in the covers.  “Hounds have no right to opine,” opines the head whipper-in; so clapping spurs into his prad, he begins to pursue the delinquent round the common, with “Markis, Markis! what are you at, Markis? get into cover, Markis!” But “it’s no go”; Marquis creeps through a hedge, and “grins horribly a ghastly smile” at his ruthless tormentor, who wends back, well pleased at having had an excuse for taking “a bit gallop”!  Half an hour more slips away, and some of the least hasty of our cits begin to wax impatient, in spite of the oft-repeated admonition, “don’t be in a hurry!” At length a yokel pops out of the cover, and as soon as he has recovered breath, informs the field that he has been “a-hollorin’ to ’em for half an hour,” and that the fox had “gone away for Tatsfield, ’most as soon as ever the ’oounds went into ’ood.”

All is now hurry-scurry—­girths are tightened—­reins gathered up—­half-munched sandwiches thrust into the mouth—­pocket-pistols applied to—­coats comfortably buttoned up to the throat; and, these preparations made, away goes the whole field, “coolly and fairly,” along the road to Leaves Green and Crown Ash Hill—­from which latter spot, the operations of the pack in the bottom may be comfortably and securely viewed—­leaving the whips to flog as many hounds out of cover as they can, and Tom to entice as many more as are willing to follow the “twang, twang, twang” of his horn.

And now, a sufficient number of hounds having been seduced from the wood, forth sallies “Tummas,” and making straight for the spot where our yokel’s “mate” stands leaning on his plough-stilts, obtains from him the exact latitude and longitude of the spot where reynard broke through the hedge.  To this identical place is the pack forthwith led; and, no sooner have they reached it, than the wagging of their sterns clearly shows how genuine is their breed.  Old Strumpet, at length, first looking up in Tom’s face for applause, ventures to send forth a long-drawn howl, which, coupled with Tom’s screech, setting the rest agog, away they all go, like beans; and the wind, fortunately setting towards Westerham, bears the melodious sound to the delighted ears of our “roadsters,” who, forthwith catching the infection, respond with deafening shouts and joyous yells, set to every key, and disdaining the laws of harmony.  Thus, what with Tom’s horn, the holloaing of the whips, and the shouts of the riders, a very pretty notion may be formed of what Virgil calls: 

  “Clamorque virum, clangorque tubarum.”

A terrible noise is the result!

At the end of nine minutes or so, the hounds come to fault in the bottom, below the blacksmith’s, at Crown Ash Hill, and the fox has a capital chance; in fact, they have changed for the blacksmith’s tom cat, which rushed out before them, and finding their mistake, return at their leisure.  This gives the most daring of the field, on the eminence, an opportunity of descending to view the sport more