[Illustration: MORTON CHURCH.]

Combats of another character--in fact, of two other characters--recur
to our reflections as we find that we have shuffled off the coil
of bricks and mortar and are rattling across Wormwood Scrubs. More
fortunate than some who have been there before us, we have no call to
alight. Calls to this ancient field of glory, whether symbolized by
the gentlemanly pistol or the plebeian fist, have ceased to be in
vogue. Dueling and boxing are both frowned down effectually, one by
public opinion and the other by the police. It is only of late years
that they finally succumbed to those twin discouragers; but it seems
altogether improbable that the ordeal by combat in either shape
will again come to the surface in a land where tilting-spear and
quarter-staff were of old so rife. In France chivalry still asserts,
in a feeble way, the privilege of winking and holding out its iron,
and refuses to be comforted with a suit for damages.

Southall, a station or two beyond, suggests sport of a less lethal
character, being an ancient meeting-place for the queen's stag-hounds.
John Leach may have collected here some of his studies of Cockney
equestrianism. The sportsmen so dear to his pencil furnished him
wealth of opportunities on their annual concourse at the cart's tail.
The unloading of the animal, his gathering himself up for a leisurely
canter across country, the various styles and degrees of horsemanship
among his lumbering followers, and the business-like replacing of
the quarry in his vehicle, to be hauled away for another day's sport,
served as the most complete travesty imaginable of the chase. It has
the compensation of placing a number of worthy men in the saddle at
least once in the year and compelling them to do some rough riding.