frequent topics of discourse, and shew that he has not been idle. At the
lower end of the hall is a large otter's skin stuffed with hay, which
his mother ordered to be hung up in that manner, and the Knight looks
upon it with great satisfaction, because it seems he was but nine years
old when his dog killed him. A little room adjoining to the hall is a
kind of arsenal filled with guns of several sizes and inventions, with
which the Knight has made great havock in the woods, and destroyed many
thousands of pheasants, partridges and woodcocks. His stable-doors are
patched with noses that belonged to foxes of the Knight's own hunting
down. Sir ROGER shewed me one of them, that for distinction sake has a
brass nail struck through it, which cost him about fifteen hours riding,
carried him through half a dozen counties, killed him a brace of
geldings, and lost above half his dogs. This the knight looks upon as
one of the greatest exploits of his life. The perverse widow, whom I
have given some account of, was the death of several foxes; for Sir
ROGER has told me that in the course of his amours he patched the
western door of his stable. Whenever the widow was cruel, the foxes were
sure to pay for it. In proportion as his passion for the widow abated
and old age came on, he left off fox-hunting; but a hare is not yet safe
that sits within ten miles of his house.

There is no kind of exercise which I would so recommend to my readers of
both sexes as this of riding, as there is none which so much conduces to
health, and is every way accommodated to the body, according to the Idea
which I have given of it. Doctor _Sydenham_ is very lavish in its
praises; and if the _English_ reader will see the mechanical
effects of it described at length, he may find them in a book published
not many years since, under the title of _Medicina Gymnastica._ For
my own part, when I am in town, for want of these opportunities, I
exercise myself an hour every morning upon a dumb bell that is placed in