SCRAPTOFT HALL AT TEA-TIME FOR MAN AND FOX. 117 



and, with ninety-nine hundredths of the field drawn up at the 

 farthest corner of the holt, he might have run his course with no 

 other followers than the pack and its staff. But with gallant 

 courtesy he went at once to the left, to meet the hurrying 

 throng; and so fifty men were enabled to take up the challenge 

 and ride to his lead. Fence for fence and gap for gap he 

 took them, by Barkby Thorpe Spinney, to Humberstone Village 

 — the difference in the direction of his start counter-balancing 

 the extra pace, and leaving the time the same as on the previous 

 occasion. Again he virtually beat them in half an hour — this 

 time mainly through the intervention of what the daily forecast 

 had set down mildly as a " cold shower," which in fact meant a 

 bitterly drenching rain from the north-east. ' 



But the huntsman did not fail to remember how his fox had 

 laid up to laugh in his brush after the hunt of Friday ; so set 

 to work at once to make good the laurels and then the gorse at 

 Scraptoft. Nothing apparently came of the search ; and other 

 memories acting upon the hungry and thirsty, many of these 

 trooped as before into the hospitable portals of the Hall. In 

 the middle of the comforting process which was to fortify them 

 for a long wet journey — in most cases up the piercing wind — 

 came a simultaneous rush to the window, with a snatching-up of 

 hats, whips, and half-finished glasses. Reynard was stealing 

 across the lawn, his tongue out and his head turned over his 

 shoulder. The whole party issued to scream and holloa ; while 

 the terriers took up the line and dashed into the shrubs. A 

 moment more, and out he came again — Snap and Pincher close 

 at his brush, having run their game into a cul de sac formed by 

 iron railings and wire netting. The luncheon-eaters hurried to 

 the stables, to jump into their saddles and gallop forth, with 

 girths still loose and faces beaming in justice to the good things 

 within. Hounds, just turning homeward, were quickly brought 

 up by the babel of sound, and almost met their fox as he crossed 

 the road from the shrubberies. For three fields they scurried 

 after him ; but in three more the driving storm completely 

 choked them off — and the Barkby Holt fox again slept in safety. 



