THE CALPE HUNT. 323 



the very nature of things it follows that such falls are 

 serious, as they very often result in horse and man 

 rolling down half a hillside. The Higueron country, 

 north-eastwards from the Rock, is perhaps the most 

 unrideable of all, and those meets are always the 

 worst attended. Taking it all in all, it is probably the 

 roughest " country" in the world. The only thing I 

 know that will at all compare with it is that one 

 meets with sometimes pig-sticking in India, and this 

 latter has the further drawback that you must go top- 

 speed all the way. 



Fences there are here and there, nevertheless, 

 generally made by heaping up thorns and interlacing 

 cactus. The newly-landed subaltern generally makes 

 a point of putting his horse at the first of these he sees. 

 Instead, however, of the good-humoured approval 

 " larking" meets with at home, he is met with yells of 

 horror from the field. " Come back ! Cultivation ! " is 

 the cry. These little fences mean that the brown 

 earth the other side has been ploughed, and as the not 

 very wealthy Hunt has to pay for every footmark on 

 these, they are even more carefully guarded than 

 wheat or seeds in England. Nay, more, the Spanish 

 cultivator is quite likely to take the law into his own 

 hands. I recollect one summer evening, when two of 

 us were larking over a loose stone wall near the sea, 

 a Spanish peasant shouting to us to desist. But not 

 only did he not wait to see if we stopped, which we 

 did, but rushing into the house, returned with his 

 escopeta, or blunderbuss, the sight of which effectually 

 sent us galloping off. As a rule, however, the 



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