30 GUN, RIFLE, AND HOUND. 



time in doing so, hounds and horsemen had completely 

 disappeared again. 



The woods then are left behind. Now we cross 

 the only bit of plough I saw during the run. Surely 

 the others are coming back to me now ? Yes, I am 

 in that field before the Master is out of it. A few 

 minutes more and we are neck and neck. 



" I wish I rode eleven stone," he shouts, as I top 

 the next fence in front of him. This lands me into 

 a long piece of poor land, studded with gorse bushes 

 and slightly downhill. The other two are close in 

 front now, and we have been running nearly three- 

 quarters of an hour. We must kill soon. The only 

 wonder to me is, how even such a gallant wild fox 

 should have stood up before hounds so long. 



The two leaders are pulling up and jumping off. 

 Killed ! is my first thought, but no, there go the pack 

 as hard as ever. I gallop down to them, and soon see 

 the cause of their getting off. The fence before them 

 is a stone-faced bank with a few loose-looking sods on 

 top. Before it runs a black-looking drain of some 

 width, and for some distance the other side the ground 

 is obviously boggy. 



My right foot is out of the stirrup to dismount, 

 when it suddenly occurs to me, why shouldn't I trust 

 the old horse ? No cleverer hunter ever was foaled in 

 Ireland, it is soft falling at the worst, and if I do it I 

 shall be alone with hounds. 



So thinking, I cram him manfully at it. Lightly 

 he changes his legs on the top of the fence, and, clever 

 as a cat, drops into the far field clear of the worst of the 



