208 WHIP AND SPUR. 



very spicy mount, "Excuse me, are you going 

 to Brinklow 1 ? You must turn to the right." 



Confound these Englishmen, thought I, where 

 is their traditional coldness and reserve? And I 

 reined up for a chat. 



My companion came from the vicinity of Bir- 

 mingham. Like so many of his class, he devotes 

 three days a week to systematic hunting, and 

 he was as enthusiastic as an American boy could 

 have been in telling me all I wanted to know 

 about the sport. To get hold of a grown man 

 who had never seen a foxhound seemed an event 

 for him, and my first instructions were very agree- 

 ably taken. Our road ran past the beautiful deer- 

 stocked park of Coombe Abbey, where the green 

 grass of a moist December and the thick cluster- 

 ing growth of all-embracing ivy carried the fresh 

 hues of our summer over the wide lawn and to 

 the very tops of the trees about the grand old 

 house. The few villages on our way were neither 

 interesting nor pleasant, but the thatched farm- 

 houses and cottages, and the wonderful ivy, and 

 the charming fields and hedges were all that 

 could have been asked. 



