THE NOBLE SCIENCE. 11 



London, even should they be all killed and eaten by the 

 enemy on the morrow, having made all the dispositions 

 calculated to guard against every contingency, and entitle 

 him to feel that confidence in his own resources which 

 was the forerunner of victory. So, in hke manner, 

 parvis componere magna — to compare great affairs with 

 those comparatively of little consequence — should a 

 master of foxhounds, upon joining, at the covert side, 

 a host of followers, all " with souls in arms, and eager 

 for the fray ; " when contemplating the responsibility 

 which rests with him,— when reviewing the numbers 

 looking up to him as arbiter of what that day shall bring 

 forth, be enabled to say to himself, " I have done my 

 duty, to the best of my judgment ; I have fixed to draw 

 the covert, which, of all others, it is most expedient to 

 draw ; I have ascertained the more than probability of 

 finding here, or in the neighbourhood ; I am not at vari- 

 ance with any farmer or landholder who might have been 

 propitiated ; I have brought an effective establishment 

 into the field ; in short, I have done, and shall do, all 

 within my power towards the sport, which, all must know, 

 will ever very much depend upon the elements, and a 

 variety of circumstances over which I have no control, 

 and which, whether favourable or otherwise, will affect 

 me, at least as much as, if not more than, any one else." 

 He will thus be supported through all the trying events 

 of the day, by a consciousness that his field lack none of 



