nce[56] among all the gentlemen about him. He carries a
tulip-root in his pocket from one to another, or exchanges a puppy
between a couple of friends that live perhaps in the opposite sides of
the county. Will is a particular favourite of all the young heirs, whom
he frequently obliges with a net that he has weaved, or a setting dog
that he has made[57] himself: he now and then presents a pair of garters
of his own knitting to their mothers or sisters; and raises a great deal
of mirth among them, by inquiring as often as he meets them _how they
wear_? These gentleman-like manufactures and obliging little humours make
Will the darling of the country.

Sir Roger was proceeding in the character of him, when we saw him make up
to us with two or three hazel-twigs in his hand, that he had cut in Sir
Roger's woods, as he came through them in his way to the house. I was
very much pleased to observe on one side the hearty and sincere welcome
with which Sir Roger received him, and on the other, the secret joy which
his guest discovered[58] at sight of the good old Knight. After the first
salutes were over, Will desired Sir Roger to lend him one of his servants
to carry a set of shuttlecocks he had with him in a little box to a lady
that lived about a mile off, to whom it seems he had promised such a
present for above this half-year. Sir Roger's back was no sooner turned,
but honest Will began to tell me of a large cock pheasant that he had
sprung in one of the neighbouring woods, with two or three other
adventures of the same nature. Odd and uncommon characters are the game
that I look for, and most delight in; for which reason I was as much
pleased with the novelty of the person that talked to me, as he could be
for his life with the springing of a pheasant, and therefore listened to
him with more than ordinary attention.

In the midst of his discourse the bell rung to dinner, where the
gentleman I have been speaking of had the pleasure of seeing the huge
jack, he had caught, served up for the first dish in a most sumptuous
manner. Upon our sitting down to it he gave us a long account how he had
hooked it, played with it, foiled[59] it, and at length drew it out upon
the bank, with several other particulars that lasted all the first
course. A dish of wild-fowl that came afterwards furnished conversation
for the rest of the dinner, which concluded with a late invention of
Will's for improving the quail-pipe[60].

Upon withdraw