"Hold his head," grinned Darby. "Full-stop him yourself, or you'll be in a ditch."
The fox tried the spinny, and as Phil upon the cart-pony put it, took a swee-gee out around the hills. A more abominable country it would be difficult to imagine—lumps of tussocky ground rising out of sullen little boggy places, bogs on the summits of the hills and loose slaty stones, with a few tortuous tracks showing the ways of moderate safety here and there.
With the fox-hounds flashing over it, it took all one knew to keep near them; and if one let hounds go, they might top the hill and go on down to one of the best pieces of country. With the scratch pack yowling solemnly it was a pretty sight to watch them—every hound hunting; now Beauty ahead, now Daisy; again dock-tailed Grandjer, throwing his blended tongue, half hound and half terrier; Home Ruler quite exhausted, towling melodiously at the rear of them all.
"He will be cot," shrieked little Andy, dashing the Rat over the rough ground. "He will be cot. See! there is one wavin' ahead."
The fox had sat down to consider matters, and jumped up again as the steady "Yow-ow" came slowly along, the lulls were growing unsafe, so he meditated a return to Castle Freyne, where he was sure to find some hole unstopped if he had time to look. Her pale face glowing as with white fire, her eyes ablaze, Psyche dashed on behind Darby. She splashed into bogs, she let her good little horse stumble against tussocks; the madness of hunting had bitten her, was in her blood, never to come out again. Every fence was a joy, a thrill of uncertainty. She was not sure once whether she would not follow little Andy on his Rat, because he was abreast of hounds, but was checked firmly by Darby.
Even the scratch pack were brought to their noses on a piece of cold wet ground, where the fox had lain down in a clump of briars overgrowing some rocks.
They quieted solemnly, every nose down.
"Clever as Christians," breathed Andy ecstatically. "Look at Grandjer an' Beauty, an' he nosin', an' Daisy! Whiroo!"
The fox leaped from his shelter, flying off down the hill.
"There! there! there!" Darby's right arm was caught and held. "Now, there, is that a fox or a squirrel—the thing they're hunting? And may I say 'Tally ho?"