FOX-HOUNDS. 177 



as donkeys, as fat as pigs, in these "woods, that go and 

 die of old age." 



The Fitzwilliam are supposed to be the higgest-boned 

 hounds now bred, and exquisitely handsome. If they 

 have a fault, they are, for want of work, or excess of 

 numbers, rather too full of flesh ; so that at the end of 

 the year, when the days grow warm, they seem to tire 

 and tail in a long run. 



Many of the pasture fences are big enough to keep 

 out a bullock ; the ditches wide and full of water ; bul- 

 finches are to be met with, stiff rails, gates not always 

 unlocked; so, although a Pytchley flyer is not indis- 

 pensable, on a going day, nothing less thaii a hunter 

 can get along. 



Tom Sebright, as a huntsman and breeder of hounds, 

 has been a celebrity ever since he hunted the Quorn, 

 under Squire Osbaldeston, six-and-thirty years ago. 

 Sebright looks the huntsman, and the huntsman of an 

 hereditary pack, to perfection ; rather under than over 

 the middle height ; stout without being unwieldy ; with 

 a fine, full, intelligent, and fresh-coniplexioned oval 

 countenance ; keen gray eyes ; and the decided nose of 

 a Cromwellian Ironside. A fringe of white hair below 

 his cap, and a broad bald forehead, when he lifts his 

 cap to cheer his hounds, tell the tale of Time on this 

 accomplished veteran of the chase. 



" The field," with the Fitzwilliam, is more aristocratic 

 than fashionable ; it includes a few peers and their 

 friends from neighbouring noble mansions, a good many 

 squires, now and then undergraduates from Cambridge, 

 a very few strangers by rail, and a great many 

 first-class yeoman farmers and graziers. Thus it is 

 equally unlike the fashionable " cut-me-down " multi- 

 tude to be met at coverside in the " Shires " par 



