FROM BRAUNSTON GORSE AT LAST. 



217 



itself is easy here, formidable there, impossible at a third place 

 as you may happen to hit it, and, still more, as your mount 

 faces width or you fancy water. But, nearly everywhere, the 



-^i... 





one bank levels with the other ; a bold horse need never be 

 trapped ; and the mere stride of your gallop will land you, if 



only ah, there is the word that has wrecked every plan r 



annulled every project, and spoiled every plot since the sun first 

 shone upon failures. And the mud of the Braunston Brook was- 

 stirring with ifs well nigh the whole of Saturday's afternoon. 

 The water made the feature, nay, the whole physiognomy, of 

 this foxchase and landscape as I will endeavour to sketch. 

 Need I touch on the weather, the ground, the covert, the 

 hounds, the horses, and the people ? A line is enough, itt 

 epitome the day warm, cloudy, and breezy ; the earth, with 

 its velvet coverlid, in perhaps better form for hunting than it 

 has been during the season that is now fast vanishing ; the 

 covert a perfect nest of thorn, privet, and what not ; hounds the 

 Pytchley bitch pack, wiry, varmint and sharp ; horses ugly in 

 their motley spring colouring, but in a hundred instances- 

 striking in their lean shapeliness ; the people now I an* 

 " baffled and beat." He who would venture to lay hands on 

 one name should be prepared to complete his list with a whole 



