CHAPTER XXIX

COOKING UP A HUNT DINNER

Captain Doleful, ever anxious for the prosperity of the town and his own emolument, conceived that a hunt dinner on the night of his ball would have the effect of drawing divers rural parties to the town who might not otherwise honour him with their presence, and he lost no time in communicating the idea to the worthy master, Mr. Jorrocks.

Of course the eclat it would confer on the hunt, and the brilliancy it would reflect on Mr. Jorrocks’s master-ship, were the main points Captain Doleful urged on behalf of his proposal; and Mr. Jorrocks, nothing loth to indulge in a good dinner, at which he was to play first fiddle, readily came into the proposition, and the following notice was inserted in the “Paul Pry”:—

“Mr. Jorrocks’s Fox-hounds!

“There will be a Hunt Dinner, at the Dragon Hotel, on the night of the Master of the Ceremonies’ Ball, at which Members of the Hunt, and the public in general, are invited to attend.

“Mr. Jorrocks in the Chair!

“Tickets, twelve shillings each, to be had at the bar of the Dragon Hotel up to five o’clock on Monday evening, after which none can possibly be issued.”

Never was a happier device, or one more eminently successful. Not only did the visitors of the place hasten to secure tickets, but people from all the neighbouring towns showered in their orders by the post, and it soon became apparent that a bumper would be the result. The longest long room at the “Dragon” was soon declared inefficient for the accommodation of the party, and the masons and joiners were summoned to lay the adjoining bedroom to the end, which would afterwards be restored to privacy by the usual means of folding-doors. Then came the joining and fitting of tables, the measuring of cloths, the borrowing of knives, forks, glasses, salt-cellars, decanters, and waiters. Captain Doleful flew about the town like a lost dog in search of its master When Mr Snubbins, the landlord of the “Dragon,” failed in accomplishing a loan, the Captain exerted his authority in compelling one. What with his ball and the dinner he scarcely had time for his meals.

On the Monday he bespoke an audience with Mr. Jorrocks, to put the finishing stroke to his arrangements. He was duly received in the dining-room of Diana Villa, where pens, ink, and paper were laid for his coming. The dinner, he assured the worthy master, was calculated to make him eminent in the eyes of all men, and most materially to aid the financial department of the Hunt. “There will be,” said he, “a gathering from all quarters. Men from every point—sportsmen of every shade and grade are about to assemble, and if you can manage to tickle the fancy of each with a speech, so as to make him believe his favourite sport is the best, there is no saying but, in the happy mood that most men are in when pleased and half-drunk, you may draw a good many into becoming members or subscribing.”

“Well, there can be no difficulty whatsomever at all,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, “in making them a werry ’andsome speech—beautiful speech, I may say, but in course they can’t expect me to tell them that I consider any sport better than ’unting.”

“Why, as to that,” rejoined Captain Doleful, “it makes little odds what a man says on an occasion of this sort, especially a chairman, whose first care should be to put every one in good humour with himself; and if you were to outstep the real facts a little for once, no one would ever think of throwing it in your teeth on a future occasion. For instance now, Captain Couples, the great courser, has written for tickets for three,—himself, his son, and a friend,—in order that he may have the honour of making your acquaintance, and then of presenting his son in due form. Of course you will take an early opportunity during the evening of buttering him by introducing as a toast the beautiful sport of coursing, which you may say is one of the most classical and elegant of field sports, and say that it is one which you feel a peculiar pleasure in proposing, inasmuch as you have been given to understand that one of the most distinguished patrons of the leash has honoured the Handley Cross Hunt dinner with his presence, which affords you an opportunity of coupling with the sport the name of the gallant Captain Couples, and of course the toast will be responded to with a heavy round of cheers, which will lay the captain open to the insinuating applications of Mr. Fleeceall, and you may reckon him, if not his son also, a member of your Hunt for a year at all events, especially if you get him to pay the money down on the nail.”

“Humph!” said Mr. Jorrocks, turning it over in his mind whether he could do such violence to his feelings as to praise the sport of coursing, or call it sport at all, for the sake of the three sovereigns he would get by Captain Couples becoming a member of the Hunt. Nothing daunted, Captain Doleful proceeded with his enumeration and recommendations. “Mr. Trippitt, the famous cricketer, will most likely come. He was the founder of the Winwicket Cricket Club, which beat all London at Lord’s the year before last; you should toast him and his club together, and of course you would string a lot of sentences together in praise of the game of cricket, which you are doubtless aware is most popular all over England. Then there is Mr. Ringmore, the quoit-player, and loads of people who keep some hobby or other for their private riding, who should all be toasted in turn.”

