"I was with them miles beyond that,"says another."There were five or six men rode the brook,"continues our philosopher,who names the four or five,not mentioning the unfortunate who had spoken last as having been among the number."Well;then he went across by Ashby Grange,and tried the drain at the back of the farmyard,but Bootle had had it stopped.A fox got in there one day last March,and Bootle always stops it since that.So he had to go on,and he crossed the turnpike close by Ashby Church.Isaw him cross,and the hounds were then full five minutes behind him.He went through Frolic Wood,but he didn't hang a minute,and right up the pastures to Morley Hall.""That's where I was thrown out,"says the unfortunate who had boasted before,and who is still disposed to boast a little.But our philosopher assures him that he has not in truth been near Morley Hall;and when the unfortunate one makes an attempt to argue,puts him down thoroughly."All I can say is,you couldn't have been there and be here too at this moment.Morley Hall is a mile and a half to our right,and now they're coming round to the Linney.He'll go into the little wood there,and as there isn't as much as a nutshell open for him,they'll kill him there.It'll have been a tidy little thing,but not very fast.I've hardly been out of a trot yet,but we may as well move on now."Then he breaks into an easy canter by the side of the road,while the unfortunates,who have been rolling among the heavy-ploughed ground in the early part of the day,make vain efforts to ride by his side.They keep him,however,in sight,and are comforted;for he is a man with a character,and knows what he is about.He will never be utterly lost,and as long as they can remain in his company they will not be subjected to that dreadful feeling of absolute failure which comes upon an inexperienced sportsman when he finds himself quite alone,and does not know which way to turn himself.
A man will not learn to ride after this fashion in a day,nor yet in a year.Of all fashions of hunting it requires,perhaps,the most patience,the keenest observation,the strongest memory,and the greatest efforts of intellect.But the power,when achieved,has its triumph;it has its respect,and it has its admirers.Our friend,while he was guiding the unfortunates on the road,knew his position,and rode for a while as though he were a chief of men.He was the chief of men there.He was doing what he knew how to do,and was not failing.He had made no boasts which stern facts would afterwards disprove.And when he rode up slowly to the wood-side,having from a distance heard the huntsman's whoop that told him of the fox's fate,he found that he had been right in every particular.No one at that moment knows the line they have all ridden as well as he knows it.But now,among the crowd,when men are turning their horses'heads to the wind,and loud questions are being asked,and false answers are being given,and the ambitious men are congratulating themselves on their deeds,he sits by listening in sardonic silence."Twelve miles of ground !"he says to himself,repeating the words of some valiant youngster;"if it's eight,I'll eat it."And then when he hears,for he is all ear as well as all eye,when he hears a slight boast from one of his late unfortunate companions,a first small blast of the trumpet which will become loud anon if it be not checked,he smiles inwardly,and moralizes on the weakness of human nature.But the man who never jumps is not usually of a benevolent nature,and it is almost certain that he will make up a little story against the boaster.
Such is the amusement of the man who rides and never jumps.
Attached to every hunt there will be always one or two such men.
Their evidence is generally reliable;their knowledge of the country is not to be doubted;they seldom come to any severe trouble;and have usually made for themselves a very wide circle of hunting acquaintances by whom they are quietly respected.But I think that men regard them as they do the chaplain on board a man-of-war,or as they would regard a herald on a field of battle.When men are assembled for fighting,the man who notoriously does not fight must feel himself to be somewhat lower than his brethren around him,and must be so esteemed by others.
