ned for a scurrey, no matter whether he has joined early or late. Mr.
Waffles, on the contrary, was very easily satisfied, and never took the
shine off a run with a kill by risking a subsequent defeat. Old Tom, though
keen when others were keen, was not indifferent to his comforts, and soon
came into the way of thinking that it was just as well to get home to his
mutton-chops at two or three o'clock, as to be groping his way about
bottomless bye-roads on dark winter nights.

As he retraced his steps homeward, and overtook the scattered field of the
morning, his talent for invention, or rather stretching, was again called
into requisition.

'What have you done with him, Tom?' asked Major Bouncer, eagerly bringing
his sturdy collar-marked cob alongside of our huntsman.

'Killed him, sir,' replied Tom, with the slightest possible touch of the
cap. (Bouncer was no tip.)

'Indeed!' exclaimed Bouncer, gaily, with that sort of sham satisfaction
that most people express about things that can't concern them in the least.
'Indeed! I'm deuced glad of that! Where did you kill him?'

'At the back of Mr. Plummey's farm-buildings, at Shapwick,' replied Tom;
adding, 'but, my word, he led us a dance afore we got there--up to
Ditchington, down to Somerby, round by Temple Bell Wood, cross Goosegreen
Common, then away for Stubbington Brooms, skirtin' Sanderwick Plantations,
but scarce goin' into 'em, then by the round hill at Camerton leavin' great
Heatherton to the right, and so straight on to Shapwick, where we killed,
with every hound up--'

'God bless me!' exclaimed Bouncer, apparently lost in admiration, though he
scarcely knew the country; 'God bless me!' repeated he, 'what a run! The
finest run that ever was seen.'

'Nine miles in twenty-five minutes,' replied Tom, tacking on a little both
for time and distance.

'_B-o-y_ JOVE!' exclaimed the major.

Having shaken hands with, and congratulated Mr. Waffles most eagerly and
earnestly, the major hurried off to tell as much as he could remember to
the first person he met, just as the cheese-bearer at a christening looks
out for some one to give the cheese to. The cheese-getter on this occasion
was Doctor Lotion, who was going to visit old Jackey Thompson, of
Woolleyburn. Jackey being then in a somewhat precarious state of health,
and tolerably advanced in life, without any very self-evident heir, was
obnoxious to the attentions of three distinct litters of cousins, some one
or