MR. SPONGE'S SPORTING TOUR. 315 



was such a hullabaloo as would have made a more composed and 

 orderly-minded fox think it better to break instead of running the 

 outside of the wall as this one intended to do. What wind there 

 was swept over the downs ; and putting himself straight to catch it, 

 he went away whisking his brush in the air, as if he was fresh out of 

 his kennel instead of a sack. Then what a commotion there was ! 

 Such jumpings off to lead down, such huggings and holdings, and 

 wooa-ings of those that sat on, such slidings and scramblings, and 

 loosenings and rolling of stones. Then the frantic horses began to 

 bound, and the riders to exclaim, 



" Do get out of my way, sir ! " 



" Mind, sz> ! I'm a-top of you ! " 



" Give him his head and let him go ! " exclaimed the still 

 drunken brother Bob Spangles, sliding his horse down with a slack 

 rein. 



" That's your sort ! " roared Sir Harry, and just as he said it, 

 his horse dropped on his hind-quarters like a rabbit, landing Sir 

 Harry comfortably on his feet, amid the roars of the foot-people, and 

 the mirth of such of the horsemen as were not too frightened to 

 laugh. 



11 I think I'll stay where I am,'" observed Mr. Bugles, preparing 

 for a bird's-eye view where he was. u This hunting," said he, getting 

 off the fidgety Arab, " seems dangerous." 



The parties who accomplished the descent had now some fine 

 plain sailing for their trouble. The line lay across the open downs, 

 composed of sound, springy, racing-like turf, extremely well adapted 

 for trying the pace either of horses or hounds. And very soon it did 

 try the pace of them, for they had not gone above a mile before there 

 was very considerable tailing with both. To be sure they had never 

 beeft very well together, but still the line lengthened instead of con- 

 tracting. Horses that could hardly be held down hill, and that ap- 

 plied themselves to the turf on landing, as if they could never have 

 enough of it, now began to bear upon the rein and hang back to 

 those behind ; while the hounds came straggling along like a flock of 

 wild geese, with full half a mile between the leader and the last. 

 However, they all threw their tongues, and each man flattered him- 

 self that the hound he was with was the first. In vain the galloping 

 Watchorn looked back and tootled his horn ; in vain he worked with 

 his cap ; in vain the whips rode at the tail hounds, cursing and swear- 

 ing, and vowing they would cut them in two. 



There was no getting them together. Every now and then the 

 fox might be seen, looking about the size of a marble, as he rounded 

 some distant hill, each succeeding view making him less, till, at last, 

 he seemed no bigger than a pea. 



Five-and-twenty minutes best pace over downs is calculated to 

 try the metal of anything; and, long before the leading hounds 



