ffice, just put on the
steam of extravagance, and seemed inclined to try how much he could spend
for his master. His bills for draft hounds were enormous; he was
continually chopping and changing his horses, often almost without
consulting his master; he had a perfect museum of saddles and bridles, in
which every invention and variety of bit was exhibited; and he had paid as
much as twenty pounds to different 'valets' and grooms for invaluable
recipes for cleaning leather breeches and gloves. Altogether, Bragg overdid
the thing; and when Mr. Puffington, in the solitude of a winter's day, took
pen, ink, and paper, and drew out a 'balance sheet,' he found that on the
average of six brace of foxes to the season, they had cost him about three
hundred pounds a head killing. It was true that Bragg always returned five
or six and twenty brace; but that was as between Bragg and the public, as
between Bragg and his master the smaller figure was the amount.

Mr. Puffington had had enough of it, and he now thought if he could get Mr.
Sponge (who he still believed to be a sporting author on his travels) to
immortalize him, he might retire into privacy, and talk of 'when _I_ kept
hounds,' 'when _I_ hunted the country,' 'when _I_ was master of hounds _I_
did this, and _I_ did that,' and fuss, and be important as we often see
ex-masters of hounds when they go out with other packs. It was this
erroneous impression with regard to Mr. Sponge that took our friend to the
meet of Lord Scamperdale's hounds at Scrambleford Green, when he gave Mr.
Sponge a general invitation to visit him before he left the country, an
invitation that was as acceptable to Mr. Sponge on his expulsion from
Jawleyford Court, as it was agreeable to Mr. Puffington--by opening a route
by which he might escape from the penalty of hound-keeping, and the
persecution of his huntsman.

The reader will therefore now have the kindness to consider Mr. Puffington
in receipt of Mr. Sponge's note, volunteering a visit.

With gay and cheerful steps our friend hurried off to the kennel, to
communicate the intelligence to Mr. Bragg of an intended honour that he
inwardly hoped would have the effect of extinguishing that great sporting
luminary.

Arriving at the kennel, he learned from the old feeder, Jack Horsehide,
who, as usual, was sluicing the flags with water, though the weather was
wet, that Mr. Bragg was in the house (a house that had been the steward's
in the days of the