There more than in any other place do men's characters appear in their true lights. At the covert-side the irritable man, however well he may on ordinary occasions be able to conceal his irritability, will fret and fume if things do not go exactly as he wishes. The boaster, who in the safety of his armchair astonishes his friends with anecdotes of his own daring exploits, is, after a fast forty minutes, more often than not weighed in the balance and found wanting. The garrulous individual, who invariably knows where the fox has gone and what the huntsman ought to do, is in the field estimated at his proper value. There also the grumblers never fail to find a grievance, nor the elder generations of sportsmen to lament the "good old days gone by." In fact, the "bell-mouthed pack and tuneful horn" seem to act in some occult way in bringing out the idiosyncrasies of all their followers. This being so, a few sketches may not be uninteresting, and I shall endeavour to draw with my pen some portraits of those with whom we yearly ride, and who are so well known to most of us. To do this the more concisely, I propose to describe the field, subscribers, visitors, and others, who are to be found at the meets from the 1st of November to the end of April, and who go to make up the members of that justly celebrated pack--the Bullshire Hounds. Before individualising, however, it will be necessary to give a short history of the hunt, with a brief outline of the country, and its gradual growth. The Bullshire country is one of the oldest in England, and was originally hunted on what is known as the "Trencher system," that is everybody, in lieu of paying a subscription, kept (according to his means) one or more hounds, which he was bound to bring with him to the spot selected by the Master (who was yearly elected as huntsman) for the meet. No sinecure was the office of M.F.H., carrying the horn, for as every hound recognised the rule of a different Master, and every Master considered himself entitled to an opinion in the case of his own hound, there was a good deal of jealousy among the latter and no small amount of "tail" among the former. The "tailing," however, was augmented by the different system of preparation and feeding the Bullshire Hounds received, for while Bellman before hunting was treated to no supper, Truelove had to deal with a sumptuous repast placed before her by the compassionate but ignorant goodwife, "who couldn't abear the idea of the old dog doing all that work on an empty stomach."