Hendlie, a physician, who also failed in making anything of them. From this date, the search for gold, as an article of commerce, appears to have been abandoned, although small quantities continued to be obtained even up to the present time by desultory and unauthorised washings, and sold as objects of curiosity.

(To be continued.)

THE FARMERS AND FOXHUNTING.

Lord Londesborough has announced that on and after the First of January his tenantry will have permission to kill the hares and rabbits on their respective farms. So that the New Year opens well for Agriculture in one way at any rate; for an act like this is by no means confined to the estate upon which, in the first instance, it comes into operation. On the contrary, such a declaration carries with it all the force of a good example, and an example that has now for some years past been gradually extending its influence. Indeed, any such a paragraph now looks as familiar as that some other landlord has returned twenty per cent. on his rents in consequence of the ravages of the cattle plague, or that some bountiful landlady has been distributing blankets and coals at Christmas time. It would be unwise to underrate concessions of this kind, if it be not almost impossible to make too much of them. The neighbouring gentry cannot hold out for long when they witness the popularity which follows on the fact of the farmer getting fair-play from the Squire; and the force of public opinion, or what Mr. Thompson calls writing articles for the newspapers, is sure to tell, sooner or later. But, in giving all due appreciation to a grant so graciously proffered as that we have just cited, it may be as well to see what is due from the other side, or how far the occupier may minister to the pursuits of the owner of the soil. All country gentlemen either are, or ought to be, something of sportsmen, at heart and in practice. Whether it be with dog and gun, rod and line, or horse and hound, it is a taste for pastimes like these that does much to keep the man of means to his own home, as it is the non-resident landlord who, of all others, is the most liable to sanction abuses, of the actual effect of which he himself knows little or nothing. The battue is often enough the only incentive for a nobleman ever paying a visit to his property, when he fills the House for a week, and leaves again with his friends, the proper amount of slaughter having been accomplished, without endangering the stock or offending the keeper. This is just about the last man in England who would ever volunteer to give over the hares and rabbits to his tenantry, or dispense with his bands of spies and watchers. Only, however, encourage him to live a little more amongst you, and to see and judge a little for himself, and he may soon become an altered man. And how is this to be brought about? Mainly, we repeat, by ministering to the country gentleman's occupations, or in other words to his amusements. Foremost amongst these, as the national

sport of the country, stands foxhunting; one in which, be it ever borne in mind, the farmer may and frequently does share, as there is perhaps no other opportunity upon which he can meet his landlord on such fair terms. We are not going to dwell here on the actual profit to the producer as arising from a better and more handy market for his oats, hay, and young horses, but would the rather insist upon the good feeling the practice of such a sport engenders, precisely as ill-will and animosity are the bitter fruits of some other of our English pastimes. We will not go so far as to say that the tenant should himself be a foxhunter; but for his own comfort and position we strenuously advise him to be a friend to foxhunting. It may look a little free and easy to find a lot of people riding through your grounds and over your fences; but the damage done is often little more than imaginary; and were you holding under some foreign Prince, you and your men might be called upon to beat whenever his Highness chose to come your way.

For such and many other considerations we always regret to see a farmer making himself obnoxious to "the hunters." There is a good wholesome bye-law amongst us, that the man-never mind, be he a lord, commoner, or labourer-who shoots or traps a fox shall forthwith be shunned by his fellows. It is a crime for which society has no other and perhaps no severer punishment. But the farmer can go further even than this. He can lock his gates when he ought to open them; he can arm his people with staves and pitchforks, instead of jugs of homebrewed and hunches of home-baked; and he can seize hold of any of the riders he catches upon his land. At any rate he thinks he can, though this is not precisely the law of the matter. There is a story just now going the round of the papers that is remarkable, not so much for any novelty in the farmers' grievance, as for the admirable summingup of the Lord Chief Justice. The occupier of the land over which the hounds were running "had caught a gentleman in red, who declared he was going off, and that his object was to be off as quickly as possible, as the hounds were already gone. There was a gate, however, which the farmer would not open, nor allow the hunter to pass." And again: "the plaintiff arrested another gentleman as he was getting through a field, and caught hold of his bridle," and "remained persistently hanging on to the bridle," though, as the plaintiff admitted, the captive and his friend said they would see him again, and that he had afterwards no difficulty in finding them. There is an episode which speaks to the wondrous sagacity of "a poor dog" that the plaintiff set on to the fox, and that subsequently appeared to be very much inclined to set himself on to some of the sportsmen. We shall, however, prefer keeping to the law of the case, and as to how far a farmer is justified in detaining a gentleman he may find trespassing on his land when following the hounds. Nothing, as we have already said, can be in better taste, as nothing will be more acceptable to the great majority of Englishmen, whether sportsmen, agriculturists, or others, than the summing-up of the Lord Chief Justice, who said, as we say: "It is much to be regretted that the occurrence should have taken place, and undoubtedly in the first instance the plaintiff had the law on his side; but then, on the other hand, he had certainly gone somewhat beyond the law, and had by his own conduct given provocation which had tended to aggravate the matter. He had a right

