Draghounds 1 1 5 



merry style. '' Now you can go," exclaims 

 the Master, and the whole field is quickly in 

 motion once more. Three formidable black- 

 thorn fences have to be jumped or " tunnelled." 

 The leader, mounted on a weedy, undersized 

 thoroughbred, jumps into the first of these, 

 and sticks fast. But the man immediately 

 behind him, not expecting this stoppage 

 in transitu^ and unable to pull up his very 

 impetuous steed, charges right into him, and, 

 applying as it were a hammer to a nail, 

 knocks him clean through the fence on to 

 his nose in the field beyond. The rest get 

 over in another place, and wading across a 

 shallow stream, jump the next two fences, 

 and come to a water meadow, intersected 

 with more or less rotten - banked ditches. 

 They are not big, however, which is fortunate, 

 considering that our horses are now galloping 

 in peaty ground, well over their fetlocks. 

 This does not last long, and we soon emerge 

 on to a lovely tract of sound grass, with nice, 

 jumpable fences. Here and there a post and 

 rails varies the monotony of the scene, a 



