'nearly in a straight line to the pitch, and comes up comparatively straight from the pitch; but you give a man curved lines to deal ' with and upright curves too-no one can cut a curved rise correctly, nor hit correctly to leg either.' Clarke caught at this explanation: he had never thought of it before. Slows' without elevation, and 'slows' too slow-as also 'slows' spin, and extreme accuracy is the way to bowl a match away.

2. The second observation I have to make relates to a manly style and elegance in batting. Watch Hayward at the wicket, or Mr. Fellowes: they just touch the block-hole with the bat to ascertain the line of the wicket, and then each stands up to his full height in a commanding attitude like a man. R. Daft, Anderson, and Carpenter do the same, as also Mr. Grace, and surely no one can pretend to say that any men in England have a better defence, or are down more quickly upon a shooting ball than are these men generally. But look at others-nineteen out of twenty at leastthere they stand with bended knees, half a foot shorter than Nature made them, and without half the reach, the command, or the strength that they ought to have. Some men stand at guard with a long, flat, horizontal back, like cows. Some stick out behind so indecently, we wonder they are not ashamed that any ladies should see them; and almost all are cramped and all up in a heap-in a word, if you want to see a man looking at a deplorable disadvantage to any non-cricketing observer, only see him in at cricket.

Need we say that ease and elegance are one-that the limbs must look easy to play easy, and that you never can use your arms and legs to advantage unless you let them move with all the freedom and composure which characterize all the ordinary gestures and movements of life. Verbum sat. We commend this observation to the members of the M. C. C., and entreat them, by degrees, to introduce the custom, if not the written law, to put no man into an M. C. C. match who disgraces the Club by attitudes not to be exaggerated even by Punch.'

STAG HUNTING IN LOWER BRITTANY.

AMONG the many estimable country gentlemen who are wont to wile away their time on a wet day by studying literature in the pages of Baily' (not the ancient lexicographer of that name, but the modern Turf and Forest caterer of Cornhill), a few, perhaps, may be found who would not object to the history of a day's sport in a French forest. Lest, however, a fit of the gout may be the result of such a digression from their ordinary diet, I beg to premise, in limine, that they must not expect from a charcoal country the same substantial fare that Collyns so well describes, or that Fenwick Bissett so bountifully provides for his guests in the glorious forests of the

wild Exmoor.

Elysian fields are they though with joy I say it as yet there is

little of the ghost about the latter gentleman; and if his horses were gifted as Balaam's ass was, I believe they would bear me out in this broad assertion.

So much for the drag; now for the chase. During the whole summer, but especially during the last few weeks, the peasants of Landeri, on the north side of the Forest of Pencoet, in Morbihan, have been suffering from the depredations of a red deer, remarkable for his shifty habits and the enormous span of his antlers, by which he was readily known throughout the whole of that mountain land. He was supposed to consume a bushel of corn per night, which was certainly within the mark; for the havoc he made in many a golden wheat-field was traceable by avenues of bare straw, the ears of which he had cropped off in his nightly raids. Consequently, when every device had been practised in vain for his destruction, and traps, pitfalls, guns, and even a pack of wolves that had been seen to hunt him had failed to effect it, a deputation from the peasantry waited on the Mayor of Landeri to pray that a public chasse might be organized for the capture of this grand cerf.

So the mayor gave his consent, but he did it in this way: he wrote to the Baron Keryfan, and begged him to bring his pack of hounds to the Forest of Pencoet on the 12th August; and then he invited every man that could carry a gun in that and the neighbouring communes to join in the chase. The rendezvous was in the Valley of Kergoat, on the banks of a brawling brook that flashed like liquid silver over its granite bed: a wilder spot and a wilder scene were never witnessed even by the hunters of that genêt land. Peasants in every variety of quaint costume, such as they donned in the days of Anne of Britanny, mingled freely, but not intrusively, among a few fine, veritable specimens of the ancien noblesse, still to be found in those fastnesses; then the piqueurs, with their endless horns, and the pack of noble hounds that accompanied them, made me express my deep regret to the baron that no artist was present to perpetuate that glorious scene. With such materials Grant or Landseer would have added fresh and imperishable laurels to their already well-decked brows: but to describe it with a pen is impossible. At 8 o'clock A.M. the joyful tidings arrived that the stag had been safely harboured by a piqueur, who vouched for his identity by the broad slot imprinted on the soil. Immediately a handsome 'cap' rewarded his success; and, as soon as the band of bloodthirsty. peasants could be posted in guerilla fashion at certain points on the edge of the cover, three couple of fine deep-flewed hounds were uncoupled, trotted off, and at once laid on his line.