to remonstrate against the irruption of the hunters into the fields, and if they persisted he would have a right to take proper measures for legal redress. But when one of the hunters was on the land, and was going off, he had no right to take hold of him and arrest him, as if he had committed a felonious act, or some wilful injury which would justify his apprehension as a criminal offender. He might, if he so pleased, object to hunting. Generally speaking, the farmers were the keenest followers of the hounds, and therefore they good-humouredly bore with their share of any damage caused to their fields by hunting. But a man had a right to object to it; and if he did so, then no doubt it was, strictly speaking, unlawful to go upon his lands. And when the hunters were upon the plaintiff's land he had a right to insist upon their going off again, and he had also a right to resort to legal proceedings against any of them for redress; but it was foolish and unwarrantable on his part to attempt to arrest one of them, and hold him as a prisoner." If we had our will, we should like to see this address to the Jury properly framed and hung in every Market-Ordinary room in the country. Men, however tenacious of their own rights, have no right to "aggravate matters;" they have no right to take hold of sportsmen and arrest them as if they were "criminal offenders;" all this is "foolish and unwarrantable;" whilst farmers generally-and we are proud of such testimony from such a quarter-"good humouredly bear with their share of any damage caused to their fields by hunting.' It will be a bad day for us all when they are taught to feel otherwise.

,,

There is something in the free licence of foxhunting, as the sport of everyone who chooses to avail himself of it, that no law will, we hope, be ever able to tame down, although some of its own followers are rather evincing a disposition to do so. One correspondent of a sporting paper, who can really know nothing of what he is talking about, states seriously that no one should go to meet hounds until he has in common courtesy called upon the Master and obtained permission to do so! and a Master of hounds publicly announces that he shall take the pack home again if any one comes out who is not a subscriber! But this surely cannot apply to farmers over whose lands the hounds go, as every farmer is, as the Lord Chief Justice has it, "good humouredly" subscribing season after season, in the way of damaged fences, broken gates, and so forth. The very raising, however, of such points tends to narrow one's notions of the glorious character of the sport, that, mos pro lege, has hitherto been associated with a certain freedom of action known of in no other country but our own.-Mark Lane Express.

At this festive season of the year-to borrow a favourite advertising exordium-the minds of the most ethereal among us must occasionally run on the subject of eating. The topic is forced upon us at every turn, whether we will or not. The shop-front of a butterman, which, with its bladders of lard and massive double-Gloucesters, is not usually particularly attractive, is converted into a little Dilkoosha, or Garden of Delight, with a mimic lake in the centre, on which swans, manufactured of the best Dorset, are gracefully floating. The poulterer covers the whole front of his house from attic to basement with geese and turkeys; while the butcher, by means of gay ribands and rosettes, makes his prize joints look as picturesque as possible. In short, everybody is reminded that he has a stomach, and that it is his bounden duty to fill it if he can. Again, as we wandered among the stalls and pens of the Islington Cattle Show, and surveyed that unrivalled collection of domesticated quadrupeds, we were compelled to remember that all this display of animal perfection_really meant sirloins of beef, haunches of mutton, and legs of pork. It is sad to think that over the majority of those symmetrical beings-at whose nurture Art and Nature have gone hand and hand-the Damocles knife of the blue-tunicked executioner hangs glittering, ready to fall within a day or two. But we do not suppose that many people indulge in these sentimental reflections. Perhaps they feel as the pretty young lady did who delighted her tender-hearted lover by compassionating the sufferings of the oxen under the merciless drovers' cudgels. "Only think," she said, by way of clinching her arguments," how it bruises the beef!"

