’Master wins, for a ‘undr’d!’ exclaims Leather, as, getting into the third field, Mr. Sponge takes a decided lead; and Lucy, encouraged by the sound, looks up, and sees her ‘white jacket’ throwing the dry fallow in the faces of the field.

‘Oh, how I hope he will!’ exclaims she, clasping her hands, with upturned eyes; but when she ventures on another look, she sees old Spraggon drawing upon him, Hangallows’s flaming red jacket not far off, and several others nearer than she liked.  Still the tail was beginning to form.  Another fence, and that a big one, draws it out.  A striped jacket is down, and the horse, after a vain effort to rise, sinks lifeless on the ground.  On they go all the same!

Loud yells of exciting betting burst from the spectators, and Buckram gets well on for the cross.

There are now five in front—­Sponge, Spraggon, Hangallows, Boville, and another; and already the pace begins to tell.  It wasn’t possible to run it at the rate they started.  Spraggon makes a desperate effort to get the lead; and Sponge, seeing Boville handy, pulls his horse, and lets the light-weight make play over a rough, heavy fallow with the chestnut.  Jack spurs and flogs, and grins and foams at the mouth.  Thus they get half round the oval course.  They are now directly in front of the hill, and the spectators gaze with intense anxiety;—­now vociferating the name of this horse, now of that; now shouting ‘Red jacket!’ now ‘White!’ while the blind fiddler perseveres with the old melody of—­’The Devil among the Tailors.’

‘Now they come to the brook!’ exclaims Leather, who has been over the ground; and as he speaks, Lucy distinctly sees Mr. Sponge’s gather an effort to clear it; and—­oh, horror!—­the horse falls—­he’s down—­no, he’s up!—­and her lover’s in his seat again; and she flatters herself it was her sherry that saved him.  Splash!—­a horse and rider duck under; three get over; two go in; now another clears it, and the rest turn tail.

What splashing and screaming, and whipping and spurring, and how hopeless the chance of any of them to recover their lost ground.  The race is now clearly between five.  Now for the wall!  It’s five feet high, built of heavy blocks, and strong in the staked-out part.  As he nears it, Jack sits well back, getting Daddy Longlegs well by the head, and giving him a refresher with the whip.  It is Jack’s last move!  His horse comes, neck and croup over, rolling Jack up like a ball of worsted on the far side.  At the same moment, Multum-in-Parvo goes at it full tilt; and, not rising an inch, sends Captain Boville flying one way, his saddle another, himself a third, and the stones all ways.  Mr. Sponge then slips through, closely followed by Hangallows and a jockey in yellow, with a tail of three after them.  They then put on all the steam they can raise over the twenty-acre pasture that follows.

The white!—­the red!—­the yaller!  The red!—­the white!—­the yaller! and anybody’s race!  A sheet would cover them!—­crack! whack! crack! how they flog!  Hercules springs at the sound.