SPORTING FOR MEN OF MODERATE MEANS 271 



The rain is pattering against my windows, and it is 

 a wild wet night ; but still I am contented, and 

 looking out for to-morrow, when I am going to 

 have a day's rabbit-shooting, and beat a favourite 

 snipe marsh. 



I like to have my dogs about me, although I am 

 not a single man, and have boys as tall as myself. 

 Yet my dumb animals are companions to me — 

 shooting alone for so many years in vast forests 

 and thinly-inhabited countries, and often far away 

 from friends and civilised life, has made me some- 

 what lonely in habits. 



It sometimes makes me laugh to hear some men 

 talk on sporting matters. I have often been trudg- 

 ing home late at night, wet through, or in a heavy 

 snow-storm, with my tired dogs " at heel," when 

 others have had a good dinner, a skinful of wine, 

 finished their third glass of toddy, are beginning to 

 talk rather thick, and find their cigars won't draw. 

 I was obliged to content myself with a cup of sour 

 cider, black rye-bread and eggs, and up and away 

 before daylight again. Certainly I need not have 

 done so ; and sitting here, before my comfortable 

 fire, I think how soft I was. But young men will 

 be young men ; and it was my love of sport that 

 made me lead the wild and solitary life I did. 



But there is no occasion for any one to do as I 



