A DISTINGUISHED STRANGER. 73 



" I have not," replies her brother ; " in the first place he is a 

 snob, and you know how I abominate that genus ; moreover, 

 he knows nothing of the science of hunting, and he is deficient 

 in pluck." 



" Then why on earth did you get him as Master ? " 



" Why, you know, when poor Tom Beverley came to grief 

 after his uncle's death, his cousin Robert, who came in for all 

 the old man's money, simply stepped into Tom's shoes b}^ 

 buying his house, and offering to hunt the country in his 

 place if they would guarantee a subscription of £2,000 only, 

 which was certainly a generous offer. I was in India at the 

 time or should certainly have opposed it, for Spencer Thorn- 

 hill would willingly have taken the country, though, no doubt, 

 he would have wanted a bigger guarantee. However, the 

 committee, mindful probably of their own pockets, thought 

 fit to accept his off'er, so now we are saddled with as incom- 

 petent a Master as one could well find. It would not have 

 been so bad," he goes on, ''if he would let Mason hunt the 

 hounds, but, like a good many more of them, he thinks it is 

 only necessary to sit on a horse and blow a horn to be a hunts- 

 man, and we have killed ten brace of cubs fewer than last 

 season in consequence." 



" Is Mr. Robert Beverley popular in the neighbourhood ? " 

 asks Lady Winifred. 



"With a certain few," replies her brother. "He stuff's 

 them with dinners and makes a lot of them, but though I 

 have only been down a fortnight, I can see that the best people 

 do not care for him ; and he has quarrelled with the farmers, 

 too, the idiot, and there is wire up this season where there 

 never has been in the memory of man. 



" Poor Tom ! " he continues, " what sport he showed us the 

 three years he w^as master. I wonder what became of him ? 

 Poor old chap. A better fellow never Avalked." 



" Has nothing been heard of him ! " 



