The other affair, though perhaps almost telling more against himself, was not so expensive. He had given his friend, Lord Acres, a black retriever with a high character and a long pedigree, and had made no little parade of the gift. A few weeks afterwards he was shooting at Home Wood (Acres' place), and the dog was out. According to his usual custom, Bowles was grumbling at everything; guns, birds, cartridges, weather, and his servant all came in for their share. At last he pitched on the dog, and turning to his host during the process of lunch, he said: "Can't think, Acres, where you manage to pick up your dogs! Look at that mongrel brute there. Never saw such a beast in my life. He's only fit to run behind a butcher's cart."
"Why, Major," replied his lordship, roaring with laughter, "that's looking a gift-horse in the mouth with a vengeance. It's your own dog that you gave me."
Bowles acknowledges now that for once in his life he wishes he had not spoken.
It is a beautiful morning for hunting. The late frost—which, though it lasted but a week, was sharp—is well out of the ground, and everybody who owns anything with four legs, besides a number who are dependent on their own, have turned out with the hounds at Mickleborough Green.
The landlord of The Three Bells, that quaint old inn—with its remains of past glories, as shown by its spacious coach-stables—which stands back from the road facing the green, is doing a roaring trade; and Lizzie the barmaid says her "arms do just ache a-drawing the beer." The hounds gathered round old Tom on the green, with pink coats dotted here and there, present as pretty a picture as one could wish to see. All are in high spirits and congratulating each other and themselves on the change in the weather and the prospects of a run. Chaff is flying thick about "the old mare's big leg," or "the lucky thing the frost was for that young horse who was pulled out on all occasions;" and old Tom comes in for his share, being told that "both the hounds and himself look as if they had been doing themselves well on those non-hunting days—waistcoat buttons a bit tight, eh Tom?" and such-like banter.
Presently, along the road the Major appears, in company with Mr. Boulter the Secretary, and young Earnshaw, who is learning farming—by hunting four days a-week—with Mr. Noble.
"Here's Bowles," say two or three sportsmen; "he can't find much to grumble at to-day, anyhow."
As he rides up they greet him with a hearty "Good-morning, Major; lovely day, isn't it?"
"Lovely day? Lovely fiddlestick!" is the reply. "Up to your neck in mud. Country so heavy you can't ride, and then of all places to pick out Mickleborough! Why, the water will be out all over the bottom. But there, it's always the same. I told Lappington he ought to meet at the Kennels; but nobody ever listens to me."
"Well, but Bowles," interrupts the Secretary; "we met at the Kennels the last fixture before the frost."