twice been on his head, fast compounding. But then if ho will send a horse alon 

 for twenty minutes, without the semblance of a pull, and with only dealer's condition 

 in him, what can he expect ? 



How differently Captain Slasher takes things. Ilis own stud are all screwed, so he 

 is on a hired nap;, and notwithstanding he rushed at the big timber fence and gave him 

 a regular nasty one, he is going on smiling, and patting his horse's neck, is nm-siug him up 

 a firm headland, until he recovers his wind, and is determined, by patience, judgment, and 

 fine riding, to make up for the deficiency of his mount, and, let the country be what it will, 

 to see the end. He is not a man to make this determination without acting up to it, and 

 though he may get another fall, \erj likely two, you may lay long odds on his being one 

 of the half-dozen at the finish. More than that, he can tell you why the fox ran that 

 particular line (the stiflfest in the hunt) instead of the usual one over the downs, and away 

 for the main earths — how it was they never checked over the wet cold plough, and the 

 reason that Green's horse refused the brook, and Tomkins's broke his back at the stake 

 and bound. And then, when it is all over, you will hear him talk a great deal about the 

 performances of his friends and their horses, but never a word about his own, though, on a 

 screw not worth twenty pounds, and in spite of a bad fall to start with, he was in front 

 fi-om start to finish. 



But then Slasher is a sportsman who rides to hunt, and does not hunt to ride. ^\.nd 

 it is not every trifle that puts him out of his way. It is almost foi'gotten now, but he 

 is the man that steered in Confidence for the Grand Military twenty years ago without a 

 bridle, and with a broken collar bone ! We have not said much about the hounds ? 

 Well no, they have kept so straight and gone so fast that it has been rather difficult matter 

 to see much of them. In fact they had nothing to do but race. That all lioimds, 

 if they have breeding and condition, can do, and with such a scent they can't make any 

 mistake. Should they come to cold hunting, picking it out throiigh sheep and cattle- 

 stains, down roads, and amongst houses and farmsteads, we will leave the men to smoke 

 and chat, and turn our attention to the pack. Let it not for a moment be supposed we 

 overlook them ; nothing would give us so much pleasiU'C as to see Livelj' whose dam and 

 grandam we walked, make a good hit ; and have we not always sworn by the board of 

 cm- father, that a fox may run the roads as long as ho liked so that old Matchless was 

 amongst the pack, and the field ^^'ould only give her room to pick it out ? Was it not 

 the old bitch that feathered for a mile down Cold Harbour Lane, without daring to speak 

 to it, and then carrying the line through into a grass field, gave us the brilliant quarter of 

 an horn-, and a kill in the open to finish with ? No ; we by no means overlook the hounds, 

 and could tell how we waited hours on a cold, a bitter cold, December night and took our 

 turn manfully with pick and shovel, to see old Pilot, the beloved of our youth, and thi-ee 

 others got out of a drain into which they had forced themselves after their fox. And 

 how tenderly we carried them home, and nursed them, when, exhausted and all but 

 drowned, they were at last recovered. Is not each deed, good and bad, of our (for want of 

 a better word, shall we say) native pack chronicled in memory ? And do we not know how 

 Eiotus, who suffered nothing to lead her in chase, would often not try a yard with a bad 

 scent, and how her descendants, even to the tenth generation, would run hare rather 

 than ch-aw for a fox. But then, as old Dick said, " if she won't find a fox she's worth a 

 pack when he's sinking, and never tired in her life. 'No, no, sii" ; she's a very wild one, 

 and at times would rather play than work, but you know how she helps me when an 

 afternoon fox is running short afore 'em. Yes, I must have something from her." And 

 he did. 



