"Then it's you as have drove her mad," ground Rupert through his teeth. "You did a ought to be drownded too!" And he pommelled his way through the crowd and straight into the water. A hoarse laugh was the only salute as the wretched beast, with a whine of recognition and an attempt to reach her master's outstretched hand, sank under a final stone. Wild with rage, Rupert showered blows right and left from his clenched fists, pushed one boy into the pond, knocked down another, and set off at a gallop home. It might have gone hard with him, however, for the men and boys were very angry; but the old ratcatcher passing by called out :—

"You'd best take care! Benyam will be down upon ye like the Devil and all his works for killin' of his dog." They paused for a moment and he got off unmolested.

His heart was half broken, and he sat down under a hedge as soon as he reached a quiet spot, and sobbed desperately-those dry hard sobs without a tear, which harden instead of softening one's heart-to lose the only thing that loved him, and in such a way! Then he rose up a harder and a worse boy, with revenge and wrong in his heart; the powers of good and evil, the black and white horses of the old myth, were making a struggle for his soul, and the black horse was winning.

The boy's face was the index to what was going on within. Nature had done well for him : had given him a large square forehead, a clear eye, and a firm good mouth-the power of thought in the upper part of the face, and of will in the lower; but now there was a sullen look in the brow, and a dogged expression about the chin.

CHAPTER IV.

A HUNTING MORNING.

Ir was a great hunting county, and to watch the horses and dogs across country was one of Rupert's chief pleasures. To rush after the hounds in full chase, and judge where there was the greatest chance of their path being cut across again, was as keen a delight to him as to the best mounted man in the field. Hunting is a really popular amusement, and nearly as much enjoyed by foot as by horsemen.

It was a beautiful day, the first burst of spring after a long frost, the pale blue sky dappled with little flecks of cloud, a bright sun and a soft wind, when Rupert reached, breathless, one of those double gates in a high unclipped hedge, which seem invented to give most trouble to man and beast, and to be of no use to either. Half the red-coats, and the dogs, had swept past him across the poachy field full of rushes,-" splash gate" leading into "swim meadow," notorious both,-when an impatient sportsman came up: a tall dark man, riding a very fine black horse; everything about him looked as first-rate as his horse, but he seemed out of humour and angry; he had taken a wrong cut, and was far behind the rest of the field.

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Open those gates, boy!" he called out imperiously. Rupert did as he was bid; but as he pushed back the second, the impatient horse in the narrow space between the two, lashed out with his hind legs, and in his haste, Rupert, in avoiding the kick, let fall the gate. It touched neither horse nor man, who was far too good a rider to be caught; but he swore a fierce oath at the lad, and turned out of his way to strike at him with his heavyhandled whip before he rode on. The boy had done his best, and almost hissed with rage and a burning sense of injustice. In a few minutes, however, he followed till all were out of sight; and he was turning slowly home, when the fox suddenly entered a great wood from which they had been keeping him carefully all the morning, and doubled back almost to the place whence he had started.

The cheery sound, which is music in the ears of gentle and simple sportsmen, was heard echoing up and down the heart of the wood, though the horsemen could not be seen as they galloped along the ridings.

Rupert had a good eye for sport, and he took up his station in a capital position, where the "spinney" ended in a steep bank on the field; the brushwood was so thick that it was hard for anything bigger than a fox to make a way on either side, but in the middle was an old clearing where a number of trees had been dragged out: the bank, however, had been made up again, and a new and solid oak post and rail fixed at the top. Rupert ensconced himself very comfortably under a neighbouring hedge, and was rewarded by the fox jumping almost into his arms, followed by the whole pack at full cry and full speed, tails in the air, black, brown, and white; it was very delightful, and not a horseman in sight to share the honour of his position, though he could hear their cries all round.

