<^n (Apology to J\Ir. Surtees 



the rearguard of the hunt composed of the road, gate, and 

 gap brigade. How well he understands the feelings of the 

 funker ! And how kindly he expresses them when he makes 

 Mr. Jorrocks soliloquise during a run. Here are two choice 

 specimens. Mr. Jorrocks was alone with the hounds on 

 the famous Cat and Custard Pot Day. (It will be re- 

 membered that James Pigg arrived at the meet drunk, and 

 was sent home, while a suggestion from Harry Capper 

 that a subscription should be raised for Pigg, with whom 

 there seems to have been some sympathy, had the effect of 

 dispersing the field.) No one to show him the way down 

 bridle roads. ' '' 'Eavens be praised, 'ere 's a gate," as his 

 quick eye caught sight of one in the corner of the field.' 

 On another occasion he exclaims, ' What a huntsman I 

 should be if it were not for the leaps.' It would be inter- 

 esting to know how many huntsmen have said, or at least 

 thought, something of the kind. This last saying is in- 

 tensely human, and is one of the best things in the book. 

 It hits the feelings of the funker bang in the middle of the 

 note. It gives with one touch nearly everything that has 

 made Mr. Jorrocks a sportsman, vital, human, and enduring. 

 For the old man understood all about Fox-hunting. In 

 the back office of his tea-dealing establishment in London 

 he had mastered the theory of the Chase by reading Beck- 

 ford until he knew him backwards. He had seen some- 

 thing of the practice of the art in the hills of Surrey where 

 there were not too many fences. Then he comes down to 

 the stiffly enclosed vale of Sheepwash, and would give 



25 



