LOSING ONE'S START 267 



persevere, trusting to a check, a friendly turn, or a 

 convenient road to bring you up to them again, and 

 push on all eyes and ears, all hopes and fears ; but 

 your anxiety will only make the reward more sweet 

 if fortune do but favour you. 



If a friendly road does present itself and lead in 

 the direction of the disappearing forms, my advice is, 

 get on to it at once, even if you have to lead over the 

 roadside fence or risk a fall to take you there ! Once 

 on the " 'ard 'igh road," peg along it, regardless, for 

 once, of legs and feet ; you are sure to gain a bit 

 here. But keep your neck stretched and a bright 

 look-out over the fences, and should you see the 

 scarlet or black backs turning away from you, hesitate 

 not, but quit the highway at once, and again pursue 

 diligently. Many are the disappointments you may 

 suffer, many the difficulties you may encounter : a bit 

 of rising ground hides the chase from view, and give 

 you pause, but pause as seldom as possible. That 

 sound which brought you up with a jerk was not the 

 chiming of the pack, but the gabble of geese and 

 turkeys at yonder farm close by. That sound that 

 thrilled you so, again, was not the huntsman's horn 

 (as you discover when you stop to listen), but the 

 braying of a jackass, or the distant lowing of cattle. 

 Those yells you heard came not from the followers 

 of the pack, but from children released from the road- 

 side school. 



Trust not too much to the ear, but depend chiefly 

 on your eyesight to bring you out of your difficulties ; 

 and, if your horse be a good one, the chances are 

 that you will speedily overtake some of those who 