In twenty minutes from that time the tufters had turned him out of his lair. Ye gods! how shall I tell of the fanfare of trumpets that accompanied that find? or how narrate the peal of melody that burst on the ear as twenty couples of hounds threw their tenor tongues simultaneously on the forester's track?

He quailed not, however, before the crash, but, tossing his antlers high in the air, away he went as proudly as a tambour-major at the

head of his band. He little dreamt, however, that the foe was in front as well as in rear, till the crack of a gun and the whistle of a bullet suddenly warned him of his danger. Luckily for me the brave beast escaped that and other bullets, as he had frequently done before; but if the impotent curses that followed him had carried weight, enough were hurled at him to sink a seventy-four. But away he went, light as a lark, and away went the pack, now clear of the footmen, and settling to the scent in downright earnest.

The country over which the chase was flying was very similar to our Hampshire downs; so, as I ride only a pound or two over ten stone, and had a quick, thorough-bred Arab between my knees, I had a capital opportunity of observing the hounds, and the style in which they did their work. In this respect I am bound to say they surprised me greatly: there was none of that tailing so common in stag-hunting: no hounds behind throwing their tongues and making believe that they were the leaders of the chase: but, on the contrary, now the pace was becoming serious, there was little or no music to be heard from the body of the pack. They swung like fox-hounds over the scent, ran hard and true, and carried a capital head throughout the run. I never saw better work in my life-never.

An hour over the open is no joke for horses in any country; and I believe, if it had not been for a cover in front of us, that not two out of the twenty horsemen would have gone for ten minutes longer.

Here, however, the deer hung a while, and either underwent a Protean process, or raked up a younger stag: the latter proved to be the fact, but the dodge availed him nothing. The baron blew his horn, and, with an obedience which I never saw equalled in a hunting-field before, every hound stopped in chase and flew to the sound. Again the great deer was once more on his legs, and again he broke cover apparently as fresh and as strong as ever.

For three mortal hours that gallant beast went as straight as a crow could fly, and then took soil in a large fish-pond belonging to a monastery, the name of which I had no time to inquire. This let in Henri Larochejacquelin, Keryfan, and myself, the sole survivors of the morning's meet. After a cast round the pond, which was overhung with old willows and drooping oak trees, Keryfan spied the deer, sunk up to his eyes in water; a rope was soon obtained, a lasso formed, and in a throw or two Keryfan had him securely. The rope, passed over the fork of an oak, brought him quickly to the bank; and in another moment a couteau de chasse drank his life's blood.

The deer, which must have been rare venison, fed as it was on corn and wild thyme, was given by Keryfan to the monks (who were in at the death, as monks usually are), and, doubtless, many a hearty grace was said over such dainty food. The antlers, which carried ten points, Keryfan presented to me, saying, at the same time, Cut down every stick on your estate, Frank, before you 'that little Arab into money: he travels like oil, and you'll never < own a better horse.' FRANK FEATHERSTONE.

turn

A COLLEGE FINGERPOST.

PART V.

