FOX-HUNTING 



Osbaldeston's hounds, in the year 1826, when that 

 pack was at the height of its well-merited celebrity. 

 Let us also indulge ourselves with a fine morning in 

 the first week of February, and at least two hundred 

 well-mounted men by the cover's side. Time being 

 called — say a quarter past eleven, nearly our great- 

 grandfathers' dinner hour — the hounds approach the 

 furze-brake, or the gorse, as it is called in that region. 

 ^^ Hark in, hark!" with a slight cheer, and perhaps 

 one wave of his cap, says Mr. Osbaldeston,^ who long 

 hunted his own pack, and in an instant he has not a 

 hound at his horse's heels. In a very short time the 

 gorse appears shaken in various parts of the cover 

 — apparently from an unknown cause, not a single 

 hound being for some minutes visible. Presently 

 one or two appear, leaping over some old furze 

 which they cannot push through, and exhibit to the 

 field their glossy skins and spotted sides. **Oh, you 

 beauties ! " exclaims some old Meltonian, rapturously 

 fond of the sport. Two minutes more elapse ; 

 another hound slips out of a cover, and takes a short 

 turn outside, with his nose to the ground and his stern 

 lashing his side — thinking, no doubt, he might touch 

 on a drag, should Reynard have been abroad in the 

 night. Hounds have no business to think, thinks the 

 second whipper-in, who observes him ; but one crack 

 of his whip, with **Rasselas, Rasselas, where are you 

 going, Rasselas ? Get to cover, Rasselas " ; and Rasselas 



1 Master from 1817 to 1821, and again from 1823 to 1827. 



17 c 



