'No, none at all," said the Squire, glancing up at the tall weathercock which adorned his stable buildings. "Not with the wind in this direction. If we find at Mapledale, we shall most likely run right away towards Carlingford, and leave off miles away from here. It is the near meets that make it so awkward about Hilsby. Bidder owns such a lot of land, and it lies in such a manner that the hounds are almost bound to cross it somewhere in the course of a good run; and I am afraid from the tone of his letter that he really means to pick a quarrel. However, I will see about it to-morrow, and try and smooth him down; though, of course, he will have to reduce his claims considerably before we can come to an agreement. The sum he names is simply exorbitant."

"He seems a very strange, peculiar-tempered man,' said Mrs. Tempest, "and his own family, I fancy, hold him rather in terror. Catherine does, I know. I want to send her to the farm this morning on a message for me, and the children with her: they are so fond of going there."

"Yes; Jack says he and old Bidder are great friends," returned her husband, laughing. "Perhaps he will help to settle this dispute. Well, I must be going. Ah, here come the youngsters! Jack, Stella, you are only just in time to see me start."

'Good-bye, father. Oh, I wish I were going too," fervently said Jack, a manly-looking boy of eight years. old, who had inherited his father's regular features and his mother's fairness of complexion. His sister, Stella, was a pretty fragile little girl of six.

"Poor Jack!" said Mr. Tempest, pityingly. "But even if the meet were a near one to-day, I don't believe your pony would be fit to go, after all the hard work that you gave her on Monday. Good-bye, Stella; good-bye, my

dear;" and, with a farewell wave of his hand to his wife, he rode away. The hunt kennels were about a mile from Harbury Hall, and there he was to join the hounds and whippers-in.

"Don't look so dreadfully disappointed, Jackie dear," said Mrs. Tempest, turning smilingly towards her little son. "You mustn't expect to go out very often until you are a bigger boy. But before you begin lessons, suppose you fetch a bit of bread from the breakfast-table, and we will take it to White Rose, in case she is feeling disappointed too. And then afterwards, when you go out for your walk, I want you to tell Catherine to take you and Stella to Hilsby Farm, and ask Mrs. Bidder if she will be able to spare us an extra supply of cream and butter next week, for the hunt breakfast."

"Oh yes; that will be nice," said Stella eagerly, and Jack remarked, "Kitty will be glad of that. She says she always likes an excuse for going home to see her mother."

"And is that very surprising?" said Mrs. Tempest. "If you were away from home, Jack, I suppose you wouldn't care at all about coming to see me?"

The look that passed between them was worth seeing. A mother's love for her first-born son not seldom gives him credit for virtues he does not possess, but little Jack Tempest was indeed a boy to gladden the hearts of any parents. Loving and gentle and obedient as he was to his mother, there was no lack of spirit about him; and the plucky way in which he and his clever little pony, White Rose, followed the Grasshire hounds, endeared him to all true sportsmen in the district. In fact, he was inclined to be too venturesome, and Robert, the groom who had the charge of him, sometimes found it difficult to restrain his young master's impetuosity.

In a little while, when their morning lessons were over, Jack and Stella started for their walk in company with their nurse, Catherine Bidder, or Kitty, as they more often called her. She was a cheerful fresh-looking person of about eight-and-twenty, and as, in the several capacities of housemaid and nurse, she had been in the Tempests' service ever since she was seventeen, she regarded the family with little less affection than her own kindred at the farm. Kitty had several sisters, but, with the exception of Phebe, the youngest, they, like herself, were all out in the world;and a good thing for them too, said the neighbours, for old Boaz Bidder was notorious for his crotchety ways and violent temper, and in popular phrase he was reported to lead his women-kind at home a life. The farm being principally a dairy-farm, where the superfluous milk had to be made up into cheese and butter, naturally gave employment to a certain number of women, and the daughters sometimes felt a little ashamed of not staying there to try and lighten their mother's labours. But Mrs. Bidder, who was a sensible, hard-working, and unselfish woman, declared that one of them was quite enough to keep her company, and that she would rather know them happy elsewhere, and get what additional help she required from the wives of the labourers around, than see any more of her children fretting in secret against their father's narrow and despotic rule. She herself did not mind his temper; no, she was used to it; and she recognised and was proud of his solid merit. Why, where in the country-side, she would ask, would you find another farmer who kept as sober as did Boaz, even upon market-days at Carlingford, or who worked as he did late and early, overlooking the labourers and seeing that each detail of farm management was properly carried out, or who was such a judge of cattle? But girls would be girls, and a rough word or two was more to them than these

sterling virtues.

Well, let them wait until they had hus

bands of their own!

See, Kitty, some of the hunters must have been over here on Monday," said Jack eagerly, pointing out a broken fence upon the farmer's land. "Father and I didn't come We were higher up, and so were most of the people too."

this way.

"I'm glad you weren't here, at any rate, Master Jack," said Catherine. You know my father can't bear to have

people trespassing upon his lands."

But it is so queer of him to mind it when we're hunting," returned Jack, who of course took a completely onesided view of the situation. "Father doesn't care how many people ride over his fields if the hounds are out. Don't you remember when the fox came in the garden last November, and the hounds and every one went dashing into the shrubberies? Wasn't it fun? The gardeners didn't like it though, because they had to put things straight." "Yes, I remember," put in Stella. "I wish they would come again. Kitty, mother says that the very next time Jack goes with the hounds she will take me in the ponycarriage and drive about the lanes as long as we can see anything of him.”

"Look, there is your father over there in that field with the cows in it," exclaimed Jack suddenly, as they went up a bit of rising ground which opened out to them a wider view of the surrounding country. "Kitty, may I go to

him ?"

"Yes, if you like," said Kitty.

"Only, Master Jack, you

It

had better say nothing to him about his fences being broken or about hunting, unless he begins to talk of it himself. only puts him out sometimes to be reminded."

"No, I won't," Jack promised. "Stella, are you coming?"

“I

Stella shook her head. She was decidedly afraid of the cross-looking farmer whom her brother liked so well. want Phebe to show me the turkeys and guinea-fowls," she said, hanging back and clinging tightly to Kitty's hand.

CHAPTER II.

THE homestead at Hilsby Farm was a fine example of those quaint old black and white buildings which were once so common both in Grasshire and in another county near to it. But now, unfortunately for lovers of the picturesque, they are becoming somewhat scarce, for as one by one they fall into thorough disrepair, they are almost always built up again by their owners in a more modern and commonplace style, comfortable, perhaps, but destitute of the charm of old association and distinctiveness. Such a fate, however, was not likely to befall the house at Hilsby in Boaz Bidder's lifetime, for he had a strong attachment to the home of his forefathers, and took a heartfelt pride in its splendid dark oak beams and rafters, and in the spotless purity of the white plaster, which made such a striking contrast. Economical and saving as he was in other ways, he never grudged the money necessary for keeping "the old place i in order. A few large trees stood about it, and there were ancient yews and big elderberry bushes in the garden, which had but a small supply of flowers to brighten up its more gainful vegetable produce.

"Oh, mother, but father can't mean it! He must just have spoken in a passion, like."

The two women, Kitty and her mother, were alone together in the kitchen, for Phebe had taken Stella to