I have read of "the hare and many friends," but they were very unlike
young Buttar; no one could desire a stouter or a stauncher friend.
Before starting they had well laid their plans, and determined to give
the hounds a good run. Ernest had provided himself with a good pocket
compass, so that he could steer as direct a course as the ground would
allow to the point he had selected to round before turning back towards
home.
"Let us go along over the smooth ground at a good pace--we shall save
time to spare when we come to the difficult places," observed Ernest to
Buttar, as they were waiting for the Doctor's signal to start. It was
given--and away they went; steady at first, but gradually increasing
their speed as they found that they could easily draw breath. They met
with no impediments in the way. They easily leaped the brooks they
encountered. The old couple in Ashby-lane stared at them, and wondered
where they could be going, leaving little bits of paper behind them.
Then they came to Ashby-downs: it was hot work toiling up the steep
side, with the hot sun striking down on them; but when they got to the
summit, a fresh breeze and a clear blue air revived their strength, and
they went along merrily, every now and then looking back to try and
catch sight of the hounds, judiciously dropping their scent in places
where it could be seen, and not blown away by the breeze. They had
several points to attend to. They had been especially charged by the
Doctor to avoid trespassing on any private ground; they had to select an
interesting course, and one not too difficult, at the same time with
every possible variety of country.
On they went, making good play over the short smooth turf of the downs.
At last they came to the cliff. Buttar was for descending again, and
crossing the ravine where it opened into the plain country.
"No, no," said Ernest, "we shall increase our distance if we can manage
to get down the highest part of the cliff. Let us try what we can do
before we give it up."
Down the cliff they began to descend. There were plenty of craggy,
rugged spots, which facilitated their descent, but in most places there
was only room for one person to descend at a time, so, as in the
instance of the stepping-stones, their pursuers had to form in Indian
file. They easily reached the ledge. Below it the way was, indeed,
difficult. At the very end, however, Ernest observed several points of
rock jutting out. By climbing up to them he saw that he could drop down
on a broader ledge, well covered with soft turf, and could then descend
under the very ledge on which they were standing.
Buttar agreed to make the attempt, feeling certain that Lemon would find
that or some other means of overcoming the difficulty.
Ernest clutched the rock, and got along bravely, followed by Buttar.
"Take care that you do not sprain your ankle as you drop," cried the
latter, as Ernest prepared to let go so as to descend to the ledge. He
reached it in safety. He caught his companion in his arms so as to
break his fall, and sprinkling some paper under the long ledge, they
pursued their way. Once Buttar had to let down Ernest with their
handkerchiefs tied together, while Ernest again caught him. Safely they
reached the bottom, and away they went across valleys, over streams, and
up hills, never once dreaming of fatigue.
I need not follow them in the whole of their course. They were much
delighted, on reaching a high mound, to see the hounds in hot pursuit of
them, and still more when all the pack were assembled on the ledge
trying to find a way down.
"I hope none of them will come to grief," said Buttar. "Do you know, I
think that it would have been safer to have taken some other course:
that is a difficult place."
"The very reason I was glad to find it," replied Ernest; "one of these
days some of them may have a whole tribe of Red Indians or Caffres after
them, and then they may be thankful that they learned how to get down a
place of the sort. See! I think they are finding out the way. Let us
push on." They rose up into view, and waving their caps, on they went.
Next they found a descent, down which they trotted quickly, and then
another cliff appeared before them; at the top some fine views were to
be obtained. They did not hesitate; up they climbed Fairway Tower was
in sight; a wide valley full of streams and rather difficult country
was, however, between them and it. They pushed on along the downs; then
they descended another steep hill, and on reaching the plain a rapid
wide stream was before them. Ernest had expected to come down near a
bridge, which he proposed crossing. He and Buttar looked at the broad
stream with a puzzled expression. They were not quite certain whether
the bridge was to the right or left. They decided on taking the left,
going down the stream. At last they met a countryman. They inquired of
him about the bridge.
"Oh; 'tis the other way, lads," he answered. "But, I say, young
measters, bees you runnin' away from school in such a hurry?"
"No, no," answered Ernest, laughing. "We are running for the pleasure
of making the school run after us. If we could get across the stream it
may puzzle them to follow us. Can you show us any place where we may
cross?"
"Yes; that I can," was the answer. "There bees a place with a sort of
an island loike in the middle. There's a plank athwart one place, and a
tree hangs over t'other. If ye be as active as ye looks, ye'll make no
odds a getting over."
"Oh, thank you, thank you, my man, we shall be much obliged to you, and
as your time is your money? here is what is your due," answered Ernest,
handing the countryman a small coin. "But lead on; we have no time to
lose."
