CHAPTER XL 



AN IMPERIAL HUNTRESS. 

 I. 



A KEEN air was blowing, and a heavy mist veiled the 

 landscape, as I drove rapidly along on Saturday, on 

 my way to the meeting of Sir Watkin Wynnes cele- 

 brated pack of hounds, which was fixed for Macefan r 

 the residence of the Hon. Edward Kenyon, five miles 

 from Whitchurch, in the county of Shropshire. The 

 hour named was half-past ten; and it was evident 

 that the desire to see the Empress of Austria in the 

 field was uppermost in the mind of the dwellers in this 

 part of Salop. Horses and carriages were at fabulous 

 prices, every available vehicle and every possible horse 

 being requisitioned for this important occasion. Com- 

 menting rather strongly on prices for vehicular con- 

 veyance, I was met with the old familiar rejoinder that 

 it was not so much the paucity of horses as the rarity 

 of the presence of an empress in this somewhat primi- 

 tive part of the world that sent up prices to so high a 

 point. Trotting smartly along, we passed many well- 

 mounted men, some in scarlet with green collars, the 

 uniform of the hunt ; several ladies, who looked as if 

 they were well accustomed to face a big fence or th& 

 occasional tall banks, and old hawthorn hedges, which 



