THE NOBLE SCIENCE. 135 



" My bosom's lord sits lightly on its throne, 

 And all this day an unaccustomed spirit 

 Lifts me above the ground with cheerful thoughts." 



If the half of earthly joys consist in anticipation, the 

 sportsman is half way towards his seventh heaven, 

 when, bounding on his covert hack, time and space 

 appear annihilated, by the rapidity of his progress 

 towards the scene in which his very soul is centred : — 

 I speak of sportsmen ; — nothing can be further from my 

 thoughts, than the presumption that such trash as 

 this can meet with anything but the most unqualified 

 contempt from the man who hunts, for fashion, or 

 relief from ennui. What has he to do with the beauty 

 of Nature ? 



" What's Hecuba to him, or he to Hecuba V 



The different sentiments with which men may 

 wend their way, each ostensibly intent upon the same 

 object — the different sensations which the being out 

 upon a hunting day may create in different breasts, always 

 remind me, most forcibly, of Lord Byron's exhibition of 

 a true seaman's feelings upon his element, contrasted 

 with those of one incapable of sharing them : — 



" Say, who can tell— not thou luxurious slave, 

 Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave ; 

 Not thou, vain lord of indolence and ease. 

 Whom slumber soothes not, pleasure cannot please : 

 Say, who can tell, save he whose heart hath tried, 

 And danc'd in triumph o'er the waters wide, 

 27te exulting sense, the jnilse's maddening x>lay. 

 That thrills the ivanderer of that trackless way." 



Thus it is with hunting.— On the mere steeple-chaser, 