"Noa, ma young ones, I'll no take your money. It's too much by half for
just ten minutes' work. Come along though, if ye bees in a hurry," said
the good-natured fellow, putting back the coin, and leading the way down
the stream. "If so be when we gets wages, we never has them, ye know,
till the work is done." He trudged on with his arms swinging before
him, getting quickly over the ground, though his legs did not appear to
move half so fast as those of the young gentlemen. He did not utter a
word all the time, but seemed to concentrate all his energies in getting
over the ground as rapidly as he could. Ernest and Buttar ran on by his
side, dropping the paper here and there sufficiently thick to indicate
their course. At last they reached the spot mentioned by the
countryman. He showed them a narrow plank, partly hid by bushes, by
which they crossed to a green island surrounded by willows, which hung
over into the stream.
"A grand place for fishing, this," observed Buttar, as he looked into
the dark, clear water which went whirling by in eddies, and here and
there formed deep calm pools and little bays, in which they could not
help feeling sure many a trout lay hid.
"No time to think about it, though," answered Ernest. "We will come
here, by all means, another day and try what we can do. Let us now see
how we are to get across the river. Lay the scent thickly, that the
hounds may not be in fault, or they may lose it altogether and give the
chase up in despair."
While they were speaking they were following the countryman through the
reeds and grass, which was already high in that moist situation. He
stopped at the base of a fine large willow, which they saw bent very
much over the water, though the bushes prevented them from seeing how
far. There were some notches in its trunk, and up these he climbed.
They followed him closely, and saw him descend on the opposite bank by
means of a knotted rope which hung from the end of one of the limbs.
They were delighted with the plan.
"Capital!" exclaimed Buttar. "What fun it will be to have all the
hounds come scrambling over the old trunk, and letting themselves down
by the rope, one after the other."
The countryman looked at the speaker with a puzzled gaze. "The owndes!"
he exclaimed. "They'll ne'er trouble the rope, I'm thinking." He
evidently could not settle it in his mind that his young companions were
not mad. Buttar and Ernest laughed heartily at his look of
astonishment.
"We speak of our schoolfellows, who pretend to be hounds, and we are
hares leading them on," exclaimed Buttar. The countryman clapped his
hands and rubbed them together to express his delight at the notion,
while he joined in their laughter at his mistake.
"Well, that there be a jolly good game, I do think," he exclaimed. "I
loikes it, that I do--No, no--I'll not take your money, young measters.
I gets a good day's pay for a good day's work, and that's all I asks,
and all I wishes for." Ernest, on hearing this sentiment, put out his
hand and warmly shook that of the countryman. "I like to hear you say
that, friend. It is what all of us should alone desire, and I am sure
the world would be much happier if everybody in it were like you; but
good-bye, good-bye; I've no time to talk now. I should like to fall in
with you and have a chat another day. It's a good bit off to Fairway
Tower, which we must round before we turn homeward."
"You bees a free spoken young genl'man, and I'd lief have a chat we ye,"
answered the countryman; "my name is John Hodge, and I live in Lowley
Bottom; ye knows where that is, I'm thinking."
"That I do; very glad. I'll come and see you, John Hodge; good-bye,
good-bye;" exclaimed Ernest, as he and Buttar set off at full speed
across a grassy willow-bounded field towards Fairway Tower, which
appeared full in sight on the downs above them. They had thoroughly
regained their wind during the time they had spent with John Hodge, so
now they went away once more at full speed. They had a number of
broadish ditches to leap, but they easily sprang over them, laughing
whenever they pictured to themselves any of their followers tumbling in,
a catastrophe they thought very likely to occur at two or three places,
where the bank they had to leap to was higher than the one they leaped
from.
Once more they reached the foot of the downs. These downs rose on the
opposite side of the broad stream they had crossed. Looking along the
course of the river towards the sea, it appeared as if the silvery
thread of water had cut the green hills in two parts, and that then they
had slipped away from it on either side, leaving a broadish expanse
covered with meadows and copses, and here and there a corn-field, and a
cottage garden, and a potato-ground, with its small, low,
straw-thatched, mud cottage.
Up--up the smooth, closely cropped side of the steep hill they climb,
with just as good a heart as when they started. Steep as it was, they
scarcely panted an instant. Ernest was in capital training; that is to
say, he was in the condition in which a strong healthy boy ought always
to be. So, indeed, was Buttar; for neither of them ever ate a particle
more of food than they required, they eschewed tarts of all sorts, and
kept all their limbs and muscles in full exercise. May English boys
never cease to practise athletic sports, and more especially systematic
gymnastics!
