But Mr.
Poplington Laughed, And Said To Me That Jone Had Served Him Right.
The country about Lynton is wonderfully beautiful, with rocks and
valleys, and velvet lawns running into the sea, and
Woods and ancestral
mansions, and we spent the day seeing all this, and also going down to
Lynmouth, where the little ships lie high and dry on the sand when the
tide goes out, and the carts drive up to them and put goods on board,
and when the tide rises the ships sail away, which is very convenient.
I wanted to keep on along the coast, but the others didn't, and the
next morning we started back to Chedcombe by a roundabout way, so that
we might see Exmoor and the country where Lorna Doone and John Ridd cut
up their didoes. I must say I liked the story a good deal better before
I saw the country where the things happened. The mind of man is capable
of soarings which Nature weakens at when she sees what she is called
upon to do. If you want a real, first-class, tooth-on-edge Doone
valley, the place to look for it is in the book. We went rolling along
on the smooth, hard roads, which are just as good here as if they was
in London, and all around us was stretched out the wild and desolate
moors, with the wind screaming and whistling over the heather, nearly
tearing the clothes off our backs, while the rain beat down on us with
a steady pelting, and the ragged sheep stopped to look at us, as if we
was three witches and they was Macbeths.
The very thought that I was out in a wild storm on a desolate moor
filled my soul with a sort of triumph, and I worked my tricycle as if I
was spurring my steed to battle. The only thing that troubled me was
the thought that if the water that poured off my mackintosh that day
could have run into our cistern at home, it would have been a glorious
good thing. Jone did not like the fierce blast and the inspiriting
rain, but I knew he'd stand it as long as Mr. Poplington did, and so I
was content, although, if we had been overtaken by a covered wagon, I
should have trembled for the result.
That night we stopped in the little village of Simonsbath at Somebody's
Arms. After dinner Mr. Poplington, who knew some people in the place,
went out, but Jone and me went to bed as quick as we could, for we was
tired. The next morning we was wakened by a tremendous pounding at the
door. I didn't know what to make of it, for it was too early and too
loud for hot water, but we heard Mr. Poplington calling to us, and Jone
jumped up to see what he wanted.
"Get up," said he, "if you want to see a sight that you never saw
before. We'll start off immediately and breakfast at Exford." The hope
of seeing a sight was enough to make me bounce at any time, and I never
dressed or packed a bag quicker than I did that morning, and Jone
wasn't far behind me.
When we got down-stairs we found our cycles waiting ready at the door,
together with the stable man and the stable boy and the boy's helper
and the cook and the chambermaid and the waiters and the other
servants, waiting for their tips. Mr. Poplington seemed in a fine
humor, and he told us he had heard the night before that there was to
be a stag hunt that day, the first of the season. In fact, it was not
one of the regular meets, but what they called a by-meet, and not known
to everybody.
"We will go on to Exford," said he, straddling his bicycle, "for though
the meet isn't to be there, there's where they keep the hounds and
horses, and if we make good speed we shall get there before they start
out."
The three of us travelled abreast, Mr. Poplington in the middle, and on
the way he told us a good deal about stag hunts. What I remember best,
having to go so fast and having to mind my steering, was that after the
hunting season began they hunted stags until a certain day - I forget
what it was - and then they let them alone and began to hunt the does;
and that after that particular day of the month, when the stags heard
the hounds coming they paid no attention to them, knowing very well it
was the does' turn to be chased, and that they would not be bothered;
and so they let the female members of their families take care of
themselves; which shows that ungentlemanliness extends itself even into
Nature.
When we got to Exford we left our cycles at the inn and followed Mr.
Poplington to the hunting stables, which are near by. I had not gone a
dozen steps from the door before I heard a great barking, and the next
minute there came around the corner a pack of hounds. They crossed the
bridge over the little river, and then they stopped. We went up to
them, and while Mr. Poplington talked to the men the whole of that pack
of hounds gathered about us as gentle as lambs. They were good big
dogs, white and brown. The head huntsman who had them in charge told me
there was thirty couple of them, and I thought that sixty dogs was
pretty heavy odds against one deer. Then they moved off as orderly as
if they had been children in a kindergarten, and we went to the stables
and saw the horses; and then the master of the hounds and a good many
other gentlemen in red coats, in all sorts of traps, rode up, and their
hunters were saddled, and the dogs barked and the men cracked their
whips to keep them together, and there was a bustle and liveliness to a
degree I can't write about, and Jone and I never thought about going in
to breakfast until all those horses, some led and some ridden, and the
men and the hounds, and even the dust from their feet, had disappeared.
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