revel in descriptions of coats and waistcoats, boots and breeches,
and who pretend that there is no sport without an outfit which is only
within the reach of a man with ten thousand a year, would no doubt have
been extremely disgusted with the whole affair. We rose at five o'clock
in the morning and hunted puss up to her form (instead of paying a
shilling to a boy to turn her out) with six couples, giving tongue most
melodiously. Viewing her away we rattled across the crispy brown moor,
and splattered through bogs with a loose rein, in lunatic enjoyment,
until we checked at the edge of a deep "combe." Then--when the old
yellow Southerner challenged, and our young host cheered him with "Hark
to Reveller, hark!"--to hear the challenge and the cheer re-echoed again
from the opposite cliff; and--as the little pack in full cry again took
up the running, and scaled the steep ascent--to see our young huntsman,
bred in these hills, go rattling down the valleys, and to follow by
instinct, under a vague idea, not unmixed with nervous apprehensions of
the consequences of a slip, that what one could do two could, was vastly
exciting, and amusing, and, in a word, decidedly jolly. So with many
facts, some new ideas, and a fine stock of health from a week of open
air, I bade farewell to my hospitable hosts and to romantic Exmoor.

FOOTNOTES:

[228-*] According to tradition, the Exmoor ponies are descended from
horses brought from the East by the Phoenicians, who traded there with
Cornwall for metals.

[Illustration: SITZ BATH.]

POSTSCRIPT.

THE HUNTING MAN'S HEALTH.

Without health there can be no sport. A man at the commencement of the
hunting often requires condition more than his horse, especially if
engaged in sedentary occupations, and averse to summer riding or
walking. Of course the proper plan is to train by walking or riding. I
remember, some years ago, when three months of severe mental occupation
had kept me entirely out of the saddle, going out in Northamptonshire,
fortunately admirably mounted, when the hounds were no sooner in cover
than they were out of it, "running breast high," five minutes after I
had changed from my seat in a dog-cart to the saddle. We had thirty-five
minutes' sharp run, without a check, and for the latter part of the run
I was perfectly beaten, almost black in the face, and scarcely able to
hold my horse together. I did not recover from this too sudden exertion
for many days. Thos