“Elope, lads! Elope!” cries Dicky Boggledike to his hounds, whistling and waving them together, and in an instant the rollers and wide-spreaders are frolicking and chiding under his horse’s nose. “G-e-e-ntly, lads! g-e-ently!” adds he, looking the more boisterous ones reprovingly in the face—“gently lads, gently,” repeats he, “or you’ll be rousin’ the gem’lman i’ the gos.” This movement of Dicky and the hounds has the effect of concentrating the field, all except our fair friend and Billy, who are still in the full cry of conversation, Miss putting forth her best allurements the sooner to bring Billy to book.
At a chuck of his lordship’s chin, Dicky turns his horse towards the gorse, just as Billy, in reply to Miss de Glancey’s question, if he is fond of hunting, declares, as many a youth has done who hates it, that he “doats upon it!”
A whistle, a waive, and a cheer, and the hounds are away. They charge the hedge with a crash, and drive into the gorse as if each hound had a bet that he would find the fox himself.
Mr. Boggledike being now free of his pack, avails himself of this moment of ease, to exhibit his neat, newly clad person of which he is not a little proud, by riding along the pedestrian-lined hedge, and requesting that “you fut people,” as he calls them, “will have the goodness not to ‘alloa, but to ‘old up your ‘ats if you view the fox;” and having delivered his charge in three several places, he turns into the cover by the little white bridle-gate in the middle, which Cupid-without-Wings is now holding open, and who touches his hat as Dicky passes.
The scene is most exciting. The natural inclination of the land affords every one a full view of almost every part of the sloping, southerly-lying gorse, while a bright sun, with a clear, rarified atmosphere, lights up the landscape, making the distant fences look like nothing. Weak must be the nerves that would hesitate to ride over them as they now appear.
Delusive view! Between the gorse and yonder fir-clad hills are two bottomless brooks, and ere the dashing rider reaches Fairbank Farm, whose tall chimney stands in bold relief against the clear, blue sky, lies a tract of country whose flat surface requires gulph-like drains to carry off the surplus water that rushes down from the higher grounds. To the right, though the country looks rougher, it is in reality easier, but foxes seem to know it, and seldom take that line; while to the left is a strongly-fenced country, fairish for hounds, but very difficult for horses, inasmuch as the vales are both narrow and deep. But let us find our fox and see what we can do among them. And as we are in for a burst, let us do the grand and have a fresh horse.
CHAPTER XIII.
GONE AWAY!
SEE! a sudden thrill shoots through the field, though not a hound has spoken; no, not even a whimper been heard. It is Speed’s new cap rising from the dip of the ground at the low end of the cover, and now having seen the fox “right well away,” as he says, he gives such a ringing view halloa as startles friend Echo, and brings the eager pack pouring and screeching to the cry—