We hadn't found till rather late, the limeurs were rather new to
the work, and the November day was short, of course; the pack got on the
slot of a roebuck too, and were off the boar's scent in a little while,
running wild. Altogether we got scattered, and in the forest it grew
almost as dark as pitch; you followed just as you could, and could
only guide yourself by your ear when the hounds gave cry, or the horns
sounded. On you blundered, hit or miss, headlong down the rocks and
through the branches; horses warmed wonderfully to the business,
scrambled like cats, slid down like otters, kept their footing where
nobody'd have thought anything but a goat could stand. Our hunting
bloods wouldn't live an hour in a French forest. You see we just look
for pace and strength in the shoulders; we don't much want anything
else--except good jumping power. What a lot of fellows--even in the
crack packs--will always funk water! Horses will fly, but they can't
swim. Now, to my fancy, a clever beast ought to take even a swelling bit
of water like a duck. How poor Standard breasted rivers till that fool
staked him!"
He dropped more walnuts into his wine, wistfully recalling a mighty hero
of Leicestershire fame, that had given him many a magnificent day out,
and had been the idol of his stables, till in his twelfth year the noble
old sorrel had been killed by a groom's recklessness; recklessness
that met with such chastisement as told how and why the hill-tribes'
sobriquet had been given to the hand that would lie so long in indolent
rest, to strike with such fearful force when once raised.
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