A Rux 125 



getting out of hand, and can be stopped if the \Yater 

 should be uncomfortably wide. Striding away over the 

 grass is excellent fun, but a brook of unknown width and 

 problematical depth alters the aspect of affairs. A man 

 in a tweed coat and gaiters is over first ; master, hunts- 

 man, and whips follow handsomely ; one pink lands side 

 by side with the whip, another goes gallantly down to 

 the water, but the horse stops abruptly, very abruptly, 

 on the brink, and the rider's saddle being slippery — it is 

 wonderful how slippery saddles are when a man has put 

 on steam to get over a brook — he slides over his horse's 

 right shoulder, a splash and a loose horse being two 

 results. 



Two hundred yards to the right a man in black, the 

 right, that is to say the other, side of the water, is lead- 

 ing an increasing string. It is Tapeson, the lawyer, who 

 knew of a ford, and Tapeson' s intelligence is warmly 

 appreciated by several sportsmen who were hard put to 

 it to decide whether they should try their fate at the 

 brook or go in search of the Maizeley detachment. That 

 is the w^orst of water. If there is no bridge and no ford, 

 the alternative is to jump or to lose the day's sport. If 

 the man in a stone-wall country has patience, a big jump 

 will become what is comfortably called a ' walking-place.' 

 A gap is almost inevitable in a hedge, and when the gap 

 has been crossed by a considerable portion of the field, it 

 is usually so beaten down as to need no j umping ; but a 

 brook does not grow smaller — on the contrary, as its 

 banks become poached or broken away it becomes larger ; 

 there is more to do and increased diffidence about doing 

 it. To this l)rook Urbington comes down in capital 

 style till he gets some sixty yards from the bank. The 

 big grey has been shaking his head and reaching a bit 



