156 THE HUNTING FIELD 



and whose long tails were protected from the mud 

 by midway gatherings of the same material. Peter 

 was then in the flush of youth. His plump, healthy 

 cheeks glowed rubicund beneath the powder of his 

 well-pomatumed hair, terminating behind his lace- 

 daubed velvet cap in a knotty pig-tail, the buttons and 

 gold lace of his jacket almost concealed the rich 

 scarlet of the material, while his well-cleaned leathers 

 fit so tight and close as to cause astonishment to the 

 beholders how he ever got into them. The youthful 

 Peter on the leaders looked like the rosebud to his 

 blooming father on the box, radiant in all the 

 magnificence of a three-cornered gold -laced hat, 

 projecting pig-tail, bottle-nose, ponderous back, and 

 stomach without end. 



When the Duke of Blazington died, he left Peter 

 ;£2o a year; and when Peter's father died, which he 

 did in the most complimentary manner shortly after 

 his grace, Peter got what amounted to ;!^2o a-year 

 more. Our friend then married the pretty head 

 housemaid of Blazington Castle, and took the neat 

 little hostelry called the " Grapes," midway between 

 Plumley and Moss Side, so agreeably known to many 

 of our readers as the first stage on the road matri- 

 monial. This sign Peter shortly after changed into 

 that of the "Fox and Hounds," and prosperity 

 attending way-side speculation in those days, Peter 

 soon found the weekly contents of his till would 

 justify him in buying a poster that would do a little 

 hunting occasionally. Peter used then to creep out 

 on the sly, breeched and gaitered, with a stick in his 

 hand. Somehow he always happened to have business 

 in the neighbourhood of where the hounds met — 

 either a servant to hire, a horse to look at, a pig to 

 buy, corn to pay for, barley for malting to bespeak, 

 or something of that sort, and being there he would 

 just stay to see them " find." Just stay to see them 

 find ! What a charming, self-deluding sort of allow- 



