260 THE CREAM OF LEICESTERSHIRE. [Seasox 



haste would be excused, and asked that lie or she would write 

 again ver}- soon. Then an hour among the bookshelves, — a 

 scrap here, a page there, Somerville and Shakespeare, Burnand 

 and Burns, Mark Twain and Alfred Tennj^son — a taste of each 

 is better than a surfeit of any one, especially for a memory like 

 a Avaste paper basket. Capital day for looking over the guns, 

 that have been lying by a month or two. Found them rusty. 

 Accordingly proceeded to clean and lay out well-oiled frag- 

 ments on each piece of furniture within reach, which shortly, 

 and not unnaturall}', brought down the wrath of the housewife. 

 Wondered what women do wlien tliey don't hunt — and we do. 

 They can't order dinner all day. Yer}^ fortunate for them that 

 they should have us at home thus, once in the fortnight — and 

 the more so that our conversation under such circumstances is 

 .so brilliantly entertaining — its sole subjects being the disgust- 

 ing appearance of the weather and the extreme hardship of 

 being thus pent up in their societ}'. Dinner next, and a 

 marvellous appetite considering disappointment endured, want 

 of exercise, and the shattered constitution that kej^t one within- 

 doors. But they say they were very cold and wet outside ; and 

 had onl}' a slow afternoon limit from Hungerton Foxholes to 

 Noi-ton. 



THE BELVOIR AT HOME AND ABROAD. 



Wednesday, Nov. 27th. — Tlie Belvoir at Waltham. If 

 there could be variance of opinion as to the pace hounds 

 travelled 3'esterday, there will ))e little argument on the subject 

 of to-day. It was a thorovigh Belvoir burst — bright, bustling, 

 and brilliant. Let us pass over the morning, when from 

 Melton Spinney, starting close to their fox, they were headed 

 back just at the Melton Brook — hij a j^f^dlar, forsootli. ^Miat 

 in Heaven's name could a pedlar, and his pack, have been 

 doing by the side of Melton Brook ? And what wares could 

 he have hoped to sell there, unless he brought a stock 



