10 THE bp:st season on recoed. 



*' The country Is surely very blind ! " invariably follows 

 tlie interrogatory of the friend in the street as to " what 

 sport are you having?" Very blind it Is, undoubtedly; 

 but let not him and others delude themselves that they 

 will find the ditches all cut and cleaned for them by 

 November. There will be fewer leaves on the hedges — ■ 

 and already our horses have to pick a more meagre 

 luncheon from them than they found ready to hand a 

 week iM^o. But the ditches are as OTasscovered and 

 indistinguishable as ever ; and so, if memory and prece- 

 dent are not deceiving me, they will in a great measure 

 continue to be till winter snow has played its part. 

 Meanwhile this very bugbear of " blindness" immensely 

 facilitates riding for those who w^ill try it. For instance, 

 on this Friday in question w^e could never have kept 

 company with hounds along the stiff hue they travelled, 

 had there been a crowd — not because the fences were 

 particularly blind, but because they were so strong that 

 getting over them here and there, and galloping for 

 gates as often as was necessary, would have been a 

 choking and constantly disappointing process for a mass 

 of horsemen. Timber is just as easy to see now as at 

 any other time — and much easier to jump, for a horse 

 now takes off sound and probably springy ground. But 

 then timber, of course, generally occurs in isolated 

 patches, where a tree has been felled out of the hedge- 

 row, or a gap has been repaired. At least it is so In our 

 blessed shire and Its neighbours. Each flight of rails of 

 this kind only admits of one horse and rider at a time ; 

 and, likely enough, constitutes the only jumpable place 



