338 MB. SPONGE'S SPORTING TOUR. 



before there was very considerable tailing with both. To be sure, 

 they had never been very well together, but still the line lengthened 

 instead of contracting. Horses that could hardly be held down 

 hill, and that applied themselves to the turf, on landing as if they 

 could never have enough of it, now began to bear upon the rein 

 and hang back to those behind ; while the hounds came straggling 

 along like a flock of wild geese, with full half a mile between the 

 leader and the last. However, they all threw their tongues, and 

 each man flattered himself that the hound he was with was the 

 first. In vain the galloping "Watchorn looked back and tootled 

 his horn ; in vain he worked with his cap ; in vain the whips rode 

 at the tail hounds, cursing and swearing, and vowing they would 

 cut them in two. 



There was no getting them together. Every now and then the 

 fox might be seen, looking about the size of a marble, as he rounded 

 some distant hill, each succeeding view making him less, till, at 

 last, he seemed no bigger than a pea. 



Five-and-twenty minutes best pace over downs is calculated to 

 try the mettle of anything ; and, long before the leading hounds 

 reach Cockthropple Dean, the field was choked by the pace. Sir 

 Harry had long been tailed off ; both the brothers Spangles had 

 dropped astern ; the horse of one had dropped too ; Sawbones, the 

 doctor's, had got a stiff neck ; Willing, the road surveyor, and Mr. 

 Lavender, the grocer, pulled up together. Muddyman, the 

 farmer's four-year-old had enough at the end of ten minutes ; both 

 the whips tired theirs in a quarter of an hour ; and in less than 

 twenty minutes Watchorn and Sponge were alone in their glory, 

 or rather Sponge was in his glory, for Watchorn's horse was beat. 



" Lend me your horn ! " exclaimed Sponge, as he heard by the 

 hammer and pincering of Watchorn's horse, it was all U P with 

 him. 



The horse stopped as if shot ; and getting the horn, Mr. Sponge 

 went on, the brown laying himself out as if still full of running. 

 Cockthropple Dean was now close at hand, and in all probability 

 the fox would not leave it. So thought Mr. Sponge as he dived 

 into it, astonished at the chorus and echo of the hounds. 



" Tally ho I " shouted a countryman on the opposite side ; and the 

 road Sponge had taken being favourable to the point, he made for 

 it at a hand-gallop, horn in hand, to blow as soon as he got there. 



" He's away ! " cried the man as soon as our friend appeared ; 

 " red 'cross tornops ! " added he, pointing with his hoe. 



Mr. Sponge then put his horse's head that way, and blew a long 

 shrill reverberating blast. As he paused to take breath and 

 listen, he heard the sound of horses' hoofs, and presently a stentorian 

 voice, half frantic with rage, exclaimed from behind, 



" Who the Dickens are you ? " 



