How Mansfield and Cresswell made a vow to taste neither meat nor drink till they had run their quarry down; and how the ever- diminishing pack sighted the hares just out of Maddick, going up the Bengle Hill.

Over Bengle Hill, down into the valley beyond, and up the shoulder of Blackarch ridge, how they toiled and struggled, till once more the sea burst on to their view, and the salt breezes put new life into their panting frames.

How along the ridge and down towards Grey Harbour the leaders gained on the hares, hand-over-hand.

And how, at last, in that final burst along the hard, dry sand, the hares were caught gloriously, half a mile from home, after one of the fastest runs Templeton had ever recorded.
But my muse must curb her wings, and descend from poetry to prose, in order to narrate the particular adventures of our three modest heroes.
For the first half-mile, be it said to their glory, they led the hunt.
Being convinced that their only hope was to get a good start, and shake off the field from the very beginning, they dashed to the front on Cresswell's cry of "Forward!" at the rate of ten miles an hour, and for five minutes showed Templeton the way.
Then occurred one of those lamentable disasters which so often befall youthful runners on the exhaustion of their first wind: Coote's shoe- lace came undone! That was the sole reason for his pulling up.

To say that he was blown, or that the pace was hard on him was adding insult to calamity; and doubtless the redness of his countenance as he knelt down to make fast the truant lace was solely due to indignation at the possibility of such a suggestion.
Dick and Heathcote, as they stood one on each side of him, really thankful for the pause, professed to be highly impatient at the delay.
"Come on," said Dick, "here they all come." "What a brutal time you take to do up that beastly lace!" cried Georgie, "we might have been in the next field by this time." "I think it will hold now," said Coote, rising slowly to his feet, as the pack came up in full cry.
"Blown already, youngsters ?" asked Cresswell.