6 FOX-HUNTING RECOLLECTIONS 



part there was no regret at leaving Malta — my final 



farewell might have been said in the words of 



Byron : 



*' Adieu ye joys of La Valette, 

 Adieu sirocco, sun, and sweat, 

 Adieu thou palace rarely entered, 

 Adieu ye mansions where I've ventured, 

 Adieu ye cursed streets of stairs, 

 How surely he who mounts them swears ! " 



In the autumn of i860 I was posted to the 

 Rifle Depot at Winchester, commanded by Colonel 

 Macdonald. No better quarter in England than 

 old Winchester — so many sports, pastimes, and 

 advantages ; dry fly fishing in the Test and 

 Itchen, nowadays at famine prices, was to be got 

 for next to nothing in those days. How many 

 delightful afternoons did I pass on the water of 

 Brambridge House, then belonging to Charles 

 Sartoris — how many games of tennis in th^ old 

 tennis-court at Crawley, the Queen's Crawley of 

 Thackeray in Vanity Fair. I never could see 

 that tumbledown old house (since demolished 

 altogether) without thoughts of Rawdon Crawley, 

 Becky Sharp, and Hester's famous speech, '' If 

 you please, Sir Pitt, Sir Pitt died this morning, 

 Sir Pitt." Then the hunting (our Colonel was 

 very good about leave for that), and plenty of 

 packs to choose from : the H.H., with Edward 

 Tredcroft as Master ; the Hambledon, hunted by 