'WHERE ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise.' Have we any truer proverb than this, or one which bears a closer relationship to the acts and habits of mankind generally? Probably not. I forget what Latin author remarks that A knowledge of the future would 'have been by no means useful to old Priam.' It is wisely ordained that the future, even from hour to hour and day to day, is a sealed book to us; it is essential to our happiness and well-being, in both a moral and social point of view, that we cannot foresee what is to happen. To me it is ever a pleasing and consolatory task, as well as a most instructive one, to look back upon the wisdom of the philosophers of old; upon their intimate knowledge of human nature; their correctness of sentiment; their logical reasoning and admirable simplicity of expression, all acquired under necessarily difficult circumstances, living, as they did, in an age of comparative darkness and uncivilized barbarity. Hence their little sayings and casual remarks occasionally take deep root in one's memory, and not unfrequently, when properly applied, act as incentives, or checks, as the case may be, upon one's thoughts, words, and deeds. Philosophers don't thrive in the present day: the race is all but extinct. Pro'verbial philosophy' one has heard of, and some few have read; but, as a rule, men know it not, even by name. Moralists there are; but they are few and far between;' they, like mushrooms, spring up at certain seasons only, peculiarly favourable to themselves. The crop, at best, is very scanty, for the seed sown is found to be tampered with; sometimes with rottenness at the core; and so men tread it under foot, and consequently cause the toil of the moralist to become flat, stale, and unprofitable.' Theirs is not a paying game; their seed, like wheat at the time I am writing, is a drug' in the market; not, 'pari ratione,' because of the abundance thereof, but still equally unremunerative, because of the doubtful measure by which it is meted, and of the speculative selfishness which forms the bag in which it is introduced into the market of public opinion. Turf morality has long ceased to exist. Prophets we have in abundance, and, strange to say, they almost all appear to find honour in their own country.' They also, like fungi, spring from the Turf,' and are esteemed, if not by the mouth, yet by the eye, a great delicacy. Their substance, which often consists solely of a few lines in a sporting paper by way of pointing out future events,' is most eagerly devoured by the eye of man. We have the many-eyed Argus,' Augur,' Observer,' Hotspur,' Judex,' and a shoal of smaller fry: but yet all their fancies; certainties, barring health; guarantees; tips; and secrets worth knowing, could not have impressed my mind with anything like the slightest indication of what was coming off on the morning after my day at The Pigeons.' All the touts in the world could not have had an idea that I was

VOL. VIII.-No. 55.

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about to be put through the mill,' and to have a trial, giving away lumps of weight to older nags than myself. They might have been skulking about at the foot of every staircase in quad,' and as they saw me emerge with my clothing' on, en route for the spot where the trial was to come off, they would have been in as great ignorance as to what was really about to take place; as to how I was also to be sweated; handled; pulled up; then increased in my work; next unjustly confined to my stall; as they were, I rejoice to say, deluded, nonplussed, and anticipated (by the consummate tact and industry of Edwin Parr) in reference to the gallant horse Lord Clifden, during his preparation for the Sellinger. Yet I was in a somewhat similar predicament to that of the Telscombe touts in the instance above-similar, merely because I had not the remotest conception of what was about to take place, yet dissimilar, because I had never attempted to arrive at a certainty' of the issue of any thing so fickle, uncertain, and unseen as I knew my interview with the Dean (for whatever cause he wanted me) must of course be! And what was the consequence? No innocent man ever went before a judge with more calm self-possession, with more unsuspecting hope, and less nervousness or fear, than I had as I strolled across quad' to the deanery on that luckless day. How true sang my old favourite Horace, a philosopher indeed!—

I feel it quite necessary here to state that body and mind being out of order on the previous evening (the brandy being in, and the senses consequently out), I had entirely forgotten, on the morning succeeding my encounter with the college porter, which I mentioned in the last paper, so entirely, that although I noticed him-' the • pampered menial'-making his way in his best livery, not more than twenty yards before me, to the deanery, the thought never struck me that he was to be one of my prosecutors. I recollect well, even to this day, how weak, dejected, and poorly I felt-how, in a manner, I felt exceedingly sorry for myself, although fear of what was to come had nothing to do with my state of feeling, for, in truth, I had not had time or inclination to think. Even my last dream of knocking out the Dean's eye with a spur had not made a lasting impression upon me. The fact was, I was inwardly mourning and sighing over the state of my head and body; and, simply because there was no one to sympathize with me, I made a virtue of necessity, and was deeply sympathizing with myself. Of what great worth would pity just then have been considered by me-surely as a pearl of price! What did I long for so much as the outpourings of a kindly heart! Commiseration only is by the world stigmatized as something cold and paltry. Perhaps it is so deservedly; but, recollect, I was but young at the time, with a heart not as yet become rusty through frequent rubbing up against the iron-like hardness and indifference of the world; and with a mind not alto