142 THE IMAGE OF WAE 



the note of a hound or a horn, or the loud-mouthed 

 shoutings and whip-crackings which prove that the 

 tufters are being stopped from the pursuit of an 

 animal of the wrong sex. At last comes a message 

 from the Master to keep the road clear, as the bucks 

 are working in that direction. This is shortly fol- 

 lowed by a loud holloa — a buck has at last been 

 separated. Almost before we are mounted the 

 huntsman comes for the pack, and a quarter of an 

 hour before midday they are laid on the line. The 

 deer has apparently lain down, for almost immedi- 

 ately he lobs across the ride, his spreading antlers 

 laid back upon his flanks. For some time he dodges 

 and doubles across this enclosure — Yinney E-idge by 

 name — and then makes for an ornamental plantation 

 that adjoins it. A pause follows, and then we hear 

 hounds running back, and make -towards them. Not 

 long afterwards there bounds into the ride we are 

 in — the wrong buck. We are in duty bound to assist 

 the whipper-in to secure the hounds which are fol- 

 lowing this deer ; and then we hasten off at hot pace 

 in the direction where we last heard the others. 

 We have a smart gallop before we find them driving 

 across an open plain divided into two by a boggy 

 brook which brings one sportsman at least to grief. 

 On they go, over the Lymington river and through 

 another enclosure called Hursthill, and thence run 

 into the grounds of a quaint, old-fashioned-looking, 

 but modern, country house. The difiiculties here 

 produce a check, but a holloa comes from the Brocken- 

 hurst road just beyond. Parallel to the pack, w^e 

 clatter down Clay Hill and turn into the greenwood 

 again and race up a hill — Park Hill. Hounds have 

 been running nearly an hour now, and our horses 



