The country round about, if any country could have been seen, would have shown wild, open, and cheerless.  Here a patch of wood, there a patch of heath, but its general aspect bare and unfruitful.  The commanding outline of Beechwood Forest was not visible for the weather.  Time now, let us suppose, half-past ten, with a full muster of horsemen and a fog making unwonted dulness of the scene—­the old sign-pole being the most conspicuous object of the whole.

Hark! what a clamour there is about it.  It’s like a betting-post at Newmarket.  How loud the people talk!  What’s the news?  Queen Anne dead, or is there another French Revolution, or a fixed duty on corn?  Reader, Mr. Puffington’s hounds have had a run, and the Flat Hat men are disputing it.

‘Nothing of the sort! nothing of the sort!’ exclaims Fossick, ’I know every yard of the country, and you can’t make more nor eight of it anyhow, if eight.’

‘Well, but I’ve measured it on the map,’ replied the speaker (Charley Slapp himself), ‘and it’s thirteen, if it’s a yard.’

‘Then the country’s grown bigger since my day,’ rejoins Fossick, ’for I was dropped at Stubgrove, which is within a mile of where you found, and I’ve walked, and I’ve ridden, and I’ve driven every yard of the distance, and you can’t make it more than eight, if it’s as much.  Can you, Capon?’ exclaimed Fossick, appealing to another of the ‘flat brims,’ whose luminous face now shone through the fog.

‘No,’ replied Capon, adding, ‘not so much, I should say.’

Just then up trotted Frostyface with the hounds.

‘Good morning, Frosty! good morning!’ exclaim half-a-dozen voices, that it would be difficult to appropriate from the denseness of the fog.  Frosty and the whips make a general salute with their caps.

‘Well, Frosty, I suppose you’ve heard what a run we had yesterday?’ exclaims Charley Slapp, as soon as Frosty and the hounds are settled.

‘Had they, sir—­had they?’ replies Frosty, with a slight touch of his cap and a sneer.  ’Glad to hear it, sir—­glad to hear it.  Hope they killed, sir—­hope they killed!’ with a still slighter touch of the cap.

’Killed, aye!—­killed in the open just below Crabstone Green, in your country,’ adding, ‘It was one of your foxes, I believe.’

‘Glad of it, sir—­glad of it, sir,’ replies Frosty.  ’They wanted blood sadly—­they wanted blood sadly.  Quite welcome to one of our foxes, sir—­quite welcome.  That’s a brace and a ‘alf they’ve killed.’

‘Brace and a ha-r-r-f!’ drawls Slapp, in well-feigned disgust; ’brace and a ha-r-r-f!—­why, it makes them ten brace, and six run to ground.’

‘Oh, don’t tell me,’ retorts Frosty, with a shake of disgust; ’don’t tell me.  I knows better—­I knows better.  They’d only killed a brace since they began hunting up to yesterday.  The rest were all cubs, poor things!—­all cubs, poor things!  Mr. Puffington’s hounds are not the sort of animals to kill foxes:  nasty, skirtin’, flashy, jealous divils; always starin’ about for holloas and assistance.  I’ll be d——­d if I’d give eighteenpence for the ’ole lot on ’em.’