A HOUGH DAY WITH THE ORAFTON. 395 



certainty of being within hearing of a find, but of seeing nothing 

 afterwards while I should be driving eastward or westward to 

 find a way to follow round. Here there was soon signal enough 

 to convince me that at least a fox if not a man-eating tiger of 

 fierce degree was abroad or else that Fawsley House was 

 afire. The screams that came from the neighbourhood of the 

 mansion were enough to prove one of two things viz., either 

 (1) that fox-hunting is the dearest joy that comes to the agricul- 

 tural population of Northamptonshire, or (2) that this county 

 has a vast starving majority tramping the fields on the chance 

 of a luckpenny. That the second supposition is foolish as it is 

 far-fetched it would need only a single glance at the " foot- 

 runners" to prove. A jollier, better preserved, heartier lot of 

 good fellows never wore shoe-leather than these keen skir- 

 mishers, ready to fling a gate or to answer a question, for 

 the love of sport and because they are English. Don't talk to 

 me, querulous one, about foxhunting being the rich man's play. 

 I tell you it is the poor man's recreation, and comes next to his 

 food, at least in the bonny Midlands and 7 see a deal more of 

 the inside of the game now that my lines are cast in hard places, 

 i.e. the road now that I am pinioned, a "runner," and one who 

 reads as he runs. 



Well, I and the skirmishers were in capital position now. 

 Reynard ran round us merely sheering off to the shade of the 

 hill coverts in response to the clamorous welcome that saluted 

 him. It was obvious that hounds could make no pretence of 

 really driving him ; and when at length they rose the Preston 

 hill it seemed they would dribble away into space, disappear 

 tamely towards Ashby, and leave us to make our respective ways 

 to public or Penates. But there was something better in store. 

 Fortune and self-consideration had brought us to a halt on one 

 of the highest points of the rolling greensward, but under the lee 

 of a small plantation and under the full glow of the intermittent 

 sun. Below and directly in front lay the little wood of Gan- 

 derton, in a green flat valley intersected by two streams of 

 water the second and larger gleaming yellow in the sunshine 



