A HOT AND THIRSTY MARCH 251 



to tell, most of them had wholly or partly doffed their 

 uniform, and met the almost sulphurous air in accoutre- 

 ment and headpiece more suited to an atmosphere that 

 was hardly earthly. Fairer heads were topped with straw. 

 Am I right, by the way, in saying that maidenhair was to 

 the black god sacred ? Let this be as it may, there was 

 many a beaming countenance on Saturday that offered 

 scant allegiance to the dismal deity after the episode of 

 which I shall briefly tell. 



The Pytchley, indeed, seldom adjourn for luncheon. 

 They did on Saturday — to great and grateful advantage of 

 horse and alike of rider. At whose good gift you may 

 guess for yourselves, when I lay the occasion at Arthing- 

 worth. Oh, it was hot ! But the bucket was ready and 

 the bowl was cool. Benedidus bcnedicat. And there was a 

 fox at Sunderland Wood. We thought he would only help 

 us to finish the fresh-lit cigar, and that he would merely 

 die under the heat, like the two fat foxes of yesterday 

 (Sulby and Naseby, if I may note it now). But to-day's 

 find was not to end in smoke, nor its fox in a worry. 

 Briefly, we had twenty-five minutes, up the happy valley 

 of Kelmarsh and yonder, that turned a hopeless prospect 

 into hottest reality, swamped dawdling idleness in broiling 

 action. By Kelmarsh Spinnies and Tallyho Covert to 

 that of Naseby is a line of meadow-land (or rather, rich 

 feeding-land, I fancy) high scenting, fair going, and 

 frequent, that has been run many a time and oft, from 

 Captain Thomson's reign of my earliest memory, and, for 

 all I know, during centuries afore. Our fox of this after- 

 noon twisted as he ran, blown and exhausted, no doubt, by 

 pace and heat ; and from most of the fields into which we 

 jumped we rode out at right angles (unless, by-the-bye, 

 that only exit happened already to be taken possession of 

 by a factor of the hunt embedded to the girths). But we 

 rode till every rein was white with soapsud and every flank 

 was heaving — till, when a pause came for all but hounds 

 and huntsman, we clustered as best we might under shade 

 of hedge or hovel, to gasp for breathable air — and 



" Oh for a pull at the bowl that was gone, 

 And a draught of the cup that was still ! " 



