real sportsmen, so suggestive are they of cub-hunting and of staying at the 'Hay-cock' at Wandsford to see that last fox killed on the fourth of May. Postume! postume! years pass. Do they kill that May fox' now? But no matter. The glorious baying of hounds, which, if not brought to the coverside in our fashion, are still a 'pack,' and which also, remember, is going not to hunt a calf out of a carriage, but a wild animal found by hounds-the presence of scores of men who will tell us that we French understand venerie, while you English understand only the chasse, which, rendered into our native tongue, means that in France they hunt the vermin, no-the noble deer! in England we jump 'obstacles' to get near the dogs which hunt that deer!--the interest of a population which, if not restrained by mounted police, would be as noisy as the dusky shoemakers of Raunds, and as destructive of their own sport-all that, I say, proves that there is a love of 'chasing' in France. The Prince of Wales, who rode a very nice chestnut called 'Marignan,' was the centre of attraction at the meet, and it is not odd, as he wore the scarlet and leather of the British sportsman; and from the time when Adam took to wearing summer clothes (where would Poole, Davis, Smallpage, &c., have been but for that dispute about a pippin ?) till now there has never been such a dress. Three other redcoats, too, were on duty that day, and they just put in the tint which was required to make up the picture -contrast of colour is beautiful, but want of scent is the reverse.

When Baron Lambert let loose the dogs of chase, I expected a brilliant burst. Before us was a noble stag of ten (I believe in writing nine is the least you can say), 'not been gone ten minutes.' A flourish of horns, and H. R. H. settled down in his saddle, threw away a good small cigar, jammed on his hat, and prepared for business. Principis ad exemplar, others jammed on their hats, and each looked certus eundi, i.e., like going. Whimperer by (Cambridgeshire) Whisperer hit it off cleverly, but did not speak. Trumpeter by the Beaufort Rattler scored to cry, and so did several others the names of which I regret to say I cannot publish; but there was one old hound out of, I suppose, a Bedfordshire kennel, which, marked with an ‘O,' and having rather a curved stern, must have been called 'Ninety,' and she once gave tongue, and at her every good sportsman rode. Alas! you cannot ride through a forest the trees in which are as thick as leaves in Vallambrosa. Pace, however, was not wanting, and so with a burning scent and in rides like those, when dry, in the New Forest, but not in such a scenting country, everybody went off at score. After ten minutes a man said to me, 'And the 'hounds!' 'Hush! Prince,' I replied; 'we never mention them-besides, 'they run and are silent; let us do so and sail away.' 'Avanti! avanti!' says Mon Prince, putting an unnecessary spur to his steed. A period of five minutes is supposed to have elapsed. 'Can't we jump anything?' asks an agonized voice, as if a stranger from the Shires, and then I overheard it sigh out, All galloping-such going! Oh, what would I give for a stile with a bad 'footboard, or even a good high gate, painted white! But the voice was an even tenor (like Tom Hohler).

Pounding away went H. R. H.; pounding after him came the respectful 'field.' Mr. Gamble, on a very neat one, but scarcely what you would buy for a baby's first mount, close in attendance, behind him boys with the Prince's second and third horses. Speculative sportsmen take lines of their own, and find them hard and short lines. Men with dogs in bunches stand at corners of rides; several hornblowers sound 'Tra-la-i-la' (any old sportsman who really is fond of the science will understand this, and play it on his

horn); several men out of mufti on runaway chargers remind you that cavalry must be quartered in the neighbourhood ;-a very quick twenty minutes all over grass, and not a check. Suddenly there is one.

Où est la chasse? Where is the hunt?' as they would say in old Ireland (God bless her! and may her bed be a potato-bed). There is a whimper, 'like a dog in a dream.' 'Harkforward!' says the Huntsman-in-Chief. 'Pardon,' says a French-horn blower, 'that is the little chase.' That means that the pack has separated, and that two deer are afoot. And the great chase?' asked the M. I. S. H. Excellency, it is somewhere.' So Baron X-plays Tra-la-i-la on his horn, and gallops off 'somewhere' in search of the grand chase. The result is, that having galloped two thoroughbreds to death, and having never seen a stag except several which we were not hunting, we go home and say that we have had-and, indeed, we have had-a capital day's sport. Ah! gentle reader, you little know what it is to ride dressed in green and gold, on your head a cocked-hat, by your side a rapier, with which to kill the deer, if you see him, and no greater person is by at the kill-if you are, sheathe your rapier.

