was concerned) had a little chat
with Jan, whose ears he pulled affectionately, while the youngster sat
with muzzle resting on Dick's knee.

"Don't much like saying good-by to you, Jan, boy," said Dick Vaughan.

"Ah, well, there need not be any good-bys to-night, Dick," said the
Master. "We'll all be at the station in the morning, Finn and Jan as
well."

"Ha! that's good of you," said Dick. "But you'll never let that
youngster run five miles behind a carriage, will you? Isn't he too
gristly in the legs yet, for the weight he carries?"

The Master smiled. "Trust me for that, Dick. I've reared too many big
wolfhound pups to make that mistake. A few such road trips as that, and
Master Jan would never again show a real gun-barrel fore leg. Why, he
weighs a hundred and twenty pounds! No; old Finn will lope alongside of
us, but Master Jan can have a seat inside. I have seen some of the best
and biggest hounds ever bred spoiled for life by being allowed to follow
horses on the road in their first year. There was Donovan, by Champion
Kerry, you know. He might have beaten Finn, I believe, if they hadn't
ruined him in his sixth month, trying to harden his feet behind a
dog-cart on the great north road. The result was, when he was shown at
the Palace in his eleventh month, his fore legs had gone for ever--like
a dachshund's."

"Ah! When I get back," said Dick, musingly, you'll be pretty nearly a
two-year-old, Jan, boy."

"And if all goes well, he will be as strong a hound as any in England;
won't he, Betty? You'll see to that."

"I will if you'll help to keep us going the right way," said Betty,
smiling at the Master.

And so, directly after an early breakfast, the Nuthill party drove to
the station, with Jan on the floor of the wagonette and Finn pacing
easily beside it. There was quite an assembly on the platform of the
little station to see "young Mr. Vaughan" off. For he was bound for
Liverpool that day, where he was to meet Captain Will Arnutt, of the
Royal North-west Mounted Police of Canada, with whom he was to embark
for Halifax, _en route_ for Regina, in Saskatchewan, the headquarters of
the R.N.W.M.P., for which fine service Dick Vaughan had enlisted, after
a stiff course of training under Captain Arnutt's personal supervision.

"Between ourselves," the captain had told the Master, in Lewes, a week
or two earlier, "neither I nor the Royal North-west have much to teach
young Vaughan in the matter of horsemansh