The hare and his companion soon reached the top of the downs, and
turning round, spread out their arms with open palms, and gulped down a
dozen draughts of the pure fresh breeze, which would now be somewhat
behind them, though they had hitherto had it chiefly in their faces, an
important advantage which Ernest had taken into consideration when he
selected the course for the day.
Note it, all you who may have to do hare. Get the wind in your face as
much as possible during your outward course, in cold as well as in hot
weather, but more especially in hot. In cold weather, however, it is
important, as you will, if you have the wind behind you when going, get
very hot, and you will be apt to get chilled when leisurely returning,
or be prevented, from fear of it, of sitting down and resting. Not that
such an idea of catching cold ever entered into the imagination of the
two schoolboys. Along the ridges of the smooth downs they went merrily,
gazing down into the valley below, and more than once looking round to
discover if the hounds were following. Nowhere were they to be seen.
The foot of Fairway Tower was reached at last. It was the keep of a
castle of very ancient date, built in the centre of a Roman encampment.
The walls were of enormous thickness, allowing a staircase to wind up
within them.
"Let us give them a good view of the sea," cried Ernest. Up the
well-worn stone steps they mounted. Up--up they sprung, laughing
merrily and cheering loudly when they reached the top. Few people,
after a run of nearly fifteen miles, would have liked to have followed
their example. The view, Ernest declared, repaid them. It was
expansive, and it gave, from its character, a pleasing, exhilarating
sensation to the heart as it lay at their feet basking in sunshine. On
either hand were the smiling undulating downs, dotted here and there
with flocks of sheep. Before them the country sloped away for a couple
of miles till it reached the bright blue dancing ocean, over which
several white sails were skimming rapidly. Inland there was a
beautifully diversified country. There were several rich woods
surrounding gentlemen's seats, and here and there a hamlet and a church
spire rising up among the trees, and some extensive homesteads, the gems
of an English rural landscape; and there were wide pasture lands, and
ploughed fields already getting a green tinge from the rising corn, and
many orchards blushing with pink bloom, and white little cottages, and
the winding river, and many a silvery stream which ran murmuring into
it; but I need not go on with the description. Ernest and Buttar drank
in its beauties as they did the cool breeze which blew on their cheeks,
and then they looked round to try and discover the hounds.
"I see them," exclaimed Buttar, after a long scrutinising search.
"There they are, just coming out of Beechwood; they look no bigger than
a troop of ants. Well, we have got a fine start of them--let us give
them a cheer. They won't hear us, but they may possibly see us."
Ernest agreeing to Buttar's proposal, they got to the top of the highest
pinnacle, and taking off their hats they waved them vehemently above
their heads, shouting at the same time to their hearts' content at the
top of their voices, Hurra, hurra, hurra; once more, hurra! They did
not expect, however, that the sound could possibly reach their friends,
so they shouted, it must be owned, for their own satisfaction and
amusement. Having shouted and waved their hats till they were tired,
they agreed that it should be time to commence their homeward way. They
accordingly prepared to descend from their lofty perch to the world
below. They did not go down by the staircase, but by the rugged
projections in the wall, where a wide breach existed, made either by the
hand of time or by Cromwell's cannons in the times of the Cavaliers and
Roundheads. They laughed very much as they stuck bits of paper into the
crevices in the walls, and scattered them on every spot where there was
a chance of their remaining. They were not long in reaching the bottom,
for they were fearless climbers, and made little of dropping down ten
feet or so to a ledge below them, provided they felt sure that they
could balance themselves when there, and not go head foremost lower
still, as careless climbers are apt to do. After this every step would
bring them nearer home; but still they endeavoured to make the course as
interesting as possible. Having taken a turn round the tower, and
dropped the scent thickly in their track, off they again set. Along the
upper edge of the downs they went at an easy jog-trot, and then when
compelled at last, with regret, to leave the breezy hills, they took
their way across a succession of fields where oats, and turnips, and
mangel wurtzel were wont to grow, till they descended into the richer
pasture and wheat-producing lands. Still they had many a stream and
deep ditch to leap.
"How do you feel, old fellow?" said Ernest, after they had made good
play for a couple of miles or more without stopping.
"As fresh as one of the daisies we are treading on," answered Buttar.
"Do you know, Bracebridge, I never like treading on wild flowers; it
seems such wanton destruction of some of the most beautiful works of
nature. I feel all the time as a donkey who has got into a flower-bed
ought to feel,--that I am a very mischievous animal. I would always
rather go out of my way than injure them, especially such graceful gems
as the wood anemone, or the wild hyacinth, or the wood sorrel, or
primroses and cowslips. I feel that I could not restore one of the
hundreds my careless feet have injured, even if my life depended on it."