Do

The Page killed the boar, and the King got the gloire.'

you remember that day at Plessis, when the parson came to grief? So it is here, so it is everywhere-never ride before your betters. But I say it is hunting, and I know it is galloping.

The deer is lost, sir,' says first huntsman to the M. I. S. H. 'Is he?' asks the Master. Then let us go home, and be sure we worry and eat him ' at nine.'

One hunt this month, however, was nearly being unpleasantly remarkable : for, as you have long since heard, a deer charged the Prince of Wales, and gave him such a collar-bones' as is seldom to be enjoyed out of the Shires. It was not a nice fall to witness, and, indeed, I have seen one or two men forget to get up, or come to themselves, for an hour or two after such a cropper; but I presume that H.R.H. has had falls before, and so got clear of his horse. There was, truth to tell, an awful panic; but, shorter than most panics, and cured in a different way, it was calmed by seeing the chief sufferer paying away' liberally on a second horse before the nearest native was quite aware that he had fallen off the first. Circumstances over which I have no control prevented my seeing the grand day's shooting which followed this day's hunting.-Rossini died and must be buried.-But I can tell you that it was a very 'grande chasse' indeed, and admirably managed. Through the short cover you walk in line with soldiers-who know their duty, and do it admirably-are the beaters. Game abounds, and the result of that especial day was 1469 head of game to ten guns. The Prince of Wales, as you will perceive, headed the list; Lord Lansdowne (the only English visitor at Compiègne, except the l'rince's suite) being a good second; the Emperor third. No ladies shot on this day. I shall now give you a correct list of killed, wounded, and missing :-The gross bag was 1,469 head, which was thus composed,-1 roe-deer (which fell to the lot, and the deadly tube, of Sir William Knollys). The Emperor, 5 hares, 104 rabbits, 105 pheasants, 24 partridges, and I wood-pigeon-total, 239 head; the Prince of Wales, 4 hares, 115 rabbits, 141 pheasants, 12 partridges-total, 270 head; Maréchal Bazaine, I hare, 32 rabbits, 22 pheasants, 2 partridges-total, 57 head; Col. Keppel, I hare, 32 rabbits, 22 pheasants, 1 partridge-total, 56 head; Le Duc D'Albe, 2 hares, 61 rabbits, 34 pheasants, 3 partridges-total, 149 head; Count de

Moltke, 3 hares, 80 rabbits, 63 pheasants, 3 partridges-total, 149 head; Count Mercy Argestean, 3 hares, 48 rabbits, 42 pheasants-total, 93 head; Count de Bedmar, 2 hares, 68 rabbits, 56 pheasants, 3 partridges-total, 129 head; Lord Lansdowne, 4 hares, 163 rabbits, 87 pheasants, 6 partridges-total, 260 head; Sir William Knollys, 1 roe-deer, 1 hare, 59 rabbits, 25 pheasantstotal, 86 head. I shall now go back to Paris. The racing season of France terminated on Sunday, 22nd November, with a little meeting at Vessinet, where there were three fifty-pound plates,' a good deal of betting, many people, and good sport. The lists, and the ring, too, had the best of it; and so the racing sun of France may be said to have set glorious, and the success of the backers

Tints to-morrow with prophetic ray.'

