FOX-HUNTING 153 



What opportunities artists miss ! I can 

 imagine no more comical scene for a 

 looker-on. Codling, in hatless wrath, with 

 the draggled brush so hardly earned and 

 rescued, pouring curses on me, whilst I stood 

 open-mouthed, blue, and shaking, with the 

 dripping head in my hands, the hounds 

 crouching and shiverino- and wretched 

 around us, and the backbone of the fox 

 lying between us — our horses disappearing 

 on the horizon ! I think what has stamped 

 this day on my memory was the awful 

 journey home in a blizzard with a tired 

 horse. I hardly knew what I did, but in 

 those days the head at my saddle, and the 

 thought of the run, were ample compensation 

 for all I had endured from the water, the 

 weather, and the wrath of my successful 



