Up to this point there has been more riding than hunting; but what Meltonian has eyes for hounds, or cares about them, while they lead the field at highest speed if only they furnish musical accompaniment enough for him to ride by? Those twenty minutes, full of dash and keen rivalry, are to him worth all the slow hunting runs ever chronicled, and the delight of watching hounds puzzle out a cold scent or drive a fox through dense woodlands where no man can ride to them, and when only by their sonorous music one can know which way the tide of chase is rolling, is to him a sensation unknown. At this first check, which means that either the fox will beat his pursuers or that they will have to hunt him patiently to death, the man who comes out simply to ride would fain go home again, were it not that a fresh fox may be found presently, and another fast scurry give him the opportunities of steeplechasing distinction for which his soul craves.
There is a popular superstition that the typical Leicestershire huntsman is very much of the same mind on these points—that, having got off the line of one fox, he will neither give hounds time to make their own cast nor complete the work with painstaking science himself, but will simply fling forward in a half-circle, like an over-eager hound. That, if he fails to hit off a scent in this dashing fashion, he will gallop straight to the nearest brake and find a fresh fox, thereby getting credit for a wonderfully clever cast from those who have been too far behind to see what happened, or too inexperienced to know. These things, or something like them, happen, it is true, when hounds come to their first check before there has been time to shake off the crowd. A huntsman who could not practice little deceptions of this kind at times without making either his pack or himself hopelessly wild, would be as useless in the shires as a hound that had not the courage to thread its way among hundreds of heels, and slip through the torrent of mad pursuers when the “gone away” has been sounded. I have seen such methods resorted to with brilliant success by Will Goodall of the Pytchley, by Neill of the Cottesmore, and Tom Firr of the Quorn, when the throng pressed so persistently that hounds had no chance to hunt. But the perfection of breeding and training is attested by the fact that, though frequently lifted thus, all three packs will stoop readily to a scent when they have room, make their own casts with dash, not waiting with heads up for their huntsman to help them whenever they come to a difficulty, and hunt a cold line as cleverly as any “provincial” pack.
There is not much time to “leave ’em alone,” or practice slow tactics now, for the thunder of road-riders rolls down the wind, and in a few minutes more the presence of hundreds may spoil all that would have been possible with a field of only fifty followers. Still the huntsman will not hurry. The hounds probably know more than he does, and he knows enough to be sure that a mistake made at the first check can rarely be retrieved. There is a little feathering and waving of sterns on the line our fox has come; then a few couples try forward without success, and then, as if actuated by one impulse, they all swing round in a wide self-cast. In this there is no flashy wildness, but perfect steadiness and close work, yet nothing to suggest the style of harriers.
See one hound as he circles round, stops suddenly, stoops to the furrow, feathers along it for a few yards, and then throws his tongue lightly. “Hoic to Festive! hoic together! Hurrah for the blood of Belvoir Fallible!” shouts the huntsman, all animation in a second at the sound. Every hound flies to where Festive spoke, but they do not stop to “quest” the scent and make sure of it for themselves, as harriers would. Each, jealous of honors and striving for the lead, flies eagerly forward to feel for the line a few yards in advance of his rivals. So, one after the other, they take up the cry until all burst out in a clamorous chorus, and speed over the open once more.
Luckily, we are set going just in time, and straight for a line of frowning bullfinches, where network of thorns to be bored through, and ox-rails and ditches to be got over somehow, would stall off the faint-hearted. A minute later the road-riding division in all their might would have been upon us, but now they are left behind again. There is a gorse covert ahead, where fresh foxes are sure to be on foot, and if only we change to any of these, our hunted one may save his brush after all. But Will, the whipper-in, slips round as fast as he can to the fox side as hounds dash into the cover.
A red-roan steers away when he gets there, but it is not the right animal, and Will stops the leading hounds when they come to him. Then all is silence. But what is that old bitch doing in the dry ditch beside the boundary fence? Our huntsman has one eye on her, the other on the uplands a field or two off. Yes, that’s it. Something brown is stealing along a furrow. The fox has never gone into this gorse, but skirted it, his cunning telling him that he might thus delay pursuers and throw them off on a false scent. Two or three light touches of the horn bring hounds to him. In a cluster they follow him as he crashes through a bullfinch and tops the next gate. He takes them along as if they were running in view, but at one wave of his hand when he comes where the fox was last viewed, they spread out like a fan, own to the scent with notes of joy, and take us on again mile after mile, their pace quickening as the power of horses to rise at a leap begins to flag.
A welcome breathing space comes when hounds enter a chain of woods in which our fox is certain to pause for a while. But here the huntsman gives his quarry little time to rest. His voice rings out in answer to every whimper from a hound he can trust, and so they keep driving straight through for the far end. Evidently our fox is a stout-hearted traveler, who does not mean to dwell and be caught like a rat in a trap. He will run until he can run no longer, and then die like a gentleman. Shall we be there to see, or is the end yet afar off?
The bold first flightman, whose example disproves the fallacy that a hard rider neither cares nor knows anything about hound work, shall be our guide still. Watch him as he moves quietly through the rides of this wood—his eye quick to take in all that each hound is doing, his ear sensitive to every sound, while he may seem to be noting nothing. He knows instinctively, though he may never have seen the pack before, when a hound is lying with the reckless clamor of youth, or with the half-closed mouth and faint whimper of long-continued weakness for riot, or when another is telling the truth with hot outspoken tongue. Directly that last welcome sound reaches him, followed by Will’s view-halloa, he is out of the wood like an arrow from the bow, and with the pack as it comes together in the open.
Two fields have been crossed, and we begin to realize that the fox’s point must be a well-known stronghold of the neighboring hunt where tree-tops can be seen in the hazy distance; but his gallant effort to reach it is in vain. We see by the way hounds begin to twist and turn that the hunted one’s sinewy limbs are beginning to fail him, though his courage holds out to the last. There is no need to nurse your horse any longer, for the chase is near its end, and you may push over wet meadow or deep plough without fear. You cannot override hounds now or turn them from the line, for see, their hackles are up; that low, fierce growl means that they have caught a view of the sinking fox, and the shrill scream that makes every fibre tingle with excitement is a death-knell.
A minute later the clear “Whaw! whoop!” rings out over the tattered remnants for which hounds are struggling and wrangling. The superb young horsewoman, whose daring deeds have put many a bold Meltonian to shame, is handed a trophy which Diana might proudly hang at her saddle-bow, for it is the brush of as good a fox as ever led his pursuers a fast forty minutes over Leicestershire pastures.