Two Days With the Quorn (First Day) 155 



That's English. It's very nice when you know how to go 

 about it. 



The reception in the smoking room of the Bay Mare Inn 

 was quite as chilly as anytliing I had previously experienced, 

 and I made up my mind never again to attempt to be civil or 

 to speak to an Englishman unless I was spoken to. 



The landlady followed the maid in with my pot of tea. She 

 poured it for me herself. 



"Is that to your liking, sir?" 



"Yes, thank you." 



All the time she was waiting on me she was talking to this 

 and that gentleman: for one she had mended a pair of gloves, 

 for another she had washed out some hunting scarves. She 

 seemed to be the mother of the whole lot of them : a nice family, 

 only I thought that she might have taught them to be a little 

 more civil to strangers. I drank my tea in silence and retired 

 into a shell of my own, which by the time w^e went out to dinner 

 I could feel growing to quite a thickness. It was a most 

 satisf }dng dinner : great slices of roast beef to satisfy the wants 

 of a wood chopper, cold meats, a stuffed hog's head, etc. I ate 

 my dinner in silence: but, dear me, by the time coffee was 

 served in the smoking room I thawed out in spite of myself, 

 and the first thing I knew I was on speaking terms with one 

 of the most agreeable gentlemen it has ever been my good for- 

 tune to meet, Col. Richardson, to whom I was afterwards in- 

 debted for one of the grandest day's sport I ever enjoj^ed with 

 hounds, an account of which I will attempt to give in my second 

 day's experience with the Quorn. We talked horse, hunting 

 and hounds, forwards, sideways and backwards until we were 

 the only persons in the smoking room. The Colonel had rid- 

 den to hounds in America and knew several gentlemen of my 

 acquaintance. 



"But," said the Colonel, "I do not fancy those Long Island 

 fences. I own to flunking timber." 



