But at present the fun shall not be finished,and we will go back to the wood from which the fox is just breaking.You,my pupil,shall have been patient,and your patience shall be rewarded by a good start.On the present occasion I will give you the exquisite delight of knowing that you are there,at the spot,as the hounds come out of the covert.Your success,or want of success,throughout the run will depend on the way in which you may now select to go over the three or four first fields.It is not difficult to keep with hounds if you can get well away with them,and be with them when they settle to their running.In a long and fast run your horse may,of course,fail you.That must depend on his power and his condition.But,presuming your horse to be able to go,keeping with hounds is not difficult when you are once free from the thick throng of the riders.And that thick throng soon makes itself thin.The difficulty is in the start,and you will almost be offended when I suggest to you what those difficulties are,and suggest also that such as they are even they may overcome you.You have to choose your line of riding.Do not let your horse choose it for you instead of choosing it for yourself.He will probably make such attempts,and it is not at all improbable that you should let him have his way.Your horse will be as anxious to go as you are,but his anxiety will carry him after some other special horse on which he has fixed his eyes.The rider of that horse may not be the guide that you would select.But some human guide you must select.Not at first will you,not at first does any man,choose for himself with serene precision of confident judgment the line which he will take.You will be flurried,anxious,self-diffident,conscious of your own ignorance,and desirous of a leader.Many of those men who are with you will have objects at heart very different from your object.Some will ride for certain points,thinking that they can foretell the run of the fox.They may be right;but you,in your new ambition,are not solicitous to ride away to some other covert because the fox may,perchance,be going there.Some are thinking of the roads.Others are remembering that brook which is before them,and riding wide for a ford.With none such,as Ipresume,do you wish to place yourself.Let the hounds be your mark;and if,as may often be the case,you cannot see them,then see the huntsman;or,if you cannot see him,follow,at any rate,some one who does.If you can even do this as a beginner,you will not do badly.
But,whenever it be possible,let the hounds themselves be your mark,and endeavour to remember that the leading hounds are those which should guide you.A single hound who turns when he is heading the pack should teach you to turn also.Of all the hounds you see there in the open,probably not one-third are hunting.
The others are doing as you do,following where their guides lead them.It is for you to follow the real guide,and not the followers,if only you can keep the real guide in view.To keep the whole pack in view and to ride among them is easy enough when the scent is slack and the pace is slow.At such times let me counsel you to retire somewhat from the crowd,giving place to those eager men who are breaking the huntsman's heart.When the hounds have come nearer to their fox,and the pace is again good,then they will retire and make room for you.
Not behind hounds,but alongside of them,if only you can achieve such position,it should be your honour and glory to place yourself;and you should go so far wide of them as in no way to impede them or disturb them,or even to remind them of your presence.If thus you live with them,turning as they turn,but never turning among them,keeping your distance,but losing no yard,and can do this for seven miles over a grass country in forty-five minutes,then you can ride to hounds better than nineteen men out of every twenty that you have seen at the meet,and will have enjoyed the keenest pleasure that hunting,or perhaps,I may say,that any other amusement,can give you.
