300 KEMINISCENCES OF A HUNTSMAN. 



to me directly. Just the same was his remembrance of 

 Mrs. Berkeley, though it was some years longer since 

 he had seen her ; and he even knew the sight of the 

 little basin in which in former days she used to sop 

 his bread when he came round to the drawing-room 

 window at Harrold. The first day I went out with 

 the three couples of old fox-hounds, and three or four 

 of my white terriers, luckily I obtained a live otter 

 just caught by Mr.Farr's man before alluded to, and 

 put him fresh from the river into a little stream in 

 Holmesley AYalk, by which there is a considerable 

 pond, and then drew for him. The hounds entered 

 at once, and soon killed the otter, for, of all bag 

 animals, an otter in that way affords less sport than 

 any other. The next day that I went out saw me 

 on the stream near Lyndhurst, that runs not far 

 from Dinney Ridge. It was a beautiful summer's 

 day, and, supposing no otter to have been on the 

 water, the scene was worth walking through, were it 

 but for its wildness and beauty. Deep beds of the 

 golden willow or bog myrtle in places flanked the 

 stream, tangled with the peculiar grasses of the bogs, 

 and occasionally in the drier places matted witii 

 brambles and the shoots of the alder. We were near 

 what was once a decoy for fowl, but now grown up 

 into cover, and giving the hounds the wind I was 

 stepping from hag to hag in a myrtle bog, curiously 

 examining the banks of the stream, and coaxing the 

 old fox-hounds to forsake a wider draw in drier places 

 for a fox, and to hang on the river with me. They 

 hud begun to do this, and were evidently thinking 

 that I was in search of some drain where a fox was 

 gone to ground, for they leant over the sides of the 

 stream, and tried the hollow roots, as they saw me 