A moment after his old enemy on the black horse came hard and fast through the wood, and up to the new set fence. It was a tremendous leap, the rail was high, the bank was deep, for the ground fell very much into the field below, and there was a wide ditch full of water and leaves. Moreover, there was no good landing-place on the other side, which sloped up again, and was poachy and slippery with the stiff soil, and greasy with a thaw after a hard frost. He drew up and looked at it; it was a great temptation to go over; the hounds were running into the fox just ahead, the rest of the field far behind, and he would have had to go back a quarter of a mile at least to find gate or gap in the thick wood. At that moment the boy, seeing him hesitate, clapped his hands.

"I'm on the right side of the hedge now, and where you'd fain be," cried he.

The jeering of a boy was not likely to affect a crack rider of the -shire hounds; but perhaps it added the half-grain necessary to the strong inclination which made him resolve to go over, and he spurred his horse at the fence: the brute was wiser than his master and refused it; and again and again the rider brought him back to the leap with whip and spur. Both by this time were furiously out of temper, and at last, in a sort of cross-grained manner, the horse went over. The boy saw them in

the air for the hundredth part of a second, the very incarnation of health, and strength, and power-the next moment there lay only a huddled mass of legs and arms on the ground: the horse was down, and the rider had fallen on the wrong side, his leg crushed under the saddle, and he himself at the mercy of the hoofs. The horse scrambled up, lashing out behind him as was his wont, and hitting his master violently on the head. In another moment he was out of sight.

Awed and frightened by the silence, Rupert crept up: the rider lay motionless, and he attempted to raise the head; the blood streamed from the mouth, and he laid it down again and ran hurriedly to look for help. The red-coats were riding rapidly on in the next field, too eager to attend to the gesticulating boy, till at last one of them, who caught sight of the riderless black horse over the hedge, found time and interest enough to listen to what he was saying.

"What, had a spill? What is it you're saying? not dead? impossible!" and he followed the lad to the spot.

"Poor fellow-what, Ayscough, can't you speak, man?" said the young squire, dismounting and going up to the prostrate form, and trying his best to alter the position of the body and to feel the pulse.

He had passed his arm through his horse's bridle, who, excited by the sounding halloes, and eager to press on, reared and struggled so that his master could hardly keep him from trampling on the fallen sportsman.

"Quiet, chestnut! still, you brute!" repeated he vainly. "Is there nobody within reach but you, boy?" said he in despair. "Can you hold the horse and fetch some one else to help carry him to the nearest house on a hurdle ? "

"Rowan and Toby's at work in the low moor," said Rupert, going off rather sullenly.

The help was long in coming. Charles Blount wetted his handkerchief in the ditch and sat trying to keep the head cool. Hounds and hunters had swept far away, and the stillness was awful to him, alone with that senseless body there was not a creature within sight or hearing; nothing stirred but the twittering birds, and an occasional drop falling from the twigs. He had a man's horror of sickness or death where he could not help, while he was perfectly fearless himself. And as he knelt there doing his poor little best he looked round with dismay; he felt utterly hopeless and wretched, and his blood ran cold as he looked at what had lately been his imperious cousin lying silent and motionless, the face perfectly white and streaks of blood across the light part of his clothes.

At length Rupert returned: they hoisted the unconscious burden on the shoulders of the men. "Where's the nearest house?" Charles inquired. Rupert pointed to his grandfather's on the bill, and the melancholy little procession began to move up, preceded by the boy, who had now given up the horse to its master. "You haven't ridden him?” said the young squire, a little anxiously even at that moment. "Did he go pretty steadily? I'm of no use here," he added, in a few minutes. "I'll

ride off for the doctor. I saw Brown in the field not half an hour back." And he mounted his horse and vanished.

The hurdle and its accompaniments went on alone. Rupert threw open the house-door and led the way into the empty parlour; it was a low stone-floored room, the windows of which were never opened, with scarcely any furniture in it: they laid the hurdle on a great table in the midst, spit in their hands, and, all in the way of business, proceeded to lift its occupant on to the great wide, hard sofa of ceremony on which no one had ever rested.

By this time the old man had heard the commotion, and came in much annoyed.

"What are ye doing, I should like to know, in other men's doors?" he said, sourly. "It's one of they random rackety hunters, is it?"

He was too stolid and stodgy to be surprised or distressed at anything so little personal to himself as the sight of a man insensible from a fall out hunting.

