t echoes reply from the walls of
the house of worship--and now, in momentary contrition,

"Drops a sad, serious tear upon our playful pen!"

and we bethink ourselves--alas! all in vain, for

"_Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret_"--

of these solemn lines of the poet of peace and humanity:--

"One lesson, reader, let us two divide,
Taught by what nature shows and what conceals,
Never to blend our pleasure and our pride
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels."

It is next to impossible to reduce fine poetry to practice--so let us
conclude with a panegyric on Fox-Hunting. The passion for this pastime
is the very strongest that can possess the heart--nor, of all the heroes
of antiquity, is there one to our imagination more poetical than Nimrod.
His whole character is given, and his whole history, in two
words--Mighty Hunter. That he hunted the fox is not probable; for the
sole aim and end of his existence was not to exterminate--that would
have been cutting his own throat--but to thin man-devouring wild
beasts--the Pards--with Leo at their head. But in a land like this,
where not even a wolf has existed for centuries--nor a wild boar--the
same spirit that would have driven the British youth on the tusk and paw
of the Lion and the Tiger, mounts them in scarlet on such steeds as
never neighed before the flood, nor "summered high in bliss" on the
sloping pastures of undeluged Ararat--and gathers them together in
gallant array on the edge of the cover,

"When first the hunter's startling horn is heard
Upon the golden hills."

What a squadron of cavalry! What fiery eyes and flaming
nostrils--betokening with what ardent passion the noble animals will
revel in the chase! Bay, brown, black, dun, chestnut, sorrel, grey--of
all shades and hues--and every courser distinguished by his own peculiar
character of shape and form--yet all blending harmoniously as they crown
the mount; so that a painter would only have to group and colour them as
they stand, nor lose, if able to catch them, one of the dazzling lights
or deepening shadows streamed on them from that sunny, yet not unstormy
sky.

You read in books of travels and romances, of Barbs and Arabs galloping
in the desert--and well doth Sir Walter speak of Saladin at the head of
the Saracenic chivalry; but take our word for it, great part of all such
descriptions are mere falsehood or fudge. Why in the devil's name should
dwell