30 RIDING 



him as he breaks, 1 but in any case the first few fields afford 

 the clue; they know they are after the old customer, and 

 if they see hounds mean running, away they hustle on the 

 familiar conducting lines, sure to be there or thereabouts at the 

 death, if death ensues, when a feeling of regret as at the loss of 

 an old friend seems to mingle with the sportsman's natural de- 

 light at seeing a fox handsomely killed. Perhaps of all men 

 who go hunting they most thoroughly enjoy a run, since they 

 see nearly as much of it as the thrusting brigade, and being 

 seldom in danger and their attention wholly undisturbed by 

 feelings of rivalry, they observe and appreciate the working of 

 hounds with a more critical eye than do any but the real pro- 

 fessors of the death or glory division, to whom, indeed, they 

 are ofttimes a very thorn in the flesh ; for what can be more 

 disheartening to a man who has gone his level best for twenty 

 minutes over a cramped or strongly enclosed country, than to 

 see, on approaching a road at the expiration of that time, a bevy 

 of cool veterans turning out of it through a bridle gate a hundred 

 yards in front of him, and by so much therefore nearer to hounds; 

 or to hear subsequently at dinner that his performance has been 

 scanned not always with admiration, and his little aberrations duly 

 noted from the serene security of a parallel lane ? Let it not be 

 supposed, however, that these wary ones are invariably safe men 

 to follow for one who has made up his mind that nothing but 

 a rut or a rabbit-hole shall have a chance of putting him down. 

 Even the Homers of the chase sometimes nod, they now and 

 again get cornered like other less enlightened mortals, and are 

 known on emergency to do very mighty deeds of valour, some- 

 what after the fashion of the Squire's second horseman in 

 Leech's celebrated picture who, having led Tom and Harry 

 through a delicious succession of gates, finds the last one into 

 the road chained, and hops over it like a bird. 



i Mr. Henley Greaves was noted for his acquaintance with foxes. On one 

 occasion while he hunted the V.W.H. country, on viewing a fox away from the 

 Purlieus gorse, he remarked in his slow solemn way : That's a Folly wood gentle- 

 man,' and galloped off. Straight as he went by road and lane to the Folly wood 

 some four miles distant, the hounds went straighter and were there before him. 



