I then sent my stud down to the stables I had taken for them at Soakington, under the care of a steady old groom, who is as sagacious as he is obstinate, and engaging for myself the large parlour and the little blue bedroom at the Haycock, prepared for a comfortable five months’ spell at hunting and nothing else. No society to distract me; no books that I couldn’t go to sleep over, if I was tired; above all, no female influence to make one late in the mornings, restless in the day-time, and sleepless at night—an effect I have remarked as the usual consequence of a quiet bachelor suffering himself to be deluded into the company of that insidious creature, woman. “Beautiful she is, The serpent’s voice less subtle than her kiss, The snake but vanquished dust; and she will draw Another host from heaven, to break heaven’s law.” I did not then know of Miss Lushington’s presidency at the board of control. I had not even pictured to myself the possibility of such a Siren in such a collection of satins, more innocent than Ulysses—who, I am convinced, was a finished profligate from the first, and only went to Troy to get away from Penelope—I did not even mistrust the cup of Circe. Ah! she made a pig of her admirer, that ancient enchantress; and in Miss Lushington’s presence the admirer makes an ass of himself: that is all the difference. But I anticipate. Soakington is a delightful situation for hunting; though perhaps for other purposes the extremely wet nature of the soil and dampness of the atmosphere might make it a less desirable locality. The village consists of a few buildings, of which the Haycock with its stables and out-houses forms far the largest part: there are half-a-dozen straggling cottages, a dilapidated barn, always open and always empty; a pair of stocks with no foot-hold, and a pound; the church is three-quarters-of-a-mile off, and it always rains on a Sunday, except when it snows.