512 FOXHOUND, FOREST, AND PRAIRIE. 



flashed over it now scarce a moment, then swung into the 

 woodland of Poundhill after their quarry, and their deep notes 

 at once rang gaily forth from the sea of fern into which they 

 plunged. Good play, too, they made through it ; and we had 

 to gallop to keep within distance, by means of the green rides 

 that came so frequently and so handily. Now and again we 

 were glad to pull into a trot, where the ridings appeared to be 

 little used and so less carefully tended; but on the whole it 

 was goodly galloping while to drink hound music once again 

 was alone a revel. In twenty minutes we were warmed to the 

 heartcore when, as we pulled up at four cross rides, the buck 

 suddenly rose from the stream where it cut the path some fifty 

 yards in front. Glorious he looked with his broad-antlered 

 front, as he halted and gazed his red sides just heaving with 

 the exercise and summer condition. Hounds were not a hundred 

 yards away, and a few stragglers hurried promptly to the horn. 

 But " chance and change 'tis folly to rue ; ' a little doe jumped 

 up in their midst almost immediately ; hounds changed to her ; 

 were subsequently stopped ; and of sport and story there be- 

 longed nothing more to the day. 



A GALLOP. 



OBLIGINGLY that buck allows me to follow on and to a 

 climax. A veteran of some eleven seasons, it seems it had 

 long been his custom to haunt the precincts of New Park. He 

 had shifted responsibility on the Thursday, as told above. But 

 Mr. Lovell had not done with him yet : and Monday was 

 ordered for a second attack. My question directed to our 

 respected oberjager had been on the Thursday, " Will a fallow 

 buck, like a fox, run straighter and readier next time for being 

 bustled up ? " " Probably," said Mr. Lascelles : but, un- 

 fortunately, he was not there on Monday to see the probability 

 fulfilled. 



The meet was at the Lodge Gate, New Park, at the whole- 



