70 



LEAVES FROM A HUNTING DIARY 



Major at the bottom of the lot quite hidden from view, just 

 opposite the spectators' carriages, in one of which Mrs. Tait 

 was seated. Naturally very much alarmed at first, she soon 

 recovered, and said, "Johnnie's all right, I can hear him 

 swearing;" but as Charlie McKee once remarked to me, the 

 Major's swearing was like poetry, so harmless that we all 

 liked it. 



Miss Hattie Tait 



Miss Hattie Tait has inherited all her father's and mother's 

 popularity, and one of her best mounts with the Essex Hounds 

 was " Kitty," the favourite polo pony already alluded to on 

 page 68. *' Kitty '' was a fine fencer and good stayer. 



Omitting to advertise Meets must have tome into favour about this 

 time, for I find this entry: "The Saturday meet at Nasing Common 

 on November loth, though not advertised, was pretty generally known " ; 

 also that in those days people were very fond of hanging about Nasing 

 Coppice to save the ride over the common. No harm appears to 

 have been done on this occasion, for a coppice fox was found at 



