She sat so still and so long at a corner of the underwood that at last the harassed fox stole out close to her with lolling tongue and eye askant, and took the open field again. She thrilled at first sight of him, and her cheeks burned; but her quick eye took in all the signs of his distress, and she sat quiet, and watched him coolly. Not so her horse. He plunged, and then trembled all over, and planted his fore-feet together at this angle \, and parted his hind-legs a little, and so stood quivering, with cocked ears, and peeped over a low paling at the retiring quadruped, and fretted and sweated in anticipation of the gallop his long head told him was to follow. He looked a deal more statuesque than any three statues in England, and all about a creature not up to his knee.--And by the bye: the gentlemen who carve horses in our native isle, did they ever see one,--out of an omnibus?--The whipper-in came by, and found him in this gallant attitude, and suspected the truth, but, observing the rider's tranquil position, thought the fox had only popped out and then in again. However, he fell in with the huntsman, and told him Miss Peyton's gray had seen something. The hounds appeared puzzled; and so the huntsman rode round to Miss Peyton, and, touching his cap, asked her if she had seen nothing of the fox. She looked him dreamily in the face. "The fox?" said she; "he broke cover ten minutes ago." The man blew his horn lustily, and then asked her reproachfully why she had not tally-hoed him, or winded her horn: with that he blew his own again impatiently. Miss Peyton replied, very slowly and pensively, that the fox had come out soiled and fatigued, and trailing his brush. "I looked at him," said she, "and I pitied him. He was one, and we are many; he was so little, and we are so big; _he had given us a good gallop_; and so I made up my mind he should live to run another day." The huntsman stared stupidly at her for a moment, then burst into a torrent of oaths, then blew his horn till it was hoarse, then cursed and swore till he was hoarse himself, then to his horn again, and dogs and men came rushing to the sound. "Couple up, and go home to supper," said Miss Peyton, quietly. "The fox is half-way to Gallowstree Gorse; and you won't get him out of that this afternoon, I promise you." As she said this, she just touched her horse with the spur, leaped the low hedge in front of her, and cantered slowly home across country. She was one that seldom troubled the hard road, go where she would. She had ridden about a mile, when she heard a horse's feet behind her. She smiled, and her color rose a little; but she cantered on. "Halt, in the king's name!" shouted a mellow voice; and a gentleman galloped up to her side, and reined in his mare. "What! have they killed?" inquired Catharine, demurely. "Not they; he is in the middle of Gallowstree Gorse by now." "And is this the way to Gallowstree Gorse?"