TIPPERARY IX SPRING 353 



CHAPTER LV 



TIPPEKAKY IX SPRING 



The Green Island looked, probably, never less green than 

 on Wednesday, April i, 1894, when I was being whirled 

 across it on my way to the hunting-grounds of county 

 Tipperary. The bountiful herbage of the previous autumn 

 had been more than the cattle could clear off during a 

 winter unusually mild even for that favoured climate, and 

 the fog-grass had grown brown for want of rain. The 

 stock in many cases browsed fetlock-deep, presenting, in 

 their sleek condition, pleasing contrast to the attenuated 

 beasts we had seen roaming the bare pastures of distressful 

 Britain. But the rain, commencing gently in Dublin, 

 was now falling gradually. County Tipperary had already 

 enjoyed twenty-four hours' downpour, and the drive from 

 Clonmell to Fethard was across a sea of pasturage as rich 

 and verdant as ever. I seemed to be back in October. 

 The green buds, already thickly clothing the bushes, helped 

 to keep up the illusion, which the patches of blackthorn 

 blossom scarce seemed to dispel, so well might these have 

 been snowdrifts of an early storm. 



" Will hunt Thursday and Friday. Come," had been 

 the Master's kindly telegram. It arrived when I had sur- 

 rendered all thought of further hunting, when boots and 

 breeches had been cupboarded, and self and horses thrown 

 up for the summer. Is it necessary to say how gleefully 

 I accepted the summons, the more eagerly that an open 

 winter in England had for six months allowed me no taste 

 of Ireland's ever fresh and genial sport ? 



In Mr. Burke's season there had, it appears, been a lull 

 of some weeks subsequent to the successful October I had 

 been so happy in seeing. Sport then gradually mended, 

 until after the New Year it rose to proper form, culminat- 

 ing during the final months in several runs of surpassing 

 merit. Instance the second and much faster of the two 

 hunts from Ballyluski's famous covert to the wood at 

 Grove (the Master's residence), viz. seven miles from 



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