A GRIND WITH THE GRAFTON. 297 



hound, which was running back, but, strange to say, 

 not one of them has viewed the fox. 



I view something, however, that causes me as 

 great perhaps greater pleasure, and that is my 

 second horse. Rapidly as the change is effected, 

 hounds are running hard again before I am ready. 



We are to have the three-mile gallop to Catesby 

 back again, on a line parallel to that by which we 

 came. The ground is deeper than ever the fences 

 as nasty. I saw one sportsman engulfed in a narrow 

 drain, and heard afterwards that it took an hour to 

 get his horse out. Still it is for'rard, for'rard ! Catesby 

 is past, and Badby Village and Badby Wood is 

 reached again. Our fox is, of course, too hot to dwell 

 in the covert, but slips out at the bottom end and 

 crosses the valley. By Miller's Farm he turns short 

 back, keeping still to the east of the valley. I think 

 if I had known what a big place that was that the 

 Huntsman gave me a lead over there I should have 

 gone to look elsewhere. Ignorance, however, takes 

 the place of daring, and the good gray gives a kick 

 back that leaves the gulf-like drain well behind us. 



Again our fox turns back short of Newnham 

 Village. No one, however, can chronicle all the short 

 turns of a beaten fox, nor would they form interesting 

 reading. Suffice it to say we cross the Nene (if it is 

 the Nene that flows by Badby) several times. 



At last the fox, who has already once been coursed 

 in view, turns again for Badby Wood. He cannot 

 face the hill, however, but betakes himself into a net- 

 work of cottage gardens and paddocks, where we 



