36 THE IMAGE OF WAR 



woods, and in April, out of consideration for the 

 ''teeming mothers of the vulpine race," there can 

 be no earth-stopping. Here, then, our gallop must 

 end. 



No ; for see, the hounds keep away from the 

 wood. 



The fox has run parallel with its upper edge, and 

 taken a semicircular course through the great grass 

 fields that surround it. He was too hot to enter the 

 woodlands, so circled round them, looking and longing 

 no doubt, and then held on again. Once more it is 

 '' forrard, forrard," but nobody says so. Hounds are 

 nearly running away from us as it is. 



We learnt afterwards that the main body of the 

 field, who had been thrown out at the boggy brook 

 and thus left behind at the outset, had considered 

 these woods the fox's most likely point, and had made 

 straight for them. Scarcely had they got in sight of 

 them, coming by the valley below, when they saw the 

 hounds with their few followers swing round the top 

 and disappear again. The pace we were going at 

 may be judged from the fact that when they reached 

 the top, having, as may be imagined, lost no time 

 in doing so, hounds and horsemen had completely 

 disappeared again. 



The woods then are left behind. Now we cross the 

 only bit of plough I saw during the run. Surely the 

 others are coming back to me now ? Yes, . I am in 

 that field before the Master is out of it. A few 

 minutes more and we are neck and neck. 



'* I wish I rode eleven stone," he shouts, as I top the 

 next fence in front of him. This lands me into a long 

 piece of poor land, studded with gorse bushes and 

 slightly downhill. The other two are close in front 