Depend on it, next year there will be more racing in France than ever. That this plethory of sport is an advantage I will scarcely assert. Too much pudding will choke a dog-too much petty racing will choke the real interest of the French Turf. The season has been remarkable for the appearing of 'Betting Houses' in Paris, which are carried on now to such an extent that I fancy the majesty of the law must be down on them ere long. There is a 'Betting Bureau' in every second street, and in some you can stake a franc; in many, two. This is the true mischief. Messrs. Valentine and Wright are established in the Rue Choiseul, and are doing good business; but there the stakes are larger. I hear, on fair authority, that the Jockey Club' is about to establish, or, if not establish, back up, one office, where two instead of ten per cent. will be deducted. Socially, Paris is not in its usual form-an average year. Exhibiting years carry 14 lbs. extra--would give it 7 lbs. and a beating. The English elections have played the very deuce and all with travelling, and our chief passers-through are invalids bound for Italy, or punters -insatiate players-en route from Ems and Baden to Monaco. Nothing delights me so much as the way in which your travelling Englishman transacts his pleasure. Breakfast at ten, then pleasure till six, and then go home and dine quietly. To-day would be a capital day for the Louvre,' said a friend of mine, last week; it's so dark and gloomy!' and so he went off to see the glories of that gallery which is never sufficiently lighted, even when M. Phoebus Apollo is in his very best temper. But there is another and quite different traveller often here with us. I believe nobody really appreciates the sufferings of those poor individuals who are known as 'Royal Messengers.' Whenever there is a subscription got up for them I shall be delighted to give-my name. Nobody surely suffers so much as that poor swell who is at the beck and call of diplomacy. I meet him here to-day, and to-morrow hear he is delivering letters to the Khan of Tartary. He is at Berlin to-day, and was at Buda on Tuesday. Now, you cannot be farther off than Buda. I love them, they are so cheery, and take kindly five hundred miles on an empty stomach and never even wink. Still, I do not know that I should have troubled you with the woes of Royal Messengers, because you know, really, nobody cares much about them, only I chanced to pass one yesterday in the Faubourg St. Honoré, who is the father of a lieutenant in the British Navy, of whose distinguished acts I was, some two years ago, enabled to write, and who has now so distinguished himself in the river' Hau' that I hope to read that the last act of the present Admiralty will be to make Lieutenant Cecil Johnson, Captain Cecil Johnson. And then there is a dear old friend of ours, as mighty a hunter as Nimrod (whom I once heard called 'the mighty Ramrod')

himself, only that his quarry is glass and china, rather than a living quarry, has lately been here and shown us his Work on the Chase.' We all know Capt. Hawker On Fowling,' and I advise every one to get Major Byng Hall on Bric-a-brac; and if some one would translate the Bric-à-brac Hunter' into French, he would save many a Parisian from making great donkeys of themselves in the Rue du Brac, where curiosity-hunters most do congregate. Being a dull season, and the Grand Hôtel no longer the House of Call for expatriated backers, and 'pleasant but wrong' pals come over for the Sunday, as it was wont to be in the year of the great plunge-being, indeed, become as American as Delmonio's, I must introduce you to the 'Cosmopolitan,' the latest thing in meeting-houses,' to which men are moved by the spirit, and where you can get the nicest of cool drinks and hear the latest news from London. Every nation is represented, but I think I may say there are no sweeps, except those which are drawn. In fact, the company is both amusing and instructive, and the conversation improving. Racing times are, I find, the most conducive to amusing discussion; and lest the subject, from frequent discussion, should get dry, the winners usually propose to stand a cocktail,' out of gratitude to the Diva Fortuna (whose real name is Goringe), and the losers make the same proposition, in order to propitiate that deceptive deity. The hour is 6 P.M., and a black darkness bears down on the drivers in the Bois, and bores them so, that they say, 'Charles! à la maison; and then, changing their minds, they say, 'But, no! Charles, go then to the Rue Scribe;' and so they go to the street called after the composer of the Opera Comique. There they find several other devils worse than themselves. It is a cold night, and the attendance is full. You could not get a seat for a sovereign 'Poker,' and the simpler ordeal of trial by copper having occupied (this system of regulating chances is known in England, I fancy, as tossing up,' or 'skying a copper'-here as pile ou face, and is much resorted to in the highest grades of what Radical papers call the 'Sporting World,' which they believe to be peopled with horse-jockeys and black-legs). The first man I see has a hat like Garibaldi, and hair like the late Sir William Molesworth; he is neither horse-leg nor black-jockey; he is only a very. clever conjurer. He will put all the 'aces' in one spot if you wish it, bring the deuces' into the crown of your hat, and the 'cinques' into the heels of your boots. The next man is a Duke. Then we have an intermittent merchant, who sells something to somebody, when somebody wants to buy it. Here we have a swell, fresh from St. James's, with a power of aller et retour (that is not always the case, you know), who, I observe, always orders 'champagne cocktail,' as he takes the odds. A jaunty party now approaches: he is likely to have a 'good thing.' Whether he will give us that good thing will remain, of course, a matter of history for some days; but he offers one in the shape of a cool drink. We hesitate; we remember that Greeks-dona ferentes were queer customers; yet we accept the drink, and his offer of 35 to 5 (which we lose). Well! We should have lost elsewhere. How are you, Captain?' and enters swaggerer number two. He has a story about Paris, and then the conversation gets general. Never heard of it before? nonsense! Old as the hills; fancy it's older than many '-'Gave seventy-five napoleons for him, I tell you '-' And his mother was never traced ?'-' By Wanderer, out of a Gipsy mare'-' Not really worth ten shillings'-'Take a couple of 'bottles of Pommeroy and Greno, and mix them with '-' Mr. Forbes is too dry-Lagrange has not a single young one worth'-' But you should see the pupils at the early schools !'-'You should take a neat drink, now '—' I

