TX THE HEART OF THE ROOTHINGS 409 



crowd and charged the strong stake-bound fence, ditch-guarded, which 

 shut him off from the hounds, hut had the bridle not given way he would 

 have been all right. Truly he is a chip of the old block, and that grey 

 horse will develope into a valuable hunter if he comes up sound at the 

 end of the season. 



Mr. Bowlby and his son were both out for the first time this season, 

 having left Scotland covered with snow — which seems to have favoured a 

 good many counties on the previous day. It would be heartily welcomed 

 by hunting men in Essex, the ground is too hard and the fences are too 

 blind to extract much pleasure from hunting unless you join the road- 

 riding, coffee-housing contingent. 



" The Roothings are full of foxes " ! Such were the cheery words 

 of a sporting friend. So sixteen miles to a meet, and three on to the 

 first covert to be drawn, resolved itself into a mere nothing, with the 

 certainity of sport at the end, to the dozen or so Southerners who 

 invariably take their Saturdays wherever the hounds meet, rarely sending 

 their horses on, but hacking or driving the whole distance. The 

 Northerners are not half so energetic, and seldom visit our sunny and 

 grassy quarters of hill and dale, interspersed with fences of varied 

 description, which deprives it at once of the reproach of monotony. 



The mate draws the line at a hack on of more than ten miles. So 

 9 a.m. sharp, and the polo cob in the shafts, was the order of the day, 

 and what a morning Saturday, November gth, was. If you were a light 

 sleeper you would have heard the rain, which for forty-eight hours had 

 been coming down almost incessantly, still dashing against the window 

 panes as if the very floodgates of heaven had been loosed ; but remembering 

 the old adage, " Rain before seven clears up at eleven," you would have 

 dozed off without any rheumatic forebodings, whatever misgivings you 

 might have entertained about the wind getting up to roll the clouds away. 



How everything reeked with moisture as, leaving Epping behind us, 

 we bowled along through the Lower Forest, the golden leaves, which 

 still clothed its decayed and stunted trees, adding a bright gleam of colour 

 to the glittering road pools. On through North Weald the huge Ongar 

 Park Woods (still a closed demesne) loomed up on our right like heavy 

 cloud banks, and we took the first pull at the cob as we breasted Bovinger 

 Hill, and neared its mill, for the sails were whirling round in mad glee, and 

 the mare wouldn't have them at any price, and the mate had to jump out 

 and catch her by the head, and coax her past. Moreton village was reached 

 and passed with nothing worse than " hold tight ! " as the mare swerved 

 viciously at some decaying trees. The same village brought us luck in the 

 drive home that night. It must have been about one hour after sunset 

 when we were passing through the village again when the mate spied 

 his favourite terrier, which two days previously had been lost or stolen. A 

 minute sooner or a minute later, it could not have happened ; the mutual 

 recognition of man and dog is worthy of a special note in the Spcctatoi' (the 

 mate must write it). 



Up the long hill from the village we were overtaken by an active, 

 mackintoshed figure,''' hacking the whole distance, past Mr. Paton's, the 

 great animal painter, and leaving the once more deserted White House, 

 near Little Laver (would it not make a capital hunting box ?), we were 

 in the heart of the Roothings, with the wind coming up in angry puffs, 

 tearing wide rents in the leaden sky o'erhead. Then we chortled as we 

 thought of low hats and mufti costume. 



Mr. R. Bevaii. 



