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Updated: June 18, 2025
Fancy upwards of eighty boys collected on a fine clear frosty afternoon, mounted up five or six feet off the ground, some even more, stalking away as fast as they could go over the fields, shouting, and laughing, and hallooing to each other. As usual, Ernest was one of the most active. He and Buttar took the lead, but they were closely followed by Tom Bouldon, who was very great upon stilts.
First they fixed on an old oak-tree for their butt, and at a word given by Buttar, who was chosen leader, every one shot from the spot where they were standing. Some shafts hit the tree, others just glanced off, and others flew altogether wide of it.
I have read of "the hare and many friends," but they were very unlike young Buttar; no one could desire a stouter or a stauncher friend. Before starting they had well laid their plans, and determined to give the hounds a good run.
He growled and roared in a very wild-beast-like way, sometimes springing at Ernest, sometimes at Buttar or Ellis. Frank, the midshipman, also came in for an equal share of his attentions, and he seemed to consider that he was much on a par with him. The moment Frank understood the game, he played as vehemently as anybody.
Bouldon was very nearly catching Buttar, when Ernest darted out to his rescue. Now, Tommy, you must put your best leg foremost or you will be caught to a certainty. What twisting and turning, what dodging there was. Now Bouldon had almost caught up Buttar, but the latter, stooping down, was off again under his very hands, and turning suddenly, was off once more behind his back.
"On, on, on," shouted Bracebridge and Buttar. Their followers required no second appeal. "Remember what I told you," shouted Ernest "Each man to his duty." The bully turned round and gazed, first on one side and then on the other, at the approaching bands.
"Ask him press him to join us." Buttar gladly set off on the mission; but though he looked in every direction, and inquired of everybody he met, Ellis was nowhere to be found. "It cannot be helped; I wish that we had from the first asked him to join us," remarked Ernest, when Buttar returned to him with his report. "Of whom do you speak?" asked Selby, a biggish and very gentlemanly boy.
The instant his stick descended, and the ball went whirling away over the smooth glass-like surface of the ice, Frank, followed by Buttar, Bouldon, and Ellis, darted forth with tremendous speed in the hopes of reaching it before any of the opposite party, and of driving it home; but before they could strike, Charles and Lemon were up to it, and sent it flying back again.
However, he, Buttar, Bouldon, and some other of the most fearless and active boys rushed at it with their sticks, regardless of all the blows aimed at them by their opponents, and drove it back again into the middle of the ground. Then on they flew to drive it back still farther. Both parties met in the centre. There was a fierce tussle.
Down the steep they dashed, till he shouted to them to stop, and to turn off to the left. A long line of chalk cliffs intervened between them and the opposite height, and the scent led along their edge. Ernest and Buttar had, in the meantime, disappeared; after a run of a quarter of a mile, once more the scent was lost.
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