1881—82.] TRIFLES. 401 



or frost, when hunting, to be practicable at all, must be post- 

 poned for an hour or two. Such an instance was Friday of the 

 previous week at Lowesby — when a man who did not covet the 

 inside of a snug brougham, could only have been born to sleep 

 without blankets. 



Cossington Gorse had been carefully protected from the 

 Sabbath incursions of Syston poachers ; and a big strong fox 

 was at home. A run brought off the north, or Segrave, side of 

 this covert almost always means a trip over plough — of the 

 most confirmed type. But the fox of to-day picked an espe- 

 cially pretty line of grass to Walton Thorns ; and treated his 

 followers to as pleasant a twenty minutes as their souls could 

 have desired. Certainly they could not have ridden plough at 

 that pace after the recent rains — even if hounds could have 

 carried them on. As it was, the grass carried a scent and let 

 them ride freely over it. Nobody seemed to believe much in 

 the probability of finding — especially after the pack had been 

 ten minutes in covert. And so the field left their gossiping 

 ground (the road alongside the covert) very leisurely ; and only 

 awoke by degrees to the fact that hounds were running hard 

 for Segrave Village. The little stream which formed the first 

 fence looked very formidable at a distance : but was easily 

 galloped over under the influence of example. Just short of 

 the village, hounds bent to the right of the road ; and drove 

 along the easy well-drained meadows by the side of the Segrave 

 Bottom. Lord Grey de Wilton had from the first been well 

 alive to the vigour of the pursuit, and, with the huntsman, 

 made ready play along the brookside. A bridge came fortu- 

 nately in the way, just as the deep-banked stream had to be 

 crossed ; and nice country still opened ahead — Mr. B. Lubbock, 

 Captain Middleton, Mr. Adair, and others closmg up to. the 

 front. Walton Thorns was reached in bare twenty minutes ; 

 and as hoimds entered one side of the covert, he was just 

 intercepted on his way out on the other — a great galloping 

 fox, strong and lengthy as a wolf. Tmning back through the 

 covert, he left it about the same point at which he had 



