210 NIMROD S HUNTING TOUR 



doing the honours of Sir Eowland Hill's tithe-day, but came to us in 

 the evening, and amused us much. * 



The Vicar of Frees is what I call a good old-fashioned clergyman. 

 He is — as I hope all Rugby men are — quite above the vulgar asso- 

 ciation of groans and tears with piety and devotion, and is not yet 

 stricken with the new light. " Gravity," says Lord Shaftesbury, 

 " is the essence of imposture ; " and who would envy the character 



Caesar gives of Cassius ? 



" He loves no play. 

 As thou dost, Antony ; he hears no music ; 

 Seldom he smiles, and smiles in such a sort, 

 As if he mock'd himself, and scorn'd his spirit 

 That could be mov'd at anything." 



The Vicar of Frees is no humbug. He sings a hunting song to his 

 parishioners, tells them a good story at his tithe feast, and gives 

 them the best his house affords. His invitation to Sir Bellingham 

 and myself for the next time the hounds came to the Twemlows was 

 rather unique. " My claret," said he, " is of the finest vintage ; and 

 if you will drink enough of it, it will make your eyes look like boiled 

 gooseberries." 



The Vicar of Frees has a great mind to be a sportsman. Like the 



Abbot of old, 



* " He gives not of the text a pullet hen, 



That saith that hunters be not holy men : " 



SO he accompanied us the next morning to the covert's side ; and 

 could we have persuaded him to have left his spencer behind him, 

 his appearance would have been far from amiss. 



My greatest amusement was yet to come. The next morning before 

 we went a hunting, I accompanied the Vicar to see his stud, and I 

 will exhibit them to the reader as they were exhibited to me : — 

 " Here," said the Vicar, " is the mare I am going to ride. There is 

 the pony that beat all Sir Bellingham Graham's hunt — but mind ye, 

 not with me upon him. There is the finest pair of coach-horses in all 

 England — only one has lost an eye, and the other is broken-winded ; 

 and there is the colt that is to win the King's Hundred." Now the 

 four-year-old colt bred by himself, which was to win the King's 

 Hundred, proved to be a three-year-old filly ; and if ever she wins 

 a Maiden Flate, I will engage to eat her, plate and all ! 



