ling to Coursing, we have seen that the transition is easy
in the order of nature--and so is it from coursing to Fox-Hunting--by
means, however, of a small intermediate step--the Harriers. Musical is a
pack of harriers as a peal of bells. How melodiously they ring changes
in the woods, and in the hollow of the mountains! A level country we
have already consigned to merited contempt, (though there is no rule
without an exception; and, as we shall see by-and-by, there is one too
here), and commend us even with harriers, to the ups and downs of the
pastoral or sylvan heights. If old or indolent, take your station on a
heaven-kissing hill, and hug the echoes to your heart. Or, if you will
ride, then let it be on a nimble galloway of some fourteen hands, that
can gallop a good pace on the road, and keep sure footing on
bridle-paths, or upon the pathless braes--and by judicious horsemanship,
you may meet the pack at many a loud-mouthed burst, and haply be not far
out at the death. But the schoolboy--and the shepherd--and the
whipper-in--as each hopes for favour from his own Diana--let them all be
on foot--and have studied the country for every imaginable variety that
can occur in the winter's campaign. One often hears of a cunning old
fox--but the cunningest old fox is a simpleton to the most guileless
young hare. What deceit in every double! What calculation in every
squat! Of what far more complicated than Cretan Labyrinth is the
creature, now hunted for the first time, sitting in the centre!
a-listening the baffled roar! Now into the pool she plunges, to free
herself from the fatal scent that lures on death. Now down the torrent
course she runs and leaps, to cleanse it from her poor paws,
fur-protected from the sharp flints that lame the fiends that so sorely
beset her, till many limp along in their own blood. Now along the coping
of stone walls she crawls and scrambles--and now ventures from the wood
along the frequented high-road, heedless of danger from the front, so
that she may escape the horrid growling in the rear. Now into the pretty
little garden of the wayside, or even the village cot, she creeps, as if
to implore protection from the innocent children, or the nursing mother.
Yes, she will even seek refuge in the sanctuary of the cradle. The
terrier drags her out from below a tombstone, and she dies in the
churchyard. The hunters come reeking and reeling on, we ourselves among
the number--and to the winding horn tha