216 



STRAY -AW AYS 



found. They had quickened their pace after the 

 crossing, and that unmistakable throb of purpose had 

 come into their researches which, after a blank draw, 

 lifts the huntsman's heart. They spread themselves 

 over the coarse sedge and rushes, and drew together 

 with the eager sound that is more a whistle than a 



whimper, and then, 



just as hope was 



deepening to certainty, 



some watchers on the 



hill above the bog 



uttered those yells that, 



however habituated 



the hearer may be, 



have the quality that 



goes straight to the 



spinal marrow. 



/ / i ^^ /"' % ^^ ^^ instant every- 



M jj i ^^ \ thing was running — 



f y M \ hounds, country boys, 



f I a spancelled donkey, a 



pair of coupled goats ; 

 and the half-dozen 

 riders, regardless of the 

 practice of The Best 

 People, were splashing 

 and floundering across 

 the bog after them. After the bog came a slope of 

 rocks and furze, then a towering fence of stones and 

 briars, unjumpable save at a " gap " (attractively 

 filled with long, thin slabs of stone, laid across it like 

 the knives of a mowing-machine). A short struggle 

 up and across the "lazy-beds" of a patch of potato- 

 ground, and then the panting horses heaved themselves 

 up a cattle-passage that resembled the shaft of a lift, 

 and on to the road. And when they got there the 



o ^^ 



A MUNSTER COUNTRY BOY 



