CHAPTER LXIII 



THE OPENING DAY OF THE SEASON 



Welcome the chase, with its balmy November ! 



Welcome the colours of scarlet and grey ! 

 Welcome the friends that we meet and remember, 



Year after year on our opening day ! 

 Blame me not, reader, nor say I'm romancing : 



Phantom-shaped horsemen I seem to discern, 

 Riding among the gay squadron advancing, 



Each one equipped for the chase in his turn. 

 Close by the side of each sportsman is riding 



The shade of some friend who has loved him in chase, 

 Rousing him, helping him, stirring and guiding, 



The hunter who bears him with mettle and race. 



W. Phillpotts Williams. 



Most of us who donned the "war-paint" on the 

 opening day of the season, those of us, I mean, 

 who can look back over the vista of many seasons, 

 felt something of what Mr. Phillpotts Williams 

 has described in such thrilling verse in Baily's 

 Magazine, as they jogged along on an old 

 favourite hunter to the " Kirby Gate " of their 

 own country. Yes, the opening day brings back 

 to all but the youngest of us memories, half sweet, 

 half painful ; memories, moreover, of a glorious 

 past. Each field brings some well-remembered 

 incident vividly before us, each fence tells of 

 triumph and disaster, each covert tells of glorious 



