130 NIMRO&S NORTHERN TOUR. 



condition, or more full of milk at that season of the year. How 

 lucky would it be for our female aristocracy if, when doomed to 

 reside in the country, those pursuits were, oftener than we find 

 them to be, pursued by them. Milliners' and dressmakers' 

 bills, so frequently the ruin of domestic peace, would be greatly 

 lessened by such means. 



Tuesday, December 2nd. " A willing heart," says the proverb, 

 "adds a feather to the heel;" and although the fixture of the 

 duke's hounds was computed to be twenty-eight miles from 

 Chester Hall, I found it thirty. I was not to be deprived on 

 that account of the chance of another fifty-five minutes from 

 East Gordon Gorse, and such was the meet of the day. This 

 was rather a long morning's trot for the month of December, 

 but although I stopped twenty minutes at Carfrae Mill Inn, for 

 breakfast ; had a high mountain to traverse, added to three 

 miles of newly stoned road which I could not break away from ; 

 I performed the task in exactly three hours. One of King's 

 horses,* however, with no pretensions to be called a hunter, was 

 a very capital hack, as he proved himself this day, for I galloped 

 Mm nearly at the top of his speed, upon grass by the road side, 

 for the last five miles, and he did not appear distressed. But 

 I had another reason why I was not to be stopped by distance 

 from meeting the duke's hounds this day. I had had paid me 

 the very high compliment of a special invitation from that cele- 

 brated sportsman, Mr. Baillie of Mellerstain, to visit him after 

 the sport of the day was concluded considered a still higher 

 compliment from the fact of his having been for some time pre- 

 cluded from the pleasure of seeing his friends by reason of a 

 late somewhat serious indisposition, but from the effects of which 

 be was at this time recovering. 



From the celebrity given to East Gordon Gorse by the sport 

 its foxes had afforded, in addition to Tuesday not being a hunt- 

 ing day with Lord Elcho, there was the largest field, this morn- 

 ing, that I ever saw in Scotland not less, I should say, than a 

 hundred and fifty horsemen ; and the numerous carriages that 

 stood in the road, after having discharged their loads, had quite 

 a Ranksborough Gorse-like appearance. Amongst the spectators 

 on foot having just alighted from his carriage was Mr. Baillie, 

 to whom I was immediately introduced, and most kindly indeed 

 \vas I received by him. The cover we met at I have, I believe, 

 already stated, is his own. 



* An Irish horse, with twisted fore legs, but with those finely formed 

 lengthy shoulders which preclude the possibility of his falling down, 

 with anything of a horseman on his back; 



