2 1 2 The PytcJiley Hunt, Past and Present. 



hurry on or leave his brusli behind. Sandars Gorse — 

 his usual " house of call ^' — is safely reached ; but it is too 

 hot to hold him ; so skirting a familiar corner, he sinks 

 the hill and pushes on, still hopeful of eluding his enemies. 

 But the chorus of voices ceases not, and knowing that the 

 soft grass, so pleasant to his feet, is adding to his peril, 

 he turns upward to the ploughs, hoping thus to bafi9.e his 

 pursuers. Alas, for him ! no rain has fallen to make the 

 brown earth ^' carry,^^ and plough and grass seem to have 

 conspired together to take away his life. All too late 

 he changes his intention, and makes for Boughton 

 Clumps, but the earths are closed, and there is nothing 

 for it but on, on, on, for Sywell Wood. A minute^s rest 

 in Moulton bushes gives him strength and hope, but the 

 fatal clamour reaches his ear as he crouches in some 

 dampish sedge, and he feels that the end is near. One 

 more effort, but in vain. Another plough is crossed, but 

 there is no escape. A single hound, ^^ Changeling,^' child 

 of " Changeful," coming out from among the pack, rolls 

 him on the ground, and in another moment, the muffled 

 growl is heard which speaks the knell of poor Reynard. 

 Ill-luck has dogged his footsteps all the way, and he has 

 fallen a victim to the impalpable essence called scent, 

 which for once and away has remained constant over 

 grass and plough without variableness or shadow of 

 changing. On the morrow, over the same ground, with 

 the wind in the same quarter, and the atmospheric con- 

 ditions apparently in no way different, he might have 

 left his pursuers far behind, and so deferred the fatal 

 scrunch to a future day. 



Such is scent ! AVe all fancy that we know something 

 about it and can give a pretty good guess as to what is. 



