136 THE LIFE OF A SPORTSMAN 



arrived in a town, at the edge of night, by a diligence, on 

 his road to visit a friend ; and on being informed that his 

 house was only a ' mile distant,' he set off to walk. Guess 

 his surprise, then, on finding that he had to walk nearly 

 four miles of the measure of his own country. There 

 were no less than four distinct French leagues, varying 

 from 1500 to 3000 paces ; neither of them, I believe, 

 adopted now. Nevertheless, ask twenty Frenchmen what 

 is the extent of a modern French league ? and nineteen of 

 the twenty will be unable to tell you. It is generally 

 supposed to be 3000 geometrical paces, or three English 

 miles, but I believe the case to be this : twenty-five 

 French leagues make seventy miles, which renders the 

 length of ground five miles less, in that given number of 

 leagues, than if the leagues were exactly three English 

 miles. Then, again, among the ancient Romans there 

 was the like confusion respecting this measure of distance, 

 commonly called a mile. It was generally expressed by the 

 words mille passus, a thousand feet; but the exact extent of 

 it is by no means defined. One author makes it to consist 

 of seven stadia ; Plutarch, little short of eight ; Strabo 

 and Polybius, just eight. The reason of this discordance 

 seems to be, the difference between the Grecian and the 

 Roman foot, the first-named being the greatest. The 

 Romans, however, had a stone (' lapis ') which we call the 

 ' mile-stone,' at the end of each mile, the number marked 

 on it denoting the distance from Rome. Augustus, 

 indeed, erected a gilt pillar in the forum of that city, at 

 which all the public roads, or ' ways,' of Italy, dis- 

 tinguished by stones, were terminated ; and the same 

 was afterwards done in the provinces. Hence the 

 traveller would find tertius lapis on one denoting three ; 

 centesimus lapis, a hundred miles," &c. 



CHAPTER VIII 



Rural life in hall and field : a ball and a wound (consequences alike 

 common in love and war). 



THE period of our hero's brief visit to the metropolis 

 of all that is gay and voluptuous having expired, he 

 set out again for Amstead Abbey, where his arrival was 



