llypop had the callow and awkward ways of a young giraffe, but,
though only a three-year-old, he was sedate as an old maid and had the
dignity of a churchwarden. His behaviour was an example to his flippant
colleague.

For Banjo, directly he felt his master on his back, began to galumph
about the yard with a clatter of hoofs among the injured fan-tails and
to the discomfiture of Maudie.

"Right!" grunted Silver, settling into his saddle. "Now, you old hog,
you!"

Brown Lollypop cocked his long ears and watched with pained disapproval
the gambols of his elder. Himself incorruptible, he was no doubt well
pleased at heart that Banjo's misconduct should throw up in high relief
his own immaculate conduct. Lollypop was in fact a bit of a prig. Had he
been a boy he would have been head of his school, a Scholar of Balliol,
and President of the Union at his University.

The girl followed her leader through the gate, the brown horse stepping
gingerly, swinging his tail, and feeling his bit, while Banjo galumphed
and grunted to the sound of a squeaking leather.

The meet was at Folkington Green, at the foot of the Downs on the edge
of the low country.

Once in the road, Silver and the girl turned their backs on the sea and
made through the village.

Just outside it a familiar figure was waiting them on the road,
apologetic and pleading.

"I knew he would," said Boy. "He started with father and got turned
back. Now he's waiting for us. _Go back, you bad dog!_"

"Poor boy!--he wants a bit of a hunt, too," said the young man.

"I'll hunt him!" cried the girl remorselessly, and proceeded to do so
with vigour.

It was some time before the dog was routed and they were free to pursue
their way.

"What's the time?" asked the girl.

Silver referred to his wrist-watch.

"It's nearly half-past eleven."

"We must trot," said Boy.

They trotted away, the brown horse and the gray side by side, the
regular clap-clap of their feet sometimes overlapping and sometimes
beating in unison, only to break eventually again, to the disappointment
of the girl's attentive ear. It was the fashion amid the hunting folk to
despise hacking along the road as so much waste of time. To the girl the
steady tramp along the hard road was like the march of life. She would
hack from covert to covert, one of a great cavalcade, men and women,
with bobbing heads, their faces set all in the same direction, the sound
of the horses' feet splashing all r