“What a pity!” exclaims Mr. Sawyer. Not that he thinks so exactly, for Hotspur wants a puff of wind sadly. “Turned by them sheep!” says Charles, and casts his hounds rapidly forward and down wind. No; he has not been turned by the sheep: he has been coursed by a dog. Charles wishes every dog in the country was with Cerberus, except the nineteen couple now at fault. “Pliant has it,” observes the master, as Pliant, feathering down the side of a hedge, makes sure she is right, and then flings a note or two off her silvery tongue, to apprise her gossips of the fact. They corroborate her forthwith, and the chorus of female voices could scarce be outdone at a christening. Nevertheless, they are brought to hunting now, and must feel for it every yard they go. But this interval has allowed some twenty equestrians, amongst whom a graceful form in a habit is not the least conspicuous, to form the chase once more. Great is the talking and self-gratulations. Watches are even pulled out, and perspiring arrivals announce the result of their observations, each man timing the burst to the moment at which he himself came up. “How well your horse carried you!” said a soft voice at Mr. Sawyer’s elbow; “didn’t he, Papa?” added the siren, appealing to the Reverend Dove, who was eagerly watching the hounds. “We all agreed that the velvet cap had the best of it.” She wanted to make amends to him for her rudeness in the morning, and this was the opportunity to choose. The hardest male heart is sufficiently malleable under the combined influence of heat, haste, and excitement, though how this girl should have made the discovery it is beyond my ingenuity to guess. How do they discover a thousand things, of which we believe them to be ignorant? Mr. Sawyer smiled his gratitude, as he opened a gate for the lady, and very nearly let it swing back against her knees. He had not acquired sufficient practice yet at his gates, that’s the truth; and perhaps there were other portals wherein his inexperience had better have forbidden him to venture. Miss Dove was fast luring him into a country which, to use a hunting metaphor, was very cramped and blind, full of “doubles,” “squire-traps,” and other pit-falls for the unwary. Hounds are apt to be a little unsettled after so rapid a burst as I have attempted to describe, and it takes a few fields of persevering attention to steady them again. After this, however, I think we may have remarked they made but few mistakes, and a fox well rattled, up to the first check, huntsmen tell us, is as good as half killed.