MISS Patty Honeywood was not only distinguished for unlimited powers of conversation, but was also equally famous for her equestrian abilities. She and her sister were the first horsewomen in that part of the county; and, if their father had permitted, they would have been delighted to ride to hounds, and to cross country with the foremost flight, for they had pluck enough for anything. They had such light hands and good seats, and in every respect rode so well, that, as a matter of course, they looked well - never better, perhaps, than - when on horseback. Their bright, happy faces - which were far more beautiful in their piquant irregularities of feature, and gave one far more pleasure in the contemplation than if they had been moulded in the coldly chiselled forms of classic beauty - appeared with no diminution of charms, when set off by their pretty felt riding-hats; and their full, firm, and well-rounded figures were seen to the greatest advantage when clad in the graceful dress that passes by the name of a riding-habit.
Every morning, after breakfast, the two young ladies were accustomed to visit the stables, where they had interviews with their respective steeds - steeds and mistresses appearing to be equally gratified thereby. It is perhaps needless to state that during Mr. Verdant Green's sojourn at Honeywood Hall, Miss Patty's stable calls were generally made in his company.
Such rides as they took in those happy days - wild, pic-nic sort of rides, over country equally as wild and removed from formality - rides by duets and rides in duodecimos; sometimes a solitary couple or two; sometimes a round dozen of them, scampering and racing over hill and heather, with startled grouse and black-cock skirring up from under the very hoofs of the equally startled horses;- rides by tumbling streams, like the Swirl - splashing through them, with pulled-up or draggled habits - then cantering on "over bank, bush, and scaur," like so many fair Ellens and young Lochinvars - clambering up very precipices, and creeping down break-neck hills - laughing and talking, and singing, and whistling, and even (so far as Mr. Bouncer was concerned) blowing cows' horns! What vagabond, rollicking rides were those! What a healthy contrast to the necessarily formal, groom-attended canter on Society's Rotten Row!
A legion of dogs accompanied them on these occasions; a miscellaneous pack composed of Masters Huz and Buz (in great spirits at finding themselves in such capital quarters), a black Newfoundland (answering to the name of "Nigger"), a couple of setters (with titles from the heathen mythology - "Juno" and "Flora"), a ridiculous-looking, bandy-legged otter-hound (called "Gripper"), a wiry, rat-catching terrier ("Nipper"), and two silky-haired, long-backed, short-legged, sharp-nosed, bright-eyed, pepper-and-salt Skye-terriers, who respectively answered to the names of "Whisky" and "Toddy," and were the property of the Misses Honeywood. The lordly shepherds' dogs, whom they encountered on their journeys, would have nothing to do with such a medley of unruly scamps, but turned from their overtures of friendship with patrician disdain. They routed up rabbits; they turned out hedgehogs; and, at their approach, they made the game fly with a WHIR-R-R-R-R-R-R arranged as a diminuendo.
These free-and-easy equestrian expeditions were not only agreeable to Mr. Verdant Green's feelings, but they were also useful to him as so many lessons of horsemanship, and so greatly advanced him in the practice of that noble science, that the admiring Squire one day said to him - "I'll tell you what, Verdant! before we've done with you, we shall make you ride like a Shafto!" At which high eulogium Mr. Verdant Green blushed, and made an inward resolution that, as soon as he had returned home, he would subscribe to the Warwickshire hounds, and make his appearance in the field.
On Sundays the Honeywood party usually rode and drove to the church of a small market-town, some seven or eight miles distant. If it was a wet day, they walked to the ruined church of Lasthope - the place Miss Patty was sketching when disturbed by Mr. Roarer. Lasthope was in lay hands; and its lay rector, who lived far away, had so little care for the edifice, or the proper conduct of divine service, that he allowed the one to continue in its ruins, and suffered the other to be got through anyhow or not at all - just as it happened. Clergymen were engaged to perform the service (there was but one each day) at the lowest price of the clerical market. Occasionally it was announced, in the vernacular of the district, that there would be no church, "because the priest had gone for the sea-bathing," or because the waters were out, and the priest could not get across. As a matter of course, in consequence of the uncertainty of finding any one to perform the service when they had got to church, and of the slovenly way in which the service was scrambled through when they had got a clergyman there, the congregation generally preferred attending the large Presbyterian meeting-house, which was about two miles from Lasthope. Here, at any rate, they met with the reverse of coldness in the conduct of the service.
Mr. Verdant Green and his male friends strayed there one Sunday for curiosity's sake, and found a minister of indefatigable eloquence and enviable power of lungs, who had arrived at such a pitch of heat, from the combined effects of the weather and his own exertions, that in the very middle of his discourse - and literally in the heat of it - he paused to divest himself of his gown, heavily braided with serge and velvet, and, hanging it over the side of the pulpit ("the pilput," his congregation called it), mopped his head with his handkerchief, and then pursued his theme like a giant refreshed. At this stage in the proceedings, little Mr. Bouncer became in a high state of pleasurable excitement, from the expectation that the minister would next divest himself of his coat, and would struggle through the rest of his argument in his shirt-sleeves; but Mr. Bouncer's improper wishes were not gratified.