SADNESS IN SUNSHINE 245 



weather and work, he fairly burst through the giddy 

 ranks that penned him in. From what I could gather, 

 it is still a matter of speculation among his Northampton 

 friends as to whether this curious performance is not 

 practised on non-hunting days, the arena being within 

 half a mile of kennels. I cannot bring myself to enter- 

 tain this supposition, relying rather, for a solution of 

 this curious vagary, merely upon the fact that sheep are 

 the silliest animals in existence, always excepting, as 

 some would urge, our own species. 



*' You made a mistake yesterday ! " men threw in my 

 face on the morrow. I admit the fact ungrudgingly. The 

 Grafton marked two by honours. They found a fox with 

 a goodly scent, at Hinton Gorse, and he took them fast 

 over a grass line, viz. the valley that runs to Maidford — 

 thirty minutes excellent, they tell me {they, too, being men 

 whose story is learned at the tail of the hounds, not whose 

 estimate is dished up according to taste). Hounds and 

 country were alike at their best during those minutes. 

 Afterwards slow hunting by way of Sea well Wood, Brad- 

 den, Lois Weedon, and, I believe, the great covert of 

 Bucknells, w^ith a change or two of foxes as they went. 

 Or did they mark their first fox to ground in the gravel- 

 pits at Bradden, after hunting him an hour and a quarter ? 

 To-day, Thursday, we all attended Rugby Steeplechases, 

 not, as in years gone by, to see the soldiers ride (though, 

 by the same token, the most finished piece of horseman- 

 ship of to-day was but a repetition of what we used then to 

 see year after year at the same hands — those of Captain 

 W. Hope Johnstone). Nor is it any longer a meeting at 

 which our hunters may compete in mere hunting con- 

 dition. Yet it is a merry little gathering, the course is 

 perfect, and the view superb. There were no accidents, 

 and, I believe, no objections. To-night we hope for the 

 threatened rain. 



I have purposely refrained from speaking of Wednes- 

 day until the end of a letter possibly more frivolous and 

 discursive than usual. On Wednesday the news met us at 

 the covertside of the sad and sudden death of one of the 



