Sporting Sketches in Pen and Pencil 



manding positions. We flushed a covey, and followed it at once ; flushed 

 it and followed it again, losing no time until we hroke the covey ; then, 

 when they were dispersed over turnips or clover, we set to work with a 

 steady, careful dog, and hunted them up one after the other ; and when we 

 had done with them we hardly wanted to see them again. We then went 

 and looked for another covey, and so on. Now we disturh fresh coveys 

 every ten minutes, and get a hrace or so out of each, and soon all get wild 

 together. Look on this picture of an old First of Septemher : — 



It is the First of September. Just a quarter of a centiiry ago, my friend 

 Tom Shanks, of Winkleberry Grange, had asked me to shoot with him. Tom 

 and I had been old schoolfellows, but had parted when he left, and we had 

 not met for several years. Only a week previous I had gone in to Hoppy 

 Burgess's billiard rooms on the Parade at Portsmouth, patronised largely by 

 the officers of both forces, when who should I see sauntering round the table 

 but Tom. 



" Why, Tom, old fellow ?" " Why, Frank, my boy ! Who'd have thought 

 of seeing you ? Where have you hidden yourself ? " &c. And for twenty 

 minutes inquiries after Jack, BiU, and Harry filled up the time. 



Tom was future master of Winkleberry Grange, with nine hundred acres 

 of good land round about it. He had taken to farming, and meant to farm 

 a good slice of it, while the rest was let to a desirable tenant, and his 

 prospects were bright enough. I was then a gentleman at large, and bent 

 on enjoying life, which I did after my lights. 



" By the way, where are you going to shoot on the First ?" asked Tom 

 at length. 



" Well, I have a little walk over my own patrimony, and I have a sort 

 of conjoint arrangement with my next neighbour, and between us, with one 

 thing and the other, we make out a walk." 



" Ah, I see ! That can wait, and be none the worse, for a few days. 

 You come down and shoot with me. We've plenty of birds, dogs in fine 

 order ; and, by the way, there's ' a kick up ' the night before ; the girls have 

 a bit of a dance on, and they'll be delighted with another dancing man. So 

 mind you're hooked." 



This decided me. The shooting was very attractive, but the dance was 



