'Why, no,' replied Jack, knocking the ashes off his cigar on to the arabesque-patterned tapestry carpet—'why, no, not exactly; but these things, you know, are a good deal matter of course; just describe what you saw, you know, and butter Puff well, that's the main point.'

'But you forget,' replied Sponge, 'I don't know the country, I don't know the people, I don't know anything at all about the run—I never once looked at the hounds.'

'That's nothin',' replied Jack, 'there'd be plenty like you in that respect. However,' continued he, gathering himself up in his chair as if for an effort, 'you can say—let me see what you can say—you can say, "this splendid pack had a stunning run from Hollyburn Hanger, the property of its truly popular master, Mr. Puffington," or—stop,' said Jack, checking himself, 'say, "the property of its truly popular and sporting master, Mr. Puffington." The cover's just as much mine as it's his,' observed Jack; 'it belongs to old Sir Timothy Tensthemain, who's vegetating at Boulogne-sur-Mer, but Puff says he'll buy it when it comes to the hammer, so we'll flatter him by considering it his already, just as we flatter him by calling him a sportsman—sportsman!' added Jack, with a sneer, 'he's just as much taste for the thing as a cow.'

'Well,' said Sponge, looking up, 'I've got "truly popular and sporting master, Mr. Puffington,"' adding, 'hadn't we better say something about the meet and the grand spread here before we begin with the run?'

'True,' replied Jack, after a long-drawn whiff and another adjustment of the end of his cigar; 'say that "a splendid field of well-appointed sportsmen"—'

'A splendid field of well-appointed sportsmen,' wrote Sponge.

'"Among whom we recognized several distinguished strangers and members of Lord Scamperdale's hunt." That means you and I,' observed Jack.

'"Of Lord Scamperdale's hunt—that means you and I"'—read Sponge, as he wrote it.

'But you're not to put in that; you're not to write "that means you and I," my man,' observed Jack.

'Oh, I thought that was part of the sentence,' replied Sponge.