Meantime John Garnet, enjoying the golden hours at Porlock with the carelessness of his nature, thought no more of the toils that surrounded him than the wild deer of the forest thought of the many preparations made for its capture; of the good horses stabled, the staunch hounds fed, the distances travelled by lords and ladies, the laced coats tarnished, the bright spurs reddened, the jingling of bit and bridle, the gathering of horsemen and varlets, the energy expended in a chase that must be followed with so much pomp and circumstance for its especial downfall. Large and stately, gliding from field to field, it passed through the twilight, like some majestic ghost, to crop the yet unharvested grain, or tear the juicy turnips from the earth, with appetite unimpaired by misgivings of to-morrow, rejoicing in its pride of strength, trusting implicitly in those fleet, shapely limbs that bore it lightly over its native moor, as the wild-bird's pinions waft her through the air.

How many centuries have elapsed since the fatal morning that saw the Red King mount for his last ride through the stately stems of Bolderwood! How many since that woful hunting in Chevy Chase which began in joyous notes of hound and horn, to end in the battle-cry of the Percy, the sword strokes of the Douglas, and the pouring out like water of the bravest, noblest, gentlest blood two countries could afford! Yet has the pursuit of the wild animal by the instinct of the tame continued to be the favourite sport of Englishmen from those rude times to our own, while now, as then, many a bold, adventurous nature, panting for an outlet to its energies, finds engrossing occupation in the pleasures of the chase.

Taken in good sense and moderation, as each man's discretion teaches him to judge, the draught thus offered by a bountiful providence, which provides for our mental health the sweet no less freely than the bitter, is exhilarating in the extreme. It rouses our manly qualities of mind and body, excites our intellectual faculties and our muscular powers, braces the nervous system, stimulates to healthy effort the vital force of arm and heart and brain. Many of the most distinguished men in every time have been "fond of hunting." Few men "fond of hunting" but are frank of nature, kindly, generous, unselfish, and good fellows, to say the least!

If such a position be granted, it follows that all hunting, conducted in a spirit of humanity and fair play, is more or less to be esteemed. The stout sexagenarian who halts his steady cob on a hill, and from that point of vantage watches in the valley below his ten couple of beagles unwinding and puzzling out the line of a hare that has just crossed under his pony's nose, without assisting them by so much as a whisper, is a sportsman to the back-bone. No music on this lower earth can ravish his ears like the tuneful cry of his little darlings, who are indeed nothing loth to hear their own voices, and refuse to hunt a yard without assuring each other that it is all right. No triumph can afford him greater pleasure than his ride home to dinner with a hare dangling across his saddle, honestly killed by the patience and perseverance of that tedious pursuit which has fairly wearied her to death! and when he lays his head on his pillow, before his closing eyes passes a vision of Challenger opening in the turnips, of Rock-wood and Reveller feathering with scarce a whimper up the stony lane.

Surely his enjoyment is undeniable as that of his converse, the scarlet-coated hero in vigorous manhood, who bestrides three hundred guineas' worth of blood and symmetry, while he watches a gorse covert shaking under the researches of twenty couple of high-bred fox hounds, wild with eagerness to push up their game and dash after him over the sea of grass that lies spread around, like falcons on the wing. A physiologist might study to advantage the countenance of the rider; an artist would long to portray on canvas the attitude of the horse.

These two friends, loving each other dearly, are moved by a common sympathy. Simultaneously the eyes of each brighten, and their hearts beat fast. A crash of music from two score merry voices proclaims that a fox has been found, a hat held up against the sky-line, and, after a discreet interval, one long, ringing holloa announce that he is away! That joyous excitement for which some men are content to live, and even in a few sad cases to die, has begun in good earnest now, and trifling, puerile as it may seem, I doubt whether any pursuit in life affords for the moment such intense gratification as "a quick thing over a grass country, strongly enclosed, in a good place, and only half-a-dozen men with the hounds!"

Rider and horse, I say, are moved by a common sympathy, science and conduct being furnished by the man, strength, speed, and courage by the brute. From field to field they speed rejoicing, facing and surmounting each obstacle as it presents itself, with a varied dexterity of hand and eye that amounts to artistic skill, and even should unforeseen difficulty or treacherous foothold entail a downfall, rising together, parted, but not at variance, each perfectly satisfied with the efforts of his friend. Then, when the rattling burst is over, and the hounds are baying round a good fox who has never turned his head from the distant covert that killing pace alone forbade him to reach, how fond the caress laid by stained glove on reeking neck, how proudly affectionate the muttered words of praise, a generous animal interprets by their tone. "You're the best horse in England. I never was so well carried in my life!"

But of all forest creatures hunted by our forefathers and ourselves, the stag has been considered from time immemorial the noblest beast of chase. His nature has been the study of princes, his pursuit the sport of kings. The education of royalty itself would once have been thought incomplete without a thorough knowledge of his haunts and habits, while books were written, and authorities quoted, on the formalities with which his courteous persecutors deemed it becoming that he should be hunted to death. To this day the royal and gallant sport flourishes in West Somerset and North Devon with its former vigour. When George the Third was king, that wild, romantic western county was already famous for staunch hounds, untiring horses, and daring riders, no less than for the strength, size, and lasting qualities of its red deer.

