522 FOX-HOUND, FOREST, AND PRAIRIE. 



the minds of the drenched and dawdling crew (if they will 

 forgive the alliterative epithets), who sauntered after hounds. 

 But somebody jumped a jump — always an infectious, foolhardy, 

 proceeding, when it is just as easy, and twice as safe, to "go 

 round " ? Then another did ditto, and another and another. 

 And all had a lot to say on the subject, as soon as they issued 

 scatheless. Who would have thought it — " My old crock . ." 

 " My new four-year old . ." and so forth. You all know the 

 style in which we bound through the paper hoops of our first 

 fence of the year. They were all off the spring-board together. 

 And the next thing the Mutual-Admiration-Society found them- 

 selves opposed to was the L. & N. W. Railway. Under ordinary 

 circumstances this should have been a stopper — to progress, if 

 not to discussion. But the first shower, and the first jump, of a 

 season don't come every day. Here was a little " cock-hedge " 

 (inverted commas to convey Leicestershire parlance), such as no 

 new-fangled line would venture to depend upon. (I am told 

 the Metropolitan Extension, that has its fangs already at the 

 throat of Warwickshire, meditates nothing less than treble 

 strands of best barbed.) How could the adventurers help 

 themselves ? They hopped in for very exhilaration, scarcely 

 giving a thought, till it was too late, to the awful problem of 

 how to get out — the latter being invariably the crucial, bitter, 

 trial in crossing railway or river. They swarmed up the em- 

 bankment, and surmounted the glistening rails. But on the 

 farther brink the telegraph wires were hanging at pony height 

 above the ground. It was necessary for riders to raise the 

 lowest strands that they might pass under, while descending at 

 an angle of 45°. One, two, and three of the party effected this 

 unharmed : for at that hour in the morning the telegraph 

 offices are scarcely in full play, and the chance of executing a 

 stray foxhunter by the new process was fortunately missed. 



But Number Four in rotation was protected from the risk by 

 man's best friend, his horse. The latter, fearless no doubt of 

 timber or thorn — and certainly of such a mild barrier as dis- 

 played in the second little leafy hedge below — would have 



