grew smaller and smaller, and the adulatory condolences of her assistants became more and more hard to endure.  She literally hurled the shilling at them as she set off once more to try to recover her lost ground, and by sheer force of passion hustled Pilot over the next broken-down wall without a refusal.  For she had now got into that stony country whereof Major Booth had spoken.  Rough heathery fields, ribbed with rocks and sown with grey boulders, were all round.  The broad salmon river swept sleekly through the valley below, among the bland green fields which were as far away for all practical purposes as the plains of Paradise.  No one who has not ridden a stern chase over rough ground on a well-bred horse with his temper a bit out of hand will be able at all fitly to sympathise with the trials of Mrs. Naylor.  The hunt and all that appertained to it had sunk out of sight over a rugged hillside, and she had nothing by which to steer her course save the hoof-marks in the occasional black and boggy intervals between the heathery knolls.  No one had ever accused her of being short of pluck, and she pressed on her difficult way with the utmost gallantry; but short of temper she certainly was, and at each succeeding obstacle there ensued a more bitter battle between her and her horse.  Every here and there a band of crisp upland meadow would give the latter a chance, but each such advantage would be squandered in the war dance that he indulged in at every wall.

At last the summit of the interminable series of hills was gained, and Mrs. Pat scanned the solitudes that surrounded her with wrathful eyes.  The hounds were lost, as completely swallowed up as ever were Korah, Dathan and Abiram.  Not the most despised of the habits or the feeblest of the three-year-olds had been left behind to give a hint of their course; but the hoof-marks showed black on a marshy down-grade of grass, and with an angry clout of her crop on Pilot’s unaccustomed ribs, she set off again.  A narrow road cut across the hills at the end of the field.  The latter was divided from it by a low, thin wall of sharp slaty stones, and on the further side there was a wide and boggy drain.  It was not a nice place, and Pilot thundered down towards it at a pace that suited his rider’s temper better than her judgment.  It was evident, at all events, that he did not mean to refuse.  Nor did he; he rose out of the heavy ground at the wall like a rocketing pheasant, and cleared it by more than twice its height; but though he jumped high he did not jump wide, and he landed half in and out of the drain, with his forefeet clawing at its greasy edge, and his hind legs deep in the black mud.