such a turn out of tagrag-andbobtail. Half a score of lath and plaster old codgers on long-tailed, broken-winded mares their nether parts fancifully decorated with black tight net inexpressibles, and spindle-shanks cased in seven league ogre boots, with copper heel spurs, besides half a hundred robin-redbreasts, and scarlet-runners, armed to the teeth, and looking annihilation to man and beast. On viewing this cruel muster of mean-looking prads, well, thinks I, they'll be nowhere, that's flat; but the fox was no sooner afoot, and the dogs slipped, than the whole procession set off at such a killing pace, that nothing short of a bird-catcher could have lived with them. Gingers with their tails in the air like peacocks, to save treading on them-elbows and spindle-shanks going faster than the horses-clearing banks and bushes, to the manifest danger of the dogs' lives.-Robin redbreasts picking up their half hundreds all over the country, and running to the devil straight, with a yell which I can only liken unto Bedlam adrift. I began to suspect that the first flight of the fast goers intended to have Reynard all to themselves; but the whole lump coming suddenly on a low swampy field, the tune was soon changed. His Highness instantly tightened both his bridle reins and continued spurring his tit (a mouse-coloured dun, with a black list stripe down. the crup), to give him the semblance of shying; whilst three of his less prudential courtiers dashed in neck and crop, and then and there stuck fast, until relanded by a party of the Robins. In the mean time the fox was run to hole. This was, as the man said of the spencer, "a smart thing as far as it went," but a good deal still remained to be done. Sixteen rounds from the great man's artillery (consisting of three double and four single guns), gave Reynard warning to quit, which he did on three legs and all smoke dried. During the pause the mudlarks and bobtails had contrived to make up their leeway, with fresh wind for a second burstno law; away they whisked like mad bulls in a china shop; two of the dogs ridden down, and his Reynard-ship, unable to limp out of the way, mobbed and literally trampled to death. His Highness (may his shadow lengthen) was almost quite innocent of the English tongue, or I would have remonstrated on the outrage perpetrated by these velocipedes, or vulpecides what the devil do you call them? I have another good thing or two for you yet, Mr. Editor of the O. S. M., but do not consider it wise to give you too much at a time. Besides, on second inspection, I find I have barely room to subscribe myself, Your obedient Servant, Benares, 1st June, 1830. PARODY. Farewell! but whenever you open your beer, Oh, think upon him who has gorged on them too, When of hog you get Khubber and Poonja appears, Has charged deep and shallow whilst riding with thee! And when from the jungle out starts the grey boar, And when you have killed, having taken first spear, In spear and in mug would have tried for his share! Then farewell, and tho' we may ne'er meet again, SIR, YESSAM. STEPHEN'S THIRD CRITIQUE. In resuming the Critic's pen, I beg leave to congratulate you on the efficacy of the few caustic remarks which I have deemed it necessary for the well-doing of the Oriental Sporting Magazine to make; for of the numerous contributors to the work I am confident the greater part are frightened out of their wits when they see a Critique from Stephen announced for publication, consequently become more cautious in their contributions and more careful of their contents. This, in fact, is the only way to manage the minds and tempers of those who would otherwise overwhelm your little periodical with torrents of balderdash and nonsense. It has afforded me considerable amusement to hear the myriads VOL. I. and of conjectures as to the real author which are afloat whereever I go; but as I am confident my secret is safe, I laugh in my sleeve at all the hints and suspicions which surround me, and shall continue in my criticising career as long as I find food for censure; and I sincerely hope not only your readers, but even your correspondents, will admit that I have not allowed the sober severity of a modern Gifford to degenerate into the captious querulousness of an ancient Zoilus. Now, Sir, to commence my task. I shall begin with your first correspondent in No. 8,__ who designates himself "Nosing Tom." His contribution, regarded as a whole, is somewhat humorous and clever, and altogether bears the stamp of a mind that could 2 G master better things; but I must animadvert on his very unpardonable manner of plagiarizing expressions from other writers, such as "hating" a thing "worse than a wall-eyed horse," "having been caught with his mouth open," with many more, but his attempt to be facetious when he replies to the huntsman's question of what part of the run he liked best is a miserable failure and a decided forgery, for what person who can write as grammatically correct as "Nosing Tom" would say "when they was a catching of him?" No, Sir, he thought it was very funny, and mistook vulgarity for wit. I should like to be informed how a horse can look thick winded, which he describes his borrowed hunter to have done. Is it possible that Nosing Tom can be Novice, crept into the Deccan after following Sam Surly's advice? This brings me to that unpolished correspondent, whose last letter is no ornament to your Magazine, and whose signature is, I find, only the anagram of his real name, so in this he has been nearly as silly as Novice could be. He should certainly attend to the 4th rule he laid down for that person's guidance, and himself show the way to accomplish the 6th. Poins is equal to Nimrod, with the advantage of being less prosy; but Nimrod is invaluable. I shall leave Anti Detonator to Dragsman, who, if I mistake not, will punish him prettily for his conceit. As for S. W. from Surat, he certainly realized his hope of affording amusement, for I and many others laughed most immoderately at his ridiculous situation on the top of a tree shooting at tigers with his heart in his mouth. I'd bet a penny it was much lower, and you will add with the old gentleman in the A play, "Be quiet; I know it." Sportsman from Sattarah merits encouragement, but what can be said to B. O. S. from Belgaum ? This Bos should have signed himself"Fur," for a sad thief he has shown himself, and requires "Sacerdos" to keep him right; his battle is a sorry copy of that great black fight of Bosrecgaum, in