"I wasn't fool enough to ask him, but I don't in the least doubt that he threw them into the water—or that he'd throw Palliser there too if he could get hold of him. As for taking the hounds to Trumpeton again, I wouldn't do it if there were not another covert in the country."
"Then leave it so, and have done with it," said his wife. "I wouldn't fret as you do for what another man did with his own property, for all the foxes in England."
"That is because you understand nothing of hunting, my dear. A man's property is his own in one sense, but isn't his own in another. A man can't do what he likes with his coverts."
"He can cut them down."
"But he can't let another pack hunt them, and he can't hunt them himself. If he's in a hunting county he is bound to preserve foxes."
"What binds him, Oswald? A man can't be bound without a penalty."
"I should think it penalty enough for everybody to hate me. What are you going to do about Phineas Finn?"
"I have asked him to come on the 1st and stay till Parliament meets."
"And is that woman coming?"
"There are two or three women coming."