212 THE SPORT OF KINGS 



carries you so well over the fences that you get 

 keener than ever, and long for a fox and a scent. 

 And now some rather big woodlands loom in front 

 of you. Not such a country as you were in in the 

 morning by any means, but if a fox is there you 

 don't mind that. A fox is what is required above 

 all. So you take your place down wind and listen 

 eagerly for the overture to begin. Hark ! What 

 was that ? A hound speaks ; surely that is right. 

 Now another takes it up, and another, and then 

 three or four more in uncertain fashion ; it must 

 be right, though there is something about the note 

 you don't like, if you chance to be a keen observer 

 of such things. Ah ! there is the whipper-in's 

 rate, " Have a care there ; ware riot ! " and then 

 comes that melancholy note on the horn which 

 somehow never is heard save when a young one 

 shows inclination to misbehave in a covert that 

 holds no fox. And so that wood is drawn blank, 

 and another, and a likely patch of gorse on a hill- 

 side, and then the December day is fading from 

 the sky, and the master tells you he has come to 

 the end of the day's draw, and when you turn 

 your horse's head homewards you realise that you 

 have had a " blank day." Then it is that you 

 feel the full measure of your disappointment. Till 

 hounds were drawn out of that last patch of gorse 

 you had hope to buoy you up ; but now that is all 

 gone, and every man you meet and who asks what 

 sport you have had, tends to accentuate your 

 misery. In spite of the old fox-hunting squire, 

 with whose opinions on things in general I com- 

 menced this chapter, a blank day is a bitter thing 

 indeed, as you are riding home. 



And unfortunately blank days have been very 



