THE HARRIER. 303 



clumps, and wait patiently as the pack brush between the dwarf 

 hunter's legs, and he lifts one foreleg to let a cluster of them 

 get by more readily. Presently Chimer hits it oiF, and stands 

 still to throw up his head and toss back his ears as he opens, 

 and then they pick out the scent in Indian file, opening one 

 after another, as they acknowledge it, like the notes of a harp. 

 Presently the rabbit ' breaks ' (I trust I may be allowed the 

 expression), and they press him down hill, across the little 

 pond where the mallards spring, and the sluggard of a wood- 

 cock rises from his siesta, after a middling flight from Iceland 

 or thereabouts, and in exactly five minutes by my watch the 

 pack are tugging at him, Mr. Crane in the middle, seemingly at 

 a distance looking for the queen amongst a swarm of bees." 



There, if that is not as pretty a picture of a miniature hunt 

 as man need wish to read, I hope Idstone will take summary 

 vengeance on me for having quoted it, and anathematize me 

 with " bell, book, and candle." Truly, though, ever since I 

 first read it I have had a strange longing to see that little pack 

 at work, and would go some miles to see them run handsomely 

 into a couple or two of old bucks. He tells us they are level " at 

 tough and in pace, good in colour, shape, and make, but difficult 

 to breed and rear." I have seen some very handsome ones in my 

 time used for rabbit-hunting, notably the pack kept, a few years 

 ago, by Mr. Arthur Yates, of Bishop's Sutton, in Hants, and his 

 brother Trevor, but they never quite came up to the picture here 

 so ably drawn. I have quoted this to show how much real sport 

 there still is amongst us completely unknown to the general 

 public, and how many sources of health and amusement are 

 within the reach of nearly all, that they totally fail to see and 

 appreciate. jSTo doubt Captain Crasher may think very small 

 beer of such a chase ; but it is real hunting, after all, and many 

 would be "lad to get it. 