6

'have spoken about it '---' And seltzer-water is convenient in the morning.' 'Well, I'll inquire into it'—'Won in a walk!' says Captain Dryer (from Vienna -relation of the brewer, and that sort of thing-good fellow, but no family, you know, and that sort of thing)-Robbery-weight-not English-don't ⚫ understand-confounded bungle-should come to us and learn, don't you 'know.'-'I have never of races seen such betters as was gone und run: was at the Chantillies.-(This from a German Baron.)-Take a spirit, sir? 'yes, sir,' says a hospitable Yankee. With you, sir? yes, sir;' and they do it, and, indeed, keep on doing it.-'This is a very bad system,' says the British member for Dryburgh. 'Nothing so bad as "nipping." A fair ' amount of claret, very well; but no drinks in the day. Well! you are 'so droll. For once I really will, if Mr. Thorp won't tell. A little brandy ' and water, not too weak.'-' Ah! here is Charlie; now we shall have news!' -What's won in England?'-' Nobody.—All fellars up a tree; d-d tall tree, should say a poplar, and money at 750 per cent.' And now I seem to have nearly come to the end of my tether. In the Art world we have lost Rossini. In the theatrical world we are losing Patti, who is going to Russia. Nillson is singing charmingly; Schneider is playing as usual, but not in so good a piece. Mdlle. C▬▬ P▬▬e and Madame B--d are going on the stage, and the righteous say eventually into the pit. A distinguished horsewoman of the Bois has resurrected from the tomb to which she was prematurely consigned by the 'Sporting Gazette,' and has exchanged the hearse for the neatest of broughams. The Queen of Spain is here, and says, that had she known the French were such nice people she would have resigned her crown years ago. La Belle Gabrielle,' who sells papers for napoleons hard by the entrance of the 'Grand Hôtel,' was said to be going on the stage. She is very pretty. What do you think of her?' I asked the other night of Colonel Lothario, of the Loyals, who knows his Paris like his Piccadilly. Think of her! why I should say certainly coupè, diamonds, and opera box in three weeks!' 'Tis a bad world, my readers, but so it wags in Paris at the end of this month of November, 1868.

'OUR VAN.'

THE INVOICE.-November Notions.

NOVEMBER has been customarily devoted to fogs and benefits for Clerks of Courses, but this year it has been devoted to the constituencies of the country; still, the attendance in the Ring has not suffered in the slightest degree by the Parliamentary struggle, and the follower of Mr. Disraeli betted the same odds to the disciple of Mr. Gladstone, if he was good for the money, just the same as he would have done to a member of the same party. Mr. Merry made mincemeat of Mr. Horsman, in the same manner as he contends Belladrum will do of the horses in the Derby. William Day has returned both his candidates for Dorsetshire and Dorset; and Sir Robert Clifton is still the chosen idol of Nottingham. Stockton has proudly manifested her recognition of Mr. Dodd's merits as promoter of the Turf in that part of the world; and we are glad to think the claims of the proprietor of The Field' have not been allowed to go unnoticed at Taunton. Devonshire has not neglected the faithful attachment to his duties which the Romeo Lord