A January Frost 



welcome rain comes to open out the country 

 there will be a heavy fall of snow. You know 

 that the few flakes which fall as you walk back 

 to the house are not the prelude to the cleaning 

 up storm, though you would fain think that they 

 are ; and you know you are in for three weeks 

 or a month of it as you turn into your study, 

 light a cigar, and with a discontented grunt pick 

 up last week's sporting papers to see if from 

 them you can glean a ray of comfort. 



A prolonged frost is no doubt a great trial to 

 the patience of any sportsman, but the man of 

 leisure who, if he cannot hunt on Monday can 

 hunt on Tuesday and so on throughout the 

 week, and from one week to another, is not so 

 much to pity after all, unless the days run into 

 weeks and the weeks into months, as they do 

 sometimes, but, thank the Fates, not very often 

 in this England of ours. 



He who is to pity, however, is the hard 

 worker — professional or business man — who is 

 so keen on the sport that he takes his hardly- 

 earned holiday in the hunting season. Perhaps 

 a fortnight is all that he can spare from a busy 



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