FAMOUS SERVANTS OF THE HUNT 



poured out like a stream in spate, stopped, wavered, 

 and settled to run. At every fence the pursuers 

 grew fewer as hounds held on. The wild chorus 

 of the wood was but a rippling chime, as now 

 one, now another of the pack acknowledged the 

 beauty of the poem that Hartley Coleridge thought 

 scent made to the exquisitely attuned senses of the 

 hound. Silently the pack swept onward, silently the 

 field followed, from time to time one or another 

 dropping out of the chase. Each man is looking 

 straight before him, his vision limited to the eager 

 ears of his horse and the fleeting piebald mass of 

 the hounds. The fences are left behind. Always 

 among the foremost riders is the slight, wiry figure 

 of Will Long — now giving an ecstatic cheer, now 



" Unconsciously damning 

 Their dear little hearts as they run." 



His arm flies up at times with a characteristic 

 jerk, a signal to those behind that the hounds are 

 running on. Alas ! in Badminton Park they were 

 halloaed to a fresh fox. 



But the day was saved by an excited groom, who, 

 running up, told the huntsman, " I seen a 'unted 

 fox, Mr. Long; 'e's as black as my 'at, and 'is 

 tongue's out and 'is brush down." 



" How long has he been gone .'* " asked Will 

 briskly as he took his horn out of its case. 



" Three minutes, and 'e can go a bit yet, or I'm 

 mistaken." 



159 



