“Iss, and ef I baan’t mistaken, the white hoss es laast as usual.”
Tregellas had been busy in the cattle-shed since early morning, and now, having put a double feed in the troughs and filled the racks with sweet-smelling hay, was about to leave work and put on his Sunday-best, after the custom of Feast Day, that his appearance might do credit to his side of the parish when he sauntered past the critical eyes of the girls of Churchtown.
Just then Driver, who had been curled up in the straw dreaming of summer days amongst the moorland cattle, pricked his ears, rose to his feet, jumped the half-door, and barked furiously.
“What’s thet?” said Tregellas as the music of the pack awoke the echoes of the cliffs. “Why ’tes the hounds in full cry sure ’nuff.” Out of the byre he rushed and climbed the turf rick near the pig’s crow, hoping to get a view of the hunt. The passing chase was one of the few excitements of his dull life; and next to a sly glance at the girl of his heart the sight of a fox before hounds was what he loved most.
His eager eyes searched the rugged hillside and swept the open sward lying between it and the cliff. A sea-gull skimming its pinnacled edge drew his gaze that way. It was only for an instant; yet when he looked round again, the fox with an easy stride was crossing the springy turf where in summer thrift blooms, and discovering dips in the ground where human eye found none, with lithe movement was making for his earth near the foot of the cliffs. “Lor’, what a beety! how eh do move over the ground that steelthy like! What a broosh! Wonder ef he’s the saame varmint as killed the auld gander.”
Thrice before the fox had stood before hounds, and the last time he had but narrowly escaped with his life. Less than a year ago, it was in the month of March, they had found him on the sunny cliffs where Lamorna overlooks the ocean, and the great run he gave that day from sea to sea is still vivid in the memory of the hunt.
The Fox. [Face page 26.