GEORGE HART ON "THE KNIGHT 



13 



for two or three miles, you can warm up the most sluggish quadruped 

 upon the coldest day. 



When ]Mr. Hart first set off in pursuit of these flying couples and Jack, 

 he imagined he was at the tail of the hunt, for he was leisurely riding 

 down the road when he spied them. Picture his satisfaction when he 

 reahsed that he was at the head of affairs, and the field were furlongs 

 behind ! He certainly looked very happy and cheerful when he came back 

 to the woods. 



After all, the woods were about the best place that day, the bitterly 

 cold wind hardly softening the frost-bound ground. No one was sorry 

 when the order was given for home, in spite of gloomy anticipations of no 

 hunting on the morrow. All our pretty ladies and all our brave chasseurs 

 must have been agreeably surprised when they came down to breakfast 



George Hart on "The Knight" 



on Tuesday morning to see ground still free from snow, for the air seemed 

 pregnant with it, as it rushed in ever-hurrying blasts across the leaden sky 

 or moaned in the chimney like some unquiet spirit. Had the wind veered 

 another point or two to the north, we should have had our Christmas Eve 

 ride in the snow instead of the stinging rain. You couldn't get away from 

 it at Hatfield Heath, and scant law was given to late comers. 



The old gap near Quick Wood had been stiffly done up, and there 



