Many men and two or three ladies had been
talking to her. But he had never been far from her in the ruck, and
now he was again close by her horse's head. Broughton Spinnies were
in truth a series of small woods, running one into another almost
without intermission, never thick, and of no breadth. There was
always a litter or two of cubs at the place, and in no part of the
Brake country was greater care taken in the way of preservation and
encouragement to interesting vixens; but the lying was bad; there was
little or no real covert; and foxes were very apt to travel and get
away into those big woods belonging to the Duke,--where, as the Brake
sportsmen now believed, they would almost surely come to an untimely
end. "If we draw this blank I don't know what we are to do," said Mr.
Spooner, addressing himself to Madame Goesler with lachrymose
anxiety.
"Have you nothing else to draw?" asked Phineas.
"In the common course of things we should take Muggery Gorse, and so
on to Trumpeton Wood. But Muggery is on the Duke's land, and Chiltern
is in such a fix! He won't go there unless he can't help it.
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