THE HUNTSMAN 47 



they books ! take, I say, my advice, sir, and stoody fox- 

 hunting." Luke, Colonel Cook says, gave his whole body and 

 and mind to it, and famously he succeeded, as all the country 

 around could testify. A wag, for amusement, and to annoy a 

 musical friend that was present, asked the old Huntsman 

 " how he employed his time out of the hunting season ? " 

 The veteran disdained a reply to a question that showed so 

 little knowledge of the duties and cares of a Huntsman, and 

 the querist proceeded with, " What think you of music for 

 an amusement ? " " Music ! " contemptuously echoed Luke. 

 " Aye, fiddling, Mr. Freeman." " Fiddling, fiddling," replied 

 Luke; "it's all very well for cripples, poor things! I always 

 give them a halfpenny when I sees them at the fairs." Beck- 

 ford has a cut at the musicians also. " Louis the Fifteenth," 

 writes he, " was so passionately fond of hunting that it occu- 

 pied him entirely. The then King of Prussia, who never 

 hunted, gave up a great deal of his time to music, and himself 

 played on the flute. A German meeting a Frenchman, asked 

 him, very impertinently, 'Si son viaitrc chassoit toujours?' 

 ' Oiii, oiti^ replied the other, ' // ncjoiic jamais dc la flute' " 



A Huntsman's head generally runs upon hunting. If he 

 rides, or rails through a country, he looks at it with reference 

 to riding over it. If he examines the crops, it is merely to 

 see when they will be ripe. Woodland scenery draws forth 

 observations upon cub-hunting. Hills are looked at with an 

 eye to the easiest way up. When Williamson, the Duke of 

 Buccleuch's Huntsman, visited London, his Grace told him he 

 must see the sights. " But," replied Wool, as they call him, 

 though he is no relation of our friend Cottonwool, " I don't 

 know the country, and shall be lost." His Grace then sent 

 him out on horseback, with a groom after him, and Nimrod 

 says Wool was taken for a newly-made lord. Talking of 

 countries reminds us of a story they used to tell of the late 

 Lord Spencer, when Lord Althorp, and Dick Knight, his 



