bare ground in the night. For they who go up to battle must fight
the hard earth and the tempest, as well as face bayonet and ball. As of
yore with the brown bill, so now with the rifle--the muscles that have
been trained about the hedges and fields will not fail England in the hour
of danger.

Hark!--a distant whoop--another, a blast of a horn, and then a burst of
chiding that makes the woods ring. Down drops the bill, and together,
heedless of any social difference in the common joy, we scramble to the
highest mound, and see the pack sweep in full cry across the furrows.
Crash--it is the bushes breaking, as the first foam-flecked, wearied horse
hardly rises to his leap, and yet crushes safely through, opening a way,
which is quickly widened by the straggling troop behind. Ha! down the lane
from the hill dashes another squadron that has eroded the chord of the arc
and comes in fresher. Ay, and a third is entering at the bottom there, one
by one, over the brook. Woods, field, and paths, but just before an empty
solitude, are alive with men and horses. Up yonder, along the ridge,
gallops another troop in single file, well defined against the sky, going
parallel to the hounds. What a view they must have of the scene below! Two
ladies who ride up with torn skirts cannot lift their panting horses at
the double mound. Well, let us defy 'wilful damage' for once. The gate,
jealously padlocked, is swiftly hoisted off its hinges, and away they go
with hearty thanks. We slip the gate on again just as some one hails to us
across the field to wait a minute, but seeing it is only a man we calmly
replace the timber and let him take his chance. He is excited, but we
smile stolidly. In another minute the wave of life is gone; it has swept
over and disappeared as swiftly as it came. The wood, the field, and lane
seem painfully--positively painfully--empty. Slowly the hedger and ditcher
goes back to his work, where in the shade under the bushes even now the
dew lingers.

So there are days to be enjoyed out of doors even in much-abused November.
And when the wind rises and the storm is near, if you get under the lee of
a good thick copse there is a wild pleasure in the frenzy that passes
over. With a rush the leaves stream outwards, thickening the air, whirling
round and round; the tree-tops bend and sigh, the blast strikes them, and
in an instant they are stripped and bare. A spectral rustling, as the
darkness falls and the black cloud