An animal that can fly twenty miles on end for life, and die with its back to a rock, undaunted in defeat, a true gentleman to the last, is surely no unworthy object of pursuit.

But what are these shadows that cross the Barle by moonlight, with the water dripping like molten silver off their sides as they emerge one by one from the glistening stream to disappear again in the black night of its overhanging woods? And is not that their king who lags behind, with beam and branches of those wide-spread horns flashing in points of white as he stoops his crowned head to drink, and passes on? No shadow this, but a stately beast in all the strength and beauty of its prime. A stag of size and substance, with goodly fat on his ribs and many tines on his antlers. Thickening, too, somewhat in the neck, for already the clear air of an autumn night tells of early frosts, and soon the peaceful majesty of his repose will change to turmoil of love and war. In the meantime he feeds lazily on, turning without apparent object in a different direction from the herd.

Thus he wanders over a broad surface of country—now cropping the rank grasses that border the Exe, ere he dashes through its swift and shallow stream as though disdaining a bath that only reaches to his knees. Anon dallying with the standing oats, that pine thin and scanty on a bare hill farm, by the verge of the forest; then crossing the swampy skirts of Exmoor at his long jerking trot, to rouse the bittern and the curlew from their rest, he makes his way by many a broken path and devious sheep-track to the impervious coppices and steep wooded declivities of Cloutsham Ball. It is an hour or two before dawn when he reaches this well-known haunt, and the lordly beast, penetrating to its inmost thicket, lays himself down with the intention of sleeping undisturbed till late in the day.

With an indolent hoist of his haunches, that hardly seemed an effort, he has cleared the hazel-grown bank round his resting-place in a spring that covered some five or six yards, but left imbedded in the yielding clay a distinct impression of his cloven feet. Therefore Red Rube, stooping over the slot at daybreak, chuckles inwardly, and observes to his flask, "a warrantable deer!" kneeling down to examine the footprint more closely, and measure its width by the fingers of his own brown hand. Then he takes a wide circuit, embracing several favourite passes for deer, and satisfies himself that, save one light hart or "brocket," as he calls it, not another animal of the species is this morning harboured in Cloutsham Ball.

The stag-hounds are to meet some two miles off to the eastward. It must be travelling that distance with the sun in his eyes that causes Red Rube to blink and grin and occasionally hiccough all the way to their accustomed trysting-place.

He is there betimes with his broken-kneed pony, yet two riders have arrived before him. Rube chuckles and sidles up to them.

"Your servant, Mistress Carew—your servant, your honour," says he, in a deferential tone. "The spurs had need be sharp to-day, master. I'll warrant there'll be wicked riding, with the likeliest lass in Devon looking on!"

Nelly Carew deserved the epithet. The close-fitting blue habit so well set off her trim figure, the saucy little hat was so becoming to her fresh delicate face, that it seemed no wonder John Garnet's eyes should be fixed on his beautiful companion rather than on the opposite ridge of moor, over which hounds and horsemen were expected every moment to appear.

And Nelly, too, was more than proud of her cavalier. How handsome she thought him, and how princely, with his dark eyes, his ruddy cheeks, his pleasant, careless smile, and clustering hair. Never another rider in the West, thought Nelly, could sit his horse so fairly, and where in the bounds of England was the steed to compare with Katerfelto? "I used to think Cowslip the most beautiful creature in the world," said she, patting her favourite's neck; "but your horse has quite put me out of conceit with mine."

"I know who is the most beautiful creature in the world," answered John Garnet, not unconscious that he had arrived at the idiotic stage of his malady. "I have never seen her equal, and never shall; but we'll argue that point going home," he added, while his bright eye grew brighter. "There's no time to wrangle now, sweet Mistress Nelly, for here come the hounds!"

Cowslip and Katerfelto raised their heads at the same moment, with pointed ears and eager, solemn eyes; the grey indulging in a snort of approval and delight.

The cavalcade, consisting of huntsman, hounds, a whipper-in, and half a score of sportsmen, were to be seen filing across the moor in slanting line down the opposite hill.

John Garnet tightened his girths. "It won't be long before the fun begins," observed this impatient young man.

Nelly laughed. "When you know our country better," said she, "you will find out that a mile in distance with a coombe to cross, sometimes means a good half hour's-ride. Let us go and meet them," she added, putting Cowslip into a canter. "Here comes my aversion, Master Gale."

The Parson, mounted on his staunch black nag, was within a bow-shot, trotting softly through the heather, husbanding strength for the exertions of the day. Even to John Garnet's eyes, prejudiced as he was by Nelly's dislike, there seemed much to admire in the bearing of man and horse. The free, stealing action, the close and easy seat, the light hand, the well-bitted mouth, the confidence of the one, the docility of the other, and the good understanding prevailing between them, argued a partnership that prided itself on encountering difficulties and setting danger at defiance in concert.

"He looks like business, that parson of yours," said John Garnet to his companion, as they bounded away together; "if he's half as good in the pulpit as he seems in the saddle they ought to make him a bishop!"

