CHRISTOPHER IN HIS SPORTING JACKET 



cairn only a little lower than the falcon's nest. 



What signifies any sport in the open air, except 

 in congenial scener}' of earth and heaven? Go, thou 

 gentle Cockney! and angle in the New River; — but, 

 bold Englishman, come with us and try a salmon-cast 

 in the old Tay. Go, thou gentle Cockney ! and course 

 a suburban hare in the purlieus of Blackheath; — 

 but, bold Englishman, come with us and course an 

 animal that never heard a city-bell, by day a hare, 

 by night an old woman, that loves the dogs she 

 dreads, and, hunt her as you will with a leash and a 

 half of lightfoots, still returns at dark to the same 

 form in the turf-dike of the garden of the mountain 

 cottage. The children, who love her as their own eyes 

 — for she has been as a pet about the family, summer 

 and winter, since that chubby-cheeked urchin, of 

 some five years old, first began to swing in his self- 

 rocking cradle — will scarcely care to see her started 

 — nay, one or two of the wickedest among them will 

 join in the halloo; for often, ere this, "has she cheated 

 the very jowlers, and lauched ower her shouther at 

 the lang dowgs walloping ahint her, sair forfaquhen, 

 up the benty brae — and it's no the day that she's 

 gaun to be killed by Rough Robin, or smooth Spring, 

 or the red Bick, or the hairy Lurcher — though a' 

 fowr be let lowse on her at ance, and ye surround 

 her or she rise." What are your great big fat lazy 

 [29] 



