218 WHIP AND SPUR. 



I wish that words could give an idea of the 

 life and action of the headlong flight I had just 

 seen ; but the inadequacy of all I had read to 

 convey it to me makes it seem useless to try. 

 Photography and description may, in a measure, 

 supply the place of travel ; but he who would 

 realize the most thrilling intensity of eager horse- 

 manship must stand in a hedge-bound English 

 lane, and see with his own eyes, and for the 

 first time in his life, a hundred gayly dressed 

 and splendidly mounted fox-hunters flashing at 

 full speed across his path ; and it is worth the 

 while to see. 



Rain never fell on a more lovely country than 

 that part of Warwickshire through which my wet 

 way lay. For ten miles of the seventeen it 

 rained, gently as it rains with us in April ; nor 

 is our grass more green in April than this was 

 in Christmas week. The all-prevailing ivy was 

 filled with berries, and the laurustinus was al- 

 ready in bloom. 



No born Englishman could have cared less for 

 the soaking rain; and, wet to the skin, tired to 