No. 4. I wonder you gave it insertion. It has all the slang and vulgarity of the original without a glimmering of its wit. The foot match at Poonah is certainly an extraordinary performance, well worthy of record and interestingly recorded. Your hunting songs are capital and better than five thousand parodies. "No Turfite " deserves no answer. What business has a No Turfite with Sporting Queries? I now approach S. Y. S., and I hope on friendly terms, for the severity of the rub I was forced to give him for sending John Dockery's indelicate letters to be printed was given with good-will, and I trust it has been so taken. If he bears any malice for that animadversion, he will probably resent my critique on his present production of Recollections of Life in India, but I care little for any man's anger, and I shall do my duty fearlessly and faithfully. In the meantime, as his contribution is promised in No. 9 to be continned, I shall defer making any remarks at present. I cannot conclude without one fillip at your editorial self; why are you not more punctual in publishing? You have now gained several months by altering your periodical issues, and I hope this fresh departure will be attended with a stricter performance of promise. I am, sir, Yours obediently, ON PHYSIC AND FISTS. SIR, in his double damnables and greasy red waistcoat (Great Heaven, a red waistcoat! fancy a man in a red waistcoat, and I dare say an unshorn chin and head that knew no more of the brush or comb than Nebuchadnezzar did when he turned grazier and kept company with cows). Yes, I say, I can easily picture to myself what sort of looking personage he was when he sloped in upon the Nuggur fox hounds. I do hope that Stephen, of whom he seems (and in that he really somewhat resembles Nimrod) to be mighty alarmed, although pretending to despise his critical pretensions. I do hope, I maintain, that Stephen will touch him up a little. But to return to the subject of this scrawl. It was, as I have said before, a kind of nose-dropping, finger-blowing morning, and the mist was very thick, when in company with a lot of friends I had taken the field in search of hog. After an hour had been occupied in beating a large baubul jungle, the alarm was given that a sounder had broken cover, and in a few minutes I found myself on terms of approaching intimacy with the largest and greyest boar that ever delighted the eye of a true sportsman, or frightened the nerves of a pretender. I had already experienced that thrill of delight so eloquently and poetically described in the Tales of the Tinkers, that is to say, I had already twice drawn blood, and felt my spear "run wriggling in his rump," when, just as I was in the act of giving him a deadly thrust, my horse floundered, and I got flurried, and as he bungled I bounded out of the saddle, and soon found the tables turned, for the boar of whom I had so long been in pursuit was now in full chase of me. Being blest with pretty long legs, and having been under the doctor's hands a short time previous, the physic I had swallowed had reduced me to a fine running condition, and having lost my spear in my tumble I was glad to exercise my powers as a pedestrian to their full extent yet, notwithstanding my agility, the brute of a boar closed fast upon me, and I had already begun to flag in my pace when I got near to the ruined wall of a ruined village, in attempting to scale the broken part of which I was overtaken by the boar, and fairly brought to bay. Now, sir, as I have before stated, I was unarmed, but I was not unhanded, and, having taken lessons from the well-known Tom Belcher, I had no resource, since my physic had failed, but to have recourse to my fists, and most nobly and scientifically did I use them. As the grim grey brute came on, I planted a one, two on his dexter ogle, which gave him a more sinister look than before, and before I could repeat the dose he closed in upon me, and began using his tusks upon my ribs, where he positively tickled me so much that I was nearly expiring with laughter. How I escaped from this situation, or how I found my horse again I know not, but so it was; I soon was mounted, and in hot pursuit of this terrible monster when we came to a nullah that would have opened the mouth of the best rider that ever struggled for a first spear with the celebrated "hunter of Khandes," or the equally remarkable "Nimrod of the East." Over went the hog, and over went I, my horse coming on his head upon the opposite (bank, I was going to say, but a bank gives you an idea of something green and soft), but my lodging was on a cold flinty rock, which being a little harder than my os frontis, almost stove it in, and rendered me senseless. When I came to my senses I found myself in a richly furnished bed-room, a bright fire glowing in the grate, and several people SIR. round me in their robes de chambre. I was lying stretched upon the floor, and the blood was flowing in plentiful streams from my nostrils, and the pillow of a bed was between my legs. The solution of all this is that during an excursion which in the year 1822 I made to the north of England, I had stopped for a few days at the hospitable mansion of an old friend in Durham, and being still very convalescent from "the liver," which had sent me to England, I had feasted too much at a light supper of ham collops and champagne, and the nightmare had visited me in the character of a grey boar, and in the delirium of my dream (for a dream it was) I had got astride on the pillow, fancied I was on horseback, had rode like a devil over the bed, which I had taken for Kattywar, dashed through the curtains instead of the cockspur jungle, and the infernal nullah which terminated my ride was a drop leap from the mattress, whack down upon the carpet. What the tickling was I never could make out, unless one of the roguish housemaids had been playing tricks with me when she came to tuck me up, and I shrewdly suspected one with a dark eye and a cherry cheek, who next day had told my black servant that his master's face was fifty times darker than any other part of his body. Yours, PHILO-FUN. TIGER HUNTING BY NIMROD. If I was a devout believer in Jadoos I should certainly at once attribute the untoward occurrences during thus much of the year 30, to the evil machina tions of some top sawyer in this dark and mysterious art; yet, although my reliance on the artifices of astrologers and old women be not absolute, nor my belief in superstition, as a friend |