52 A Sportswoman in India 



with the quick-recurring little fences, which need a 

 handy horse with his hind legs well under him to be 

 successfully negotiated. Small as they are they begin 

 to bring frequent grief; the severity of the pace is 

 telling surely it cannot last much longer, -unless jacks 

 are endowed with the nine lives of a cat. 



The hounds are tailing now, spreading out over the 

 country like a comet and coming to a head in a single 

 point ; but there is such a scent that Ranger, Bonnybell, 

 and Dauntless are still straining every nerve. 



Into a grass field now, and across it we gallop ; my 

 eye was on our first whip, who was pulling his horse 

 together, while everybody else except the lady on 

 the Arab turned off for a road and bridge which lay 

 through the hedge to the right. These two galloped 

 abreast down the field, downhill, at what was apparently 

 a big ditch at the bottom. Landing on the farther 

 side, another yawning chasm faced them, and having 

 thrown themselves over that, there remained still a 

 third. 



" One of our gridirons ! the seven sisters ! " some 

 one said. 



And there really were seven parallel dykes, with big 

 banks between them. 



All glory be to the lady and her good mare, for 

 by some extraordinary skill they picked their way over 

 each " grave," and landing on the little sound bit of 

 turf between, neatly slipped over the next, jumping 

 lightly, to an inch, on to the narrow bank, and so on 

 over the whole seven. Vainly the whip alongside was 



