"It's the Chase, and belongs to Colonel Smith, I believe," said Cecil.
"There's a huge 'S' on the gates, at any rate, and one day when we were
passing I saw an old buffer going in with a gun, and Arthur Wright said
he was sure it was Colonel Smith, who has all the shooting on the
common. Lucky chap! If it were mine, wouldn't I have a glorious time!
I'd keep ever so many ferrets and dogs in those stables, and go
rabbiting every day in the year."

"I'd have a very fast pony that could fly like the wind," said Winnie,
"and I'd gallop all over the moors and the shore with my hair streaming
out behind in ringlets like the picture of Diana Vernon on the landing
at home."

"You'd very soon fall off," remarked Bertie unsympathetically, "seeing
you can't even stick on to a donkey on the sands. The little brown one
threw you twice this morning."

"That was because the saddle kept slipping," said Winnie indignantly.
"And that particular donkey has a trick of lying down suddenly, too,
when it's tired. It wants to get rid of you--I know it does--because it
rolls if you don't tumble off. It did the same with Charlie Chester the
other day, and shot him straight over its head; then it got up and flew
back to the Parade before he could catch it. The pony would be quite a
different thing, I can tell you, and I'd soon learn to ride it. What
would you do, Belle, if you owned the Chase?"

"I'd give the most wonderful parties," said Belle, "and invite all kinds
of distinguished people--dukes and duchesses, you know, and members of
Parliament, and admirals, and generals, and perhaps even the Prince and
Princess of Wales; and I'd send to Paris for my hats, and have my
clothes made by the Court dressmaker."

"I'd give a cricket match on that lawn," said Isobel, "and ask all the
Sea Urchins to tea. We'd have loads of lovely fruit from those gardens
and greenhouses, and when we were tired of cricket we could get up
sports, and let off fireworks in the evening just when it was growing
dark. That's what I'd like to do if I lived there."

"Pity you don't," exclaimed Bertie; "we'd all come. But what's the use
of talking when you know you'll never have the chance. I say, suppose we
go down the wood on this side and try to find the waterfall? It must be
rather a decent-sized one to make such a thundering noise."

The others jumped up very readily at the suggestion, and leaving the
path, they slid through the steep wood, and climbing a high wal