DOUr.S WOOD 



139 



he will be well looked after, and that you will not be charged an exorbitant 

 price for the accommodation. About 10.30 last Saturday traps from 

 various points of the compass, but chiefly the south, discharged their loads ; 

 horses were brought out, and quite a cavalcade was soon en route for High 

 Easter, last associated in the memories of most of us with the two point- 

 to-point races which came off at the end of last season. Diverse, as usual, 

 were the prognostications about the probabilities of a good or bad scent 

 among those who ventured an opinion, but generally with the qualification 

 that scent is a mysterious thing. And so it is, my dear friend. The first 

 ten minutes' brush from Garnetts hardly settled the question, but demon- 

 strated tliat gaps into a road are not to be trilled with, that the sun in your 

 eyes lends additional complication to a Roothing ditch, that to work out the 

 labyrmthine twists of a skirting fox hounds want occasionally turning to 

 the huntsman, and that if a whip's horse won't jump it can't be done. 



.1 - 



^^^^^M^ ^^ . S. :-nt^^^y''" \ 



Dobbs Wood 



A brace of foxes, at least, took advantage of this interval to make good 

 their exit from Garnetts, and horses recovered their wind while Bailey ran 

 his hounds through. No go ! Ditto, Crows Wood. For Dobbs Wood in 

 the future I shall always have a hearty affection. None of your large, 

 overgrown woods, but as snug as a parlour, with a good start a certainty 

 if a fox means going. One crash of music round the covert and the red 

 rover had gone. Each for himself at the half-opened gate at the end of 

 the wood. A pulling horse is sometimes useful on such occasions. "Very 

 sorry ! Beg your pardon ! Could not hold him ! " Away, and going like 

 smoke upwind, into and down a muddy lane, which is willingly left. 

 Grief to the left of you ; grief to the right of you ; hounds right in front of 

 you : onward we thundered. Lord's was nearly touched, and at the end of 

 an exhilarating twenty-five minutes Crows Wood was reached, and our fox 

 lost. Pace favoured the light-weights, foremost of whom was Mr. Tyndale 

 White. 



