grace of a practiced horseman an animal of exceptional symmetry and strength.  His well-knit figure is slim and almost youthful, and he holds himself as erect on his saddle as a dragoon on parade.  But his closely cropped hair is turning gray, and his face that of a man far advanced in the fifties, if not past sixty.  And a striking face it is—­long and oval, with a straight nose and fine nostrils, a broad forehead, and a firm, resolute mouth.  His complexion, though it bears traces of age, is clear, healthy, and deeply bronzed.  Save for a heavy gray mustache, he is clean shaved; his dark, keenly observant eyes are overshadowed by black and all but straight brows, terminating in two little tufts, which give his countenance a strange and, as some might think, an almost sardonic expression.  Altogether, it strikes me as being the face of a cynical yet not ill-natured or malicious Mephistopheles.

Behind him are two grooms in livery, nearly as well mounted as himself, and, greatly to my surprise, he is presently joined by Jim Rawlings, who last season held the post of first whipper-in.

What manner of man is this who brings out four horses on the same day, and what does he want with them all?  Such horses, too!  There is not one of them that has not the look of a two hundred-guinea hunter.

I was about to put the question to Keyworth, the hunt secretary, who had just come within speaking distance, and was likely to know if anybody did, when the master gave the signal for a move, and huntsman and hounds, followed by the entire field, went off at a sharp trot.

We had a rather long ride to covert, but a quick find, a fox being viewed away almost as soon as the hounds began to draw.  It was a fast thing while it lasted, but, unfortunately, it did not last long; for, after a twenty minutes’ gallop, the hounds threw up their heads, and cast as Cuffe might, he was unable to recover the line.

The country we had gone over was difficult and dangerous, full of blind fences and yawning ditches, deep enough and wide enough to swallow up any horse and his rider who might fail to clear them.  Fortunately, however, I escaped disaster, and for the greater part of the run I was close to the gentleman with the Mephistophelian face and Tom Rawlings, who acted as his pilot.  Tom rode well, of course—­it was his business—­but no better than his master, whose horse, besides being a big jumper, was as clever as a cat, flying the ditches like a bird, and clearing the blindest fences without making a single mistake.

After the first run we drew two coverts blank, but eventually found a second fox, which gave us a slow hunting run of about an hour, interrupted by several checks, and saved his brush by taking refuge in an unstopped earth.

By this time it was nearly three o’clock, and being a long way from home, and thinking no more good would be done, I deemed it expedient to leave off.  I went away as Mephistopheles and his man were mounting their second horses, which had just been brought up by the two grooms in livery.