ink that would be foolhardy. I must
tell you, Mr Stoutheart, before we get to the place of meeting, that I
can only ride a very little, and have never attempted to leap a fence of
any kind. Indeed I never bestrode a real hunter before. I shall
therefore content myself with following the hounds as far as it is safe
to do so, and will then give it up."

Young Stoutheart was a little surprised at the modest and prudent tone
of this speech, but he good-naturedly replied--

"Very well, I'll guide you through the gates and gaps. You just follow
me, and you shall be all right, and when you've had enough of it, let me
know."

Queeker and his friend were first in the field, but they had not been
there many minutes when one and another and another red-coat came
cantering over the country, and ere long a large cavalcade assembled in
front of a mansion, the lawn of which formed the rendezvous. There were
men of all sorts and sizes, on steeds of all kinds and shapes--little
men on big horses, and big men on little horses; men who looked like
"bloated aristocrats" before the bloating process had begun, and men in
whom the bloating process was pretty far advanced, but who had no touch
of aristocracy to soften it. Men who looked healthy and happy, others
who looked reckless and depraved. Some wore red-coats, cords, and
tops--others, to the surprise and no small comfort of Queeker, who
fancied that _all_ huntsmen wore red coats, were habited in modest
tweeds of brown and grey. Many of the horses were sleek, glossy, and
fine-limbed, like racers; others were strong-boned and rough. Some few
were of gigantic size and rugged aspect, to suit the massive men who
bestrode them. One of these in particular, a hearty, jovial farmer--and
a relative of Tom's--appeared to the admiring Queeker to be big and
powerful enough to have charged a whole troop of light dragoons
single-handed with some hope of a successful issue. Ladies were there
to witness the start, and two of the fair sex appeared ready to join the
hunt and follow the hounds, while here and there little boys might be
seen bent on trying their metal on the backs of Shetland ponies.

It was a stirring scene of meeting, and chatting, and laughing, and
rearing, and curvetting, and fresh air, and sunshine.

Presently the master of the hounds came up with the pack at his heels.
A footman of the mansion supplied all who desired it with a tumbler of
beer.

"Have some beer?" said