To-day, however, these precautionary measures seemed merely to arise from the force of habit, as the animal he was riding—a lengthy good-looking brown, on short legs, with long low shoulders, a long coat, a long head, and a long tail—looked as docile and good-tempered a four-year-old as ever was crossed, and played with its rusty bit, attached, as a horse-breaker’s bit always is, to the most insecure-looking and weather-beaten of bridles, with a good-humoured cheerfulness calculated to inspire the utmost confidence in its rider. “You’ve got a pleasanter mount than usual to-day, Mr. Tips,” I remarked, coming alongside of him; whereat the four-year-old tucked its long tail in, and gave a playful kick or two, snorting the while in pure gaiety of heart. “Are you going to make a hunter of him, or have you only brought him out for exercise?” Mr. Tips dived towards his fully-occupied hands with his head, as the nearest approach he could afford towards touching his hat. “Never seen hounds till to-day, sir,” he replied. “Sweet young horse he is, sir, as ever looked through a bridle; a kind animal, too, both in the stable and out; as mild as a milch cow, and as handy as a ladies’-maid.” Just then the object of our joint praises, startled, pardonably enough, by a tinker’s caravan that had taken up a conspicuous position on the Green, shied violently away from the alarming object, and did not recover its equanimity without a succession of bounds and plunges, such as would have unseated most men ignominiously, but which produced no perceptible effect on the demeanour of the experienced Tips, his affability only becoming, if possible, more conspicuous than before. Lost in admiration of my companion’s skill—for I confess to a great weakness for real finished horsemanship such as in my own person I have never yet been able to acquire—and taken up with the movements of the young horse and the conversation of its rider, I had not remarked that we had let the hounds slip on so far ahead as to find ourselves a long way behind the whole moving cavalcade, proceeding leisurely towards the gorse. An exclamation from Mr. Tips roused me to the true state of affairs. “Best shog on a little, sir,” said he, with a sparkle of excitement in his eye. “Blessed if they haven’t reached the covert already! and are putting in. There’s a short cut; this way, Mr. Softly, if you’ll be so good as follow me.”