THE NOBLE SCIENCE: 133 



the review of all essentials in the appointments of a 

 young fox-hunter — his own personal equipment is a 

 matter of too much importance to admit of my neg- 

 lecting, altogether, the subject of his dress. One of the 

 most agreeable, amusing, and clever of all writers in 

 the present day, Mrs. Trollope, has, with great truth 

 and justice, remarked, concerning " the lords of crea- 

 tion," that our ''present style of dress is at once 

 the least becoming, and the least calculated to mark 

 the distinctions of society, that ever a spiteful demo- 

 cratic tailor invented." The same talented lady, speak- 

 ing of the Hungarian gentlemen in fall dress, says, 

 that they formed " such an assembly as gave one the 

 comfortable conviction, that, notwithstanding all the 

 labour and pains taken in many parts of the world to 

 destroy it — the genus gentleman does still exist in great 

 perfection." I fear that should these pages ever meet 

 the eye of a radical, the tone and sentiment will be 

 condemned as rococo^ to an intolerable degree; but in 

 upholding the genus gentleman, above all others, I 

 should be very sorry to be mistaken, or supposed capable 

 of casting a reflection upon, or of undervaluing the ster- 

 ling worth of the middling classes, constituting, in fact, 

 the great body of the people of England. So far from 

 entertaining any such unworthy feeling, I would infi- 

 nitely prefer to shake hands with honest and albeit 

 vulgar tradesmen, either in the hunting field, or at their 



