“Yes, yes; come when you like!” cried Charley, turning and breasting his mare at a high hedge on the left, which the gallant beast cleared, but with hardly an inch to spare; and then they went crashing through the copse, and were out of sight in a minute.
“Well, that’s one way of giving a fellow the go-by!” muttered Hugh Lingon. “Why? I wouldn’t try that leap for five hundred pounds! nor would any one else who had the least regard for his neck. What did he fire-up about as soon as I mentioned Max Bray’s name? By Jove, though, as Max says, he don’t seem highly delighted about his good fortune!”
Other people made the same remark about Charley Vining, and also noticed how hard he hunted, riding in the most reckless way imaginable, but always seeming to escape free of harm, when more cautious riders met with the customary croppers, bruises, contusions, and broken limbs.
Volume Three—Chapter Six.
Had She Won?
It was one of the things generally known in the neighbourhood of Blandfield, that Sir Philip Vining gave up the Court to his son, who, in a very short time, was to confer upon it a new mistress in the shape of Laura Bray.
Every one said that it was an admirable match; and old ladies, who had set themselves up for prophets, laughed and nodded together, and reminded one another of how they had always said so. That croquet-party at the Court was not for nothing, they knew!
Then came a round of congratulatory calls, and a general disposition amongst the callers to declare that they had never heard of anything that had given them more pleasure.