NIMROD'S NORTHERN TOUR. 223 



strapping grey horse, that had lately cost him two hundred guineas, and 

 which appeared to me to know his business, and also to be pretty fit to 

 go. There was, however, I am sorry to add, nothing for him to do. The 

 morning was wild ; the foxes bad ; and it would be a waste of words and 

 time to give the result. 



I must not here depart from my general practice of offering a few 

 remarks upon the hounds and their huntsman. The general character 

 of the Linlithgow pack may, I think, be summed up in a few words. 

 They are not hounds to strike the eye, or exactly perhaps to please the 

 eye of a nice observer of form and points. It is evident, indeed, that 

 in the breeding and the drafting of them, appearances have not been 

 allowed to preponderate much in the scales. There are some coarse 

 hounds among them ; nevertheless they are a very business-like looking 

 pack, taken as a whole, and the character they bear is highly creditable 

 to them. It is indeed from character — from report chiefly that I am 

 enabled to speak of their performances ; for with the exception of the 

 finish to the first day's run, no circumstances could be more untoward 

 than those under which it was my ill fortune to see them. But the man 

 who wishes to see hounds in perfection, must first ask permission of the 

 heavens. 



Of their huntsman, Scott, I am also unable to say much except from 

 general report, which speaks favourably of him. His condition I 

 thought good ; but it is in the kennel that he is considered to shine. 

 As a huntsman he labours under disadvai.tages— not those of age, for 

 although he has the honourable appellation of '' Old Scott," there is 

 nothing against him on that score. But no man of his form can ride 

 forward enough to see hounds in all their work, over any country that 



