100 HUNTING AND SPOBTING NOTES. 



thirty minutes which ended where it began, and a fresh 

 fox saved the hfe of Mr. Walford's original stager. 



Thursday had duphcate attractions — a final Whitchurch 

 meet with Sir Watkin, or Yorton Station with the Shrop- 

 shire. Borderer had to be content with the home circuit, 

 and was not altogether discontented with his lot. How- 

 beit that sweet afternoon on the Ash pastures, which 

 never rode more beautifully since the flood, must have 

 been a treat to those who indulged in it. A Peel's 

 Gorse fox went straight to his master's kitchen garden, 

 at Hinton, for his sanctuary. An Osmere fox popped 

 into Combermere, and then to Marbury, where he was 

 lost. And by way of a wind up, an Ash warrior circled 

 towards Cloverly and back, then to the Walk Mill and 

 Wilksley, with a true band of revelrie over the grass at 

 his brush, again skirted Cloverley, and saved himself 

 close to Ightfield by going to ground, in something over 

 an hour. Although lie did not describe a straight line 

 on the map, from a hunting and scenting point of view, 

 he could scarcely have gone better. For this reason at 

 least Ash Gorse has nobly maintained its character. 

 Yorton station drew together a fair field, considering 

 that its competitor was Whitchurch, but nothing por- 

 trayed the weaning season so much as the few pink coats, 

 and the increase of mufties. Broughton Gorse did not 

 respond to our expectations, but a trot back to the Black 

 Birches was productive of a sweet chorus. So unpleas- 

 antly near, indeed, w^as it to Buggy's brush, that when 

 he jumped into the road on the Pimhill side, only to be 

 headed by a man who persistently stopped there for the 

 purpose, hounds and he were actuliy there together. 

 The clever fellow squatted down, and the hounds dashed 

 on over the fence, and one half of them went two fields 

 before they could be stopped. Some said it was a hare, 

 but this I do not believe. The probability is that 

 another fox had stolen away just before the hounds 

 entered the covert. This curious contretemps saved our 

 fox's life, for he popped back and went away under high 

 pressure from the other half of the pack, over the railway, 

 across Sansaw Park, and over the Grinshill Eoad, as if 

 for Acton Eeynald, but inclining to the right, we saw our 

 fox a field ahead of us, picking his way through Mr. Bibby's 

 ewes and lambs, and on we went like fun in front of 

 Hard wick Grange, and still to the right, swinging back. 



