AN OLD FASHIONED MONDAY II3 



several more of us galloped straight through the wood, and came out with 

 hounds, who now made for the Ice House covert, hanging there a moment 

 and picking it up on the far side of the brook running down to the wood. 

 There was a jam and a squeeze at the narrow hand-gate at the bottom. 



At the fence beyond it. Captain Bruce was off his thoroughbred 

 bay (which in the morning scurry had come down in a road, cutting its 

 knee) to pick up the huntsman's cap. Hounds were now swinging down 

 the ploughed field towards Knightsland, and there was no difficulty riding 

 abreast of them. In and out of the Toot Hill road it was a toss up which 

 side of Knightsland to go. Mr. Arkwright and the majority went left, 

 Capt. Bruce went for the gate at the bottom of the field, on the right, while 

 a few, including Mr. Bevan, Mv. F. Barclay, and JMrs. W. H. Sewell, 

 jumped into the wood. Getting out of it was not an easy matter, for a 

 deep sort of gully had to be walked down, and with only six feet run at the 

 fence beyond it, between some broken-off rails and a tree, required a bold 

 and clever horse. ]\Irs. Sewell's " Jack " was equal to it, and hounds were 

 flinging forward over the grass in front of us to Berwick Lane, which Capt. 

 Bruce and Miss Morgan had reached with them, and already they were 

 threading the thick, overhanging briary fence beyond it. The Captain 

 could not find a place, and it was a case of left or right to seek one. Fifty 

 yards to the right there was an outlet, but the wrong side of the brook, 

 fordable, as was soon proved, although it brought the black down, but did 

 not delay "Jack," or the thoroughbred bay, as they turned sharp over it, and 

 in the next field caught hounds who, instead of running, as many expected, 

 for Ongar Park, a very usual line, made for the small covert Northlands, 

 rented by Father Stubbings. Coming away from, it, hounds fairly flew down 

 the big stubble fields for Mr. Sworder's little covert. j\Ir. Avila — who was 

 riding his little blood bay, by " King Ebor," with the hunter instinct 

 inherited from its dam, " Baroness," the well-known brown mare that ]\Ir. 

 A. J. Edwards rode for so many years in Essex- — leading over the briary 

 bank, and we turned to Beachetts Avithout drawing rein, Mr. Tyndale 

 White remarking, as he swung open the big gate and galloped down the ride 

 past the keeper's house, " This is an old-fashioned -Monday." 



A moment's silence, and we knew that hounds were away in the open 

 again, and a beautiful sight it was as we jumped out of the covert at the 

 ]\Iount end, over the crumbling bank and drop. Sir Evelyn Wood, V.C., 

 and Mr. G. H. Lee being two of the first out, to see the hounds streaming 

 over the grass to Shalesmore, already a large body of followers with 

 them : gate-openers most of them, thank goodness, for back swung the gate 

 as the huntsmen and those who had gone with hounds through the wood 

 galloped on without checking their stride, and turned sharp to the left for 

 the next fence up-hill, Mr. Ned Ball on his bay having an early cut at it 

 on the right of everyone. \\'ith the rise of the ground against us to the 

 next fence by the small spinney, and "Save a jump," cried the huntsman as 

 he and Mr. C. E. Green flew the fence, while we fumbled at a sticky gate. 

 " Anywhere you like at my rails," cried Mr. Sworder, as he sailed away on 

 his good black, going straight for his own stables, and we raced the bullocks 

 for the next open gateway, and swung down the hill for Tawney Hall, with 

 hounds tearing away on our left. The only refusal, iMr. Harry Sworder, of 

 the day, on your good black, as you went at the thickest part of the fence, 

 and your stable yard and a line of gates not a hundred yards to the right, 

 but you had him over, and were in and out of the next road, near the 

 Schools, quicker than anyone. The hounds were a bit tailed out now by 

 the pace, and a sharp turn here, the fox w^as headed, they overshot it, 

 and to work out the double the huntsman's aid was required. Over 



