LORD E\'ERGREEN 219 



We have looked into Bailey, Richardson, and several of the 



old dictionaries, to see if they throw an}' light on the origin of 



the term, but we have drawn them all blank. Bailey gives 



" Tuft ■' {toiiffe F), a lock of hair, or bunch of ribbons, &c., also 



the crest of a bird, and then "Tuft (with botanists), a thicket 



of trees, bunch of grass," &c. ; while Richardson deals much 



in the same sort of description, giving "Tuft — the top, or 



summit," leading one to suppose that one might say, " the tuft 



of the morning," instead of the " top of the morning to you," 



a species of phraseology we never heard indulged in. In the 



long tail of quotations with which this worthy gentleman 



obscures the meaning of words, there is one allusion to 



hunting, certainly, but not with the pack we allude to. The 



c] notation is as follows : — 



" With his hounds 

 The l.ibouring hunter /i/f/s the thick unbaibed grounds. 

 Where harliour'd is the hart.'' 



That is not our pack — ours are the two-legged hounds — the 

 talking, babbling, fawning, courting, humbugging, glozing 

 things called men. After all is said and done, we are inclined 

 to adopt the hNpothesis (to make use of a fine word) of a friend, 

 and attribute the term to the gold tassels or tufts worn by 

 noblemen at our universities, which distinguish them from the 

 common herd, just as a fox's brush distinguishes it from a hare. 

 Indeed there can be no doubt that that is the origin of the 

 term, and we will thank the next dictionary maker to add 

 " Tuft Hunter" to the T's, and describe them as " a breed of 

 men whose offence is rank," or a breed of men desperately 

 smitten with title. Rank at school doesn't go for much — at 

 least not at our great schools where lords abound, and a 

 marquis may be fag to a milliner's son, but at college rank 

 dawns forth like a meteor, and subsequent adulation atones for 

 early familiarity and humiliations. Then the fine nose of the 

 Tuft Hunter begins to show itself, and men lay the foundation 