"Ye wouldn't have us leave a dying man upo' the ground, I take it," said one of the men. "His nag have a hot him in the 'ead; they was both down together. 'Tis an unked death, to be sure."

"And who's to be at his charges ?" growled Benyam, going up and looking at the just breathing body.

"He's a friend of Sir John Blount's. You knows he ?" answered one of the men consolingly, as he stood with his head on one side contemplating the occupant of the sofa like a work of art.

"Well, at all sights you needn't be cumbering here," was the savage reply. "Cecily, come here!" he called. "Where's his horse got to I'd just like to find out? Ye might just hop over and catch that, as ye want summut to do. We can mind the man. Cecily, I say, why don't ye come?" "I'll wait till the young squire gets back again anyhow," answered one man doggedly. "Rowan, ye may go after the nag."

"Then wait outside, will ye?" said Benyam, turning them out. "The old master's right down franzy," said the men as they left the The unused parlour, however, was so cold that they were far better off outside.

room.

Meantime Rupert had rushed into the dairy after his mother, with his eager, confused description of what had happened. "And the fox turned up by the Great Sea wood into the spinney, and he fell, and the nag topside o' him, and hot him i' the head as he lay."

"What, one of them red-coats ?" said she quietly, finishing her pat of butter. ""Tis an okkard chance for we, sure; and I've plenty for to bang about, wi'out sick men."

"Make haste," said the boy impatiently, shaking her by the gown, as she deliberately examined the kitchen cupboard for brandy and vinegar, and lingered over the fire. "Don't ye

"I am making haste," answered she, in a vexed tone. see he's sure to want hot water, and I mun fill the kittle?"

"Why, the man will be dead afore ye get nigh to him!" said he, angrily. "He've a cotched it in his 'ead, I tell ye."

By the time she reached the parlour her father had got rid of the two labourers, and had followed them out. There was no one there but the dying man as she came in with Rupert after her.

She crossed the room with the usual listless calm manner that she did everything, till she suddenly caught sight of the face on the sofa. She paused for a moment, then threw her arms over her head, and with a deep sobbing groan cast herself down upon the body.

"Oh, Rupert, speak to me, speak to me!" she moaned. In a few minutes, however, she had raised herself quickly, and was trying all sorts of remedies to bring back animation. She lifted his head up on her knees, and as each fresh trial failed, the deep sobs shook her as she cried, "Cannot ye speak one word, Rupert; can't ye sinnify as ye knows me?"

But there was neither look nor sound in answer.

When the restraints of a stern nature give way, the opening of the flood-gates is far more fearful than in softer dispositions. The boy stood by in silent wonder at her passion of grief; he obeyed all her orders, brought her in water and vinegar and brandy as she asked for them; and when everything seemed in vain, and she lay silently beside the body, he stole out of the room with the sort of feeling that he was present at a scene which he ought not to witness.

It seemed a long time before the doctor arrived at the house; but he came in at last, followed by young Blount. As none of the remedies which he applied seemed to have the slightest effect, he shook his head. "It'll all be over in a few minutes," said he; "there's hardly any pulse left."

Cecily was standing coldly and calmly by them. Every sign of emotion had vanished when she heard the strangers enter the house.

"Poor Ayscough," said Blount, coming near; "poor Rupert!"

The boy, who had followed them in, looked wonderingly round, but again the name was not addressed to him.

In a few minutes the faint signs of life had ceased, all was still, and the lad bent over the body in wondering fear. The likeness between them was curious. Cecily walked away to the window, and stood bending over a row of those strange, prickly, distorted, half-alive plants which one sees only in farmhouse windows, typical of her own death-in-life existence. The doctor looked curiously after her, but her back was turned, and not a muscle moved.

mother!" said Charles, more "I wonder what they'd like

"What a blow for his poor father and occupied with the dead than the living. done with him? It's so far to Scarsfield. At all events, we will see that you have no more trouble about it than can be helped," added he to old Benyam, who had now come in.

"I've a put up the black horse; and a very fine beast 'tis," said he,