272 THE CREAM OF LEICESTERSHIRE. [Seasox 



l)risecl to hear) they found themselves ere long working round 

 and back to the place of starting. They had travelled long 

 enough to show the uninitiated that it was safe to canter over 

 a grass field ; and to teach a horse that it did not quite pay to 

 plunge his forefeet blindly into each snowdrift. A single little 

 fence had been successfull}- encountered, the man had gathered 

 courage, and the steed had learned sobriety. So when they 

 went northwards from Keythorpe, with their fox holloaed 

 away close before them, there was quite a dash upon the line 

 of hounds. A flock of sheep caused an unfortunate check in 

 the otherwise smart gallop to Allexton Wood ; and some of 

 the prettiest hunting was over the few light-fenced fields 

 between there and "Wardley. A quarter-hour spent here 

 (where the beautifully kept rides were soft and firm as tan) ; 

 then back (undoubtedly with a fresh fox), into Allexton. They 

 worked the line througli, with ten minutes' the worst of it. 

 Then they could onh' potter for five more ; and right and left 

 it was worded that the chase was " over," and that we had 

 seen an " excellent hunting run." Accepting the latter phase, 

 we soon had to give up the former. Hounds were away again 

 down a fallow, whose jagged edges stood up like granite above 

 the snow. A clean jump, into ground whose velvet}-- feel at 

 once told it was gi-ass, Avas the first of a jolly series that 

 opened out a new experience. With a curiously improved 

 scent, there was clattering and scrambling where the next gap 

 gave glass to jump over and grass to jump into. There was 

 the crack of a hammer, the groan of shaken joints, when there 

 came a horrid five-foot drop on to a bare dry surface — and 

 conscience re-echoed the groan for the good bold horse that 

 had jumped his farthest. There was battering, wrenching, 

 hammering, and excited halloaing, when the Foot Guards 

 were clearing away obstructive chevaux-dc-frise ; and many a 

 sjDring was made from a ditch-bottom, that was meant to take 

 its source from firm ground two feet above. But there was no 

 fail, nor a single lamed horse : and it was a twenty minutes' 

 hot going that matches in description with nothing I ever saw 