Nelly's only answer was a little grimace of disgust, followed by a loving smile.

Meeting the assemblage of stag-hunting sportsmen, already increased by fresh arrivals, who turned up from every quarter as if they were the natural growth of the moor, John Garnet could not but observe that many a practised eye travelled approvingly over the symmetrical shape of Katerfelto ere it rested on the better known beauty of Mistress Carew. The honest squires whispered each other with nods, winks, and looks of intelligence.

"'Tis a rare bit of horseflesh!" said one in a faded scarlet hunting-frock with tarnished lace. "Strong as a yoke of bullocks, and light as a January brocket. Seems to me, neighbour, I've seen that nag before."

"Like enough," was the answer. "Thof I never thought to clap eyes on's rider again. That's the lad robbed Sir Humphrey and his three varlets single-handed a twelvemonth gone last Whitsuntide, by Upcot Sheepwash, and showed six hours afterwards in the market at Taunton town. It's fifty miles, squire, if it's a furlong. Aye, aye, a good horse, neighbour, and a bad trade."

"I heard tell he was hanged!" said the listener, opening round eyes of astonishment.

"He did ought to have been," replied the other. "But Galloping Jack had good friends in the West, and a good friend he's been himself, not so long ago neither, to one or two honest fellows you and me would be main vexed to see called to account. Live and let live, says I, but if we find a right stag in yonder hazels who knows his way to the sea, why, that grey horse and his rider are bound to be at one end of the hunt, and I leave it to you, neighbour, to say which!"

With these words he dismounted heavily to adjust girths and bridle, for Red Rube was already in close confabulation with the huntsman, and business seemed about to begin.

The harbourer looked more than half-drunk, yet not for an instant was that sagacity of his at fault which partook rather of animal instinct than human experience.

"The old stag will move the brocket," said he, with a laborious wink, "and it's your business to drive him to the moor, Abel. I'll warrant I bring you within a land-yard of 'un, and all as you've got to do is to catch 'un if you can!"

"Tancred and Tarquin will do that much," replied Abel, a man of few words, and in less than a minute those venerable "tufters" were uncoupled and at his horse's heels, forcing their way through the tangled underwood.

To control twenty couple of hounds hunting different lines is no easy matter. One or two are held in command without difficulty, so that their staunch pursuit may be transferred from scent to scent till they have forced the right deer into the open, when they can be stopped, while the body of the pack are brought up and laid on. Then for the crash, the chorus the jubilee! Hark together! Hark! and Forrard away!!

The brocket's heart beats fast at the first note of the "tufters," and well it may. Tancred and Tarquin are two majestic black and tan hounds, six and twenty inches high, with sweeping ears, pendant jowls, and large lengthy frames, nearly as heavy as himself. For one palpitating moment the wild deer's instinct prompts him to leap from his lair, and scouring at speed across the moor to seek the distant fastnesses of Swincombe, the gorge of Badgeworthy, or wheeling down-wind, like a bird on the wing, by Culbone slopes, to take refuge in the hanging woods of Glenthorne where they fringe the Severn Sea. But the next, a deep, loud, and melodious roar, seems to paralyse his very heart, and he crouches to the earth, scarce daring to move an ear. Suddenly the branches crash behind him, an antlered head looms wide and stately between him and the sky, while he leaps to his nimble feet in a bound that is hastened by the sharp thrust of a horn against his haunch. In less than a minute the old stag couches in the young one's lair, and the brocket, scared with fear, is darting across the moor like an arrow from a bow.

"Hark back, Tancred! Tarquin! Tarquin! hark back!" Morose and solemn, conscientiously, yet sore against the grain, these veterans desist from their pursuit, soon to be rewarded for this disciplined sagacity by a nobler quarry, a higher and stronger scent. But for a leap that covers twenty feet of distance, and lifts his antlers twice his own height in air, the old stag's flank would be torn by Tancred's reeking muzzle, his haunches crushed under Tarquin's weighty paws. But no! with half-a-dozen bounds he crashes through the hazels, speeds up a narrow glade, and emerges stately and triumphant on the open moor.

Standing erect upon an eminence against the sky, he pauses one instant, as if to afford his pursuers an opportunity of noting his grand proportions and noble width of head. All eyes are turned towards him in admiration and delight.

"Beautiful!" exclaims Parson Gale, forgetting the existence of John Garnet and the terms of his own wicked oath.

"Beautiful!" whisper the lovers, exchanging a lover's glance, while Katerfelto's rider feels a thrill of delight creep through his whole frame with the consciousness of his horse's speed and endurance; nor can Nelly herself spare him more than half her attention, so taken up is she with the gallant appearance of the deer.

"Beautiful!" echo the honest squires and yeomen, already speculating on the line, and anticipating the severity of the chase, while Red Rube, with his hand pressing Abel's knee, who is laying on his hounds with a cheer, thus delivers himself:—

"Brow, Bay, and Tray, I tell'ee, with four on the top! All his rights, as I am a living sinner, a warrantable deer, if ever there was one, or I'll eat'un, horns and all!"