"How far do you think we've gone--six miles ?" "Six! we've not done a mile and a half yet." Coote put away his handkerchief, and gave the buckle of his running drawers a hitch; and the "Firm" settled down to business.
Having once found out their pace, and got their second wind, they felt comparatively comfortable.

The scent lay true up the ridge, and as they rose foot by foot, and presently breasted the bluff nor'-wester, they felt like keeping it up for a week.
"Hullo, I say," cried Georgie, when the top of the ridge was gained, "there they go right under us; we might almost catch them by a short cut." "Can't do it," said Dick, decisively.

"We're bound to follow the scent, even if the hares doubled and came back across this very place." "Would real harriers do that ?" asked Coote.

"If I was a real harrier, and saw the hare close to me, I'd go for him no matter what the scent was." "All very well, you can't do it to-day--not if you want to get on the list," said Dick.

"They've taken a sharp turn, though, at the bottom." Trotting down a steep hill is not one of the joys of the chase, and our heroes, by the time they got to the level bottom, felt as bruised and shaken as if they had been in a railway accident.
However, a mile on the flat pulled them together again, and they plodded on by Bardie's Farm, where the scent became sparse, and on to Steg where, for the first time since leaving Templeton, they came upon traces of their fellow-man.
The worthy inhabitants of Steg, particularly the junior portion of them, hailed our three heroes with demonstrations of friendly interest.