“Werry well,” said Mr. Jorrocks, “werry well, there cannot be not never no objection whatsomever at all to sayin’ somethin’ pleasant and soapy of all the warious amusements, but it is werry difficult and inconwenient to have so many cut and dried speeches, as well as one’s dinner aboard at the same time. If I could manage to couple two or three of them together, such as coursin’, fishin’, and fiddlin’, for instance, it would suit my constitution better.”

“Oh, no! that would not do,” replied Captain Doleful, “because one of the objects in singling out a sport or diversion to give as a toast is the circumstance of some patron or follower being at table, who will make a speech in reply; but if you club two or three together, not only will you fail in getting any one to consider the toast as a compliment, but no one will rise to acknowledge it, because, though he may be a keen follower of one branch of sport, he may care nothing about the thing you couple with it—You understand?”

“Then we must jest dot down what we think should be given,” observed Mr. Jorrocks, “and also wot I should say, for it is far more than probable, indeed I should say most likely, that in the heat and noise, and lush and flush, and one thing and another, I shall forget one half o’ the toast, and possibly give the coursin man to the fiddlin’ feller, or the cricketer instead of the quoit-player.” Thereupon Mr. Jorrocks took pen, ink, and paper, and proceeded to draw out his list of toasts.

“In course, ‘the Queen, and her Stag-’ounds’ will come first,” observed he, writing the words at the head of a long slip of paper—adding, “bumper toast. Cheers.” “Do you think there will be any staggerin’ sinner there to acknowledge the toast?”

“Probably there will,” replied the captain; “at all events, if there isn’t, I would say a few words in return, as it would not look well to let the toast pass without saying something on behalf of our young and virtuous Queen. I can acknowledge it as Vice-president, and also as holding her Majesty’s commission.”

“Well then,” said Mr. Jorrocks, “let’s see what should come next? Shouldn’t it be the ’Andley Cross Fox-hounds, and my werry good health?”

“No—that will be too soon. The chairman’s health should never be given until the company have had a few glasses of wine to elate them for shouting. Besides, your health will be the toast of the evening, and things always become flat after that is given, and perhaps the company will begin to disperse.”

“Werry well—anything for a quiet life—what shall we put then?”

Captain Doleful.—“Prince Albert, to be sure! and his harriers.”

“With all my ’eart,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, placing the Prince’s name after her Majesty’s.

“We must have the Prince of Whales next, in course,” observed our master, “and all the rest of the Royal family,” putting it down, and asking the captain what should follow.

“Mr. Strider, the great racing man of these parts, will most likely come; and if so you should give the Turf,” observed Captain Doleful. “Besides, he is a very likely man to become a member of the Hunt, if not to subscribe, now that there is a regular master, his only excuse for not doing so when the committee had the hounds being that he didn’t like partnership concerns in anything but racehorses.”

“The Turf, and Mr. Strider’s good health!” Mr. Jorrocks wrote down—adding the words—“improve breed of ’osses—promote sport—amuse lower orders—mount cavalry—lick the world,” as the headings for his speech.

“Come now, jog on,” said Mr. Jorrocks, looking at the nib of his pen, “we’ve only got five toasts ready as yet: shouldn’t we give Fox-’unting?”

“Oh, certainly,” replied Captain Doleful; “that is a general toast, and acceptable to all; besides, Mr. Yarnley will be at the dinner,” observed Captain Doleful. “He has two capital covers, and one capital speech, which he likes letting off. Write down, ‘Mr. Yarnley, and Promoters of Fox-hunting!’ for he doesn’t hunt himself, and only preserves foxes in order that he may have his health drunk at ordinaries and public dinners, when he tells the company how he has always preserved foxes, and does preserve foxes, and will preserve foxes, and so forth.”

Mr. Jorrocks then added Mr. Yarnley’s name to the list of toasts, adding the words, “proprietors of covers and promoters of fox-’unting,” and the following headings for a speech, “Considerate gentleman — free from selfishness—good example.” “We should cheer this toast, I think,” added Mr. Jorrocks, “ ’specially as I s’pose the gemman takes no rent for his covers.”

“I believe not,” replied Captain Doleful, upon which Mr. Jorrocks put the word “cheers” after “good example.”

“Now Coursing should come, I think,” remarked Captain Doleful, “and Captain Couples’s health. He’s a great man at the Deptford meeting, and thinks coursing the only sport worth living for.”

“He must be a werry big blockhead, then,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, laying down his pen, and stretching out his legs as though he were going to take “the rest.” “A werry remarkable jackass, indeed, I should say. Now of all slow, starvation, great-coat, comforter, worsted-stockin’, dirty-nose sort of amusement, that same melancholy coursin’ is to me the most miserably contemptible. It’s a satire on racin’.”

“Never mind,” said Captain Doleful, “Couples’s guineas will be as good as any other man’s; and, as I said before, a chairman is not expected to swear to all he says—your business is to endeavour to please every one, so that they may go home and tell their wives and daughters what a jolly, delightful, at-all-in-the-ring sort of gentleman Mr. Jorrocks is.”

