NIMROD'S NORTHERN TOUR. 39 



having, this year, put forward five couples of young hounds of his own 

 breeding, which, his lordship adds, do him credit. 



The dinner party this day (Sunday, 9th November) at the Black Bull 

 was small, consisting only of Lord Elcho, Mr. Hay of Dunse-castle, Mr. 

 Campbell of Saddell, and myself; but we were gratified during the even- 

 ing by the appearance of Lord Saltoun and Mr. Mc Dowal Grant, for 

 whose reception a house had been taken in the town, and whose horses 

 had been awaiting their arrival. That kindred feeling which exists 

 amongst sportsmen would have put me at ease in such society as this had 

 I been a stranger to all, but it so happened that — to my no small 

 loss — Mr. Campbell was the only one of the party to whom I was 

 quite unknown. Mr. Hay I had visited when he hunted Warwickshire. 

 Lord Saltoun — '' the Hero of Hougomont," as Lord Kintore calls him — 

 I had met at Melton just twenty-two years before, being the last season 

 of his hunting there ; and of Mr. Mc Dowal Grant's hospitahty I had 

 partaken when himself. Captain Ross, and Mr. Francis Grant kept " a 

 roaring house" together, at Melton, in 1818. Our dinner was of the old 

 fox-hunter's stamp — plain roast and boiled, but every thing good of its 

 sort, and the claret such as might be expected Mr. George Wauchope, 

 of Leith, would send to his brother sportsmen at Dunse ; or Messrs. 

 Hope and Bruce, of the same place, to their countrymen and friends. 



Monday, 10th. — This was a day of no small interest to me, as it was 

 the first of my seeing hounds in Scotland, and the second of my seeing 

 them any where else for nearly five years. The fixture was Greenburn, 

 about four miles from Dunse, in a hilly and bad country. We had a 

 pretty find with the first fox, and a chance of a run, as he broke cover 

 favourably ; but being headed by a boy, he put his head down wind over 



