NIMROD'S NORTHERN TOUR. 385 



before I saw him. John Craick'scup had not, I think, been *' quaffed too 

 quickly," neither was there ** wormwood in the dregs," for he looked healtliy 

 and happy, although living, I fear, on a very small pittance in the town of 

 Turriff, once the scene of his glory. Lord Kintore, and perhaps a few 

 besides, occasionally send him a five pound note to comfort him, but I 

 confess that when I saw him next day in his lodgings, it made my heart 

 sad to see a good old sportsman not in a better plight. 1 have often 

 thought that there ought to be amongst sportsmen, a fund supported 

 by a small annual subscription, to provide for the latter days of such 

 men as huntsmen and whippers-in, as well as earth-stoppers and 

 keepers, of good character, who certainly run great risk of their lives 

 and health, in furtherance of their amusement, and not always able 

 to provide for declining years. The Whip Club had their benevolent 

 fund ; why should not sportsmen have theirs ? I shall recur to this 

 subject at another time. 



When God gave us the grape, he did it in mercy to our sufferings, and 

 we ought to acknowledge the valuable boon. A few glasses of wine 

 made John Craick feel young again, and forgetting both his poverty and 

 his years, he made us laugh " without intervallums," as Falstaff says. 

 And some of our laughs were at my expense ; for as John never hap- 

 pened to have heard of Nimrod, he would admit of no association of the 

 word with hounds and hunting ; and when Lord Kintore told him I was 

 a sportsman, he seemed very much to doubt it, taking a glance at me 

 at the time that was irresistibly ludicrous. Then some anecdotes of him- 

 self were exceedingly good, particularly one about a thorough-bred horse, 

 for which he gave in those days the very large sum of one hundred 

 guineas, and at the time when he was farming the fox-hounds, and 

 mounting himself, and his whip, for three hundred pounds per annum ! 



3 D 



