THE WILLEY WHIPPER-IN. 127 



Tell him of beauty and harmonious sounds, 

 He'd show his mare, and talk about his hounds." 



He was what was called Foxy all oyer — in his 

 language, dress, and associations. He wore a pin 

 with a knob, something smaller than a tea- saucer, of 

 Caughley china, with the head of a fox upon it ; 

 and everything nearest his person, so far as he could 

 manage it, had something to put him in mind of his 

 favourite sport. His bed-room walls were hung with 

 sporting prints, and on his mantelpiece were more 

 substantial trophies of the hunt — as the brush of 

 some remarkable victim of the pack, his boots and 

 spurs, &c. His famous drinking-horn, which we have 

 engraved together with his trencher in the trophy 

 at the head of this chapter, was equally embellished 

 with a representation of a hunt, very elaborately 

 carved with the point of a pen-knife. At the top is 

 a wind-mill, and below a number of horsemen and a 

 lady, well mounted, in full chase, and with hounds 

 in full cry after a fox, which is seen on the lower 

 part of the horn. A fox's brush forms the finis. 

 The date upon the horn, which in size and shape 

 resembles those in use in the mansions of the 

 gentry in past centuries when hospitality was dis- 

 pensed in their halls with such a free and generous 



