The Belvoir. 11 



crowd; your horse sliould be a little faster, your 

 heart a trifle harder_, and your eye a moment quicker, 

 than your neighbour's. Presuming that you possess 

 these advantages,, can persuade yourself you have 

 them, or can make up for their want by cunning 

 strategy of movement — then the Gilead of the Melton 

 neighbourhood has indeed balm for you. Without 

 these desiderata or their apology you will never pluck 

 the fruit which hangs so temptingly, except in a 

 second-hand sort of way which may content but is 

 more likely to rouse a sense of disappointment and a 

 return to a less exciting and less invidious sphere of 

 action. For here you enter a competition which from 

 its very popularity prevents success to every can- 

 didate. There is not room for all in the front, the weak 

 must be crowded out, and only the stouter and 

 swifter can attain a share in the prize. It is not that 

 the country is in itself more difficult to ride over, or 

 that to live with hounds would be a less easy matter 

 here than elsewhere — had you always room to pick 

 your own place, in your own time, and at your own 

 pace. But when hounds fly, with the lightning speed 

 so common to them over this quick- scenting grass, 

 there ensue a rush and a stampede from which only 

 superior quickness, nerve, and decision can extricate 

 a man, and allow him to pass in safety through the 

 whirlpool to sail on over the smoother water beyond. 

 The aim of every rider to hounds is (perhaps we had 

 better say, should he) to see a run and every run if he 

 can (though, again, the question naturally suggests 

 itself — lulio can ?), being all the time on such terms 

 with the pack that he may watch and follow all that 



