ightest and most glowing
colours, and that on sporting subjects my pen shall yield to none
(cheers). I have ever been the decided advocate of many sports and
exercises, not only on account of the health and vigour they inspire,
but because I feel that they are the best safeguards on a nation's
energies, and the best protection against luxury, idleness, debauchery,
and effeminacy (cheers). The authority of all history informs us,
that the energies of countries flourished whilst manly sports have
flourished, and decayed as they died away (cheers). What says Juvenal,
when speaking of the entry of luxury into Rome?"

Saevior armis
Luxuria incubuit, victumque ulciscitur orbem.

"And we need only refer to ancient history, and to the writings of
Xenophon, Cicero, Horace, or Virgil, for evidence of the value they have
all attached to the encouragement of manly, active, and hardy pursuits,
and the evils produced by a degenerate and effeminate life on the
manners and characters of a people (cheers). Many of the most eminent
literary characters of this and of other countries have been ardently
attached to field sports; and who, that has experienced their beneficial
results, can doubt that they are the best promoters of the _mens sana
in corpore sano_--the body sound and the understanding clear (cheers)?
Gentlemen, it is with feelings of no ordinary gratification that I find
myself at the social and truly hospitable board of one of the most
distinguished ornaments of one of the most celebrated Hunts in this
great country, one whose name and fame have reached the four corners
of the globe--to find myself after so long an absence from my native
land--an estrangement from all that has ever been nearest and dearest to
my heart--once again surrounded by these cheerful countenances which
so well express the honest, healthful pursuits of their owners. Let
us then," added Nimrod, seizing a decanter and pouring himself out a
bumper, "drink, in true Kentish fire, the health and prosperity of
that brightest sample of civic sportsmen, the great and renowned JOHN
JORROCKS!"

Immense applause followed the conclusion of this speech, during which
time the decanters buzzed round the table, and the glasses being
emptied, the company rose, and a full charge of Kentish fire followed;
Mr. Jorrocks, sitting all the while, looking as uncomfortable as men in
his situation generally do.

The cheering having subsided, and the parties having resumed