One thing, however, is certain. Either from the naturalist's or from the epicure's point of view, sheep, oxen, and swine are, especial objects of interest to Londoners during the month of December; so we think we may, without fear of offence, ask our readers to join us in examining a book which treats of the flocks and herds of North Britain. We shall not be too technical for fear of becoming unreadable; in fact, we mean to review the book rather in the character of a cockney than of a grazier.

The author calls his present book Field and Fern, and has, we notice, published other books under similarly alliterative titles, such as Post and Paddock, and Silk and Scarlet. Probably this little etymological device tickles the palates of his rural readers, and, if so, he is quite at liberty to indulge in it. This, however, is but a trifling matter. It is more to the purpose to remark that Mr. Dixon writes with an extraordinary enthusiasm and earnestness concerning horses, oxen, sheep, pigs, and dogs-an enthusiasm which appears sometimes ludicrous to those who have little taste for such subjects, but which gives * FIELD AND FERN; OR SCOTTISH FLOCKS AND HERDS. By H. H. DIXON, author of the Royal Agricultural Society of England Prize Essay on Shorthorns, 1865." London: Rogerson and Tuxford, 246, Strand.

a remarkable vividness and reality to his descriptions; that he traces the pedigree of a greyhound with a loving devotion such as Sir Bernard Burke might bestow on the annals of a family of historic fame-in short, that he is much at home among famous hunters and racers, and prize bulls, and prize pigs, and prize fowl, as Mr. Frank Buckland is at home among giraffes, and porpoises, and boa constrictors.

Before crossing the Border the author had already spent four industrious years in inspecting the flocks and herds of England. His object in visiting Scotland is best told in his own words :

"I wished to visit past and present Highland Society winners, in their own stall or fold, and to gather evidence from those breeders who stand high in its annals, not only as to the present progress of the stock on which England depends for such extensive supplies, but also as to the thoughts and labours of men who have done Scotland good service, and then passed to their rest. Grouse shooting, deer-stalking, and salmon rodfishing have their own liege lords of the pen; but still there were many little points connected with hunting, coursing, racing, and otter-hunting which seemed calculated to work into a picture of Scottish life, and to vary the monotony of mere beef and mutton chapters."

He soon found that he had set himself a serious task. He had to pluck the heart out of three summers, a winter, and a spring, to travel some 8,000 miles, to sleep away from home 250 nights, and change his bed 146 times before he wrote a line. As for the manner of travelling, he tells us that he tried walking, but found it unsuitable for the responsible task which he had in hand. Coaches and Railways afforded some help; but after a day under a heavy knapsack he was too tired to undertake the inevitable evening cross-examination on the all-important subject of stock. Accordingly he pushed his way to the Orkneys, and there bought a "garron"-a shy half-bred island mare-and on this northern dam-el's back performed the rest of his preregrinations, riding her ultimately up to his own door in Kensington-square. In these locomotive days, when we can scarcely accomplish the simplest journey without seating ourselves in the body of a great black caterpillar, hundreds of feet long, with fiery eyes and tail, there is something delightful in the sensation of being dependent only on so small and manageable a creature as a horse. But this mode of travelling has its drawbacks. It is a weary thing to sit at night for three-quarters of an hour on a corn-box in order to make sure that the ostler does you justice. Then the Highland ferries were a constant source of difficulty; the Orkney lass bolted whenever she saw a railway train, and the author thought himself lucky when he could put her head in the right direction, so as to get a three hundred yard gallop to the good. In Lanarkshire and Ayrshire he sometimes found a blast furnace roaring like a lion in the path, late at night, between himself and his inn. The only plan of action to be adopted with the "garron" in this case was to blindfold her, stuff her ears, and twist her round five or six times, just as we twist Buff round at a children's party. "Still, with fine weather," he says, "it is a grand independent way of travelling. It was positively exhilarating to put the mare's head straight across Scotland during a hard frost, from St. Boswell's to Ayr, or to rattle from Athelstaneford to Kelso over the Lammermoors with two shirts and three pairs of stockings on, with the thermometer at 16 below freezing point, and the cold cutting your cheeks to the bone.

Having said so much concerning the mode of travelling, let us ac