utes have sped, you are free
In the name of the Law, which is Mercy, depart!"

CHAPTER XLVIII.

OLD TURF FRIENDS.

An announcement in the morning papers of the death of Mr. Richard
C. Naylor of Kelmarsh, Northamptonshire, at the age of eighty-six,
carried me back to the far-off days when, tempted by the hospitality
and kind friendship of Lord Falmouth, I became a regular visitor of
Newmarket Heath--an _habitue_ during the splendid dictatorship of
Admiral Rous!

I would like to mention the names of some of the celebrities of the
Turf of those days, many of them my frequent companions, and no less
my real and sincere friends. Time, however, fails. But in looking
through the piles of letters with which the kindness of my friends has
favoured me from time to time, I come across many a relic of the past
that recalls the pleasantest associations. Even a telegram, most
prosaic of correspondence, which I meet with at this moment, is a
little poem in its way, and brings back scenes and circumstances over
which memory loves to linger.

It is nothing in itself, but let any one who has loved country
life and enjoyed its sports and its many friendships consider what
forgotten pleasures may be brought to mind by this telegram.

_Telegram_.

DORCHESTER, _November_ 2, '97.

Handed in at QUORN at 9.10 a.m.

Received here at 11.1 a.m.

_To_ SIR H. HAWKINS, The Judges' House, Dorchester.

Just returned from Badminton to find the most charming present from
you, which I shall always regard with the greatest value, and think
you are too kind, in giving me such a present. Am writing.--LONSDALE.

"At _Quorn_," I repeat, and then I find the letter which Lord Lonsdale
was writing. This is it:--

CHURCHILL COTTAGE,
QUORN,
LOUGHBOROUGH,
_Tuesday, November_ 2, '97.

MY DEAR SIR HENRY,--How can I thank you enough for your magnificent
present? It is, indeed, kind of you thinking of me, and I can assure
you that the spurs shall remain an "heirloom" to decorate the
dinner-table (a novel ornament) and match the silver spur poor old
White Melville gave me. Why you should have so honoured me I do not
know, but that I fully value your kindly thought I do know.

Is there any chance of your being in these parts? If so, _do_ pay me a
visit.

And with many, many thanks for your extreme kindness,

Believe me

Yours very truly,

(_Signed_) LONSDALE.

Alas! almost all of them have passed away, yet they will live