HUNTING THE HARE. 



I WAS warned by the signs of the coming spring that 

 if I meant to keep my promise, made some time back, 

 of revisiting the Isle of Thanet, and having another 

 day with the harriers, it would be necessary that I 

 should lose no time in carrying out my intention. 

 Leaving London by the Chatham and Dover Eailway, 

 travelling in one of their excellently-appointed fast 

 trains, I was landed in Ramsgate in time for dinner — 

 a very important hour, for if one does not dine wisely 

 and well, how can one possibly expect to ride with 

 nerve and judgment on the following morning ? 



The Arabs have a saying to the effect that " hurry 

 is the devil/^ I substitute the word *^^ indigestion/^ 

 Whoever saw a dyspeptic man ride well to hounds? 

 Why, the thing is an impossibility, for under the 

 malign influence of a disordered liver molehills assume 

 the proportions of mountains, and the babbling brook, 

 the flight over which, in happier hours, is readily 

 accomplished, looms as largely in the distance as the 

 mythical and gloomy River Styx. Sufficient, there- 

 fore, to say that I arose in the morning in first-rate 

 order to enjoy what is to me a very pleasurable 

 pursuit, namely, the hunting of the hare over the wide 

 extent of open country lying contiguous to Ramsgate 

 and Margate, reaching to the old-fashioned town of 

 Sandwich on one side, and going far towards Canter- 

 bury on the other. 