“Aye, that’s all werry good,” grunted our master, “but conscience is conscience arter all, and coursin’ is coursin’. It’s as bad as drinkin’ the ’Andley Cross waters to have to praise what one doesn’t like. I’ll give the Merry ’Arriers afore Coursin’, howsomever,” said Mr. Jorrocks, putting down the words “hare-’unting”; “will there be any currant-jelly boy to return thanks?—I’m sure there will, indeed, for I never knew a mixed party yet without a master of muggers among them.”

To this toast Mr. Jorrocks added the words—“nose—fine music—pleasant—soup.” “Now,” said he, “we’ve got the Queen and the Staggers—Prince Halbert—Prince of Whales—Strider and the Turf—Fox-’unting—Yarnley and Proprietors of Covers—the Merry Arriers.”

“Put ‘Coursing’ next, then,” said Doleful; “it will follow hare-hunting very well, and be all in the soup line.”

“Well, if you must have it, you must,” replied Mr. Jorrocks, writing down the word “coursin’.” “Who acknowledges the toast?—ah, Couples—Captain, I think you said he is? Captain Couples—a werry good man too—blow me tight, though, if I knows what to say in givin’ on it.”

“Oh, say it’s classical, and a fine bracing amusement.” Mr. Jorrocks added the words “fine amusement.”

“Well, that’s eight bumpers from the chair,” observed Captain Doleful; “and now we’ll let you take your breath a little—unless Mr. Snapper comes, when you must give pigeon-shooting and the triggers generally. I’ll now toast the Chair.”

“The Chair,” wrote Mr. Jorrocks, “that’s me. Cheers, in course.”

“In course,” replied Captain Doleful, adding, “I shall butter you uncommon.”

“With all my ’eart—I can stand a wast of praise,” replied Mr. Jorrocks.

“Well, then, after that, and after your speech, which, of course, will be highly complimentary to the company, and full of promises of what you will do, you must propose my health—as Master of the Ceremonies of Handley Cross Spa.”

“And as a great sportsman!” added Mr. Jorrocks.

“No, no, I’d rather not,” exclaimed Doleful in alarm; “the fact is, I only hunt on the sly. If the dowagers thought I did not devote my whole time and energies to the town amusements, they would grumble, and say I was always out hunting instead of attending to the important duties of my post. No; just confine yourself to the M.C. department, not forgetting to insinuate that it is my ball-night, and to express a hope that all the company will honour it with their presence; you might say something, apparently half-facetiously, in the way of a hint about giving guineas for their tickets; for some people are getting into the dirty trick of paying at the door.”

“Werry good,” said Mr. Jorrocks, writing down “Capt. Doleful, M.C., not sportsman—pleasant feller—nice ball—pumps in pocket—tickets at bar—guinea.” “You’ll be ‘cheer’d,’ I s’pose?”

“Of course,” said the captain—“all the honours—one cheer more if you can get it.”

Cricketing, quoit-playing, shooting, badger-baiting, steeple-chasing, hurdle-racing, crow-shooting, and divers other sporting, extraordinary, and extravagant toasts were then added; some to fit people that were known to be coming, others put down to take the chance of any amateur of the amusement presenting himself unexpectedly at the table.

“Werry well now,” said Mr. Jorrocks at last, dotting up the column of toasts with his pen, “that’s two, four, six, seven, eight, ten, twelve, fourteen, sixteen. Sixteen bumper toasts, with speeches both goin’ and returnin’, to say nothin’ o’ shoutin’, which always tells on weak ’eads. Wot shall we say next?”

“Oh!” said Captain Doleful, in an indifferent sort of way, as much as to say the important business of the evening would be finished on drinking his health; “why, just pass the bottle a few times, or if you see a gentleman with a singing face, call on him for a song; or address your neighbour right or left, and say you’ll trouble him to give a gentleman and his hounds.”

“A gen’leman and his ’ounds,” said Mr. Jorrocks, “but they’ll have had a gen’leman and his ’ounds when they’ve had me.”

“Ah, but that’s nothing—‘a gentleman and his hounds,’ is a fine serviceable toast at a hunt-dinner. I’ve known a gentleman and his hounds—a gentleman and his hounds—a gentleman and his hounds—serve chairman, vice-chairman, and company, throughout the live-long evening, without the slightest assistance from any other source. Fox-hunters are easily pleased, if you do but give them plenty to drink. Let me, however, entreat of you, above all things, to remember my ball, and do not let them oversit the thing so as not to get to it. Remember, too, it’s a fancy one, and they’ll take more dressing.”

“Aye, aye, I’ll vip them off to you when I think they’ve had enough,” replied Mr. Jorrocks.