MR. SPONGE'S SPORTING TOUR. 211 



His father was a great confectioner in the Poultry, just by the Man- 

 sion House, and made his money out of Lord Mares. I shall only 

 stay with him till I can get myself suited in the rank of life in which 

 I have been accustomel to move ; but in the mean time I consider it 

 necessary for my own credit to do things as they should be. You 

 know my sort of hound ; good shoulders, deep chests, strong loins, 

 straight legs, round feet, with plenty of bone all over. I hate a 

 weedy animal ; a small hound, light of bone, is only fit to hunt a kat 

 in a kitchen. 



" I shall also want a couple of whips — not fellows like waiters 

 from Crawley's hotel, but light, active men, not boys. I'll have 

 nothing to do with boys ; every boy requires a man to look arter 

 him. No ; a couple of short, light, active men — say from five-and- 

 twcnty to thirty, with bow-legs and good cheery voices, as nearly of 

 the same make as you can find them. I shall not give them large 

 wages, you know; but they will have opportunities of improving 

 themselves under me and qualifying themselves for high places. But 

 mind, they must be steady — I'll keep no unsteady servants; the first 

 act of drunkenness, with me, is the last. 



" I shall also want a second horseman ; and here I wouldn't mind 

 a mute boy who could keep his elbows down and never touch the 

 curb ; but he must be bred in the line ; a huntsman's second horse- 

 man is a critical article, and the sporting world must not be put in 

 mourning for Dick Bragg. The lad will have to clean my boots, and 

 wait at table when I have company — yourself for instance. 



" This is only a poor, rough, ungentlemanly sort of shire, as far 

 as f have seen of it ; and how ever they got on with the things I 

 found that they called hounds I can't for the life of me imagine. I 

 understand they went stringing over the country like a flock of wild 

 geese. However, I have rectified that in a manner by knocking all 

 the fast 'uns and slow 'uns on the head ; and I shall require at least 

 twenty couple before I can take the field. In your official report of 

 what your old file puts back, you'll have the kindness to cobble us up 

 good long pedigrees, and carry half of them at least back to the Beau- 

 fort Justice. My man has got a crotchet into his head about that 

 hound, and I'm dimmed if he doesn't think half the hounds in Eng- 

 land are descended from the Beaufort Justice. These hounds are at 

 present called the Mangeysternes, a very proper title, I should say, 

 from all I've seen and heard. That, however, must be changed ; 

 and we must have a button struck, instead of the plain pewter plates 

 the men have been in the habit of hunting in. 



" As to horses, I'm sure I don't know what we are to do in that 

 line. Our pastrycook seems to think that a hunter, like one of his 

 pa's pies, can be made and baked in a clay. He talks of going over 

 to Rowdedow Fair, and picking some up himself; but I should say a 

 gentleman demeans himself sadly who interferes with the just prero- 



