A WEEK WITH SIX PACKS. 537 



possible. To most of us the treat was altogether new. Our 

 •ears had been tickled with stories of " a dart with Mr. Fernie," 

 and "a clipper with the Pytchley." We had said Yea, and 

 hoped for our own turn. It came in very fair fashion with 

 Mr. Ashton this Tuesday afternoon. Prior to one o'clock a 

 .pleasant scurry had been scored from Cook's Gorse ; and a 

 brace of foxes had been killed in its immediate neighbourhood. 

 It remained for the afternoon to provide the pith of the day — 

 from Hilmorton Gorse. It is early in the season ; but there 

 was a little world of riders. A score of years ago Mr. Little 

 Gilmour assured me that twenty men were now riding hard 

 to one in his youth-time. The ratio, I make bold to say, has 

 ■completed itself again since then. Else am I beginning to view r 

 bravery in the form of mere freedom from causeless fear. 

 Perhaps it is so. But there were no spectres worse than a half 

 rotten ox-rail in those days. 



To history. 1.45 by the watch when hounds issued from 

 Hilmorton Gorse, a minute after their fox. An hour later they 

 had him in the open. My estimate of the Crick country is first 

 founded upon boy's experience under Charles Payn — and may 

 accordingly be an exaggerated one. But, to put it mildly, I 

 esteem it as second to none in the Grass Countries. So, 

 when — under orders correct and pronounced — we pulled up for 

 a moment in the Watling Street, small wonder there was half- 

 assured happiness — not to say, nervous anxiety — pourtrayed in 

 fifty faces — faces as yet set and concentrated, by no means 

 effulgent as with the glow of a run in full fling. In plain, 

 •unbaptized English, we are at such times " in a devil of a 

 hurry," — afraid of being choked off, interrupted, or led astray — 

 .afraid of we hardly know what. For the indefinite is before 

 ns — and possibly we are not quite sure of ourselves. So it 

 was almost like a jest at a ghost seance, that the spell was 

 momentarily broken by a distracting trifle. 'Tis hardly worth 

 telling. But when a bold stranger leaped his way into the 

 road — (Only strangers are bold. We who know every fence, 

 and would like to know a great many more gates than we do 



