'
'I've got it,' said Sponge, who had plied his pen to good purpose.
'Justly celebrated,' repeated Jack, with a snort. 'Well, then, say,
"Hitting off the scent like a workman"--big H, you know, for a fresh
sentence--"they went away again at score, and passing by Moorlinch farm
buildings, and threading the strip of plantation by Bexley Burn, he crossed
Silverbury Green, leaving Longford Hutch to the right, and passing straight
on by the gibbet at Harpen." Those are all bits of places, observed Jack,
'that none but the country folks know' indeed, I shouldn't have known them
but for shootin' over them when old Bloss lived at the Green. Well, now,
have you got all that?' asked he.
'"Gibbet at Harpen,"' read Sponge, as he wrote it.
'"Here, then, the gallant pack, breaking from scent to view,"' continued
Jack, speaking slowly, '"ran into their fox in the open close upon
Mountnessing Wood, evidently his point from the first, and into which a few
more strides would have carried him. It was as fine a run as ever was seen,
and the hunting of the hounds was the admiration of all who saw it.
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