Indeed, a horse has only to become a hack, to be able to do double the work he was ever supposed to be capable of.
But to the meet.
Scrambleford Green was a small straggling village on the top of a somewhat high hill, that divided the vale in which Jawleyford Court was situated from the more fertile one of Farthinghoe, in which Lord Scamperdale lived.
It was one of those out-of-the-way places at which the meet of the hounds, and a love feast or fair, consisting of two fiddlers (one for each public-house), a few unlicensed packmen, three or four gingerbread stalls, a drove of cows and some sheep, form the great events of the year among a people who are thoroughly happy and contented with that amount of gaiety.
Think of that, you 'used up' young gentlemen of twenty, who have exhausted the pleasures of the world! The hounds did not come to Scrambleford Green often, for it was not a favourite meet; and when they did come, Frosty and the men generally had them pretty much to themselves.

This day, however, was the exception; and Old Tom Yarnley, whom age had bent nearly double, and who hobbled along on two sticks, declared that never in the course of his recollection, a period extending over the best part of a century, had he seen such a 'sight of red coats' as mustered that morning at Scrambleford Green.

It seemed as if there had been a sudden rising of sportsmen.

What brought them all out?
What brought Mr.Puffington, the master of the Hanby hounds, out?
What brought Blossomnose again?
What Mr.
Wake, Mr.Fossick, Mr.Fyle, who had all been out the day before?
Reader, the news had spread throughout the country that there was a great writer down; and they wanted to see what he would say of them--they had come to sit for their portraits, in fact.

There was a great gathering, at least for the Flat Hat Hunt, who seldom mustered above a dozen.