he (with many others) went away with part of the pack, which could not be stopped, and only got up to the main body of hounds just as they recovered the scent, at a check at the end of a very severe burst, took the lead and kept it, until the hounds ran into their fox, at the expiration of the time mentioned. The horse he rode a thorough-bred grey, afterwards called Whetstone-had never been ridden as a hunter before in his life, and was purchased by Forester, for two hundred and fifty guineas, in the field. Lord Maynard, however, seeing the distress this horse exhibited, pronounced that he would never be himself again; neither was he. Lord Paget, who rode a horse called Slender, Pole on True Blue, and Forester on Sweeper, also distinguished themselves on this memorable day—a day never to be forgotten in Leicestershire.

"Mr. Loraine Smith, on this day, rode a horse he had not long before purchased of Mr. Berridge; but, not having had a trial of his merits, he had not then given him a name. It was, however, by plunging with him into the river Wellin, near Langton, which he did at no small risk, with a horse somewhat beaten, that he was indebted for a sight of the conclusion of this splendid run. He had the good luck to meet the hounds, evidently running into their fox, pointing for Market Harborough, having no one in company with them but Mr. Wardle. Mr. Smith's horse soon afterwards declined; and Mr. Wardle, on this young and raw horse, would have been good two miles a-head of any other man in the field, had the fox not been headed nearly at the finish, which enabled several of his brother sportsmen to witness it; and a glorious finish it was, in the middle of a large grass field. But, as regards Wardle and his raw horse, the most extraordinary part of the story is yet to come. The country about Langton was just then newly inclosed, and he jumped all the strong post-and-rail fences without getting one fall. Neither was his crossing the river Wellin undeserving of notice. He pushed his horse before him, into deep water, leaped upon his back whilst he was in the act of swimming, and thus was carried to the opposite bank!" "I remember hearing of another desperate run," said Mr. Somerby, in continuation," in which Mr. Loraine Smith distinguished himself greatly, by his fine judgment in riding to hounds. On a day, with the same pack (Meynell's), called the Alsop's-House day,' he appeared at cover on a five-year-old horse, of his own breeding, called Shopleton; and one, by his own admission, not of high form as a hunter. He likewise got a bad start, and never could get near the hounds till he met them on Leak Hills, on their return from Gotham

Wood. Notwithstanding this disadvantage, towards the end of the run, which embraced an immense sweep of country, himself and a gentleman named Deverill were the only two that continued to keep with the hounds till they came to Kinnoulton cover, when his (Smith's) horse slackened pace. Deverill went on, and was the only man whose horse could raise a canter when the fox was dying. He rode a mare called Gaylass, got by Lord Grosvenor's famous Mambrino, whose fine. picture by Stubbs has been so much admired; and, in consequence of her performance this day, she was sold to Sir John Shelley, and by him to Sir Harry Featherstone; in both instances at large prices: remaining a first-class hunter, in Leicestershire, for several successive years. Neither did Smith's horse suffer in reputation, despite of his standing still, which might be expected from his age, and the great weight he carried. He was purchased by Lord Charles Somerset, and, subsequently, by the Duke of Rutland, at a large price, continuing long to be a horse of repute in the Belvoir Hunt. It was computed, at the time, that, by his knowledge of the country and the points the fox was making, Smith saved three miles of ground in the course of this run, which is the principal cause of my having detailed the particulars of it to you."

"Now, Frank," said Mr. Raby, "you have had a great treat; so take yourself off to the ladies. I dare say you will dream of Leicestershire and Dick Knight."

"We shall see him in Leicestershire some day or another," observed Mr. Somerby.

"No," replied Mr. Raby; "at least, I hope not. Melton Mowbray is no place for younger brothers; and I fear it has proved too much for many elder ones."

"He's a fine lad, however," continued Mr. Somerby; "how he appeared to devour all we have been telling him, about those illustrious characters, in their way."

"Ay," observed Mr. Egerton; "I wish he had as good an appetite for the food I put before him. He is reading of illustrious persons every day to me; but there is no Mr. Meynell, or Dick Knight amongst them; and so far from devouring them, they now and then appear almost to choke him."

"But he does not want parts," resumed Mr. Somerby.

"By no means," said the tutor; "but something more than good parts is required to enable younger brothers to catch their elder ones in the arduous race of life, to use a sporting expression. He, however, often reminds me that my rector told him Alexander the Great was a fox-hunter; and also, the good prince Cyrus."

THE DIGGING OUT.

BY SYLVANUS SWAN QUILL.

Illustrated by A. COOPER, R.A.

WE once dined with an old East Indian who had the effrontery to assure us, after the third or fourth bottle, that fox-hunting was a meagre sport compared with the sports of his country. A fox, he said, was a paltry animal beside a Bengal tiger; a horse, a poor monture (the wretch quoted French), in juxta-position with an elephant a pack of fox-hounds a pitiful thing to set up against a pack of hunting leopards; a gorse cover a despicable affair in comparison with an East Indian jungle. Of course, we were highly indignant; and, as a matter equally of course, we resolved never again to enter the old tawny, mulligatawny rascal's house again, as long as we lived. Fox-hunting, said the old callipashionate villain, is wanting in that variety-that constant succession of excitements, which is found in the sports of the East.

Indeeeeeeed!

We know not how enough to express our horror of any such doctrine, or our hatred of any such doctrinaires. Fox-hunting (it is we who say it) is par excellence the sport of all others that is most fertile in adventure-most inexhaustible in incident. And why is this? Because our chase-sly REYNARD THE FOX, is of all animals the

cleverest, the cunningest, the sagaciousest. For ruses de guerre, Mehemet Ali, or Governor Lin, is as nothing compared with him. His resolution and courage are undaunted and indomitable. His sagacity and sapience are admitted by all classes of quadrupeds to be without parallel. And this extensive acquaintance with the world and the world's ways on the part of the animal, is the reason why we, his followers, find such an endless variety of scenery and incident in his pursuit.

Of scenery:

For in this consists one of the principal charms-one of the most glorious raptures of fox-hunting. Talk of your kaleidoscopes and your cosmoramas-their transmutations are as nothing compared with the "chops and changes" of a well-ordered fox-chase. What an endless picture gallery of living landscapes, framed in heaven and earth, and gilded by that best of all gilders, the sun, is offered to the gaze of the adventurous Nimrod! It is a gallery, too, in which he is not offended with the foppery of schools; here is no Flemish series, -no Dutch series-no Spanish series—no Italian series: the pictures are all in one manner-Nature's last. At one moment we are buried