Page:Lesbia Newman - Dalton - 1889.djvu/91

 up the opposite slope almost abreast of the leading hound, who was pointing straight for a group of large and remarkable grass mounds with a hawthorn or two growing on their summits. It was an ancient tumulus, and had been the scene of antiquarian excavations some years before. Of late it had been abandoned to rabbits, and for that reason was a favourite earth for foxes. A regular passaze inwards, large enough for a wheelbarrow, had been cut by the explorers, and a footpath led close by. It so happened that on this afternoon an Irish labourer who was employed in the neighbourhood every autumn, was passing the spot, when he heard the hounds, and presently saw them coming like smoke down the meadows, with the white steed stretched out in full gallop a few yards on their right rear. Having before seen a run end at these mounds, a happy thought struck him; he ran into the cutting and threw himself flat on his stomach near the entrance, with his head out, to watch the event. Sure enough, in another mimute appears the beaten fox, making straght toward hm. Up jumps Pat—‘Dhivel a bit, ye varrment! an it's skhulking into the eartth ye'd be afther—get along wid ye, ye halting spalpeen!’ and first his hatchet then his hat whirled after the scared animal, who turned and went at random northwards, parallel with the brook, not knowing what he was about, his howling pursuers now in full view and gaining upon him every second.

Meanwhile, the master and the huntsman, seeing there was no saving the rest of the run unless by a chance of cutting in, took their course, followed by the rest, toward an eminence which commanded a view of the grass valley and the brook. Arrived there, they pulled up and looked in the direction of the cry.

‘We're quite out of it,’ said the master. ‘Yonder they go right across the valley; Eastwold Mounds is his point: I thought it would be. Now then, how will that young