to tell
Frosty it was eighteen, he would want to lay overnight, and that wouldn't
do. Besides the trouble and inconvenience, it would spoil the best part of
a five-pund note; and five-pund notes don't grow upon gooseberry-bushes--at
least, not in my garden.'

'Rather scarce in all gardens just now, I think,' observed Jack; 'at least,
I never hear of anybody with one to spare.'

'Money's like snow,' said his lordship, 'a very meltable article; and
talking of snow,' he said, looking up at the heavy clouds, 'I wish we
mayn't be going to have some--I don't like the look of things overhead.'

'Heavy,' replied Jack; 'heavy: however, it's due about now.'

'Due or not due,' said his lordship, 'it's a thing one never wishes to
come; anybody may have my share of snow that likes--frost too.'

The road, or rather track, now passed over Blobbington Moor, and our
friends had enough to do to keep their horses out of peat-holes and bogs,
without indulging in conversation. At length they cleared the moor, and,
pulling out a gap at the corner of the inclosures, cut across a few fields,
and got on to the Stumpington turnpike.

'The hounds are here,' said Jack, after studying the muddy road for some
time.

'They'll not be there long,' replied his lordship, 'for Grabtintoll Gate
isn't far ahead, and we don't waste our substance on pikes.'

His lordship was right. The imprints soon diverged up a muddy lane on the
right, and our sportsmen now got into a road so deep and bottomless as to
put the idea of stones quite out of the question.

'Hang the road!' exclaimed his lordship, as his hack nearly came on his
nose, 'hang the road!' repeated he, adding, 'if Puff wasn't such an ass, I
really think I'd give him up the cross-road country.'

'It's bad to get at from us,' observed Jack, who didn't like such trashing
distances.

'Ah! but it's a rare good country when you get to it,' replied his
lordship, shortening his rein and spurring his steed.

The lane being at length cleared, the road became more practicable, passing
over large pastures where a horseman could choose his own ground, instead
of being bound by the narrow limits of the law. But though the road
improved, the day did not; a thick fog coming drifting up from the
south-east in aid of the general obscurity of the scene.

'The day's gettin' _wuss_,' observed Jack, snuffling and staring about.

'It'll blow over,' replied his lordship, who was not easily disheartened.
'It'll