The dinner on this occasion was of the most substantial description, and, for want of a better, Rob Hadley was put in the chair, a distinction his modesty would have induced him to decline; but the voices of the company were unanimous, and on mounting his perch he returned thanks on his bugle in the favourite hunting air of “Old Towler”; which, as “on that day,” or a few days before, a stag was supposed to have died, was considered extremely appropriate, and was applauded accordingly. Whether a stag had died or not seemed subsequently to have become a matter of doubt, for the chairman, after carving the “noble haunch,” and coming to the foot, which was enclosed with a profusion of curled writing-paper, was not a little surprised to find the hoof, instead of being _cloven_, to be _entire_. A noted farrier present swore it was the hoof of a young donkey! This the landlord positively denied, but upon a jury being summoned to decide the question, the hoof was found to have mysteriously disappeared, and the point remained for ever unsettled; although it was freely hinted that the guard of the “Emerald,” jealous at being shut out from the feast, had conveyed the haunch away and substituted for it the hind-quarter of a deceased “Neddy” he had imported from Wolverhampton. One of the most daring deeds ever related of a guard was that well-nigh incredible one told of the guard of the famous “Tantivy”:-- “We had just entered Oxford from Woodstock,” says Lord William Lennox, “when suddenly the horses started off at an awful pace. What made matters worse was that we saw at a distance some men employed in removing a large tree that had fallen during the storm of the previous night across the road near St. John’s College. The coachman shook his head, looking very nervous, while the guard, a most powerful man, stood up, prepared for any emergency. On we went, the coachman trying in vain to check the galloping steeds, and we had got within a few yards of the critical spot when the guard, crawling over the roof, managed, somehow or another, to get on the footboard, when, with a spring, he threw himself on the near wheeler, and with a giant’s clasp checked the horses at the very moment the leaders were about to charge the tree. Down they came, but the guard never yielded an inch, and, with the assistance of the country people near at hand, the leaders regained their legs, without the slightest damage to man, horse, coach, or harness. A subscription for our gallant preserver was got up on the spot.”