404 THE BEST OF THE FUN 



so now. But, if you value your summer happiness, don't 

 miss a day, even if you let the bills stand over until April 

 ist. The old axiom, " Hunt six days a week until Christ- 

 mas, and as many as you can afterwards," never applied 

 better than to this year. Have you done your duty by the 

 first part ? The sharpest sport sometimes takes place in 

 November ; the longest runs in February — and why ? be- 

 cause in these months you are likely to be running the old 

 foxes. At other times, except occasionally, they are hidden 

 up, and, likely enough, in the end meet their death at the 

 mouth of lurcher, steel trap, or gun. 



In the country what is there left for us ? The daily 

 paper, the morning stroll while shivering helpers circle the 

 straw ride ; the evening cigar and the midnight meditation ; 

 the conjuring up of old scenes, old faces, perhaps dead 

 faces. Pack my portmanteau. Let me seek my fellow-men 

 in the warm smoking-room of the club, and in London 

 make a holiday of this leisure time. 



Of the Pytchley, We are permitted to know the secret 

 of ownership and origin of the rather plain but exceedingly 

 clever couple of hounds that, in fair weather or foul, on a 

 cold scent or a hot one, have been leading the Pytchley 

 lady pack for the last few weeks. They belong, it appears, 

 to Mr. Lort Philips, Master of the Pembrokeshire, and well 

 remembered in the Rugby country as carrying the horn in 

 many a merry gallop while Master of the North Warwick- 

 shire. And their breeding is a cross of the old Welsh hounds 

 as retained in the Llangibby and Chepstow kennel. Thus, 

 Dimple, the yellow hound that so continually caught the 

 eye of the least informed of us, was by the Llangibby 

 Danger — Taunton Vale Verity ; while the other, Sportive, 

 was by Llangibby Sultan — North Warwickshire Fairy. 

 Some of you may have been present at the hound sale at 

 Rugby the year before last, and may remember a strikingly 

 good-looking couple of dog-hounds among the number 

 disposed of by Mr. Lort Philips when reducing his pack. 

 These were (if my worthless memory does not altogether 

 fail me) Saracen and Saladin ; and these I had the fortune 

 subsequently to see running hard at the head of Mr. 

 Merthyr Guest's pack in the Blackmore Vale. Critical 



