A CLUB-ROOM. 13 



world, and the slashingest heavy weight in all Leices- 

 tershire, that is Lord Alvanley ; he who proposed to 

 amend the constitution of the natural and civil year, 

 by having all the frost and snow of the former, all the 

 Sundays of the latter, gathered into the months of 

 April, May, June and July, so that neither weather 

 nor worship should interfere with the sportsman's 

 occupation, from the first of shooting on the moors in 

 August until the last of fox-hunting in March. 



He with a chin almost as long as that of Titus 

 Gates, of ill memory, making his mouth appear to be 

 in the centre of his face, that is Molyneux, except 

 his father Sefton, the best finger on four horses in 

 the kingdom, and second to very few at a brook or a 

 bullfinch. 



Musgrave and Magher, Goodricke and Holyoke sit 

 in close conclave with the Squire, discussing points 

 of bone and muscle, breeding and^ blood, as if the 

 nation's weal thereon depended, in low tones, of which 

 nothing escaped to the general ear, except now and 

 then some such phi-ase as " splendid arm" — '' why, yes ; 

 a little cross-made, but monstrous power, and then 

 such a stride " — or, "no — by Timoleon out of an Or- 

 ville mare," or scnuething of similar import relating to 

 what was to those most veritable members of the 

 equestrian order, the only serious subject of thought 

 and object of life. 



Others of less note, younger, yet ardent votaries of 

 the chase, were lounging about, sipping cofiee or cura- 

 coa, chatting of the news of the day, the best run of 

 the season, which had occurred on that very Saturday ; 

 whose horse had lived to the end of it ; how Osbaldis- 

 tone's "Clasher" had cleared the Union Canal lock 

 between Turlangton and Countisthorpe, twenty-five 

 feet of bright water in his stride ; how many of his 

 ribs, or whether it was his collar-bone, Grantly Ber- 

 keley broke in that tremendous push over the park 