"The same sort of idea has crossed my mind, I own," replied Ernest; "but
then I bethought me, that they have been given in such rich profusion
that, although hundreds or thousands may fall victims to our careless
steps, as you remark, thousands and tens of thousands remain to show the
glory of God's works, and that year after year they come back to us as
plentiful and lovely as ever. But I say, old fellow, it won't do to
stop and philosophise. We are hares for the nonce, remember, and the
hounds are in hot chase after us. By the by, _apropos_ to the subject,
I remember reading a capital Irish story of Lover's, which made me laugh
very much. For some reason or other, a fox walks into the cottage of a
keeper, who is absent, and sits down on a chair before the fire, putting
his feet on the fender, and taking up a newspaper, resolved to make
himself comfortable. `A newspaper?' exclaimed the Irishman to whom the
story is being narrated. `What did he want with that?' `Faith! how
else could he tell where the hounds were going to meet in the morning?'
is the answer."
Buttar laughed heartily at Ernest's anecdote.
"Do you know that I cannot help feeling sometimes, as I am running
along, as if I were really and truly a two-legged hare," observed the
latter.
"Well, so do I," replied Buttar. "And when I have been doing a hound, I
have so completely fancied myself one, as I have been scrambling through
hedges and ditches, that I have felt more inclined to bark than to
speak, and should certainly have claimed fellowship with a harrier had I
encountered one."
"However that may be, as I do not feel inclined to sup on grass or raw
cabbage, and should much rather prefer a good round of beef and some
bread and cheese, let us now take the shortest cut home," observed
Ernest, who was getting hungry.
"Agreed! agreed!" cried Buttar. "I don't think, though, that the hounds
can be far behind us. It's my belief, when they come in, that they'll
all declare they never have had such a day's run since they came to
school."
The huntsman, and whipper-in, and hounds were left on the ledge of rock,
looking out for a way by which to reach the bottom of the cliff. At
last Tom Bouldon espied a bit of paper sticking in a crevice above where
they were standing. He climbed up to it and seeing another, and
another, clearly defined the path the hare had taken.
"Tally ho! tally ho!" he shouted.
"Tally ho! tally ho!" cried the huntsman, and sounded his horn.
In an instant, like shipwrecked sailors escaping from a wreck, all the
boys were scrambling along the face of the cliff. Then they began to
drop down, one after the other, fearless of broken limbs, and very soon
they were assembled in the valley below. Once more they burst away in
full cry. Across many a marsh they had to wade, and over many a stream
to jump, into which more than one tumbled, and had to be hauled out by
the rest. Indeed, had not Tom kept them up to their work, several of
the hounds would have given up and turned back. Then Lemon cheered them
on with his horn, and waved before them his flag, and, shouting
together, they surmounted all difficulties, and seldom for more than a
minute at a time lost the scent, till they came to the passage of the
river. Here for a few minutes they were fairly puzzled. They got into
the island, but how to get out again they could not tell. Round and
round it they ran, till the scent was discovered by Lemon on the stem of
the old willow.
"Tally ho! tally ho!" he shouted, springing along the leaning stem, and
disappearing among the branches.
Tom whipped in the hounds, wondering what had become of their leader,
till he was seen on the grass on the opposite bank, having come down,
not having discovered the rope, rather more rapidly than he intended.
Some had already descended in the same rapid way, coming down on
all-fours, or with all-fours upwards, and there lay on the soft grass,
kicking and sprawling in delightful confusion, before the rope was
discovered. The rest got down by the rope, followed by the whipper-in,
and then they all picked themselves up, and set off at full speed after
the hare. I need not follow them. Continually this indefatigable
whipper-in had to keep them up to their work, and very often had to help
out those who had tumbled into ditches and trenches, or stuck fast in
hedges.
"Well, I do declare we never have had such a run since I came to
school," cried Tom, enthusiastically. "Bracebridge deserves a cup, that
he does."
The sentiment was echoed by all hands, from Lemon downwards.
"Now, let us see if we can catch him before he reaches home."
Vain was the notion. The active hares kept well ahead of them, and when
they reached the school, not a little tired, and as hungry as hounds
should be, were found, seated at table, in clean dry garments, and
enjoying a hearty supper. The two hares were speedily joined by
huntsman, whipper-in, and hounds; and the Doctor and two or three of the
bigger boys came in to superintend the feast, and to hear them "fight
their battles o'er again." The hares said very little of their
exploits; but it is surprising what wonderful accounts some of the
hounds gave of what they had done, what hair-breadth escapes they had
had, what hills they had climbed, what streams and ditches they had
leaped.